[To the Editor of the -SPECTATOR.] SIR,—As to literary coincidences,
it is curious how good judges will differ as to whether resemblances are merely accidental or otherwise. I have noticed what appears to me at least something more than an accidental resemblance
between a well-known passage in Tennyson's In Memoriam' lxxxviii, and Lucian's Nigrinos 35, 36, Jacobitz's edition. The idea is the same in both writers : intellectual competition, aiming at an ideal, is compared to archery :— " When one would aim an arrow fair ; But send it slackly from the string ; And one would pierce an outer ring, And one an inner here and there And last the master bowman, he, Would cleave the mark."
The corresponding passage in Lucian is :-
" The speech borne along with sure aim, dove, so to speak, the soul itself. . . . There are many archers in life with their quivers full of various theories ; but all don't shoot straight. Some draw the string too hard and let go their arrows with unnecessary force. They aim right, but their arrows don't remain on the mark. They pass right through at and leave only a gaping wound in the soul. Others again from weakness don't even reach the mark, but being sent slackly from the string fall mid-way. . . But the goad archer (master-bowman).. .
The passage is too long to be fully cited, but the resemblance will, I think, be apparent. A friend whose judgment is more experienced than mine thinks Tennyson had not the passage from Lucian in his mind. I think he had read the passage.
—I am, Sir, Sze., - A. A. Bunn. Galbally Rectory, Co. Limerick.
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