AUTHORS OF GREECE

By the Reverend T. W. LUMB, M.A.

With an Introduction by
The Reverend CYRIL ALINGTON, D.D.

AUTHOR’S PREFACE

Greek literature is more modern in its tone than Latin or Medieval or
Elizabethan. It is the expression of a society living in an environment
singularly like our own, mainly democratic, filled with a spirit of free
inquiry, troubled by obstinate feuds and still more obstinate problems.
Militarism, nationalism, socialism and communism were well known, the
preachers of some of these doctrines being loud, ignorant and popular. The
defence of a maritime empire against a military oligarchy was twice
attempted by the most quick-witted people in history, who failed to save
themselves on both occasions. Antecedently then we might expect to find
some lessons of value in the record of a people whose experiences were
like our own.

Further, human thought as expressed in literature is not an unconnected
series of phases; it is one and indivisible. Neglect of either ancient or
modern culture cannot but be a maiming of that great body of knowledge to
which every human being has free access. No man can be anything but
ridiculous who claims to judge European literature while he knows nothing
of the foundations on which it is built. Neither is it true to say that
the ancient world was different from ours. Human nature at any rate was
the same then as it is now, and human character ought to be the primary
object of study. The strange belief that we have somehow changed for the
better has been strong enough to survive the most devilish war in history,
but few hold it who are familiar with the classics.

Yet in spite of its obvious value Greek literature has been damned and
banned in our enlightened age by some whose sole qualification for the
office of critic often turns out to be a mental darkness about it so deep
that, like that of Egypt, it can be felt. Only those who know Greek
literature have any right to talk about its powers of survival. The
following pages try to show that it is not dead yet, for it has a distinct
message to deliver. The skill with which these neglected liberators of the
human mind united depth of thought with perfection of form entitles them
at least to be heard with patience.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

I count it an honour to have been asked to write a short introduction to
this book. My only claim to do so is a profound belief in the doctrine
which it advocates, that Greek literature can never die and that it has a
clear and obvious message for us to-day. Those who sat, as I did, on the
recent Committee appointed by Mr. Lloyd George when Prime Minister to
report on the position of the classics in this country, saw good reason to
hope that the prejudice against Greek to which the author alludes in his
preface was passing away: it is a strange piece of irony that it should
ever have been encouraged in the name of Science which owes to the Greeks
so incalculable a debt. We found that, though there are many parts of the
country in which it is almost impossible for a boy, however great his
literary promise, to be taught Greek, there is a growing readiness to
recognise this state of affairs as a scandal, and wherever Greek was
taught, whether to girls or boys, we found a growing recognition of its
supreme literary value. There were some at least of us who saw with
pleasure that where only one classical language can be studied there is an
increasing readiness to regard Greek as a possible alternative to Latin.

On this last point, no doubt, classical scholars will continue to differ,
but as to the supreme excellence of the Greek contribution to literature
there can be no difference of opinion. Those to whom the names of this
volume recall some of the happiest hours they have spent in literary study
will be grateful to Mr. Lumb for helping others to share the pleasures
which they have so richly enjoyed; he writes with an enthusiasm which is
infectious, and those to whom his book comes as a first introduction to
the great writers of Greece will be moved to try to learn more of men
whose works after so many centuries inspire so genuine an affection and
teach lessons so modern. They need have no fear that they will be
disappointed, for Mr. Lumb’s zeal is based on knowledge. I hope that this
book will be the means of leading many to appreciate what has been done
for the world by the most amazing of all its cities, and some at least to
determine that they will investigate its treasures for themselves. They
will find like the Queen of Sheba that, though much has been told them,
the half remains untold.

C. A. ALINGTON.

HOMER

Greek literature opens with a problem of the first magnitude. Two splendid
Epics have been preserved which are ascribed to “Homer”, yet few would
agree that Homer wrote them both. Many authorities have denied altogether
that such a person ever existed; it seems certain that he could not have
been the author of both the Iliad and the Odyssey, for the
latter describes a far more advanced state of society; it is still an
undecided question whether the Iliad was written in Europe or in
Asia, but the probability is that the Odyssey is of European
origin; the date of the poems it is very difficult to gauge, though the
best authorities place it somewhere in the eighth century B.C. Fortunately
these difficulties do not interfere with our enjoyment of the two poems;
if there were two Homers, we may be grateful to Nature for bestowing her
favours so liberally upon us; if Homer never existed at all, but is a mere
nickname for a class of singer, the literary fraud that has been
perpetrated is no more serious than that which has assigned Apocalyptic
visions of different ages to Daniel. Perhaps the Homeric poems are the
growth of many generations, like the English parish churches; they
resemble them as being examples of the exquisite effects which may be
produced when the loving care and the reverence of a whole people blend
together in different ages pieces of artistic work whose authors have been
content to remain unnamed.

It is of some importance to remember that the Iliad is not the story of
the whole Trojan war, but only of a very small episode which was worked
out in four days. The real theme is the Wrath of Achilles. In the tenth
year of the siege the Greeks had captured a town called Chryse. Among the
captives were two maidens, one Chryseis, the daughter of Chryses, a priest
of Apollo, the other Briseis; the former had fallen to the lot of
Agamemnon, the King of the Greek host, the latter to Achilles his bravest
follower. Chryses, father of Chryseis, went to Agamemnon to ransom his
daughter, but was treated with contumely; accordingly he prayed to the god
to avenge him and was answered, for Apollo sent a pestilence upon the
Greeks which raged for nine days, destroying man and beast. On the tenth
day the chieftains held a counsel to discover the cause of the malady. At
it Chalcas the seer before revealing the truth obtained the promise of
Achilles’ protection; when Agamemnon learned that he was to ransom his
captive, his anger burst out against the seer and he demanded another
prize in return. Achilles upbraided his greed, begging him to wait till
Troy was taken, when he would be rewarded fourfold. Agamemnon in reply
threatened to take Achilles’ captive Briseis, at the same time describing
his follower’s character. “Thou art the most hateful to me of all Kings
sprung of Zeus, for thou lovest alway strife and wars and battles. Mighty
though thou art, thy might is the gift of some god. Briseis I will take,
that thou mayest know how far stronger I am than thou, and that another
may shrink from deeming himself my equal, rivalling me to my face.” At
this insult Achilles half drew his sword to slay the King, but was checked
by Pallas Athena, who bade him confine his resentment to taunts, for the
time would come when Agamemnon would offer him splendid gifts to atone for
the wrong. Obeying the goddess Achilles reviled his foe, swearing a solemn
oath that he would not help the Greeks when Hector swept them away. In
vain did Nestor, the wise old counsellor who had seen two generations of
heroes, try to make up the quarrel, beseeching Agamemnon not to outrage
his best warrior and Achilles not to contend with his leader. The meeting
broke up; Achilles departed to his huts, whence the heralds in obedience
to Agamemnon speedily carried away Briseis.

Going down to the sea-shore Achilles called upon Thetis his mother to whom
he told the story of his ill-treatment. In deep pity for his fate (for he
was born to a life of a short span), she promised that she would appeal to
Zeus to help him to his revenge; she had saved Zeus from destruction by
summoning the hundred-armed Briareus to check a revolt among the gods
against Zeus’ authority. For the moment the king of the gods was absent in
Aethiopia; when he returned to Olympus on the twelfth day she would win
him over. Ascending to heaven, she obtained the promise of Zeus’
assistance, not without raising the suspicions of Zeus’ jealous consort
Hera; a quarrel between them was averted by their son Hephaestus, whose
ungainly performance of the duties of cupbearer to the Immortals made them
forget all resentments in laughter unquenchable.

True to his promise Zeus sent a dream to Agamemnon to assure him that he
would at last take Troy. The latter determined to summon an Assembly of
the host. In it the changeable temper of the Greeks is vividly pictured.
First Agamemnon told how he had the promise of immediate triumph; when the
army eagerly called for battle, he spoke yet again describing their long
years of toil and advising them to break up the siege and fly home, for
Troy was not to be taken. This speech was welcomed with even greater
enthusiasm than the other, the warriors rushing down to the shore to
launch away. Aghast at the coming failure of the enterprise Athena stirred
up Odysseus to check the mad impulse. Taking from Agamemnon his royal
sceptre as the sign of authority, he pleaded with chieftains and their
warriors, telling them that it was not for them to know the counsel in the
hearts of Kings.

Thus did Odysseus stop the flight, bringing to reason all save Thersites,
“whose heart was full of much unseemly wit, who talked rashly and unruly,
striving with Kings, saying what he deemed would make the Achaeans smile”.

He continued his chatter, bidding the Greeks persist in their homeward
flight. Knowing that argument with such an one was vain, Odysseus laid his
sceptre across his back with such heartiness that a fiery weal started up
beneath the stroke. The host praised the act, the best of the many good
deeds that Odysseus had done before Troy.

When the Assembly was stilled, Odysseus and Nestor and Agamemnon told the
plan of action; the dream bade them arm for a mighty conflict, for the end
could not be far off, the ten years’ siege that had been prophesied being
all but completed. The names of the various chieftains and the numbers of
their ships are found in the famous catalogue, a document which the Greeks
treasured as evidence of united action against a common foe. With equal
eagerness the Trojans poured from their town commanded by Hector; their
host too has received from Homer the glory of an everlasting memory in a
detailed catalogue.

Literary skill of a high order has brought upon the scene as quickly as
possible the chief figures of the poem. When the armies were about to
meet, Paris, seeing Menelaus whom he had wronged, shrank from the combat.
On being upbraided by Hector who called him “a joy to his foes and a
disgrace to himself”, Paris was stung to an act of courage. Hector’s heart
was as unwearied as an axe, his spirit knew not fear; yet beauty too was a
gift of the gods, not to be cast away. Let him be set to fight Menelaus in
single combat for Helen and her wealth; let an oath be made between the
two armies to abide by the result of the fight, that both peoples might
end the war and live in peace. Overjoyed, Hector called to the Greeks
telling them of Paris’ offer, which Menelaus accepted. The armies sat down
to witness the fight, while Hector sent to Troy to fetch Priam to ratify
the treaty.

In Troy the elders were seated on the wall to watch the conflict, Priam
among them. Warned by Iris, Helen came forth to witness the single combat.
As she moved among them the elders bore their testimony to her beauty; its
nature is suggested but not described, for the poet felt he was unable to
paint her as she was.

Seeing her, Priam bade her sit by him and tell the names of the Greek
leaders as they passed before his eyes. Agamemnon she knew by his royal
bearing, Odysseus who moved along the ranks like a ram she marked out as
the master of craft and deep counsel. Hearing her words, Antenor bore his
witness to their truth, for once Odysseus had come with Menelaus to Troy
on an embassy.

Helen pointed out Ajax and Idomeneus and others, yet could not see her two
brothers, Castor and Pollux; either they had not come from her home in
Sparta, or they had refused to fight, fearing the shame and reproach of
her name. “So she spake, yet the life-giving earth covered them there,
even in Sparta, their native land.”

When the news came to Priam of the combat arranged between Paris and
Menelaus, the old King shuddered for his son, yet he went out to confirm
the compact. Feeling he could not look upon the fight, he returned to the
city. Meanwhile Hector had cast lots to decide which of the two should
first hurl his spear. Paris failed to wound his enemy, but Menelaus’ dart
pierced Paris’ armour; he followed it up with a blow of his sword which
shivered to pieces in his hand. He then caught Paris’ helmet and dragged
him off towards the Greek army; but Aphrodite saved her favourite, for she
loosed the chin-strap and bore Paris back to Helen in Troy. Menelaus in
vain looked for him among the Trojans who were fain to see an end of him,
“and would not have hidden him if they had seen him”. Agamemnon then
declared his brother the victor and demanded the fulfilment of the treaty.

Such an end to the siege did not content Hera, whose anger against the
Trojans was such that she could have “devoured raw Priam and his sons”.
With Zeus’ consent she sent down Pallas Athena to confound the treaty.
Descending like some brilliant and baleful star the goddess assumed the
shape of Laodocus and sought out the archer Pandarus. Him she tempted to
shoot privily at Menelaus to gain the favour of Paris. While his
companions held their shields in front of him the archer launched a shaft
at his victim, but Athena turned it aside so that it merely grazed his
body, drawing blood. Seeing his brother wounded Agamemnon ran to him, to
prophesy the certain doom of the treaty breakers.

While the leeches drew out the arrow from the wound, Agamemnon went round
the host with words of encouragement or chiding to stir them up to the
righteous conflict. They rushed on to battle to be met by the Trojans
whose host

In the fight Diomedes, though at first wounded by Pandarus, speedily
returned refreshed and strengthened by Athena. His great deeds drew upon
him Pandarus and Aeneas, the son of Aphrodite and the future founder of
Rome’s greatness. Diomedes quickly slew Pandarus and when Aeneas bestrode
his friend’s body, hurled at him a mighty stone which laid him low. Afraid
of her son Aphrodite cast her arms about him and shrouded him in her robe.
Knowing that she was but a weak goddess Diomedes attacked her, wounding
her in the hand. Dropping her son, she fled to Ares who was watching the
battle and besought him to lend her his chariot, wherein she fled back to
Olympus. There her mother Dione comforted her with the story of the woes
which other gods had suffered from mortals.

But Athena in irony deemed that Aphrodite had been scratched by some Greek
woman whom she caressed to tempt her to forsake her husband and follow one
of the Trojans she loved.

Aeneas when dropped by his mother had been picked up by Apollo; when
Diomedes attacked the god, he was warned that battle with an immortal was
not like man’s warfare. Stirred by Apollo, Ares himself came to the aid of
the Trojans, inspiring Sarpedon the Lycian to hearten his comrades, who
were shortly gladdened by the return of Aeneas whom Apollo had healed. At
the sight of Ares and Apollo fighting for Troy Hera and Athena came down
to battle for the Greeks; they found Diomedes on the skirts of the host,
cooling the wound Pandarus had inflicted. Entering his chariot by his
side, Athena fired him to meet Ares and drive him wounded back to Olympus,
where he found but little compassion from Zeus. The two goddesses then
left the mortals to fight it out.

At this moment Helenus, the prophetic brother of Hector, bade him go to
Troy to try to appease the anger of Athena by an offering, in the hope
that Diomedes’ progress might be stayed. In his absence Diomedes met in
the battle Glaucus, a Lycian prince.

In answer, Glaucus said:

He then told how he was a family friend of Diomedes and made with him a
compact that if they met in battle they should avoid each the other; this
they sealed by the exchange of armour, wherein the Greek had the better,
getting gold weapons for bronze, the worth of a hundred oxen for the value
of nine.

Coming to Troy Hector bade his mother offer Athena the finest robe she
had; yet all in vain, for the goddess rejected it. Passing to the house of
Paris, he found him polishing his armour, Helen at his side. Again
rebuking him, he had from him a promise that he would be ready to re-enter
the fight when Hector had been to his own house to see his wife
Andromache. Hector’s heart foreboded that it was the last time he would
speak with her. She had with her their little son Astyanax. Weeping she
besought him to spare himself for her sake.

He answered, his heart heavy with a sense of coming death:

He stretched out his arms to his little son who was affrighted at the
sight of the helmet as it nodded its plumes dreadfully from its tall top.
Hector and Andromache laughed when they saw the child’s terror; then
Hector took off his helmet and prayed that the boy might grow to a royal
manhood and gladden his mother’s heart. Smiling through her tears,
Andromache took the child from Hector, while he comforted her with brave
words.

Thus she parted from him, looking back many a time, shedding plenteous
tears. So did they mourn for Hector even before his doom, for they said he
would never escape his foes and come back in safety.

Finding Paris waiting for him, Hector passed out to the battlefield. Aided
by Glaucus he wrought great havoc, so much that Athena and Apollo stirred
him to challenge the bravest of the Greeks. The victor was to take the
spoils of the vanquished but to return the body for burial. At first the
Greeks were silent when they heard his challenge, ashamed to decline it
and afraid to take it up. At last eight of their bravest cast lots, the
choice falling upon Ajax. A great combat ended in the somewhat doubtful
victory of Ajax, the two parting in friendship after an exchange of
presents. The result of the fighting had discouraged both sides; the
Greeks accordingly decided to throw up a mound in front of their ships,
protected by a deep trench. This tacit confession of weakness in the
absence of Achilles leads up to the heavy defeat which was to follow. On
the other side the Trojans held a council to deliver up Helen. When Paris
refused to surrender her but offered to restore her treasures, a
deputation was sent to inform the Greeks of his decision. The latter
refused to accept either Helen or the treasure, feeling that the end was
not far off. That night Zeus sent mighty thunderings to terrify the
besiegers.

So far the main plot of the Iliad has been undeveloped; now that
the chief characters on both sides have played a part in the war, the poem
begins to show how the wrath of Achilles works itself out under Zeus’
direction. First the king of the gods warned the deities that he would
allow none to intervene on either side and would punish any offender with
his thunders. Holding up the scales of doom, he placed in them the lot of
Trojans and of Greeks; as the latter sank down, he hurled at their host
his lightnings, driving all the warriors in flight to the great mound they
had built. For a time Teucer the archer brother of Ajax held them back,
but when he was smitten by a mighty stone hurled of Hector all resistance
was broken. A vain attempt was made by Hera and Athena to help the Greeks,
but the goddesses quailed before the punishment wherewith Zeus threatened
them. When night came the Trojans encamped on the open plain, their
camp-fires gleaming like the stars which appear on some night of
stillness.

Disheartened at his defeat, Agamemnon freely acknowledged his fault and
suggested flight homewards. Nestor advised him to call an Assembly and
depute some of the leading men to make up the quarrel with Achilles. The
King listened to him, offering to give Achilles his own daughter in
wedlock, together with cities and much spoil of war. Three ambassadors
were chosen, Phoenix, Ajax and Odysseus. Reaching Achilles’ tent, they
found him singing lays of heroes, Patroclus his friend by his side. When
he saw the ambassadors, he gave them a courtly welcome. Odysseus laid the
King’s proposals before him, to which Achilles answered with dignity.

Phoenix had been Achilles’ tutor. In terror for the safety of the Greek
fleet, he appealed to his friend to relent.

When this appeal also failed, Ajax, a man of deeds rather than words,
deemed it best to return at once, begging Achilles to bear them no
ill-will and to remember the rights of hospitality which protected them
from his resentment. When Achilles assured them of his regard for them and
maintained his quarrel with Agamemnon alone, they departed and brought the
heavy news to their anxious friends. On hearing it Diomedes briefly bade
them get ready for the battle and fight without Achilles’ help.

When the Trojan host had taken up its quarters on the plain, Nestor
suggested that the Greeks should send one of their number to find out what
Hector intended to do on the morrow. Diomedes offered to undertake the
office of a spy, selecting Odysseus as his comrade. After a prayer to
Athena to aid them, they went silently towards the bivouac. It chanced
that Hector too had thought of a similar plan and that Dolon had offered
to reconnoitre the Greek position. He was a wealthy man, ill-favoured to
look upon, but swift of foot, and had asked that his reward should be the
horses and the chariot of Achilles.

