82 11ESIOD.

band these towers of strength and muscularity against Cronus and his Titans ; and so the battle was set in array, and a fierce war ensued " Each with each Ten years and more the furious battle joined Unintermitted ; nor to either host Was issue of stern strife nor end ; alike Did either stretch the limit of the war." E. 846-850. Hesiod's description of the contest, which has been justly held to constitute his title to a rank near Homer as an epic poet, is prefaced by a feast at which Zeus addresses his allies, and receives in turn the assurance of their support. The speeches are not wanting in dignity, though briefer than those which, in his great epic, Milton has moulded on their modeL Our Eng- lish poet had bathed his spirit in Hesiod before he essayed the sixth book of his ' Paradise Lost ; ' and it was well and wisely done by the translator of the fol- lowing description of the war betwixt Zeus and the Titans to aim at a Miltonic style and speech : " All on that day roused infinite the war, Female and male ; the Titan deities, The gods from Cronus sprang, and those whom Zeus From subterranean gloom released to light : Terrible, strong, of force enormous ; burst A hundred arms from all their shoulders huge : From all their shoulders fifty heads upsprang O'er limbs of sinewy mould. They then arrayed Against the Titans in fell combat stood, And in their nervous grasp wielded aloft Precipitous rocks. On the other side alert