from it
so often, in search of adventures with particular knights, that we
wellnigh forget the principal object of the poem, and feel no absorbing
interest in the issue of any particular events, or the exploits of any
particular heroes. He had no great moral to unfold, or single interest to
sustain, in his composition. His object was to amuse, not instruct--to
fascinate, not improve. He is often as beautiful as Virgil in his
descriptions, as lofty as Homer in his conceptions; but he as often equals
Ovid in the questionable character of his adventures, or Catullus in the
seducing warmth of his descriptions. There is no more amusing companion
than the _Orlando Furioso_ for the fireside; but there is none less likely
to produce the heroes whom it is his object to portray.

That which Ariosto wants, TASSO has. The _Jerusalem Delivered_ is, beyond
all question, the epic poem of modern Europe. In it, as in the _Iliad_,
unity of interest and of action is entirely preserved. It is one great
struggle between Europe and Asia which is recorded; it is for the attack
and defence of one city that the forces of Christendom and of Mahometanism
are arrayed. But the object of contention, the moral character of the
struggle, is incomparably higher in the modern than the ancient poem. It
is not "another Helen who has fired another Troy;" it is no confederacy of
valour, thirsting for the spoils of opulence, which is contending for
victory. It is the pilgrim, not the host, whose wrongs have now roused
Europe into action; it is not to ravish beauty from its seducer, but the
holy sepulchre from its profaners, that Christendom has risen in arms. The
characters of the chiefs correspond to the superior sanctity of their
cause, and indicate the mighty step in advance which the human mind, under
the influence of Christianity and civilization, had made since the days of
Homer. In Godfrey of Bouillon we perceive enthusiasm guided by wisdom;
difficulties overcome by resolution, self-subdued by devotion. Rinaldo,
like Achilles, is led astray by beauty and the issue of the war is
prolonged from the want of his resistless arm; but the difference between
his passion for Armida, and the Grecian hero's wrath for the loss of
Briseis, marks the influence of the refined gallantry of modern times. The
exquisite episode of the flight of Erminia, the matchless pathos of the
death of Clorinda, can be compared to nothing either in the _Iliad_ or
_AEneid_; they belon