Hearing the sound of Dolon’s feet as he ran, Diomedes and Odysseus parted
to let him pass between them; then cutting off his retreat they closed on
him and captured him. They learned how the Trojan host was quartered; at
the extremity of it was Rhesus, the newly arrived Thracian King, whose
white horses were a marvel of beauty and swiftness. In return for his
information Dolon begged them to spare his life, but Diomedes deemed it
safer to slay him. The two Greeks penetrated the Thracian encampment,
where they slew many warriors and escaped with the horses back to the
Greek armament.

When the fighting opened on the next day, Agamemnon distinguished himself
by deeds of great bravery, but retired at length wounded in the hand. Zeus
had warned Hector to wait for that very moment before pushing home his
attack. One after another the Greek leaders were wounded, Diomedes,
Odysseus, Machaon; Ajax alone held up the Trojan onset, retiring slowly
and stubbornly towards the sea. Achilles, seeing the return of the wounded
warrior Machaon, sent his friend Patroclus to find out who he was. Nestor
meeting Patroclus, told him of the rout of the army, and advised him to
beg Achilles at least to allow the Myrmidons to sally forth under
Patroclus’ leadership, if he would not fight in person. The importance of
this episode is emphasised in the poem. The dispatch of Patroclus is
called “the beginning of his undoing”, it foreshadows the intervention
which was later to bring Achilles himself back into the conflict.

The Trojan host after an attempt to drive their horses over the trench
stormed it in five bodies. As they streamed towards the wall, an omen of a
doubtful nature filled Polydamas with some misgivings about the wisdom of
bursting through to the sea. It was possible that they might be routed and
that they would accordingly be caught in a trap, leaving many of their
dead behind them. His advice to remain content with the success they had
won roused the anger of Hector, whose headstrong character is well
portrayed in his speech.

Thus encouraged the army pressed forward, the walls being pierced by the
Lycian King Sarpedon, a son of Zeus. Taking up a mighty stone, Hector
broke open the gate and led his men forward to the final onslaught on the
ships.

For a brief space Zeus turned his eyes away from the conflict and Poseidon
used the opportunity to help the Greeks. Idomeneus the Cretan and his
henchman Meriones greatly distinguished themselves, the former drawing a
very vivid picture of the brave man.

Yet soon Idomeneus’ strength left him; Hector hurried to the centre of the
attack, where he confronted Ajax.

At this point Hera determined to prolong the intervention of Poseidon in
favour of the Greeks. She persuaded Aphrodite to lend her all her spells
of beauty on the pretence that she wished to reconcile Ocean to his wife
Tethys. Armed with the goddess’ girdle, she lulled Zeus to sleep and then
sent a message to Poseidon to give the Greeks his heartiest assistance.
Inspired by him the fugitives turned on their pursuers; when Ajax smote
down Hector with a stone the Trojans were hurled in flight back through
the gate and across the ramparts.

When Zeus awakened out of slumber and saw the rout of the Trojans, his
first impulse was to punish Hera for her deceit. He then restored the
situation, bidding Poseidon retire and sending Apollo to recover Hector of
his wound. The tide speedily turned again; the Trojans rushed through the
rampart and down to the outer line of the Greek ships, where they found
nobody to resist them except the giant Ajax and his brother Teucer. After
a desperate fight in which Ajax single-handed saved the fleet, Hector
succeeded in grasping the ship of Protesilaus and called loud for fire.
This was the greatest measure of success vouchsafed him; from this point
onwards the balance was redressed in favour of the Greeks.

Achilles had been watching the anguish of Patroclus’ spirit when this
disaster came upon their friends.

Patroclus begged his friend to allow him to wear his armour and lead the
Myrmidons out to battle, not knowing that he was entreating for his own
ruin and death. After some reluctance Achilles gave him leave, yet with
the strictest orders not to pursue too far. Fresh and eager for the battle
the Myrmidons drove the Trojans back into the plain. Patroclus’ course was
challenged by the Lycians, whose King Sarpedon faced him in single combat.
In great sorrow Zeus watched his son Sarpedon go to his doom; in his agony
he shed tear-drops of blood and ordered Death and Sleep to carry the body
back to Lycia for burial.

The great glory Patroclus had won tempted him to forget his promise to
Achilles. He pursued the Trojans back to the walls of the town, slaying
Cebriones the charioteer of Hector. In the fight which took place over the
body Patroclus was assailed by Hector and Euphorbus under the guidance of
Apollo. Hector administered the death-blow; before he died Patroclus
foretold a speedy vengeance to come from Achilles.

A mighty struggle arose over his body. Menelaus slew Euphorbus, but
retreated at the approach of Hector, who seized the armour of Achilles and
put it on. A thick cloud settled over the combatants, heightening the
dread of battle. The gods came down to encourage their respective
warriors; the Greeks were thrust back over the plain, but the bravery of
Ajax and Menelaus enabled the latter to save Patroclus’ body and carry it
from the dust of battle towards the ships.

When the news of his friend’s death came to Achilles his grief was so
mighty that it seemed likely that he would have slain himself. He burst
into a lamentation so bitter that his mother heard him in her sea-cave and
came forth to learn what new sorrow had taken him. Too late he learned the
hard lesson that revenge may be sweet but is always bought at the cost of
some far greater thing.

Being robbed of his armour he could not sally out to convey his
companion’s body into the camp. Hera therefore sent Iris to him bidding
him merely show himself at the trenches and cry aloud. At the sound of his
thrice-repeated cry the Trojans shrank back in terror, leaving the Greeks
to carry in Patroclus’ body unmolested; then Hera bade the sun set at once
into the ocean to end the great day of battle.

Polydamas knew well what the appearance of Achilles portended to the
Trojans, for he was the one man among them who could look both before and
after; his advice was that they should retire into the town and there shut
themselves up. It was received with scorn by Hector. In the Greek camp
Achilles burst into a wild lament over Patroclus, swearing that he would
not bury him before he had brought in Hector dead and twelve living
captives to sacrifice before the pyre. That night his mother went to
Hephaestus and persuaded him to make divine armour for her son, which the
poet describes in detail.

On receiving the armour from his mother Achilles made haste to reconcile
himself with Agamemnon. His impatience for revenge and the oath he had
taken made it impossible for him to take any food. His strength was
maintained by Athena who supplied him with nectar. On issuing forth to the
fight he addressed his two horses:

In reply they prophesied his coming end.

The Avenging Spirits forbade them to reveal more. The awe of the climax of
the poem is heightened by supernatural interventions. At last the gods
themselves received permission from Zeus to enter the fray. They took
sides, the shock of their meeting causing the nether deity to start from
his throne in fear that his realm should collapse about him. Achilles met
Aeneas and would have slain him had not Poseidon saved him. Hector
withdrew before him, warned by Apollo not to meet him face to face.
Disregarding the god’s advice he attacked Achilles, but for the moment was
spirited away. Disappointed of his prey Achilles sowed havoc among the
lesser Trojans.

Choked by the numerous corpses the River-God Scamander begged him cease
his work of destruction. When the Hero disregarded him, he assembled all
his waters and would have overwhelmed him but for Athena who gave him
power to resist; the river was checked by the Fire-God who dried up his
streams. The gods then plunged into strife, the sight whereof made Zeus
laugh in joy. Athena quickly routed Aphrodite and Hera Artemis. Apollo
deemed it worthless to fight Poseidon.

Deserted by their protectors the Trojans broke before Achilles, who nearly
took the town.

Baulked a second time of his vengeance by Apollo, Achilles vowed he would
have punished the god had he the power. Hector had at last decided to face
his foe at the Scaean Gate. His father and his mother pleaded with him in
a frenzy of grief to enter the town, but the dread of Polydamas’
reproaches fixed his resolve. When Achilles came rushing towards him, his
heart failed; he ran three times round the walls of the city. Meanwhile
the gods held up the scales of doom; when his life sank down to death
Apollo left him for ever.

Athena then took the shape of Deiphobus, encouraging him to face Achilles.
Seeing unexpectedly a friend, he turned and stood his ground, for she had
already warned Achilles of her plot. Hector launched his spear which sped
true, but failed to penetrate the divine armour. When he found no
Deiphobus at his side to give him another weapon, he knew his end had
come. Drawing himself up for a final effort, he darted at Achilles; the
latter spied a gap in the armour he had once worn, through which he smote
Hector mortally. Lying in approaching death, the Trojan begged that his
body might be honoured with a burial, but Achilles swore he should never
have it, rather the dogs and carrion birds should devour his flesh. Seeing
their great foe dead the Greeks flocked around him, not one passing by him
without stabbing his body. Achilles bored through his ankles and attached
him to his car; then whipping up his horses, he drove full speed to the
camp, dragging Hector in disgrace over the plain. This scene of pure
savagery is succeeded by the laments of Priam, Hecuba and Andromache over
him whom Zeus allowed to be outraged in his own land.

That night the shade of Patroclus visited Achilles, bidding him bury him
speedily that he might cross the gates of death; the dust of his ashes was
to be stored up in an urn and mixed with Achilles’ own when his turn came
to die. After the funeral Achilles held games of great splendour in which
the leading athletes contended for the prizes he offered.

Yet nothing could make up for the loss of his friend. Every day he dragged
Hector’s body round Patroclus’ tomb, but Apollo in pity for the dead man
kept away corruption, maintaining the body in all its beauty of manhood.
At last on the twelfth day Apollo appealed to the gods to end the
barbarous outrage.

Zeus sent to fetch Thetis whom he bade persuade her son to ransom the
body; meanwhile Iris went to Troy to tell Priam to take a ransom and go to
the ships without fear, for the convoy who should guide him would save him
from harm.

On hearing of Priam’s resolve Hecuba tried to dissuade him, but the old
King would not be turned. That night he went forth alone; he was met in
the plain by Hermes, disguised as a servant of Achilles, who conducted him
to the hut where Hector lay. Slipping in unseen, Priam caught Achilles’
knees and kissed the dread hands that had slain his son. In pity for the
aged King Achilles remembered his own father, left as defenceless as
Priam. Calling out his servants he bade them wash the corpse outside, lest
Priam at the sight of it should upbraid him and thus provoke him to slay
him and offend against the commands of Zeus. As they supped, Priam
marvelled at the stature and beauty of Achilles and Achilles wondered at
Priam’s reverend form and his words. While Achilles slept, Hermes came to
Priam to warn him of his danger if he were found in the Greek host.
Hastily harnessing the chariot, he led him back safely to Troy, where the
body was laid upon a bed in Hector’s palace.

The laments which follow are of great beauty. Andromache bewailed her
widowhood, Hecuba her dearest son; Helen’s lament is a masterpiece.

Then with many a tear they laid to his rest mighty Hector.

Such is the Iliad. To modern readers it very often seems a little
dull. Horace long ago pointed out that it is inevitable that a long poem
should flag; even Homer nods sometimes. Some of the episodes are
distinctly wearisome, for they are invented to give a place in this
national Epic to lesser heroes who could hardly be mentioned if Achilles
were always in the foreground. Achilles himself is not a pleasing person;
his character is wayward and violent; he is sometimes childish, always
liable to be carried away by a fit of pettishness and unable to retain our
real respect; further, a hero who is practically invulnerable and yet dons
divine armour to attack those who are no match for him when he is without
it falls below the ordinary “sportsman’s” level. Nor can we feel much
reverence for many of the gods; Hera is odious, Athena guilty of flat
treachery, Zeus, liable to allow his good nature to overcome his judgment—Apollo
alone seems consistently noble. More, we shall look in vain in the Iliad
for any sign of the pure battle-joy which is so characteristic of northern
Epic poetry; the Greek ideal of bravery had nothing of the Berserker in
it. Perhaps these are the reasons why the sympathy of nearly all readers
is with the Trojans, who are numerically inferior, are aided by fewer and
weaker gods and have less mighty champions to defend them.

What then is left to admire in the Iliad? It is well to remember
that the poem is not the first but the last of a long series; its very
perfection of form and language makes it certain that it is the result of
a long literary tradition. As such, it has one or two remarkable features.
We shall not find in many other Epics that sense of wistful sorrow for
man’s brief and uncertain life which is the finest breath of all poetry
that seeks to touch the human heart. The marks of rude or crude
workmanship which disfigure much Epic have nearly all disappeared from the
Iliad. The characterisation of many of the figures of the poem is
masterly, their very natures being hit off in a few lines—and it is
important to remember that it is not really the business of Epic to
attempt analysis of character at all except very briefly; the story cannot
be kept waiting. But the real Homeric power is displayed in the famous
scenes of pure and worthy pathos such as the parting of Andromache from
Hector and the laments over his body. Those who would learn how to touch
great depths of sorrow and remain dignified must see how it has been
treated in the Iliad.

A few vigorous lines hit off the plan of the Odyssey.

Odysseus, when the poem opens, was in Calypso’s isle pitied of all the
gods save Poseidon. In a council Zeus gave his consent that Hermes should
go to Calypso, while Athena should descend to Ithaca to encourage
Odysseus’ son Telemachus to seek out news of his father.

Taking the form of Mentes, Athena met Telemachus and informed him that his
father was not yet dead. Seeing the suitors who were wooing his mother
Penelope and eating up the house in riot, she advised him to dismiss them
and visit Nestor in Pylos. A lay sung by Phemius brought Penelope from her
chamber, who was astonished at the immediate change which her son’s speech
showed had come upon him, transforming him to manhood.

Next day Telemachus called an Assembly of the Ithacans; his appeal to the
suitors to leave him in peace provoked an insulting speech from their
ringleader Antinous who held Penelope to blame for their presence; she had
constantly eluded them, on one occasion promising to marry when she had
woven a shroud for Laertes her father-in-law; the work she did by day she
undid at night, till she was betrayed by a serving-woman. Telemachus then
asked the suitors for a ship to get news of his father. When the assembly
broke up, Athena appeared in answer to Telemachus’ prayer in the form of
Mentor and pledged herself to go with him on his travels. She prepared a
ship and got together a crew, while Telemachus bade his old nurse
Eurycleia conceal from his mother his departure.

In Pylos Nestor told him all he knew of Odysseus, describing the sorrows
which came upon the Greek leaders on their return and especially the evil
end of Agamemnon. He added that Menelaus had just returned to Sparta and
was far more likely to know the truth than any other, for he had wandered
widely over the seas on his home-coming. Bidding Nestor look after
Telemachus, Athena vanished from his sight, but not before she was
recognised by the old hero. On the morrow Telemachus set out for Sparta,
accompanied by Pisistratus, one of Nestor’s sons.

Menelaus gave them a kindly welcome and a casual mention of his father’s
name stirred Telemachus to tears. At that moment Helen entered; her
quicker perception at once traced the resemblance between the young
stranger and Odysseus. When Telemachus admitted his identity, Helen told
some of his father’s deeds. Once he entered Troy disguised as a beggar,
unrecognised of all save Helen herself. “After he made her swear an oath
that she would not betray him, he revealed all the plans of the Greeks.
Then, after slaying many Trojans, he departed with much knowledge, while
Helen’s heart rejoiced, for she was already bent on a return home,
repenting of the blindness which Aphrodite had sent her in persuading her
to abandon home and daughter and a husband who lacked naught, neither wit
not manhood.” Menelaus then recounted how Odysseus saved him when they
were in the wooden horse, when one false sound would have betrayed them.
On the next morning Telemachus told the story of the ruin of his home;
Menelaus prophesied the end of the suitors, then preceded to recount how
in Egypt he waylaid and captured Proteus, the changing god of the sea,
whom he compelled to relate the fate of the Greek leaders and to prophesy
his own return; from him he heard that Odysseus was with Calypso who kept
him by force. On learning this important piece of news Telemachus was
eager to return to Ithaca with all speed.

Meanwhile the suitors had learned of the departure of Telemachus and
plotted to intercept him on his return. Their treachery was told to
Penelope, who was utterly undone on hearing it; feeling herself left
without a human protector she prayed to Athena, who appeared to her in a
dream in the likeness of her own sister to assure her that Athena was
watching over her, but refusing to say definitely whether Odysseus was
alive.

The poem at this point takes up the story of Odysseus himself. Going to
the isle where he was held captive, Hermes after admiring its great beauty
delivered Zeus’ message to Calypso to let the captive go. She reproached
the gods for their jealousy and reluctantly promised to obey. She found
Odysseus on the shore, eating out his heart in the desire for his home.
When she informed him that she intended to let him go, he first with
commendable prudence made her swear that she did not design some greater
evil for him. Smiling at his cunning, she swore the most solemn of all
oaths to help him, then supplied tools and materials for the building of
his boat. When he was out on the deep, Poseidon wrecked his craft, but a
sea goddess Leucothea, once a mortal, gave him a scarf to wrap round him,
bidding him cast it from him with his back turned away when he got to
land. After two nights and two days on the deep he at length saw land.
Finding the mouth of a small stream, he swam up it, then utterly weary
flung himself down on a heap of leaves under a bush, guarded by Athena.

The next episode introduces one of the most charming figures in ancient
literature. Nausicaa was the daughter of Alcinous, King of Phaeacia, on
whose island Odysseus had landed. To her Athena appeared in a dream,
bidding her obtain from her father leave to go down to the sea to wash his
soiled garments. The young girl obeyed, telling her father that it was but
seemly that he, the first man in the kingdom, should appear at council in
raiment white as snow. He gave her the leave she desired. After their work
was done, she and her handmaids began a game of ball; their merry cries
woke up Odysseus, who started up on hearing human voices. Coming forward,
he frightened by his appearance the handmaids, but Nausicaa, emboldened by
Athena, stood still and listened to his story. She supplied him with clean
garments after she had given him food and drink. On the homeward journey
Nausicaa bade Odysseus bethink him of the inconvenient talk which his
presence would occasion if he were seen with her near the city. She
therefore judged it best that she should enter first, at the same time she
gave him full information of the road to the palace; when he entered it he
was to proceed straight to the Queen Arete, whose favour was indispensable
if he desired a return home.

Just outside the city Athena met him in the guise of a girl to tell him
his way; she further cast about him a thick cloud to protect him from
curious eyes. Passing through the King’s gardens, which were a marvel of
beauty and fruitfulness, Odysseus entered the palace and threw his arms in
supplication about Arete’s knees. She listened kindly to him and begged
Alcinous give him welcome. When all the courtiers had retired to rest,
Arete, noticing that the garments Odysseus wore had been woven by her own
hands, asked him whence he had them and how he had come to the island. On
hearing the story of his shipwreck Alcinous promised him a safe convoy to
his home on the morrow.

At an assembly Alcinous consulted with his counsellors about Odysseus; all
agreed to help in providing him with a ship and rowers. At a trial of
skill Odysseus, after being taunted by some of the Phaeacians, hurled the
quoit beyond them all. Later, a song of the wooden horse of Troy moved him
to tears; though unnoticed by the others, he did not escape the eye of
Alcinous who bade him tell them plainly who he was. Then he revealed
himself and told the marvellous story of his wanderings.

