book int-0 a fllort account of the principal manufcripts. Among
— ,— i thefe he enumerates feveral of the Septuagint, and one in.
particular of the Books of Kings, which is of the ninth century,
and contains, in fome places, many various readings,,
materially'differing from the printed editions. He mentions
alfo feveral of the New Teftament; fome accompanied with
antient commentaries, which have never been publifhed,
and which the ingenious author has tranfcribed, collated,
and prepared for the prefs. The moft antient o f thefe,-
containing the New Teftament, was written at different periods
; the firft part fo early as the feventh or eighth century,
and the remainder in the twelfth and thirteenth. , He
adds, that this collection, although chiefly confined to theological
fubjefts, is by no means deficient in the dailies;
amongft which he enumerates Homer, AEfchylus, Sophocles,1
Demofthenes, CEfchynes, Heiiod, Paufanias, Plutarch, and a
moft beautiful Strabo, which he has collated for the new
edition of that author, preparing for the Clarendon prefs by
1 Mr. Falkener o f Oxford *.
In this library of the Holy Synod Mr. Matthaei difcovered
an antient hymn of Ceres in a manufcript of Homer, written
about the conclufion of the fourteenth century, but which
he fuppoies to have been a tranfcript from a moft antient
and valuable copy: this manufcript, befide a fragment of
the Iliad, contained the fixteen hymns ufually attributed to
Homer, in the fame order as- they are generally printed. At
the end of the fixteenth he found twelve verfes of an hymn
to Bacchus, and an hymn to Ceres, which, excepting the laft
* I t was a confiderable difappointment mation from his acquaintance. I have like- to me, that Mr. Matthaei was abfent from wife to regret, , that, on account o f his ab-
Mofcow during my continuance in that fence, I could not obtain a fight o f thefe
•city, as 1
fliQuld have derived »great infer- manufcripts^
party'
part, was entire, Mr. Mattheei, well acquainted with the
delays Which would have attended the publication at Mof-
coW, fent a copy of the hymn to the celebrated Ruhnkenius,
of tho univerfity of Leyden, who -gave it to the public in
1780 ; and, as ,by miftake twenty lines had been omitted,
he put forth a fecond edition the following year *.
The learned editor has prefixed a critical difquiiition upon
this hymn, in which heaflerts that it is undoubtedly of great
antiquity, and written, if not- by Homer himfelf, yet certainly
by a>very diligent imitator of hisftyle and phrafeology.
The exprefs teftimony of Paufanias, who repeatedly mens-
tions that Homer had compofed an hymn to Ceres, may
perhaps feem to fome readers a ftrong argument, that it is
the genuine production of the great author whofe name it
bears,: and yet the joint opinion of the two antient grammarians
t, quoted by Ruhnkenius in his preface, may be
thought of fufficient weight to counterbalance the fingle
evidence o f Paufanias; whofe judgement (as the editor has
well. obferyed) in this cafe is of the lefs value, becaufe he
has, without difcrimination, adjudged the reft of' the Homeric
hymns to the reputed parent, many of which bear
much ftronger marks of a lefs honourable origin, than this
compofition in queftion. Though the ftyle and plan of this
hymn appears to me (as well as to the celebrated editor) inferior
to Homer, and in fome places unworthy of him, yet
this argument, depending on the tafte and feelings of the
reader, will not operate on all with equal force ; nor will
■even they who allow its inferiority to the other productions
Homeri Hymnus in Cefarem nunc ad Alexiph.— Grammaticus vetus apud A1»
pnmum editus a Davide Ruhnkenio. latium de Fair. Horn. &c. P r a f.
t P* V IL &c V III. Scholiaites Nicandri
Vol . I, Y y o t