t in the
Society, whereof I am a Member, a very considerable Body of _Trojans_,
who, upon a proper Occasion, would not fail to declare ourselves. In
the mean while we do all we can to annoy our Enemies by Stratagem, and
are resolved by the first Opportunity to attack Mr. _Joshua Barnes_
[1], whom we look upon as the _Achilles_ of the opposite Party. As for
myself, I have had the Reputation ever since I came from School, of
being a trusty _Trojan_, and am resolved never to give Quarter to the
smallest Particle of _Greek_, where-ever I chance to meet it. It is
for this Reason I take it very ill of you, that you sometimes hang out
_Greek_ Colours at the Head of your Paper, and sometimes give a Word
of the Enemy even in the Body of it. When I meet with any thing of
this nature, I throw down your Speculations upon the Table, with that
Form of Words which we make use of when we declare War upon an Author.

_Graecum est, non potest legi._ [2]

I give you this Hint, that you may for the future abstain from any
such Hostilities at your Peril.

_Troilus_.

C.

[Footnote 1: Professor of Greek at Cambridge, who edited Homer, Euripides,
Anacreon, &c., and wrote in Greek verse a History of Esther. He died
in 1714.]

[Footnote 2:

It is Greek. It cannot be read.

This passed into a proverb from Franciscus Accursius, a famous
Jurisconsult and son of another Accursius, who was called the Idol of
the Jurisconsults. Franciscus Accursius was a learned man of the 13th
century, who, in expounding Justinian, whenever he came to one of
Justinian's quotations from Homer, said Graecum est, nec potest legi.
Afterwards, in the first days of the revival of Greek studies in Europe,
it was often said, as reported by Claude d'Espence, for example, that to
know anything of Greek made a man suspected, to know anything of Hebrew
almost made him a heretic.]

* * * * *

No. 246. Wednesday, December 12, 1711. Steele

[Greek: Ouch ara soi ge pataer aen ippora Paeleus Oude Thetis maetaer,
glaukae de d etikte thalassa Petrai t aelibatoi, hoti toi noos estin
apaenaes.]

_Mr. SPECTATOR_,

As your Paper is Part of the Equipage of the Tea-Table, I conjure you
to print what I now write to you; for I have no other Way to
communicate what I have to say to the fair Sex on the most important
Circumstance of Li