First he and his companions reached the land of the Lotus-eaters. Finding
out that the lotus made all who ate it lose their desire for home,
Odysseus sailed away with all speed, forcing away some who had tasted the
plant. Thence they reached the island of the Cyclopes, a wild race who
knew no ordinances; each living in his cave was a law to himself, caring
nothing for the others. Leaving his twelve ships, Odysseus proceeded with
some of his men to the cave of one of the Cyclopes, a son of Poseidon,
taking with him a skin of wine. When the one-eyed monster returned with
his flock of sheep, he shut the mouth of the cave with a mighty stone
which no mortal could move; then lighting a fire he caught sight of his
visitors and asked who they were. Odysseus answered craftily, whereupon
the monster devoured six of his company. Odysseus opened his wine-skin and
offered some of the wine; when the Cyclops asked his name, Odysseus told
him he was called Noman; in return for his kindness in offering him the
strangely sweet drink the Cyclops promised to eat him last of all. But the
wine soon plunged the monster into a slumber, from which he was awakened
by the burning end of a great stake which Odysseus thrust into his eye. On
hearing his cries of agony the other Cyclopes came to him, but went away
when they heard that Noman was killing him. As it was impossible for
anyone but the Cyclops to open the cave, Odysseus tied his men beneath the
cattle, putting the beast which carried a man between two which were
unburdened; he himself hung on to the ram. As the animals passed out, the
Cyclops was a little surprised that the ram went last, but thought he did
so out of grief for his master. When they were all safely outside,
Odysseus freed his friends and made haste to get to the ship. Thrusting
out, when he was at what seemed a safe distance he shouted to the Cyclops,
who then remembered an old prophecy and hurled a huge rock which nearly
washed them back; a second rock which he hurled on learning Odysseus’ real
name narrowly missed the ship. Then the Cyclops prayed to Poseidon to
punish Odysseus; the god heard him, persecuting him from that time onward.
Reassembling his ships, Odysseus proceeded on his voyage.

He next called at the isle of Aeolus, king of the winds, who gave him in a
bag all the winds but one, a favouring breeze which was to waft him to his
own island. For nine days Odysseus guarded his bag, but at last, when
Ithaca was in sight, he sank into a sleep of exhaustion. Thinking that the
bag concealed some treasure, his men opened it, only to be blown back to
Aeolus who bid him begone as an evil man when he begged aid a second time.

After visiting the Laestrygones, a man-eating people, who devoured all the
fleet except one ship’s company, the remainder reached Aeaea, the island
where lived the dread goddess Circe. Odysseus sent forward Eurylochus with
some twenty companions who found Circe weaving at a loom. Seeing them she
invited them within; then after giving them a charmed potion she smote
them with her rod, turning them into swine. Eurylochus who had suspected
some trickery hurried back to Odysseus with the news. The latter
determined to go alone to save his friends. On the way he was met by
Hermes, who showed him the herb moly, an antidote to Circe’s draught.
Finding that her magic failed, she at once knew that her visitor was
Odysseus whose visit had been prophesied to her by Hermes. He bound her
down by a solemn oath to refrain from further mischief and persuaded her
to restore to his men their humanity. When Odysseus desired to depart
home, she told him of the wanderings that awaited him. First he must go to
the land of the dead to consult the shade of Teiresias, the blind old
prophet, who would help him.

Following the goddess’ instructions, they sailed to the land of the
Cimmerians on the confines of the earth. There Odysseus dug a trench into
which he poured the blood of slain victims which he did not allow the dead
spirits to touch till Teiresias appeared. The seer told him of the sorrows
that awaited him and vaguely indicated that his death should come upon him
from the sea; he added that any spirit he allowed to touch the blood would
tell him truly all whereof he was as yet ignorant, and that those ghosts
he drove away would return to the darkness.

First arose the spirit of his dead mother Anticleia who told him that his
wife and son were yet alive and his father was living away from the town
in wretchedness.

Thrice he tried to embrace her, and thrice the ghost eluded him, for it
was “as a dream that had fled away from the white frame of the body”. A
procession of famous women followed, then came the wraith of Agamemnon who
told how he had been foully slain by his own wife, as faithless as
Penelope was prudent. Achilles next approached; when Odysseus tried to
console him for his early death by reminding him of the honour he had when
he was alive, he answered:

On hearing that his son Neoptolemus had won great glory in the capture of
Troy, the spirit left him, exulting with joy that his son was worthy of
him. Ajax turned from Odysseus in anger at the loss of Achilles’ armour
for the possession of which they had striven. The last figure that came
was the ghost of Heracles, though the hero himself was with the gods in
Olympus.

He recognised Odysseus before he passed back to death; when a crowd of
terrifying apparitions came thronging to the trench, Odysseus fled to his
ship lest the Gorgon might be sent from the awful Queen of the dead.

Returning to Circe, he learned from her of the remaining dangers. The
first of these was the island of the Sirens, who by the marvellous
sweetness of their song charmed to their ruin all who passed. Odysseus
filled the ears of his crews with wax, bidding them to tie him to the mast
of his ship and to row hard past the temptresses in spite of his
strugglings. They then entered the dangerous strait, on one side of which
was Scylla, a dreadful monster who lived in a cave near by, on the other
was the deadly whirlpool of Charybdis. Scylla carried off six of his men
who called in vain to Odysseus to save them, stretching out their hands to
him in their last agony. From the strait they passed to the island of
Trinacria, where they found grazing the cattle of the Sun. Odysseus had
learned from both Teiresias and Circe that an evil doom would come upon
them if they touched the animals; he therefore made his companions swear a
great oath not to touch them if they landed. For a whole month they were
wind-bound in the island and ate all the provisions which Circe had given
them. At a time when Odysseus had gone to explore the island Eurylochus
persuaded his men to kill and eat; as he returned Odysseus smelled the
savour of their feast and knew that destruction was at hand. For nine days
the feasting continued. When the ship put out to sea Zeus, in answer to
the prayer of the offended Sun-God, sent a storm which drowned all the
crew and drove Odysseus back to the dreaded strait. Escaping through it
with difficulty, he drifted helplessly over the deep and on the tenth day
landed on the island of “the dread goddess who used human speech”,
Calypso, who tended him and kept him in captivity.

On the next day the Phaeacians loaded Odysseus with presents and landed
him on his own island while he slept. Poseidon in anger at the arrival of
the hero changed the returning Phaeacian ship into stone when it was
almost within the harbour of the city. When Odysseus awoke he failed to
recognise his own land. Athena appeared to him disguised as a shepherd,
telling him he was indeed in Ithaca:

Such is the description of the land for which Odysseus forsook Calypso’s
offer of immortality. After smiling at Odysseus’ pretence that he was a
Cretan Athena counselled him how to slay the suitors and hurried to fetch
Telemachus from Sparta. The poet tells why Athena loved Odysseus more than
all others.

Transformed by her into an old beggar, Odysseus went to the hut of his
faithful old swineherd Eumaeus; the dogs set upon him, but Eumaeus scared
them away and welcomed him to his dwelling. In spite of Odysseus’
assurance that the master would return Eumaeus, who had been often
deceived by similar words, refused to believe. Feigning himself to be a
Cretan, Odysseus saw for himself that the old servant’s loyalty was
steadfast; a deft touch brings out his care for his master’s substance:

By the intervention of Athena the two leading characters are brought
together. She stood beside the sleeping Telemachus in Sparta, warning him
of the ambush set for him in Ithaca and bidding him to land on a lonely
part of the coast whence he was to proceed to the hut of Eumaeus. On his
departure from Sparta an omen was interpreted by Helen to mean that
Odysseus was not far from home. As he was on the point of leaving Pylos on
the morrow a bard named Theoclymenus appealed to him for protection, for
he had slain a man and was a fugitive from justice. Taking him on board
Telemachus frustrated the ambush, landing in safety; he proceeded to
Eumaeus’ hut, where Odysseus had with some difficulty been persuaded to
remain.

The dogs were the first to announce the arrival of a friend, gambolling
about him. After speaking a word of cheer to Eumaeus Telemachus enquired
who the stranger was; hearing that he was a Cretan he lamented his
inability to give him a welcome in his home owing to the insolence of his
enemies. Remembering the anxiety of his mother during his absence he sent
Eumaeus to the town to acquaint her with his arrival. Athena seized the
opportunity to reveal Odysseus to his son, transforming him to his own
shape. After a moment of utter amazement at the marvel of the change,
Telemachus ran to his father and fell upon his neck, his joy finding
expression in tears. The two then laid their plans for the destruction of
the suitors. By the time Eumaeus had returned Odysseus had resumed his
sorry and tattered appearance.

Telemachus went to the town alone, bidding Eumaeus bring the stranger with
him. They were met by one Melanthius a goatherd, who covered them with
insults. “In truth one churl is leading another, for the god ever bringeth
like to like. Whither art thou taking this glutton, this evil pauper, a
kill-joy of the feast? He hath learned many a knavish trick and is like to
refuse to labour; creeping among the people he would rather ask alms to
fill his insatiate maw.” Leaping on Odysseus, he kicked at him, yet failed
to stir him from the pathway. Swallowing the insult Odysseus walked
towards his house. A superb stroke of art has created the next incident.
In the courtyard lay Argus, a hound whom Odysseus had once fed. Neglected
in the absence of his master he had crept to a dung-heap, full of lice.
When he marked Odysseus coming towards him he wagged his tail and dropped
his ears, but could not come near his lord. Seeing him from a little
distance Odysseus wiped away his tears unnoticed of Eumaeus and asked
whose the hound was. Eumaeus told the story of his neglect: “but the doom
of death took Argus straightway after seeing Odysseus in the twentieth
year”. In the palace Telemachus sent his father food, bidding him ask a
charity of the wooers. Antinous answered by hurling a stool which struck
his shoulder. The noise of the high words which followed brought down
Penelope who protested against the godless behaviour of the suitors and
asked to interview the stranger in hope of learning some tidings of her
husband, but Odysseus put her off till nightfall when they would be less
likely to suffer from the insolence of the suitors.

In Ithaca was a beggar named Irus, gluttonous and big-boned but a coward.
Encouraged by the winkings and noddings of the suitors he bade Odysseus
begone. A quiet answer made him imagine he had to deal with a poltroon and
he challenged him to a fight. The proposal was welcomed with glee by the
suitors, who promised on oath to see fair play for the old man in his
quarrel with a younger. But when they saw the mighty limbs and stout frame
of Odysseus, they deemed that Irus had brought trouble on his own head.
Chattering with fear Irus had to be forced to the combat. One blow was
enough to lay him low; the ease with which Odysseus had disposed of his
foe made him for a time popular with the suitors.

Under an inspiration of Athena, Penelope came down once more to chide the
wooers for their insolence; she also upbraided them for their stinginess.

Stung by the taunt, they gave her the accustomed presents, while Odysseus
rejoiced that she flattered their heart in soft words with a different
intent in her spirit. The insolence of the suitors was matched by the
pertness of the serving maids, of whom Melantho was the most impudent. A
threat from Odysseus drew down upon him the wrath of the suitors who were
with difficulty persuaded by Telemachus to depart home to their beds.

That night Odysseus and his son removed the arms from the walls, the
latter being told to urge as a pretext for his action the necessity of
cleaning from them the rust and of removing a temptation to violence when
the suitors were heated with wine. At the promised interview with his wife
Odysseus again pretended he was a Cretan; describing the very dress which
Odysseus had worn, he assured her that he would soon return with the many
treasures which he had collected. Half persuaded by the exact description
of a garment she had herself made, she bade her maids look to him, but he
would not suffer any of them to approach him save his old nurse Eurycleia.
As she was washing him in the dim light of the fireside her fingers
touched the old scar above his knee, the result of an accident in a
boar-hunt during his youth.

Concealing the scar carefully under his rags by the fireside he put a good
interpretation on a strange dream which had visited his wife.

That night Odysseus with his own eyes witnessed the intrigues between his
women and the suitors. He heard his wife weeping in her chamber for him
and prayed to Zeus for aid in the coming trial. On the morrow he was again
outraged; the suitors were moved to laughter by a prophecy of
Theoclymenus:

In answer Eurymachus bade him begone if all within was night; taking him
at his word, the seer withdrew before the coming ruin.

Then Athena put it into the heart of Penelope to set the suitors a final
test. She brought forth the bow of Odysseus together with twelve axes. It
had been an exercise of her lord to set up the axes in a line, string the
bow and shoot through the heads of the axes which had been hollowed for
that purpose. She promised to follow at once the suitor who could string
the bow and shoot through the axes. First Telemachus set up the axes and
tried to string the weapon; failing three times he would have succeeded at
the next effort but for a glance from his father. Leiodes vainly tried his
strength, to be rebuked by Antinous who suggested that the bow should be
made more pliant by being heated at the fire.

Noticing that Eumaeus and Philoetius had gone out together Odysseus went
after them and revealed himself to them; the three then returned to the
hall. After all the suitors had failed except Antinous, who did not deem
that he should waste a feast-day in stringing bows, Odysseus begged that
he might try, Penelope insisting on his right to attempt the feat. When
she retired Eumaeus brought the bow to Odysseus, then told Eurycleia to
keep the woman in their chambers while Philoetius bolted the hall door.

The first victim was Antinous, whom Odysseus shot through the neck as he
was in the act of drinking, never dreaming that one man would attack a
multitude of suitors. Eurymachus fell after vainly attempting a
compromise. Melanthius was caught in the act of supplying arms to the rest
and was left bound to be dealt with when the main work was done. Athena
herself encouraged Odysseus in his labour of vengeance, deflecting from
him any weapons that were hurled at him. At length all was over, the
serving women were made to cleanse the hall of all traces of bloodshed;
the guiltiest of them were hanged, while Melanthius died a horrible death
by mutilation. Odysseus then summoned his wife to his presence.

Eurycleia carried the message to her, laughing with joy so much that
Penelope deemed her mad. The story of the vengeance which Odysseus had
exacted was so incredible that it must have been the act of a god, not a
man. When she entered the hall Telemachus upbraided her for her unbelief,
but Odysseus smiled on hearing that she intended to test him by certain
proofs which they two alone were aware of. He withdrew for a time to
cleanse him of his stains and to put on his royal garments, after ordering
the servants to maintain a revelry to blind the people to the death of
their chief men.

When he reappeared, endued with grace which Athena gave him, he marvelled
at the untoward heart which the gods had given his wife and bade his nurse
lay him his bed. Penelope caught up his words quickly; the bed was to be
laid outside the chamber which he himself had made. The words filled
Odysseus with dismay:

On hearing the details of their secret Penelope ran to him casting her
arms about him and begging him to forgive her unbelief, for many a
pretender had come, making her ever more and more suspicious. Thus
reunited the two spent the night in recounting the agonies of their
separation; Odysseus mentioned the strange prophecy of Teiresias, deciding
to seek out his father on the morrow.

A vivid description tells how the souls of the suitors were conducted to
the realm of the dead, the old comrades of Odysseus before Troy
recognising in the vengeance all the marks of his handiwork. Odysseus
found his father in a wretched old age hoeing his garden, clad in soiled
garments with a goat-skin hat on his head which but increased his sorrow.
At the sight Odysseus was moved to tears of compassion. Yet even then he
could not refrain from his wiles, for he told how he had indeed seen
Odysseus though five years before. In despair the old man took the dust in
his hands and cast it about his head in mighty grief.

For a moment the old man doubted, but believed when Odysseus showed the
scar and told him the number and names of the trees they had planted
together in their orchard.

Meanwhile news of the death of the wooers had run through the city. The
father of Antinous raised a tumult and led a body of armed men to demand
satisfaction. The threatening uproar was stopped by the intervention of
Athena who thus completed the restoration of her favourite as she had
begun it.

It is strange that this poem, which is such a favourite with modern
readers, should have made a less deep impression on the Greeks. To them,
Homer is nearly always the Iliad, possibly because Achilles was
semi-divine, whereas Odysseus was a mere mortal. But the latter is for
that very reason of more importance to us, we feel him to be more akin to
our own life. Further, the type of character which Odysseus stands for is
really far nobler than the fervid and somewhat incalculable nature of the
son of Thetis. Odysseus is patient endurance, common sense,
self-restraint, coolness, resource and strength; he is indeed a manifold
personality, far more complex than anything attempted previously in Greek
literature and therefore far more modern in his appeal. It is only after
reading the Odyssey that we begin to understand why Diomedes chose
Odysseus as his companion in the famous Dolon adventure in Noman’s land.
Achilles would have been the wrong man for this or any other situation
which demanded first and last a cool head.

The romantic elements which are so necessary a part of all Epic are much
more convincing in the Odyssey; the actions and adventures are
indeed beyond experience, but they are treated in such a masterly style
that they are made inevitable; it would be difficult to improve on any of
the little details which force us to believe the whole story. Added to
them is another genuine romantic feature, the sense of wandering in
strange new lands untrodden before of man’s foot; the beings who move in
these lands are gracious, barbarous, magical, monstrous, superhuman,
dreamy, or prophetic by turns; they are all different and all fascinating.
The reader is further introduced to the life of the dead as well as of the
living and the memory of his visit is one which he will retain for ever.
Not many stories of adventure can impress themselves indelibly as does the
Odyssey.

To English readers the poem has a special value, for it deals with the sea
and its wonders. The native land of its hero is not very unlike our own,
“full of mist and rain”, yet able to make us love it far more than a
Calypso’s isle with an offer of immortality to any who will exchange his
real love of home for an unnatural haven of peace. A splendid hero, a good
love-story, admirable narrative, romance and excitement, together with a
breath of the sea which gives plenty of space and pure air have made the
Odyssey the companion of many a veteran reader in whom the Greek
spirit cannot die.

Of the impression which Homer has made upon the mind of Europe it would be
difficult to give an estimate. The Greeks themselves early came to regard
his text with a sort of veneration; it was learned by heart and quoted to
spellbound audiences in the cities and at the great national meetings at
Olympia. Every Greek boy was expected to know some portion at least by
heart; Plato evidently loved Homer and when he was obliged to point out
that the system of morality which he stood for was antiquated and needed
revision, apologised for the criticism he could not avoid. It is sometimes
said that Homer was the Bible of the Greeks; while this statement is
probably inaccurate—for no theological system was built on him nor
did he claim any divine revelation—yet it is certain that authors of
all ages searched the text for all kinds of purposes, antiquarian,
ethical, social, as well as religious. This careful study of Homer
culminated in the learned and accurate work of the great Alexandrian
school of Zenodotus and Aristarchus.

In Roman times Homer never failed to inspire lesser writers; Ennius is
said to have translated the Odyssey, while Virgil’s Aeneid
is clearly a child of the Greek Homeric tradition. In the Middle Ages the
Trojan legend was one of the four great cycles which were treated over and
over again in the Chansons. Even drama was glad to borrow the great
characters of the Iliad, as Shakespeare did in Troilus and
Cressida. In England a number of famous translations has witnessed to
the undying appeal of the first of the Greek masters. Chapman published
his Iliad in 1611, his Odyssey in 1616; Pope’s version
appeared between 1715 and 1726; Cowper issued his translation in 1791. In
the next century the Earl Derby retranslated the Iliad, while an
excellent prose version of the Odyssey by Butcher and Lang was
followed by a prose version of the Iliad by Lang Myers and Leaf. At
a time when Europe had succeeded in persuading itself that the whole story
of a siege of Troy was an obvious myth, a series of startling discoveries
on the site of Troy and on the mainland of Greece proved how lamentably
shallow is some of the cleverest and most destructive Higher Criticism.

The marvellous rapidity and vigour of these two poems will save them from
death; the splendid qualities of direct narration, constructive skill,
dignity and poetical power will always make Homer a name to love. Those
who know no Greek and therefore fear that they may lose some of the
directness of the Homeric appeal might recall the famous sonnet written by
Keats who had had no opportunity to learn the great language. His words
are no doubt familiar enough; that they have become inseparable from Homer
must be our apology for inserting them here.

TRANSLATIONS. As INDICATED IN THE TEXT OF THE ESSAY.

The whole of the Homeric tradition is affected by the recent discoveries
made in Crete. The civilisation there unearthed raises questions of great
interest; the problems it suggests are certain to modify current ideas of
Homeric study.

See Discoveries in Crete, by R. Burrows (Murray, 1907).

A very good account of the early age of European literature is in The
Heroic Age, by Chadwick (Cambridge, 1912).

The best interpretation of Greek poetry is Symonds’ Greek Poets, 2
vols. (Smith Elder).

Jebb’s Homer is the best introduction to the many difficulties
presented by the poems.

Flaxman’s engravings for the Iliad and Odyssey are of the
highest order.

AESCHYLUS

Towards the end of the sixth century before Christ, one of the most
momentous advances in literature was made by the genius of Aeschylus.
European drama was created and a means of utterance was given to the
rapidly growing democratic spirit of Greece. Before Aeschylus wrote, rude
public exhibitions had been given of the life and adventures of Dionysus,
the god of wine. Choruses had sung odes to the deity and variety was
obtained by a series of short dialogues between one of the Chorus and the
remainder. Aeschylus added a second actor to converse with the first; he
thus started a movement which eventually ousted the Chorus from its place
of importance, for the interest now began to concentrate on the two
actors; it was their performance which gave drama its name. In time more
characters were added; the Chorus became less necessary and in the long
run was felt to be a hindrance to the movement of the story. This process
is plainly visible in the extant works of the Attic tragedians.

Aeschylus was born at Eleusis in 525; before the end of the century he was
writing tragedies. In 490 he fought in the great battle of Marathon and
took part in the victory of Salamis in 480. This experience of the
struggle for freedom against Persian despotism added a vigour and a
self-reliance to his writing which is characteristic of a growing national
spirit. He is said to have visited Sicily in 468 and again in 458, various
motives being given for his leaving Athens. His death at Gela in 456 is
said to have been due to an eagle, which dropped a tortoise upon his head
which he mistook for a stone. He has left to the world seven plays in
which the rapid development of drama is conspicuous.

One of the earliest of his plays is the Suppliants, little read
owing to the uncertainty of the text and the meagreness of the dramatic
interest. The plot is simple enough. Danaus, sprung from Io of Argos,
flees from Egypt with his fifty daughters who avoid wedlock with the fifty
sons of Aegyptus. He sails to Argos and lays suppliant boughs on the
altars of the gods, imploring protection. The King of Argos after
consultation with his people decides to admit the fugitives and to secure
them from Aegyptus’ violence. A herald from the latter threatens to take
the Danaids back with him, but the King intervenes and saves them. There
is little in this play but long choral odes; yet one or two Aeschylean
features are evident. The King dreads offending the god of suppliants

The Egyptian herald reverences no gods of Greece “who reared him not nor
brought him to old age”. The Chorus declare that “what is fated will come
to pass, for Zeus’ mighty boundless will cannot be thwarted”. Here we have
the three leading ideas in the system of Aeschylus—the doctrine of
the inherited curse, of human pride and impiety, and the might of Destiny.

The Persians is unique as being the only surviving historical play
in Greek literature. It is a poem rather than a drama, as there is little
truly dramatic action. The piece is a succession of very vivid sketches of
the incidents in the great struggle which freed Europe from the threat of
Eastern despotism. A Chorus of Persian elders is waiting for news of the
advance of the great array which Xerxes led against Greece in 480. They
tell how Persia extended her sway over Asia. Yet they are uneasy, for

The Queen-mother Atossa enters, resplendent with jewels; she too is
anxious, for in a dream she had seen Xerxes yoke two women together who
were at feud, one clad in Persian garb, the other in Greek. The former was
obedient to the yoke, but the latter tore the car to pieces and broke the
curb. The Chorus advises her to propitiate the gods with sacrifice, and to
pray to Darius her dead husband to send his son prosperity. At that moment
a herald enters with the news of the Greek victory at Salamis. Xerxes,
beguiled by some fiend or evil spirit, drew up his fleet at night to
intercept the Greeks, supposed to be preparing for flight. But at early
dawn they sailed out to attack, singing mightily

Winning a glorious victory, they landed on the little island (Psyttaleia)
where the choicest Persian troops had been placed to cut off the retreat
of the Greek navy, and slew them all. Later, they drove back the Persians
by land; through Boeotia, Thessaly and Macedonia the broken host
retreated, finally recrossing to Asia over the Hellespont.

On hearing the news Atossa disappears and the Persian Chorus sing a dirge.
The Queen returns without her finery, attired as a suppliant; she bids the
Chorus call up Darius, while she offers libations to the dead. The ghost
of the great Empire-builder rises before the astonished spectators,
enquiring what trouble has overtaken his land. His release from Death is
not easy, “for the gods of the lower world are readier to take men’s
spirits than to let them go”. On learning that his son has been totally
defeated, he delivers his judgment. The oracles had long ago prophesied
this disaster; it was hurried on by Xerxes’ rashness, for when a man is
himself hurrying on to ruin Heaven abets him. He had listened to evil
counsellors, who bade him rival his father’s glory by making wider
conquests. The ruin of Persia is not yet complete, for when insolence is
fully ripe it bears a crop of ruin and reaps a harvest of tears. This evil
came upon Xerxes through the sacrilegious demolition of altars and
temples. Zeus punishes overweening pride, and his correcting hand is
heavy. Darius counsels Atossa to comfort their son and to prevent him from
attacking Greece again; he further advises the Chorus to take life’s
pleasures while they can, for after death there is no profit in wealth. A
distinctly grotesque touch is added by the appearance of Xerxes himself,
broken and defeated, filling the scene with lamentations for lost friends
and departed glory, unable to answer the Chorus when they demand the
whereabouts of some of the most famous Persian warriors.

The play is valuable as the result of a personal experience of the poet.
As a piece of literature it is important, for it is a poetic description
of the first armed conflict between East and West. It directly inspired
Shelley when he wrote his Hellas at a time when Greece was rousing
herself from many centuries of Eastern oppression. As a historical drama
it is of great value, for it is substantially accurate in its main facts,
though Aeschylus has been compelled to take some liberties with time and
human motives in order to satisfy dramatic needs. From Herodotus it seems
probable that Darius himself hankered after the subjugation of Greece,
while Xerxes at the outset was inclined to leave her in peace.

One or two characteristic features are worth note. The genius of Aeschylus
was very bold; it was a daring thing to bring up a ghost from the dead,
for the supernatural appeal does not succeed except when it is treated
with proper insight; yet even Aeschylus’ genius has not quite succeeded in
filling his canvas, the last scenes being distinctly poor in comparison
with the splendour of the main theme. On the other hand a notable advance
in dramatic power has been made. The main actors are becoming human; their
wills are beginning to operate. Tragedy is based on a conflict of some
sort; here the wilful spirit of youth is portrayed as defying the forces
of justice and righteousness; it is insolence which brings Xerxes to ruin.
The substantial creed of Aeschylus is contained in Darius’ speech; as the
poet progresses in dramatic cunning we shall find that he constantly finds
his sources of tragic inspiration in the acts of the sinners who defy the
will of the gods.

The Seven against Thebes was performed in 472. It was one of a
trilogy, a series of three plays dealing with the misfortunes of Oedipus’
race. After the death of Oedipus his sons Polyneices and Eteocles
quarrelled for the sovereignty of Thebes. Polyneices, expelled and
banished by his younger brother, assembled an army of chosen warriors to
attack his native land. Eteocles opens the play with a speech which
encourages the citizens to defend their town. A messenger hurries in
telling how he left the besiegers casting lots to decide which of the
seven gates of Thebes each should attack. Eteocles prays that the curse of
his father may not destroy the town and leaves to arrange the defences. In
his absence the Chorus of virgins sing a wild prayer to the gods to save
them. Hearing this, the King returns to administer a vigorous reproof; he
declares that their frenzied supplications fill the city with terrors,
discouraging the fighting men. He demands from them obedience, the mother
of salvation; if at last they are to perish, they cannot escape the
inevitable. His masterful spirit at last cows them into a better frame of
mind; this scene presents to us one of the most manly characters in
Aeschylus’ work.

After a choral ode a piece of intense tragic horror follows. The messenger
tells the names of the champions who are to assault the gates. As he names
them and the boastful or impious mottoes on their shields, the King names
the Theban champions who are to quell their pride in the fear of the gods.
Five of the insolent attackers are mentioned, then the only righteous one
of the invading force, Amphiaraus the seer; he it was who rebuked the
violence of Tydeus, the evil genius among the besiegers, and openly
reviled Polyneices for attacking his own native land. He had prophesied
his own death before the city, yet resolved to meet his fate nobly; on his
shield alone was no device, for he wished to be, not to seem, a good man.
The pathos of the impending ruin of a great character through evil
associations is heightened by the terror of what follows. Only one gate
remains without an assailant, the gate Eteocles is to defend; it is to be
attacked by the King’s own brother, Polyneices. Filled with horror, the
Chorus begs him send another to that gate, for “there can be no old age to
the pollution of kindred bloodshed”. Recognising that his father’s curse
is working itself out, he departs to kill and be killed by his own
brother, for “when the gods send evil none can avoid it”.

In an interval the Chorus reflect on their King’s impending doom. His
father’s curse strikes them with dread; Oedipus himself was born of a
father Laius who, though warned thrice by Apollo that if he died without
issue he would save his land, listened to the counsels of friends and in
imprudence begat his own destroyer. Their song is interrupted by a
messenger who announces that they have prospered at six gates, but at the
seventh the two brothers have slain each other. This news inspires another
song in which the joy of deliverance gradually yields to pity for an
unhappy house, cursed and blighted, the glory of Oedipus serving but to
make more acute the shame of his latter end and the triumph of the ruin he
invoked on his sons. The agony of this scene is intensified by the entry
of Ismene and Antigone, Oedipus’ daughters, the latter mourning for
Polyneices, the former for Eteocles. The climax is reached when a herald
announces a decree made by the senate and people. Eteocles, their King who
defended the land, was to be buried with all honours, but Polyneices was
to lie unburied. Calmly and with great dignity Antigone informs the herald
that if nobody else buries her brother, she will. A warning threat fails
to move her. The play closes with a double note of terror at the doom of
Polyneices and pity for the death of a brave King.

Further progress in dramatic art has been made in this play. One of the
main sources of the pathos of human life is the operation of what seems to
us to be mere blind chance. Just as the casual dropping of Desdemona’s
handkerchief gave Iago his opportunity, so the casual allotting of the
seven gates brings the two brothers into conflict. But behind it was the
working of an inherited curse; yet Aeschylus is careful to point out that
the curse need never have existed at all but for the wilfulness of Laius;
he was the origin of all the mischief, obstinately refusing to listen to a
warning thrice given him by Apollo. Another secret of dramatic excellence
has been discovered by the poet, that of contrast. Two brothers and two
sisters are balanced in pairs against one another. The weaker sister
Ismene laments the stronger brother, while the more unfortunate Polyneices
is championed by the more firmly drawn sister. Equally admirable is the
contrast between the righteous Amphiaraus and his godless companions. The
character of each of these is a masterpiece. War, horror, kindred
bloodshed, with a promise of further agonies to arise from Antigone’s
resolve are the elements which Aeschylus has fused together in this vivid
play.

“There was war in Heaven” between the new gods and the old. The Prometheus
Bound contains the story of the proud tyranny of Zeus, the latest
ruler of the gods. Hephaestus, the god of fire, opens a conversation with
Force and Violence who are pinning Prometheus with chains of adamant to
the rocks of Caucasus. Hephaestus performs his task with reluctance and in
pity for the victim, the deep-counselling son of right-minded Law. Yet the
command of Zeus his master is urgent, overriding the claims of kindred
blood. Force and Violence, full of hatred, hold down the god who has
stolen fire, Hephaestus’ right, and given it to men. They bid the Fire-God
make the chains fast and drive the wedge through Prometheus’ body. When
the work is done they leave him with the taunt:

Abandoned of all, Prometheus breaks out into a wild appeal to earth, air,
the myriad laughter of the sea, the founts and streams to witness his
humiliation; but soon he reflects that he had foreseen his agony and must
bear it as best he can, for the might of Necessity is not to be fought
against. A sound of lightly moving pinions strikes his ears; sympathisers
have come to visit him; they are the Chorus, the daughters of Ocean, who
have heard the sound of the riveted chains and hurried forth in their
winged car Awestruck, they come to see how Zeus is smiting down the mighty
gods of old. It would be difficult to imagine a more natural and touching
motive for the entry of a Chorus.

In the dialogue that follows the tragic appeal to pity is quickly blended
with a different interest. By a superb stroke of art Aeschylus excites the
audience to an intense curiosity. Though apparently subdued, Prometheus
has the certainty of ultimate triumph over his foe; he alone has secret
knowledge of something which will one day hurl Zeus from his throne; the
time will come when the new president of Heaven will hurry to him in
anxious desire for reconciliation; when ruin threatens him he will forsake
his pride and beg Prometheus to save him. But no words will prevail on the
sufferer till he is released from his bonds and receives ample
satisfaction for his maltreatment. The Chorus bids him tell the whole
history of the quarrel. To them he unfolds the story of Zeus’ ingratitude.
There was a discord among the older gods, some wishing to depose Cronos
and make Zeus their King. Warned by his mother, Prometheus knew that only
counsel could avail in the struggle, not violence. When he failed to
persuade the Titans to use cunning, he joined Zeus who with his aid hurled
his foes down to Tartarus. Securing the sovereignty, Zeus distributed
honours to his supporters, but was anxious to wipe out the human race and
create a new stock. Prometheus resisted him, giving mortals fire the
creator of many arts and ridding them of the dread of death. This act
brought him into conflict with Zeus. He invites the Chorus to step down
from their car and hear the rest of his story. At this point Ocean enters,
one of the older gods. He offers to act as a mediator with Zeus, but
Prometheus warns him to keep out of the conflict; he has witnessed the
sorrows of Atlas, his own brother, and of Typhos, pinned down under Etna,
and desires to bring trouble upon no other god; he must bear his agonies
alone till the time of deliverance is ripe. Ocean departing, Prometheus
continues his story. He gave men writing and knowledge of astronomy,
taught them to tame the wild beasts, invented the ship, created medicine,
divination and metallurgy. Yet for all this, his art is weaker far than
Necessity, whereof the controllers are Fate and the unforgetting Furies.
Terror-struck at his sufferings, the Chorus point out how utterly his
goodness has been wasted in helping the race of mortals who cannot save
him. He warns them that a time would come when Zeus should be no longer
King; when they ask for more knowledge, he turns them to other thoughts,
bidding them hide the secret as much as possible. Their interest is drawn
away to another of Zeus’ victims, who at this moment rushes on the scene;
it is lo, cajoled and abandoned by Zeus, plagued and tormented by the
dread unsleeping gadfly sent by Zeus’ consort Hera. She relates her story
to the wondering Chorus, and then Prometheus tells her the long tale of
misery and wandering that await her as she passes from the Caucasus to
Egypt, where she is promised deliverance from her tormentor.

The play now moves to its awful climax. The sight of Io stirs Prometheus
to prophesy more clearly the end in store for Zeus. There would be born
one to discover a terror far greater than the thunderbolt, and smite Zeus
and his brother Poseidon into utter slavery. On hearing this Zeus sends
from heaven his messenger Hermes to demand fuller knowledge of this new
monarch. Disdaining his threats, Prometheus mocks the new gods and defies
their ruler to do his worst. Hermes then delivers his warning. Prometheus
would be overwhelmed with the terrors of thunder and lightning, while the
red eagle would tear out his heart unceasingly till one should arise to
inherit his agonies, descending to the depths of Tartarus. He advises the
Chorus to depart from the rebel, lest they too should share in the
vengeance. They remain faithful to Prometheus, ready to suffer with him;
then descend the thunderings and lightnings, the mountains rock, the winds
roar, and the sky is confounded with sea; the dread agony has begun.

Once more the bold originality of Aeschylus displays itself. Here is a
theme unique in Greek literature. The strife between the two races of gods
opens out a vista of the world ages before man was created. It will
provide a solution to a very difficult problem which will confront us in a
later play. The conflict between two stubborn wills is the source of a
sublime tragedy in which our sympathies are with the sufferer; Zeus, who
punishes Prometheus for “unjustly” helping mortals, himself falls below
the level of human morality; he is tyrannous, ungrateful and revengeful—in
short, he displays all the wrong-headedness of a new ruler. No doubt in
the sequel these defects would have disappeared; experience would have
induced a kindlier temper and the sense of an impending doom would have
made it essential for him to relent in order to learn the great secret
about his successor.

Pathos is repeatedly appealed to in the play. Hephaestus is one of the
kindliest figures in Greek tragedy; the noble-hearted young goddesses
cannot fail to hold our affection. They are the most human Chorus in all
drama; their entry is admirable; in the sequel we should have found them
still near Prometheus after his cycle of tortures. But the subject-matter
is calculated to win the admiration of all humanity; it is the persecution
of him to whom on Greek principles mankind owes all that it is of value in
its civilisation. We cannot help thinking of another God, racked and
tormented and nailed to a cross of shame to save the race He loved. The
very power and majesty of Aeschylus’ work has made it difficult for
successors to imitate him; few can hope to equal his sublime grandeur;
Shelley attempted it in his Prometheus Unbound, but his Prometheus
becomes abstract Humanity, ceasing to be a character, while his play is
really a mere poem celebrating the inevitable victory of man over the
evils of his environment and picturing the return of an age of happiness.

Nearly all the characters in Greek tragedy were the heroes of well-known
popular legends. In abandoning the well-trodden circle Aeschylus has here
ensured an undying freshness for his work—it is novel, free and
unconventional; more than that, it is dignified.

The slightest error of taste would have degraded if to the level of a
comedy; throughout it maintains a uniform tone of loftiness and sincerity.
The language is easy but powerful, the art with which the story is told is
consummate. Finally, it is one of the few pieces in the literature of the
world which are truly sublime; it ranks with Job and Dante. The great
purpose of creation, the struggles of beings of terrific power, the
majesty of gods, the whole universe sighing and lamenting for the agonies
of a deity of wondrous foresight, saving others but not himself—such
is the theme of this mighty and affecting play.

In 458 Aeschylus wrote the one trilogy which is extant. It describes the
murder of Agamemnon, the revenge of Orestes and his purification from
blood-guiltiness. It will be necessary to trace the history of Agamemnon’s
family before we can understand these plays. His great-grandfather was
Tantalus, who betrayed the secrets of the gods and was subjected to
unending torture in Hades. Pelops, his son, begat two sons, Atreus and
Thyestes. The former killed Thyestes’ son, invited the father to a banquet
and served up his own son’s body for him to eat. The sons of Atreus were
Agamemnon and Menelaus, who married respectively Clytemnestra and Helen,
daughters of Zeus and Leda, both evil women; the son of Thyestes was
Aegisthus, a deadly foe of his cousins who had banished him. The
“inherited curse” then had developed itself in this unhappy stock and it
did not fail to ruin it.

When Helen abandoned Menelaus and went to Troy with Paris, Agamemnon led a
great armament to recover the adulteress. The fleet was wind-bound at
Aulis, because the Greeks had offended Artemis. Chalcas the seer informed
Agamemnon that it would be impossible for him to reach Troy unless he
offered his eldest daughter Iphigeneia to Artemis. Torn by patriotism and
fatherly affection, Agamemnon resorted to a strategem to bring his
daughter to the sacrifice. He sent a messenger to Clytemnestra saying he
wished to marry their child to Achilles. When the mother and daughter
arrived at Aulis they learned the bitter truth. Iphigeneia was indeed
sacrificed, but Artemis spirited her away to the country now called
Crimea, there to serve as her priestess. Believing that her daughter was
dead, Clytemnestra returned to Argos to plot destruction for her husband,
forming an illicit union with his foe Aegisthus, nursing her revenge
during the ten years of the siege.

The Agamemnon, the first play of the trilogy, opens in a romantic
setting. It is night. A watchman is on the wall of Argos, stationed there
by the Queen. For ten years he had waited for the signal of the
beacon-fire to be lit at Nauplia, the port of Argos, to announce the fall
of Troy. At last the expected signal is given. He hurries to tell the news
to the Queen, a woman with the resolution of a man; in his absence the
Chorus of Argive Elders enter the stage, singing one of the finest odes to
be found in any language. It likens Agamemnon and his brother to two
avenging spirits sent to punish the sinner. The Chorus are past military
age, and are come to learn from Clytemnestra why there is sacrifice
throughout all Argos. They remember the woes at the beginning of the
campaign, how Chalcas prophesied that in time Troy would be taken, yet
hinted darkly of some blinding curse of Heaven hanging over the Greeks,
his burden being

Clytemnestra enters, the sternest woman figure in all literature. She
reminds the Chorus that she is no child and is not known to have a
slumbering wit. When they enquire how she has learned so quickly of the
capture of Troy, she describes with great brilliance the long chain of
beacon fires she has caused to be made, stretching from Ida in Troyland to
Argos. She imagines the wretched fate of the conquered and the joy of the
victors, rid for ever of their watchings beneath the open sky. Striking
the same ominous note as Chalcas did, she continues:

This speech inspires the Chorus to sing another solemn ode. Too much
prosperity leads to godlessness; Paris carried away Helen in pride and
infatuation, stealing the light of Menelaus’ eyes, leaving him only the
torturing memories of her beauty which visited him in his dreams. But
there is a spirit of discontent in every city of Greece; all had sent
their young men to Troy in the glory of life, and in return they had a
handful of ashes, asking why their sons should fall in murderous strife
for another man’s wife. At night the dark dread haunts Argos that the gods
care not for men who shed much blood, who succeed by injustice, who are
well spoken of overmuch. Often these are smitten full in the face by the
thunderbolt; and perhaps this beacon message is mere imagining or a lie
sent from heaven.

Hearing this the Queen comes forth to prove the truth of her story. A
herald at that moment advances to confirm it, for Troy has been sacked.

Immediately after learning this story, Clytemnestra makes the first of a
number of speeches charged with a dreadful double meaning.

The Chorus understand well the hidden force of this sinister speech and
bid the messenger speak of Menelaus, the other beloved King of the land.
In reply he tells how a dreadful storm sent by the angry gods descended
upon the Greek fleet. In it fire and water, those ancient foes, forsook
their feud, conspiring to destroy the unhappy armament. Whether Menelaus
was alive or not was uncertain; if he lived, it was only by the will of
Zeus who desired to save the royal house. The Chorus who look at things
with a deeper glance than the herald, hear his story with a growing
uneasiness.

They touch a more joyous chord of welcome and loyalty when at last they
see the actual arrival of Agamemnon himself.

The King enters the stage accompanied by Cassandra, the prophetic daughter
of Priam, thus giving visible proof of his contempt for Apollo, the Trojan
protector and inspirer of the prophetess. He has heard the Chorus’ welcome
and promises to search out the false friends and administer healing
medicine to the city. Clytemnestra replies in a second speech of double
significance.

After some words of extravagant flattery, she bids her waiting women lay
down purple carpets on which Justice may bring him to a home which he
never hoped to see. Agamemnon coldly deprecates her long speech; the
honour she suggests is one for the gods alone; his fame will speak loud
enough without gaudy trappings, for a wise heart is Heaven’s greatest
gift. But the Queen, not to be denied, overcomes his scruples. Giving
orders that Cassandra is to be well treated, he passes over the purple
carpets, led by Clytemnestra who avows that she would have given many
purple carpets to get him home alive. Thus arrogating to himself the
honours of a god, he proceeds within the palace, while she lingers behind
for one brief moment to pray openly to Zeus to fulfil her prayers and to
bring his will to its appointed end. Thoroughly alarmed, the Chorus give
free utterance to the vague forebodings which shake them, the song of the
avenging Furies which cries within their hearts.

These pious hopes are broken by the entry of the Queen who summons
Cassandra within: when the captive prophetess answers her not a word,
Clytemnestra declares she has no time to waste outside the palace: already
there stands at the altar the ox ready for sacrifice, a joy she never
looked to have; if Cassandra will not obey, she must be taught to foam out
her spirit in blood.

In the marvellous scene which follows Aeschylus reaches the pinnacle of
tragic power. Cassandra advances to the palace, but starts back in horror
as a series of visions of growing vividness comes before her eyes. These
find utterance in language of blended sanity and madness, creating a
terror whose very vagueness increases its intensity. First she sees
Atreus’ cruel murder of his brother’s children; then follows the sight of
Clytemnestra’s treacherous smile and of Agamemnon in the bath, hand after
hand reaching at him; quickly she sees the net cast about him, the
murderess’ blow. In a flash she foresees her own end and breaks out into a
wild lament over the ruin of her native city. Her words work up the Chorus
into a state of confused dread and foreboding; they can neither understand
nor yet disbelieve. When their mental confusion is at its height, relief
comes in a prophecy of the greatest clearness, no longer couched in
riddling terms. The palace is peopled by a band of kindred Furies, who
have drunk their fill of human blood and cannot be cast out; they sit
there singing the story of the origin of its ruin, loathing the murder of
the innocent children. Agamemnon himself would soon pay the penalty, but
his son would come to avenge him. Foretelling her own death, she hurls
away the badges of her office, the sceptre and oracular chaplets, things
which have brought her nothing but ridicule. She prays for a peaceful end
without a struggle; comparing human life to a shadow when it is fortunate
and to a picture wiped out by a sponge when it is hapless, she moves in
calmly to her fate.

There is a momentary interval of reflection, then Agamemnon’s dying voice
is heard as he is stricken twice. Frantic with horror, the Chorus prepare
to rush within but are checked by the Queen, who throws open the door and
stands glorying in the triumph of self-confessed murder. Her real
character is revealed in her speech.

To their solemn warning that she would herself be cut off, banished and
hated, she replies:

A little later she denies her very humanity.

Burial he should have, but without any dirges from his people.

The last scene of this splendid drama brings forward the poltroon
Aegisthus who had skulked behind in the background till the deed was done.
He enters to air his ancient grievance, reminding the Chorus how his
father was outraged by Atreus, how he himself was a banished man, yet
found his arm long enough to smite the King from far away. In contempt for
the coward the Elders prepare to offer him battle; they appeal to Orestes
to avenge the murder. The quarrel was stopped by Clytemnestra, who had had
enough of bloodshed and was content to leave things as they were, if the
gods consented thereto.

Before the sustained power of this masterpiece criticism is nearly dumb.
The conception of the inherited curse is by now familiar to us; familiar
too is the teaching that sacrilege brings its own punishment, that human
pride may be flattered into assuming the privilege of a deity. These were
enough to cause Agamemnon’s undoing. But it is the part played by
Clytemnestra which fixes the dramatic interest. She is inspired by a lust
for vengeance, yet, had she known the truth that her daughter was not dead
but a priestess, she would have had no pretext for the murder. This
ignorance of essentials which originates some human action is called
Irony; it was put to dramatic uses for the first time in European
literature by Aeschylus. The horrible tragedy it may cause is clear enough
in the Agamemnon; its power is terrible and its value as a dramatic
source is inestimable. There is another and a far more subtle form of
Irony, in which a character uses riddling speech interpreted by another
actor in a sense different from the truth as it is known to the
spectators; this too can be used in such a manner as to charge human
speech with a sinister double meaning which bodes ruin under the mask of
words of innocence. Few dramatic personages have used this device so
effectively as Clytemnestra, certainly none with a more fiendish intent.
Again, in this play the Chorus is employed with amazing skill; their vague
uneasiness takes more and more definitely the shape of actual terror in
every ode; this terror is raised to its height in the masterly Cassandra
scene—it is then abated a little, perhaps it is just beginning to
disappear, for nobody believed Cassandra, when the blow falls. This
integral connection between the Chorus and the main action is difficult to
maintain; that it exists in the Agamemnon is evidence of a
constructive genius of the highest order.

The Choephori (Libation-bearers), the second play of the trilogy,
opens with the entry of Orestes. He has just laid a lock of hair on his
father’s tomb and sees a band of maidens approaching, among them Electra,
his sister. He retires with Pylades his faithful friend to listen to their
conversation. The Chorus tell how in consequence of a dream of
Clytemnestra they have been sent to offer libations to the dead, to
appease their anger and resentment against the murderers. They give
utterance to a wild hopeless song, full of a presentiment of disaster
coming on successful wickedness enthroned in power. They are captives from
Troy, obliged to look on the deeds of Aegisthus, whether just or unjust,
yet they weep for the purposeless agonies of Agamemnon’s house. When asked
by Electra what prayers she should offer to her dead father, they bid her
pray for some avenging god or mortal to requite the murderers. Returning
to them from the tomb, she tells them of a strange occurrence; a lock of
hair has been laid on the grave, and there are two sets of footprints on
the ground, one of which corresponds with her own. Orestes then comes
forward to reveal himself; as a proof of his identity, he bids her
consider the garments which she wove with her own hands; urging her to
restrain her joy lest she betray his arrival, he tells how Apollo has
commanded him to avenge his father’s death, threatening him with sickness,
frenzy, nightly terrors, excommunication and a dishonoured death if he
refuses.

In a long choral dialogue the actors tell of Clytemnestra’s insolent
treatment of the dead King; she had buried him without funeral rites or
mourning, with no subjects to follow the corpse; she even mangled his body
and thrust Electra out of the palace; thus she filled the cup of her
iniquity. The Chorus remind Orestes of his duty to act, but first he
inquires why oblations have been offered; on learning that they are the
result of Clytemnestra’s dreaming that she suckled a serpent that stung
her, and that she hopes to appease the angry dead, he interprets the dream
of himself. He then unfolds his plot. He and Pylades will imitate a
Phocian dialect and will seek out and slay Aegisthus. An ode which
succeeds recounts the legends of evil women, closing with the declaration
that Justice is firmly seated in the world, that Fate prepares a sword for
a murderer and a Fury punishes him with it.

Approaching the palace Orestes summons the Queen and tells her that a
stranger called Strophius bade him bring to Argos the news that Orestes is
dead. Clytemnestra commands her servants within the house to welcome him
and sends out her son’s old nurse Cilissa to take the news to Aegisthus.
The nurse stops to speak to the Chorus in the very language of grief for
the boy she had reared, like Constance in King John. The Chorus
advise her to summon Aegisthus alone without his bodyguard, for Orestes is
not yet dead; when she departs they pray that the end may be speedily
accomplished and the royal house cleansed of its curse. Aegisthus crosses
the stage into the palace to meet a hasty end; seeing the deed, a servant
rushes out to call Clytemnestra, while Orestes bursts out from the house
and faces his mother. For a moment his resolution wavers; Pylades reminds
him of Apollo’s anger if he fails. To his mother’s plea that Destiny
abetted her deed he replies that Destiny intends her death likewise;
before he thrusts her into the palace she warns him of the avenging Furies
she will send to persecute him. She then passes to her doom.

After the Chorus have sung an ode of triumph Orestes shows the bodies of
the two who loved in sin while alive and were not separated in death. He
then displays the net which Clytemnestra threw around her husband’s body
and the robe in which she caught his feet; he holds up the garment through
which Aegisthus’ dagger ran. But in that very moment the cloud of more
agonies to come descends upon the hapless family. In obedience to Apollo’s
command he takes the suppliant’s branch and chaplet, and prepares to
hasten to Delphi, a wanderer cut off from his native land. The dreadful
shapes of the avenging Furies close in upon him: the fancies of incipient
madness thicken on his mind: he is hounded out, his only hope of rest
being Apollo’s sacred shrine. The play ends with a note of hopelessness,
of calamity without end.

After the Agamemnon this play reads weak indeed. Yet it displays
two marked characteristics. It is full of vigorous action; the plot is
quickly conceived and quickly consummated; the business is soon over.
Further, Aeschylus has discovered yet another source of tragic power, the
conflict of duties. Orestes has to choose between obedience to Apollo and
reverence for his mother. That these duties are incompatible is clear;
whichever he performed, punishment was bound to follow. It is in this
enforced choice between two evils that the pathos of life is often to be
found; that Aeschylus should have so faithfully depicted it is a great
contribution to the growth of drama.

The concluding play, the Eumenides, calls for a briefer
description. It opens with one of the most awe-inspiring scenes which the
imagination of man has conceived. The priestess of Delphi finds a man
sitting as a suppliant at the central point of the earth, his hands
dripping with blood, a sword and an olive branch in his hand. Round him is
slumbering a troop of dreadful forms, beings from darkness, the avengers.
When the scene is disclosed, Apollo himself is seen standing at Orestes’
side. He urges Hermes to convey the youth with all speed to Athens where
he is to clasp the ancient image of Athena. Immediately the ghost of
Clytemnestra arises; waking the sleeping forms, she bids them fly after
their victim. They arise and confront Apollo, a younger deity, whom they
reproach for protecting one who should be abandoned to them. Apollo
replies with a charge that they are prejudiced in favour of Clytemnestra,
whom, though a murderess, they had never tormented.

The scene rapidly changes to Athens, where Orestes calls upon Athena;
confident in the privilege of their ancient office the Chorus awaits the
issue. The goddess appears and consents to try the case, the Council of
the Areopagus acting as a jury. Apollo first defends his action in saving
Orestes, asserting that he obeys the will of Zeus. The main question is,
which of the two parents is more to be had in honour?

Athena herself had no mother; the female is merely the nurse of the child,
the father being the true generative source. The Chorus points out that
the sin of slaying a husband is not the same as that of murdering a
mother, for the one implies kinship, while the other does not. Athena
advises the Court to judge without fear or favour. When the votes are
counted, it is found that they are exactly even. The goddess casts her
vote for Orestes, who is thus saved and restored.

The Chorus threaten that ruin and sterility shall visit Athena’s city;
they are elder gods, daughters of night, and are overridden by younger
deities. But Athena by the power of her persuasion offers them a full
share in all the honours and wealth of Attica if they will consent to take
up their abode in it. They shall be revered by countless generations and
will gain new dignities such as they could not have otherwise obtained.
Little by little their resentment is overcome; they are conducted to their
new home to change their name and become the kindly goddesses of the land.

The boldness of Aeschylus is most evident in this play. Not content with
raising a ghost as he had done in the Persae, he actually shows
upon a public stage the two gods whom the Athenians regarded as the
special objects of their worship. More than this, he has brought to the
light the dark powers of the underworld in all their terrors; it is said
that at the sight of them some of the women in the audience were taken
with the pangs of premature birth. The introduction of these supernatural
figures was the most vivid means at Aeschylus’ disposal for bringing home
to the minds of his contemporaries the seriousness of the dramatic issue.
It will be remembered that the Prometheus was the last echo of the
contest between two races of gods. The same strain of thought has made the
poet represent the struggle in the mind of Orestes as a trial between the
primeval gods and the newer stock; the result was the same, the older and
perhaps more terrifying deities are beaten, being compelled to change
their names and their character to suit the gentler spirit which a
religion takes to itself as it develops. At any rate, such is Aeschylus’
solution of the eternal question, “What atonement can be made for
bloodshed and how can it be secured?” The problem is of the greatest
interest; it may be that there is no real answer for it, but it is at
least worth while to examine the attempts which have been made to solve
it.

Before we begin to attempt an estimate of Aeschylus it is well to face the
reasons which make Greek drama seem a thing foreign to us. We are at times
aware that it is great, but we cannot help asking, “Is it real?” Modern it
certainly is not. In the first place, the Chorus was all-important to the
Greeks, but is non-existent with us. To them drama was something more than
action, it was music and dancing as well. Yet as time went on, the Greeks
themselves found the Chorus more and more difficult to manage and it was
discarded as a feature of the main plot. Only in a very few instances
could a play be constructed in such a manner as to allow the Chorus any
real influence on the story. Aeschylus’ skill in this branch of his art is
really extraordinary; the Chorus does take a part, and a vital part too,
in the play. Again, the number of Greek actors was limited, whereas in a
modern play their number is just as great as suits playwright’s
convenience or his capacity. The impression then of a Greek play is that
it is a somewhat thin performance compared with the vivacity and
complexity of the great Elizabethans. The plot, where it exists, seems
very narrow in Attic drama; it could hardly be otherwise in a society
which was content with a repeated discussion of a rather close cycle of
heroic legends. Yet here, too, we might note how Aeschylus trod out of the
narrow circumscribed round, notably in the Prometheus and the Persoe.
Lastly, the Greek play is short when compared with a full-bodied five-act
tragedy. It must be remembered, however, that very often these plays are
only a third part of the real subject dealt with by the playwright.

All Greek tragedy is liable to these criticisms; it is not fair to judge a
process just beginning by the standards of an art which thinks itself
full-blown after many centuries of history. Considering the meagre
resources available for Aeschylus—the masks used by Greek actors
made it impossible for any of them to win a reputation or to add to the
fame of a play—we ought to admire the marvellous success he
achieved. His defects are clear enough; his teaching is a little archaic,
his plots are sometimes weak or not fully worked out, his tendency is to
description instead of vigorous action, he has a superabundance of choric
matter. Sometimes it is said that the doctrine of an inherited curse on
which much of his work is written is false; let it be remembered that week
by week a commandment is read in our churches which speaks of visiting the
sins of the fathers upon the third and fourth generation of them that hate
God; all that is needed to make Aeschylus’ doctrine “real” in the sense of
“modern” is to substitute the nineteenth-century equivalent Heredity. That
he has touched on a genuine source of drama will be evident to readers of
Ibsen’s Ghosts. More serious is the objection that his work is not
dramatic at all; the actors are not really human beings acting as such,
for their wills and their deeds are under the control of Destiny. What
then shall we say of this from Hamlet:—

In this matter we are on the threshold of one of our insoluble problems—the
freedom of the will. An answer to this real fault in Aeschylus will be
found in the subsequent history of the Attic drama attempted in the next
two chapters. Suffice it to say that, whether the will is free or not, we
act as if it were, and that is enough to represent (as Aeschylus has done)
human beings acting on a stage as we ourselves would do in similar
circumstances, for the discussions about Destiny are very often to be
found in the mouths not of the characters, but of the Chorus, who are
onlookers.

The positive excellences of Aeschylus are numerous enough to make us
thankful that he has survived. His style is that of the great sublime
creators in art, Dante, Michaelangelo, Marlowe; it has many a “mighty
line”. His subjects are the Earth, the Heavens, the things under the
Earth; more, he reveals a period of unsuspected antiquity, the present
order of gods being young and somewhat inexperienced. He carries us back
to Creation and shows us the primeval deities, Earth, Night, Necessity,
Fate, powers simply beyond the knowledge of ordinary thoughtless men. His
characters are cast in a mighty mould; he taps the deepest tragic springs;
he teaches that all is not well when we prosper. The thoughtless,
light-hearted, somewhat shallow mind which thinks it can speak, think, and
act without having to render an account needs the somewhat stern tonic of
these seven dramas; it may be chastened into some sobriety and learn to be
a little less flippant and irreverent.

Aeschylus’ influence is rather of the unseen kind. His genius is of a
lofty type which is not often imitated. Demanding righteousness, justice,
piety, and humility, he belongs to the class of Hebrew prophets who saw
God and did not die.

TRANSLATIONS:—

Miss Swanwick; E. D. A. Morshead; Campbell (all in verse). Paley (prose).

Versions also appear in Verrall’s editions of separate plays (Macmillan).

An admirable volume called Greek Tragedy by G. Norwood (Methuen)
contains a summary of the latest views on the art of the Athenian
dramatists.

See Symonds’ Greek Poets as above.

SOPHOCLES

In Aeschylus’ dramas the will of the gods tended to override human
responsibility. An improvement could be effected by making the personages
real captains of their souls; drama needed bringing down from heaven to
earth. This process was effected by Sophocles. He was born at Colonus,
near Athens, in 495, mixed with the best society in Periclean times, was a
member of the important board of administrators who controlled the Delian
League, the nucleus of the Athenian Empire, and composed over one hundred
tragedies. In 468 he defeated Aeschylus, won the first prize twenty-two
times and later had to face the more formidable opposition of the new and
restless spirit whose chief spokesman was Euripides. For nearly forty
years he was taken to be the typical dramatist of Athens, being nicknamed
“the Bee”; his dramatic powers showed no abatement of vigour in old age,
of which the Oedipus Coloneus was the triumphant issue. He died in
405, full of years and honours.

Providence has ordained it that his art, like his country’s tutelary
goddess Athena, should step perfect and fully armed from the brain of its
creator. The Antigone, produced in 440, discusses one of the
deepest problems of civilised life. On the morning after the defeat of the
Seven who assaulted Thebes Polyneices’ body lay dishonoured and unburied,
a prey to carrion birds before the gates of the city which had been his
home. His two sisters, Antigone and Ismene, discuss the edict which
forbids his burial. Ismene, the more timid of the two, intends to obey it,
but Antigone’s stronger character rises in rebellion.

Loss of burial was the most awful fate which could overtake a Greek—before
he died Sophocles was to see his country condemn ten generals to death for
neglect of burial rites, though they had been brilliantly successful in a
naval engagement. Rather than obey Antigone would die.

Here is the source of the tragedy, the will of the individual in conflict
with established authority.

A chorus of Theban elders enters, singing an ode of deliverance and joy;
they have been summoned by Creon, the new King, uncle of Oedipus’
children. Full of the sense of his own importance Creon states the
official view. Polyneices is to remain unburied.

The elders promise obedience, but grave news is reported by a guard who
has been set to watch the corpse. Someone had scattered dust lightly over
the dead and departed without leaving any trace; neither he nor his
companions had done the deed.

When the Chorus suggest that it is the work of some deity, Creon answers
in great impatience:

He angrily thrusts the watchman forth, threatening to hang him and his
companions alive unless they find the culprit.

Such is the ordinary man’s view of the action of Polyneices, for in
Sophocles the Chorus certainly represents average public opinion. It is
quickly challenged by the entry of Antigone with the Watchman, whose story
Creon hastens out to hear. With no little self-satisfaction the Watchman
tells how they caught the girl in the very act of replacing the dust they
had removed and pouring libations over the dead. Antigone admits the deed.
When asked how she dare defy the official ordinance, she replies—

Creon replies that this is sheer insolence; it is an insult that he, a
man, should give way to a woman. He threatens to destroy both girls, but
Antigone is sure that public opinion is with her, though for the moment it
is muzzled through fear. Ismene is brought in and offers to die with her
sister; Antigone refuses her offer, insisting that she alone has deserved
chastisement.

In a second ode the gradual extinction of Oedipus’ race is described,
owing to foolish word and insensate thought, for “when Heaven leads a man
to ruin it makes him believe that evil is good”. A new interest is added
by Creon’s son Haemon, the affianced lover of Antigone, who comes to
interview his father. This is the first instance in European drama of that
without which much modern literature would have little reason for existing
at all—the love element, wisely kept in check by the Greeks. A
further conflict of wills adds to the dramatic effect of the play; Creon
insists on filial obedience, for he cannot claim to rule a city if he
fails to control his own family. Haemon answers with courtesy and
deference; he points out that the force of public opinion is behind
Antigone and suggests that the official view may perhaps be wrong because
it is the expression of an individual’s judgment. When he is himself
charged thus directly with the very fault for which he claimed to punish
Antigone, Creon lets his temper get the mastery; after a violent quarrel
Haemon parts from him with a dark threat that the girl’s death will remove
more than one person, and vows never to cross his father’s doorstep again.

Antigone is soon carried away to her doom; she is to be shut up in a
cavern without food. In a dialogue of great beauty she confesses her human
weakness—death is near, and with it banishment from the joys of
life. Creon bids her make an end; her last speech concludes with a clear
statement of the problem. Who knows if she is right? She herself will know
after death. If she has erred, she will confess it; if the King is wrong,
she prays he may not suffer greater woes than her own.

A reaction now occurs. Teiresias, the blind seer, seeks out Creon because
of the failure of his sacrificial rites; the birds of the air are gorged
with human blood, and fail to give the signs of augury. He bids Creon
return to his right senses and quit his stubbornness. When the latter
mockingly accuses the seer of being bribed, he learns the dread punishment
his obstinacy has brought him.

Cowed by the terror, the King hurries to undo his work, calling for
pickaxes to open the tomb and himself going with all speed to set free its
victim.

The sequel is told by a messenger who at the outset strikes a note of woe.

Hearing the news, Eurydice the Queen comes out, and bids him tell his
story in full. Creon found Haemon clasping the body of Antigone who had
hung herself. Seeing his father, he made a murderous attack on him; when
it failed, he drew his sword and fell on it—thus in death the two
lovers were not separated. In an ominous silence the Queen departs. Creon
enters with his son’s body, to be utterly shattered by a second and an
unexpected blow, for his wife has slain herself. Broken and helpless he
admits his fault, while the Chorus sing in conclusion:—

To Aeschylus the power that largely controlled men’s acts was Destiny. A
notable contrast is visible in the system of Sophocles. Destiny does not
disappear, rather it retires into the background of his thought. To him
the leading cause of ruin is evil counsel. Over and over again this
teaching is driven home. All the leading characters mention it, Antigone,
Haemon, Teiresias, and when it is disregarded, it is remorselessly brought
home by disaster. The dramatic gain is enormous; man’s sorrows are
ascribed primarily to his own lack of judgment, the tragic character takes
on a more human shape, for he is more nearly related to the ordinary
persons we meet in our own experience. Another great advance is visible in
the construction of the plot. It is more varied, more flexible; it never
ceases developing, the action continuing to the end instead of stopping
short at a climax. Further, the Chorus begins to fall into a more humble
position, it exercises but little influence on the great figures of the
plot, being content to mirror the opinions of the interested outside
spectator. Truly drama is beginning to be master of itself—”the
play’s the thing”.

But far more important is the subject of this play. It raises one of the
most difficult problems which demand a solution, the harmonisation of
private judgment with state authority. The individual in a growing
civilisation sooner or later asks how far he ought to obey, who is the
lord over his convictions, whether disobedience is ever justifiable. If a
law is wrong how are we to make its immorality evident? In an age when a
central authority is questioned or loses its hold on men’s allegiance,
this problem will imperiously demand an answer. When Europe was aroused
from the slumber of the Middle Ages and the spiritual authority which had
governed it for centuries was shattered, the same right of resistance as
that which Antigone claimed was insisted upon by various reformers. It did
not fail to bring with it tragic consequences, for the “power beareth not
the sword in vain”. Its sequel was the Thirty Years’ War which barbarised
central Germany, leaving in many places a race of savage beings who had
once been human. In our own days resistance is preached almost as a sacred
duty. We have passive resisters, conscientious objectors, strikers and a
host of young and imperfectly educated persons, some armed with the very
serious power of voting, who claim to set their wills in flat opposition
to recognised authority. One or two contributions to the solution of this
problem may be found in the Antigone. The central authority must be
prepared to prove that its edicts are not below the moral standard of the
age; on the other hand, non-compliance must be backed by the force of
public opinion; it must show that the action it takes will ultimately
bring good to the whole community. It is of little use to appeal to the
so-called conscience unless we can produce some credentials of the proper
training and enlightenment of that rather vague and uncertain faculty,
whose normal province is to condemn wrong acts, not to justify
law-breaking. Most resisters talk the very language of Antigone, appealing
to the will of Heaven; would that they could prove as satisfactorily as
she did that the power behind them is that which governs the world in
righteousness.

A somewhat similar problem reappears in the Ajax. This play opens
at early dawn with a dialogue between Athena, who is unseen, and Odysseus;
the latter has traced Ajax to his tent after a night of madness in which
he has slain much cattle and many shepherds, imagining them to be his
foes, especially Odysseus himself who had worsted him in the contest for
the arms of Achilles. Athena calls out the beaten hero for a moment and
the sight of him moves Odysseus to say:—

To this Athena replies:—

A band of mariners from Salamis enter as the chorus; they are Ajax’
followers who have come to learn the truth. They are confronted by
Tecmessa, Ajax’ captive, who confirms the grievous rumour, describing his
mad acts. When the fit was over, she had left him in his tent prostrate
with grief and shame among the beasts he had slain, longing for vengeance
on his enemies before he died.

The business of the play now begins. Coming forth, Ajax in a long
despairing speech laments his lot—persecuted by Athena, hated of
Greeks and Trojans alike, the secret laughter of his enemies.

Where shall he go? Home to the father he has disgraced? Against Troy,
leading a forlorn hope? He had already reminded Tecmessa with some
sternness that silence is a woman’s best grace; now she appeals to his
pity. Bereft of him, she would speedily be enslaved and mocked; their son
would be left defenceless; the many kindnesses she had done him cry for
some return from a man of chivalrous nature, Ajax bade her be of good
cheer; she must obey him in all things and first must bring his son
Eurysaces. Taking him in his arms, he says:—

He reflects that his son will be safe as long as Teucer lives, whom he
charges on his return to take the boy to his own father and mother to be
their joy. His arms shall not be a prize to be striven for; they should be
buried with him except his shield, which his son should take and keep.
This ominous speech dashes the hopes which he had raised in Tecmessa’s
heart, even the Chorus sadly admitting that death is the best for a
brainsick man, born of the highest blood, no longer true to his character.

Ajax re-enters, a sword in his hands. He feels his heart touched by
Tecmessa’s words and pities her helplessness. He resolves to go to the
shore and there bury the accursed sword he had of Hector, which had robbed
him of his peace. He will soon learn obedience to the gods and his
leaders; all the powers of Nature are subject to authority, the seasons,
the sea, night and sleep. He has but now learned that an enemy is to be
hated as one who will love us later, while friendship will not always
abide. Yet all will be well; he will go the journey he cannot avoid; soon
all will hear that his evil destiny has brought him salvation. This
splendid piece of tragic irony is interpreted at its surface value by the
Chorus, who burst into a song of jubilation. But the words have a darker
meaning; this transient joy is but the last flicker of hope before it is
quenched in everlasting night.

A messenger brings the news that Teucer, Ajax’ brother, on his return to
the camp from a raid was nearly stoned to death as the kinsman of the
army’s foe. He inquires where Ajax is; hearing that he had gone out to
make atonement, he knows the terror that is to come. Chalcas the seer
adjured Teucer to use all means in his power to keep Ajax in his tent that
day, for in it alone Athena’s wrath would persecute him. She had punished
him with madness for two proud utterances. On leaving his father he had
boasted he would win glory in spite of Heaven, and later had bidden Athena
assist the other Greeks, for the line would never break where he stood.
Such was his pride, and such its punishment. Tecmessa hurries in and sends
some to fetch Teucer, others to go east and west to seek out her lord. The
scene rapidly changes to the shore, where Ajax cries to the gods,
imprecates his foes, prays to Death, and after a remembrance of his native
land falls on his sword.

The Chorus enter in two bands, but find nothing. Tecmessa discovers the
body in a brake, and hides it under her robe. Distracted and haunted by
the dread of slavery and ridicule, she gives way to grief. Teucer enters
to learn of the tragedy; after dispatching Tecmessa to save the child
while there is yet time, he reflects on his own state. Telamon his father
will cast him off for being absent in his brother’s hour of weakness whom
he loved as his own life. Sadly he bears out the truth of Ajax utterance,
that a foe’s gifts are fraught with ruin; the belt that Ajax gave Hector
served to tie his feet to Achilles’ car—and Hector’s sword was in
his brother’s heart.

The plot now appeals to fiercer passions. Menelaus entering commands
Teucer to leave the corpse where it is, for an enemy shall receive no
burial. He strikes the same note as Creon:—

Teucer answers that Ajax never was a subject, but was always an equal. He
fought, not for Helen, but for his oath’s sake. The dispute waxes hot; the
calm dignity of Teucer easily discomfits the Spartan braggart, who departs
to bring aid. Meanwhile Tecmessa returns with the child whom Teucer in a
scene of consummate pathos bids kneel at his father’s side, holding in his
hand a triple lock of hair—Teucer’s, his mother’s, his own; this
sacred symbol, if violated, would bring a curse on any who dared outrage
him. While the Chorus sing a song full of longings for home, Agamemnon
advances to the place, followed by Teucer. The King is deliberately
insolent, reviling Teucer for the stain on his birth. In reply the latter
in a great speech reminds him that there was a time when the flames licked
the Greek ships and there was none to save them but Ajax, who had faced
Hector single-handed. With kindling passion he hurls the taunt of a
stained birth back on Agamemnon and plainly tells him that Ajax shall be
buried and that the King will rue any attempt at violence. Odysseus comes
in to hear the quarrel. He admits that he had once been the foe of the
dead man, who yet had no equal in bravery except Achilles. For all that,
enmity in men should end where death begins. Astonished at this defence of
a foe, Agamemnon argues a little with Odysseus, who gently reminds him
that one day he too will need burial. This human appeal obtains the
necessary permission; Odysseus, left alone with Teucer, offers him
friendship. Too much overcome by surprise and joy to say many words,
Teucer accepts his friendship and the play ends with a ray of sunlight
after storm and gloom.

Once more Sophocles has filled every inch of his canvas. The plot never
flags and has no diminuendo after the death of Ajax. The cause of the
tragedy is not plainly indicated at the outset; with a skill which is
masterly, Sophocles represents in the opening scene Athena and Odysseus as
beings purely odious, mocking a great man’s fall. With the progress of the
action these two characters recover their dignity; Athena has just cause
for her anger, while Odysseus obtains for the dead his right of burial. We
should notice further how the pathos of this fine play is heightened by
the conception of the “one day” which brought ruin to a noble warrior. Had
he been kept within his tent that one day—had this fatal day been
known, the ruin need not have happened. “The pity of it”, the needless
waste of human life, what a theme is there for a tragedy!

The Ajax has never exercised an acknowledged influence on
literature. It was a favourite with the Greeks, but modern writers have
strangely overlooked it. For us it has a good lesson. Here was a hero,
born in an island, who unaided saved a fleet when his allies were forced
back on their trenches and beyond them to the sea. His reward was such as
Wordsworth tells of:—

We remember many a long month of agony during which another island kept
destruction from a fleet and saved her allies withal. In some quarters
this island has received the gratitude which Ajax had; her friends asked,
“What has England done in the war, anyhow?” If it befits anybody to
answer, it must be England’s Teucer, who has built another Salamis
overseas, just as he did. Our kindred across the oceans will give us the
reward of praise; for us the chastisement of Ajax may serve to reinforce
the warning which is to be found on the lips of not the least of our own
poets:—

The Electra is Sophocles’ version of the revenge of Orestes which
Aeschylus described in the Choephori and is useful as affording a
comparison between the methods of the two masters. An aged tutor at early
dawn enters the scene with Orestes to whom he shows his father’s palace
and then departs with him to offer libations at the dead king’s tomb.
Electra with a Chorus of Argive girls comes forward, the former describing
the insolent conduct of Clytemnestra who holds high revelry on the
anniversary of her husband’s death and curses Electra for saving Orestes.
Chrysothemis, another daughter, comes out to talk with Electra; she is of
a different mould, gentle and timid like Ismene, and warns Electra that in
consequence of her obstinacy in revering her father’s memory Aegisthus
intends to shut her up in a rocky cavern as soon as he returns. She
advises her to use good counsel, then departs to pour on Agamemnon’s tomb
some libations which Clytemnestra offers in consequence of a dream.

The Queen finds Electra ranging abroad as usual in the absence of
Aegisthus. She defends the murder of her husband, but is easily refuted by
Electra who points out that, if it is right to exact a life for a life,
she ought to suffer death herself. Clytemnestra prays to Apollo to avert
the omen of her dream, her prayer seemingly being answered immediately by
the entry of the old tutor who comes to inform her of the death of
Orestes, killed at Delphi in a chariot race which he brilliantly
describes. Torn by her emotions, Clytemnestra can be neither glad nor
sorry.

Hearing so circumstantial a proof of her brother’s death, Electra is
plunged into the depths of misery.

But soon Chrysothemis returns in a state of high excitement. She has found
a lock of Orestes’ hair and some offerings at the tomb. Electra quickly
informs her that her elation is groundless, for their brother is dead; she
suggests that they two should strike the murderers, but Chrysothemis
recoils in horror from the plot. Then Orestes enters with a casket in his
hand; this he gives to Electra, saying it contains the mortal remains of
the dead prince. In utter hopelessness Electra takes it and soliloquises
over it. Seeing her misery, Orestes cannot refrain; gently taking the
casket from her he gradually reveals himself. The tutor enters and recalls
him to their immediate business. Electra asks who the stranger is and
learns that it is the very man to whom she gave the infant boy her
brother. The three advance to the palace which Orestes enters to dispatch
his mother, Electra bidding him smite with double force, wishing only that
Aegisthus were with her mother.

The end of Aegisthus himself is contrived with Sophoclean art. He comes in
hurriedly to find the two strangers who have proof of Orestes’ death.

Electra tells him they are in the palace; they have not only told her of
the dead Orestes, but have shown him to her; Aegisthus himself can see the
unenviable sight; he can rejoice at it, if there is any joy in it.
Exulting, he sings a note of triumph at the removal of his fears and
threatens to chastise all who try henceforth to thwart his will. He dashes
open the door, and there sees the Queen lying dead. Orestes bids him enter
the palace, to be slain on the very spot where his father was murdered.

Fortune has been kind in preserving us this play. The great difference
between the art of Sophocles and that of Aeschylus is here apparent. Only
one man has ventured to paint for us Aeschylus’ Clytemnestra; Leighton has
revealed her, stern as Nature herself, remorseless, armed with a sword to
smite first, then argue if she can find time to do so. Sophocles’
Clytemnestra is a woman, lost as soon as she begins to reason out her
misdeeds. She prays to Apollo in secret, for fear lest Electra may
overhear her prayer and make it void. But the crudity of Aeschylus’
resources did not satisfy Sophocles, whose taste demanded a contrast to
heighten the character of his heroine and found one in the Homeric story
that Agamemnon had a second daughter. Aeschylus’ stern nature did not
shrink from the sight of a meeting between mother and son; Sophocles
closed the doors upon the act of vengeance, though he represents Electra
as encouraging her brother from outside the palace. The Aegisthus incident
maintains the interest to the end in the masterly Sophoclean style of
refined and searching irony. The tone of the play is singular; from misery
it at first sinks to hopelessness, then to despair, and finally it soars
to triumphant joy. Such a dangerous venture was unattempted before.

The most lovable woman in Greek literature is the heroine of the next
play, the Trachiniae, produced at an uncertain date. Deianeira had
been won and wed by Heracles; after a brief spell of happiness she found
herself left more and more alone as her husband’s labours called him away
from her. For fifteen months she had heard no news of him. Her nurse
suggests that she should send her eldest son to Euboea to seek him out, a
rumour being abroad that he has reached that island. The mother in her
loneliness is comforted by a band of girls of Trachis, the scene of the
action. But her uneasiness is too great to be cheered; she describes the
strange curse of womanhood:—

But there is a deeper cause for anxiety; Heracles had said that if he did
not return in fifteen months he would either die or be rid for ever of his
labours; that very hour had come.

News reached her that Heracles is alive and triumphant; Lichas was coming
to give fuller details. Very soon he enters with a band of captive
maidens, telling how his master had been kept in slavery in Lydia; shaking
off the yoke, he had sacked and destroyed the city of Eurytus who had
caused his captivity, the girls were Heracles’ offering of the spoils to
Deianeira. Filled with pity at their lot, she looked closely at them and
was attracted by one of them, a silent girl of noble countenance. Lichas
when questioned denied all knowledge of her identity and departed. When he
had gone, the messenger desired private speech with Deianeira. Lichas had
lied; the girl was Iole, daughter of Eurytus; it was for her sake that his
master destroyed the city, for he loved the maid and intended to keep her
in his home to be a rival to his wife. Lichas on coming out was confronted
by the messenger, and attempted to dissemble, but Deianeira appealed to
him thus:—

Completely won by this appeal, Lichas confesses the truth.

During the singing of a choral ode Deianeira has had time to reflect. The
reward of her loyalty is to take a second place. The girl is young and her
beauty is fast ripening; she herself is losing her charm. But no prudent
woman should fly into a passion; happily she has a remedy, for in the
first days of her wedded life Heracles had shot Nessus, a half-human
monster, for insulting her. Before he died Nessus bade her steep her robe
in his blood and treasure it as a certain charm for recovering his waning
affection. Summoning Lichas, she gives him strict orders to take the robe
to Heracles who was to allow no light of the sun or fire to fall upon it
before wearing it. After a short interval, she returns in the greatest
agitation; a little tuft of wool which she had anointed with the monster’s
blood had caught the sunlight and shrivelled up to dust. If the robe
proved a means of death, she determined to slay herself rather than live
in disgrace. At that moment Hyllus bursts in to describe the horrible
tortures which seized Heracles when he put on the poisoned mantle; the
hero commanded his son to ferry him across from Euboea to witness the
curse which his mother’s evil deed would bring with it. Hearing these
tidings Deianeira leaves the scene without uttering a word.

The old nurse quickly rushes in from the palace to tell how Deianeira had
killed herself—while Hyllus was kissing her dead mother’s lips in
vain self-reproach, bereft of both his parents. Heracles himself is borne
in on a litter, tormented with the slow consuming poison. In agony, he
prays for death; when he learns of the decease of his wife and her
beguilement by Nessus into an unintentional crime, his resentment softens.
In a flash of inspiration the double meaning of the oracle comes over him,
his labour is indeed over. Commanding Hyllus to wed Iole he passes on his
last journey to the lonely top of Oeta, to be consumed on the funeral
pyre.

The Sophoclean marks are clear enough in this play—the tragic
moment, the life and movement, the splendid pathos, breadth of outlook and
fascination of language. Yet there is a serious fault as well, for
Sophocles, like the youngest of dramatists, can strangely enough make
mistakes. The entry of Heracles practically makes the play double, marring
its continuity. The necessary and remorseless sequence of events which is
looked for in dramatic writing is absent. This tendency to disrupt a whole
into parts brilliant but unrelated is a feature of Euripides’ work; it may
perhaps find a readier pardon exactly because Sophocles himself is not
able to avoid it always. But the greatest triumph is the character of
Deianeira. It is such as one would rarely find in warm-blooded Southern
peoples. She dreads that loss of her power over her husband which her
waning beauty brings; she is grossly insulted in being forced to
countenance a rival living in the same house after she has given her
husband the best years of her life; yet she hopes on, and perhaps she
would have won him back by her very gentleness. This creation of a type of
almost perfect human nature is the justification of a poet’s existence; it
was a saying of Sophocles that he painted men as they ought to be,
Euripides painted them as they are.

The rivalry of the younger poet produced its effect on another play with
which Sophocles gained the first prize in 409. Philoctetes, the
hero after whom it is named, had lit the funeral pyre of Heracles on Oeta
and had received from him his unconquerable bow and arrows. When he went
to Troy he was bitten in the foot by a serpent in Tenedos. As the wound
festered and made him loathsome to the army he was left in Lemnos in the
first year of the war. An oracle declared that Troy could not be taken
without him and his arrows; at the end of the siege, as Achilles and Ajax
were dead, Philoctetes, outraged and abandoned, became necessary to the
Greeks. How could they win him over to rejoin them?

Odysseus his bitterest foe takes with him Neoptolemus, the young son of
Achilles. Landing at Lemnos, they find the cave in which Philoctetes
lives, see his rude bed, rough-hewn cup and rags of clothing, and lay
their plot. Neoptolemus is to say that he is Achilles’ son, homeward bound
in anger with the Greeks for the loss of his father’s arms. As he was not
one of the original confederacy, Philoctetes will trust him. He is then to
obtain the bow and arrows by treachery, for violence will be useless. The
young man’s soul rises against the idea of foul play but Odysseus bids him
surrender to shamelessness for one day, to reap eternal glory. Left alone
with the Chorus, composed of sailors from his ship, Neoptolemus pities the
hero’s deserted existence, wretched, famished and half-brutalised. He
comes along towards them, creeping and crying in agony. Seeing them he
inquires who they are; Neoptolemus answers as he had been bidden and wins
the heart of Philoctetes who describes the misery of his life, his
desertion and the unquenchable malady that feeds on him. In return
Neoptolemus tells how he was beguiled to Troy by the prophecy that he
should capture it after his father’s death; arriving there he obtained
possession of all Achilles’ property except the arms, which Odysseus had
won. He pretends to return to his ship, but Philoctetes implores him to
set him once more in Greece. The great pathos of his appeal wins the
youth’s consent; they prepare to depart when a merchant enters with a
sailor; from him they learn that Odysseus with Diomedes are on the way to
bring Philoctetes by force or persuasion to Troy which cannot fall without
his aid. The mere mention of Odysseus’ name fills Philoctetes with anger
and he retires to the cave, taking Neoptolemus with him.

When they reappear, a violent attack of the malady prostrates Philoctetes
who gives his bow to Neoptolemus, praying him to burn him and put an end
to his agony. Noticing a strange silence in the youth, suspicions seem to
be aroused in him, but when he falls into a slumber the Chorus takes a
decided part in the action, advising the youth to fly with the bow and to
talk in a whisper for fear of waking the sleeper. The latter unexpectedly
starts out of slumber, again begging to be taken on board. Again
Neoptolemus’ heart smites him at the villainy he is about to commit; he
reveals that his real objective is Troy. Betrayed and defenceless,
Philoctetes appeals to Heaven, to the wild things, to Neoptolemus’ better
self to restore the bow which is his one means of procuring him food. A
profound pity overcomes Neoptolemus, who is in the act of returning the
weapon when Odysseus appears. Seeing him Philoctetes knows he is undone.
Odysseus invites him to come to Troy of his own freewill, but is met with
a curse; as he refuses to rejoin the Greeks, Odysseus and Neoptolemus
depart bearing with them the bow for Teucer to use.

Left without that which brought him his daily food Philoctetes bursts out
into a wild lyric dialogue with the Chorus. They advise him to make terms
with Odysseus, but he bids them begone. When they obey, he recalls them to
ask one little boon, a sword. At this moment Neoptolemus runs in, Odysseus
close behind him. He has come to restore the bow he got by treachery. A
violent quarrel ends in the temporary retirement of Odysseus. Advancing to
Philoctetes, Neoptolemus gives him his property; Philoctetes takes it and
is barely restrained from shooting at Odysseus who appears for a moment,
only to take refuge in flight. Neoptolemus then tells him the whole truth
about the prophecy, promising him great glory if he will go back to Troy
which can fall only through him. In vain Neoptolemus assures him of a
perfect cure; nothing will satisfy the broken man but a full redemption of
the promise he had to be landed once more in Greece. When Neoptolemus
tells him that such action will earn him the hatred of the Greeks,
Philoctetes promises him the succour of his unerring shafts in a conflict.

The action has thus reached a deadlock. The problem is solved by the
sudden appearance of the deified Heracles. He commands his old friend to
go to Troy which he is to sack, and return home in peace. His lot is
inseparably connected with that of Neoptolemus and a cure is promised him
at the hands of Asclepius. This assurance overcomes his obstinacy; he
leaves Lemnos in obedience to the will of Heaven.

Such is the work of an old dramatist well over eighty years old. It is
exciting, vigorous, pathetic and everywhere dignified. The characters of
the old hero and the young warrior are masterly. The Chorus takes an
integral part in the action—its whisperings to Neoptolemus remind
the reader of the evil suggestions of which Satan breathed into Eve’s
equally guileless ears in Paradise Lost. But the most remarkable
feature of the piece is its close resemblance to the new type of drama
which Euripides had popularised. The miserable life of Philoctetes, his
rags, destitution and sickness are a parallel to the Euripidean Telephus;
most of all, the appearance of a god at the end to untie the knot is
genuine Euripides. But there is a great difference; of the disjointed
actions which disfigure later tragedy and are not absent from Sophocles’
own earlier work there is not a trace. The odes are relevant, the Chorus
is indispensable; in short, Sophocles has shown Euripides that he can beat
him even on his own terms. Melodramatic the play may be, but it wins for
its author our affection by the sheer beauty of a boyish nature as noble
as Deianeira’s; the return of Neoptolemus upon his own baseness is one of
the many compliments Sophocles has paid to our human kind.

Many years previously Sophocles had written his masterpiece, the Oedipus
Tyrannus. It cannot easily be treated separately from its sequel. A
mysterious plague had broken out in Thebes; Creon had been sent to Delphi
by Oedipus to learn the cause of the disaster. Apollo bade the Thebans
cast out the murderer of the last King Laius, who was still lurking in
Theban territory. Oedipus on inquiry learns that there are several
murderers, but only one of Laius’ attendants escaped alive. In discovering
the culprit Oedipus promises the sternest vengeance on his nearest
friends, nay, on his own kin, if necessary. After a prayer from the Chorus
of elders he repeats his determination even more emphatically, invoking a
curse on the assassin in language of a terrible double meaning, for in
every word he utters he unconsciously pronounces his own doom. With
commendable foresight he had summoned the old seer Teiresias, but the seer
for some reason is unwilling to appear. When at last he confronts the
King, he craves permission to depart with his secret unsaid. Oedipus at
once flies into a towering passion, finally accusing him without any
justification of accepting bribes from Creon. With equal heat Teiresias
more and more clearly indicates in every speech the real murderer, though
his words are dark to him who could read the Sphinx’s riddle.

The Chorus break out into an ode full of uneasy surmises as to the
identity of the culprit. When Creon enters, Oedipus flies at him in
headlong passion accusing him of bribery, disloyalty and eventually of
murder. With great dignity he clears himself, warning the King of the
pains which hasty temper brings upon itself. Their quarrel brings out
Jocasta, the Queen and sister of Creon, who succeeds in settling the
unseemly strife. She bids Oedipus take no notice of oracles; one such had
declared that Laius would be slain by his own son, who would marry her,
his mother. The oracle was false, for Laius had died at the hands of
robbers in a place where three roads met. Aghast at hearing this, Oedipus
inquires the exact scene of the murder, the time when it was committed,
the actual appearance of Laius. Jocasta supplies the details, adding that
the one survivor had implored her after Oedipus became King to live as far
away as possible from the city. Oedipus commands him to be sent for and
tells his life story. He was the reputed son of Polybus and Merope, rulers
of Corinth. One day at a wine-party a man insinuated that he was not
really the son of the royal pair. Stung by the taunt he went to Delphi,
where he was warned that he should kill his father and marry his mother.
He therefore fled away from Corinth towards Thebes. On the road he was
insulted by an old man in a chariot who thrust him rudely from his path;
in anger he smote the man at the place where three ways met. If then this
man was Laius, he had imprecated a curse on himself; his one hope is the
solitary survivor whom he had sent for; perhaps more than one man had
killed Laius after all.

An ominous ode about destiny and its workings is followed by the entry of
the Queen who describes the mad terrors of Oedipus. She is come to pray to
Apollo to solve their troubles. At that moment a messenger enters from
Corinth with the tidings that Polybus is dead. In eager joy Jocasta
summons Oedipus, sneering at the truth of oracles. The King on his
appearance echoes her words after hearing the tidings-only to sink back
again into gloomy despondency. What of Merope, is she also dead? The
messenger assures him that his anxiety about her is groundless, for there
is no relationship between them. Little by little he tells Oedipus his
true history. The messenger himself found him on Cithaeron in his infancy,
his feet pierced through. He had him from a shepherd, a servant of Laius,
the very man whom Oedipus had summoned. Suddenly turning to Jocasta, the
King asks her if she knows the man. Appalled at the horror of the truth
which she knows cannot be concealed much longer she affects indifference
and beseeches him search no further. When he obstinately refuses, bidding
the man be brought at once, she leaves the stage with the cry:

Oedipus by a masterstroke of art is made to imagine that she has departed
in shame, fearing he may be proved the son of a slave.

The awful power of this astonishing scene is manifest.

The bright joyousness of the King’s impulsive speech prepares the way for
the coming horror. When the shepherd appears, the messenger faces him
claiming his acquaintance. The shepherd doggedly attempts to deny all
knowledge of him, cursing him for his mad talkativeness. Oedipus threatens
torture to open his lips. Line by line the truth is dragged from him; the
abandoned child came from another—from a creature of Laius—was
said to be his son—was given him by Jocasta—to be destroyed
because of an oracle—why then passed over to the Corinthian
messenger?—”through pity, and he saved the child alive, for a mighty
misery. If thou art that child, know that thou art born a hapless man”.

When the King rushes madly into the palace, the Chorus sings of his
departed glory. The horrors increase with the appearance of a messenger
from within, who tells how Oedipus dashed into Jocasta’s apartment to find
her hanging in suicide; then he blinded himself on that day of mourning,
ruin, death and shame. He comes out a little later, an object of utter
compassion. How can he have rest on earth? How face his murdered father in
death? The memories of Polybus and Merope come upon him, then the years of
unnatural wedlock. Creon, whom he has wantonly insulted, comes not to mock
at him, but to take him into the palace where neither land nor rain nor
light may know him. Oedipus begs him to let him live on Cithaeron,
beseeching him to look after his two daughters whose birth is so stained
that no man can ever wed them. Creon gently takes him within, to be kept
there till the will of the gods is known. The end is a sob of pity for the
tragic downfall of the famous man who solved the Sphinx’ enigma.

No man can ever do justice to this masterpiece. It is so constructed that
every detail leads up inevitably to the climax. Slowly, and playing upon
all the deepest human emotions, anxiety, hope, gloom, terror and horror,
Sophocles works on us as no man had ever done before. It is a sin against
him to be content with a mere outline of the play; the words he has chosen
are significant beyond description. Again and again they fascinate the
reader and always leave him with the feeling that there are still depths
of thought left unsounded. The casual mention of the shepherd at the
beginning of the play is the first stroke of perfect art; Jocasta’s
disbelief in oracles is the next; then follows the contrast between the
Queen’s real motive for leaving and the reason assigned to it by her son;
finally, the shepherd in torture is forced to tell the secret which
plunges the torturer to his ruin. Where is the like of this in literature?
To us it is heart-searching enough. What was it to the Greeks who were
familiar with the plot before they entered the theatre? When they who knew
the inevitable end watched the King trace out his own ruin in utter
ignorance, their feelings cannot have remained silent; they must have
found relief in sobbing or crying aloud.

The fault in Oedipus is his ungovernable temper. It is firmly drawn in the
play; he is equally unrestrained in anger, despair and hope. He is the
typical instance of the lack of good counsel which we have seen was to
Sophocles the prime source of a tragedy. Indeed, only a headlong man would
hastily marry a widowed queen after he had committed a murder which
fulfilled one half of a terrible oracle. He should have first inquired
into the history of the Theban royal house. Imagining that the further he
was fleeing from Corinth the more certain he was to make his doom
impossible of fulfilment, he inevitably drew nearer to it. This is our
human lot; we cannot see and we misinterpret warnings; how shall not
weaker men tremble for themselves when Oedipus’ wisdom could not save him
from evil counsel?

In 405 Sophocles showed in his last play how Oedipus passed from earth in
the poet’s own birthplace, Colonus. Oedipus enters with Antigone, and on
inquiry from a stranger finds that he is on the demesne of the Eumenides.
At once he sends to Theseus, King of Athens, and refuses to move from the
spot, for there he is fated to find his rest. A Chorus from Colonus comes
to find out who the suppliant is. When they hear the name of Oedipus they
are horror-struck and wish to thrust him out. After much persuasion they
consent to wait till Theseus arrives. Presently Ismene comes with the news
that Eteocles has dispossessed his elder brother Polyneices; further, an
oracle from Delphi declares that Oedipus is all-important to Thebes in
life and after death. His sons know this oracle and Creon is coming to
force him back. Declaring he will do nothing for the sons who abandoned
him, Oedipus obstinately refuses his city any blessing. He sends Ismene to
offer a sacrifice to the Eumenides; in her absence Theseus enters, offers
him protection and asks why he has come. Oedipus replies that he has a
secret to reveal which is of great importance to Athens; at present there
is peace between her and Thebes:

The secret Oedipus will impart at the proper time. The need for protection
soon comes. Creon attempts to persuade Oedipus to return to Thebes but is
met by a curse, whereupon the Theban guards lay hold of Antigone—they
had already seized Ismene—and menace Oedipus himself. Theseus
hearing the alarm rushes back, reproaches Creon for his insolence and
quickly returns with the two girls. He has strange news to tell; another
Theban is a suppliant at the altar of Poseidon close by, craving speech
with Oedipus. It is Polyneices, whom Antigone persuades her father to
interview. The youth enters, ashamed of his neglect of his father, and
begs a blessing on the army he has mustered against Thebes. He is met by a
terrible curse which Oedipus invokes on both his sons. In despair
Polyneices goes away to his doom.

A thunderstorm is heard approaching; the Chorus are terrified at its
intensity, but Oedipus eagerly dispatches a messenger for Theseus. When
the King arrives he hears the secret; Oedipus’ grave would be the eternal
protection of Attica, but no man must know its site save Theseus who has
to tell it to his heir alone, and he to his son, and so onwards for ever.
The proof of Oedipus’ word would be a miracle which soon would transform
him back to his full strength. Presently he arises, endued with a
mysterious sight, beckoning the others to follow him. The play concludes
with a magnificent description of his translation. A voice from Heaven
called him, chiding him for tarrying; commending his daughters to the care
of Theseus, he greeted the earth and heaven in prayer and then without
pain or sorrow passed away. On reappearing Theseus promised to convey the
sisters back to Thebes and to stop the threatened fratricidal strife.

The Oedipus Coloneus, like the Philoctetes, the other play
of Sophocles’ old age, closes in peace. The old fiery passions still burn
fiercely in Oedipus, as they did in Lear; yet both were “every inch a
king” and “more sinned against than sinning”. Oedipus’ miraculous return
to strength before he departs is curiously like the famous end of Colonel
Newcome. There are subtle but unmistakable marks of the Euripidean
influence on this drama; such are the belief that Theban worthies would
protect Athens, the Theseus tradition, and the recovery of worn-out
strength. These features will meet us in the next chapter. But it is again
noteworthy that Sophocles has added those touches which distinguish his
own firm and delicate handiwork. There is nothing of melodrama, nothing
inconsequent, nothing exaggerated. It is the dramatist’s preparation for
his own end. Shakespeare put his valediction into the mouth of Prospero;
Sophocles entrusted his to his greatest creation Oedipus. Like him, he was
fain to depart, for the gods called. Our last sight of him is of one
beckoning us to follow him to the place where calm is to be found; to find
it we must use not the eyes of the body, but the inward illumination
vouchsafed by Heaven.

To the Athenians of the Periclean age Sophocles was the incarnation of
their dramatic ideal. His language is a delight and a despair. It
tantalises; it suggests other meanings besides its plain and surface
significance. This riddling quality is the daemonic element which he
possessed in common with Plato; because of it these two are the masters of
a refined and subtle irony, a source of the keenest pleasure. His plots
reveal a vivid sense of the exact moment which will yield the intensest
tragic effects—only on one particular day could Ajax die or Electra
be saved. Accordingly, Sophocles very often begins his play with early
dawn, in order to fill the few all-important hours with the greatest
possible amount of action. He has put the maximum of movement into his
work, only the presence ofthe Chorus and the conventional messengers (two
features imposed on him by the law of the Attic theatre) making the action
halt.

But it is in the sum-total of his art that his greatness lies; the sense
of a whole is its controlling factor; details are important, indeed, he
took the utmost pains to see that they were necessary and convincing—yet
they were details, subordinate, closely related, not irrelevant nor
disproportionate. This instinct for a definite plan first is the essence
of the classical spirit; exuberance is rigorously repressed, symmetry and
balance are the first, last and only aim. To some judges Sophocles is like
a Greek temple, splendid but a little chilly; they miss the soaring
ambition of Aeschylus or the more direct emotional appeal of Euripides.
Yet it is a cardinal error to imagine that Sophocles is passionless; his
life was not, neither are his characters. Like the lava of a recent
eruption, they may seem ashen on the surface, but there is fire
underneath; it betrays itself through the cracks which appear when their
substance is violently disturbed.

Repression, avoidance of extremes, dignity under provocation are the marks
of the gentle Sophoclean type and it is a very high type indeed.

For we have in him the very fountain of the whole classical tradition in
drama. Sophocles is something far more important than a mere influence; he
is an ideal, and as such is indestructible. To ask the names of writers
who came most under his “influence” is as sensible as to ask the names of
the sculptors who most faithfully followed the Greek tradition of
statuary. He is Classical tragedy. The main body of Spanish and English
drama is romantic, the Sophoclean ideal is that of the small but powerful
body of University men in Elizabeth’s time headed by Ben Jonson, of the
typically French school of dramatists, of Moratin, Lessing, Goethe, of the
exponents of the Greek creed in nineteenth-century England, notably
Matthew Arnold and Walter Pater, and of Robert Bridges. To this school the
cultivation of emotional expression is suspicious, if not dangerous; it
leads to eccentricity, to the revelation of feelings which frequently are
not worth experiencing, to sentimental flabbiness, to riot and
extravagance. Perhaps in dread of the ridiculous the Classical school
represses itself too far, creating characters of marble instead of flesh.
These creations are at least worth looking at and bring no shame; they are
better than the spectral psychological studies which many dramatists, now
dead or dying, have bidden us believe are real men and women.

TRANSLATIONS:

Jebb (Cambridge). This is by far the best; it renders with success the
delicacy of the original.

Storr (Loeb Series).

Verse translations by Whitelaw and Campbell.

See Symonds’ Greek Poets, and Norwood Greek Tragedy, as
above.

EURIPIDES

No-Man’s Land was the scene of many tragedies during the Great War. There
has come down to us a remarkable tragedy, called the Rhesus, about
a similar region. It treats first of the Dolon incident of the Iliad.
Hector sent out Dolon to reconnoitre, and soon afterwards some Phrygian
shepherds bring news that Rhesus has arrived that very night with a
Thracian army. Reviled by Hector for postponing his arrival till the tenth
year of the war, Rhesus answers that continual wars with Scythia have
occupied him, but now that he is come he will end the strife in a day. He
is assigned his quarters and departs to take up his position.

Having learned the password from Dolon, Diomedes and Odysseus enter and
reach the tents of Hector who has just left with Rhesus. Diomedes is eager
to kill Aeneas or Paris or some other leader, but Odysseus warns him to be
content with the spoils they have won. Athena appears, counselling them to
slay Rhesus; if he survives that night, neither Achilles nor Ajax can save
the Greeks. Paris approaches, having heard that spies are abroad in the
night; he is beguiled by Athena who pretends to be Aphrodite. When he is
safely got away, the two slay Rhesus.

The King’s charioteer bursts on to the stage with news of his death. He
accuses Hector of murder out of desire for the matchless steeds. Hector
recognises in the story all the marks of Odysseus’ handiwork. The Thracian
Muse descends to mourn her son’s death, declaring that she had saved him
for many years, but Hector prevailed upon him and Athena caused his end.

This play is not only about No-man’s land; it is a No-man’s land, for its
author is unknown; it is sometimes ascribed to Euripides, though it
contains many words he did not use, on the ground that it reflects his
art. For it shows in brief the change which came over Tragedy under
Euripides’ guidance. It is exciting, it seizes the tragic moment, the one
important night, it has some lovely lyrics, the characters are realistic,
the gods descend to untie the knot of the play or to explain the
mysterious, some detail is unrelated to the main plot—Paris
exercises no influence on the real action—it is pathetic.

Sophocles said that he painted men as they ought to be, Euripides as they
are. This realistic tendency, added to the romanticism whence realism
always springs, is the last stage of tragedy before it declines. A
Euripides is inevitable in literary history.

Born at Salamis on the very day of the great victory of 480, Euripides
entered into the spirit of revolution in all human activities which was
stirring in contemporary Athens. He won the first prize on five occasions,
was pilloried by the Conservatives though he was a favourite with the
masses. Towards the end of his life he migrated to Macedonia, where he
wrote not the least splendid of his plays, the Bacchae. On the news
of his death in 406 Sophocles clothed his Chorus in mourning as a mark of
his esteem.

The famous Alcestis won the second prize in 438. Apollo had been
the guest of Admetus and had persuaded Death to spare him if a substitute
could be found. Admetus’ parents and friends failed him, but his wife
Alcestis for his sake was content to leave the light. After a series of
speeches of great beauty and pathos she dies, leaving her husband
desolate. Heracles arrives at the palace on the day of her death; he
notices that some sorrow is come upon his host, but being assured that
only a relation has died he remains. Meanwhile Admetus’ parents arrive to
console him; he reviles them for their selfishness in refusing to die for
him, but is sharply reminded by them that parents rejoice to see the sun
as well as their children; in reality, he is his wife’s murderer.

Heracles’ reckless hilarity shocked the servants who were unwilling to
look after an unfeeling guest. He enters the worse for liquor and advises
a young menial to enjoy life while he can. After a few questions he learns
the truth. Sobered, he hurries forth unknown to Admetus to wrestle with
Death for Alcestis. Admetus, distracted by loss of his wife, becomes aware
that evil tongues will soon begin to talk of his cowardice. Heracles
returns with a veiled woman, whom he says he won in a contest, and begs
Admetus keep her till he returns. After much persuasion Admetus takes her
by the hand, and on being bidden to look more closely, sees that it is
Alcestis. The great deliverer then bids farewell with a gentle hint to him
to treat guests more frankly in future.

This play must be familiar to English readers of Browning’s Balaustion’s
Adventure. It has been set to music and produced at Covent Garden this
very year. The specific Euripidean marks are everywhere upon it. The
selfish male, the glorious self-denial of the woman, the deep but helpless
sympathy of the gods, the tendency to laughter to relieve our tears, the
wonderful lyrics indicate a new arrival in poetry. The originality of
Euripides is evident in the choice of a subject not otherwise treated; he
was constantly striving to pass out of the narrow cycle prescribed for
Attic tragedians. A new and very formidable influence has arisen to
challenge Sophocles who may have felt as Thackeray did when he read one of
Dickens’ early emotional triumphs.

In 431 he obtained the third prize with the Medea, the heroine of
the world-famous story of the Argonauts related for English readers in
Morris’ Life and Death of Jason. A nurse tells the story of Jason’s
cooling love for Medea and of his intended wedlock with the daughter of
Creon, King of Corinth, the scene of the play. Appalled at the effect the
news will produce on her mistress’ fiery nature, she begs the Tutor to
save the two children. Medea’s frantic cries are heard within the house;
appearing before a Chorus of Corinthian women she plunges into a
description of the curse that haunts their sex.

Desolate, far away from her father’s home, she begs the Chorus to be
silent if she can devise punishment for Jason.

Creon comes forth, uneasy at some vague threats which Medea has uttered
and afraid of her skill as a sorceress. He intends to cast her out of
Corinth before returning to his palace, but is prevailed upon to grant one
day’s grace. Medea is aghast at this blow, but decides to use the brief
respite. After a splendid little ode which prophesies that women shall not
always be without a Muse, Jason emerges. Pointing out that her violent
temper has brought banishment he professes to sympathise, offering money
to help her in exile. She bursts into a fury of indignation, recounting
how she abandoned home to save and fly with him to Greece. He argues that
his gratitude is due not to her, but to Love who compelled her to save
him; he repeats his offer and is ready to come if she sends for him.
Salvation comes unexpectedly. Aegeus, the childless King of Athens,
accidentally visits Corinth. Medea wins his sympathy and promises him
children if he will offer her protection. He willingly assents and she
outlines her plan. Sending for Jason, she first pretends repentance for
hasty speech, then begs him to get her pardon from the new bride and
release from exile for the two children. She offers as a wedding gift a
wondrous robe and crown which once belonged to her ancestor the Sun. In
the scene which follows is depicted one of the greatest mental conflicts
in literature. To punish Jason she must slay her sons; torn by love for
them and thirsting for revenge she wavers. The mother triumphs for a
moment, then the fiend, then the mother again—at last she decides on
murder. This scene captured the imagination of the ancient world,
inspiring many epigrams in the Anthology and forming one of the mural
paintings of Pompeii.

A messenger rushes in. The robe and crown have burnt to death Glauce the
bride and her father who vainly tried to save her: Jason is coming with
all speed to punish the murderess. She listens with unholy joy, retires
and slays the children. Jason runs in and madly batters at the door to
save them. He is checked by the apparition of Medea seated in her car
drawn by dragons. Reviled by him as a murderess, she replies that the
death of the children was agony to her as well and prophesies a miserable
death for him.

This marvellous character is Euripides’ Clytemnestra. Yet unlike her, she
remains absolutely human throughout; her weak spot was her maternal
affection which made her hesitate, while Clytemnestra was past feeling,
“not a drop being left”. Medea is the natural Southern woman who takes the
law into her own hands. In the Trachiniae is another, outraged as
Medea was, yet forgiving. Truly Sophocles said he painted men as they
ought to be, Euripides as they were.

The Hippolytus in 429 won the first prize. It is important as
introducing a revolutionary practice into drama. Aphrodite in a prologue
declares she will punish Hippolytus for slighting her and preferring to
worship Artemis, the goddess of hunting. The young prince passes out to
the chase; as he goes, his attention is drawn to a statue of Aphrodite by
his servants who warn him that men hate unfriendly austerity, but he
treats their words with contempt. His stepmother Phaedra enters with the
Nurse, the Chorus consisting of women of Troezen, the scene of the play. A
secret malady under which Phaedra pines has so far baffled the Nurse who
now learns that she loves her stepson. She had striven in vain against
this passion, only to find like Olivia that

She decided to die rather than disgrace herself and her city Athens. The
Nurse advises her not to sacrifice herself for such a common passion; a
remedy there must be: “Men would find it, if women had not found it
already”. “She needs not words, but the man.” Scandalised by this cynicism
the Queen bids her be silent; the woman tells her she has potent charms
within the house which will rid her of the malady without danger to her
good name or her life. Phaedra suspects her plan and absolutely forbids
her to speak with Hippolytus. The answer is ambiguous:

A violent commotion arises in the palace; Hippolytus is heard indistinctly
uttering angry words. He and the Nurse come forth; in spite of her appeal
for silence, he denounces her for tempting him. When she reminds him of
his oath of secrecy, he answers “My tongue has sworn, but not my will”—a
line pounced upon as immoral by the poet’s many foes. Hippolytus’ long
denunciation of women has been similarly considered to prove that the poet
was an enemy of their sex. Left alone with the Nurse Phaedra is
terror-stricken lest her husband Theseus should hear of her disgrace. She
casts the Nurse off, adding that she has a remedy of her own. Her last
speech is ominous.

Her suicide plunges Theseus into grief. Hanging to her wrist he sees a
letter which he opens and reads. There he finds evidence of her passion
for his son. In mad haste he calls on Poseidon his father to fulfil one of
the three boons he promised to grant him; he requires the death of his
son. Hearing the tumult the latter returns. His father furiously attacks
him, calling him hypocrite for veiling his lusts under a pretence of
chastity. The youth answers with dignity; when confronted with the damning
letter, he is unable to answer for his oath’s sake. He sadly obeys the
decree of banishment pronounced on him, bidding his friends farewell.

A messenger tells the sequel. He took the road from Argos along the coast
in his chariot. A mighty wave washed up a monster from the deep. Plunging
in terror the horses became unruly; they broke the car and dashed their
master’s body against the rocks. Theseus rejoices at the fate which has
overtaken a villain, yet pities him as his son. He bids the servants bring
him that he may refute his false claim to innocence. Artemis appears to
clear her devotee. The letter was forged by the Nurse, Aphrodite causing
the tragedy. “This is the law among us gods; none of us thwarts the will
of another but always stands aside.” Hippolytus is brought in at death’s
door. He is reconciled to his father and dies blessing the goddess he has
served so long.

The play contains the first indication of a sceptical spirit which was
soon to alter the whole character of the Drama. The running sore of
polytheism is clear. In worshipping one deity a man may easily offend
another, Aeschylus made this conflict of duties the cause of Agamemnon’s
death, but accepted it as a dogma not to be questioned. Such an attitude
did not commend itself to Euripides; he clearly states the problem in a
prologue, solving it in an appearance of Artemis by the device known as
the Deus ex machina. It is sometimes said this trick is a
confession of the dramatist’s inability to untie the knot he has twisted.
Rather it is an indication that the legend he was compelled to follow was
at variance with the inevitable end of human action. The tragedies of
Euripides which contain the Deus ex machina gain enormously if the
last scene is left out; it was added to satisfy the craving for some kind
of a settlement and is more in the nature of comedy perhaps than we
imagine. Hippolytus is a somewhat chilly man of honour, the Nurse a
brilliant study of unscrupulous intrigue. Racine’s Phèdre is as
disagreeable as Euripides’ is noble. Like Hamlet, the play is full
of familiar quotations.

Two Euripidean features appear in the Heracleidae, of uncertain
date. Iolaus the comrade of Heracles flees with the hero’s children to
Athens. They sit as suppliants at an altar from which Copreus, herald of
their persecutor Eurystheus, tries to drive them.

Unable to fight in his old age Iolaus begs aid. A Chorus of Athenians rush
in, followed by the King Demophon, to hear the facts. First Copreus puts
his case, then Iolaus refutes him. The King decides to respect the
suppliants, bidding Copreus defy Eurystheus in his name. As a struggle is
inevitable Iolaus refuses to leave the altars till it is over.

Demophon returns to say that the Argive host is upon them and that Athens
will prevail if a girl of noble family freely gives her life; he cannot
compel his subjects to sacrifice their children for strangers, for he
rules a free city. Hearing his words, Macaria comes from the shrine where
she had been sheltering with her sisters and Alcmena, her father’s mother.
When she hears the truth, she willingly offers to save her family and
Athens.

A messenger announces that Hyllus, Heracles’ son, has returned with
succours and is with the Athenian army. Iolaus summons Alcmena and orders
his arms; old though he is, he will fight his foe in spite of Alcmena’s
entreaties. In the battle he saw Hyllus and begged him to take him into
his chariot. He prayed to Zeus and Hebe to restore his strength for one
brief moment. Miraculously he was answered. Two stars lit upon the car,
covering the yoke with a halo of light. Catching sight of Eurystheus
Iolaus the aged took him prisoner and brought him to Alcmena. At sight of
him she gloats over the coming vengeance. The Athenian herald warns her
that their laws do not permit the slaughter of captives, but she declares
she will kill him herself. Eurystheus answers with great dignity; his
enmity to Heracles came not from envy but from the desire to save his own
throne. He does not deprecate death, rather, if he dies, his body buried
in Athenian land will bring to it a blessing and to the Argive descendants
of the Heracleidae a curse when they in time invade the land of their
preservers.

Though slight and weakly constructed, this play is important. Its two
features are first, the love of argument, a weakness of all the Athenians
who frequented the Law Courts and the Assembly; this mania for discussing
pros and cons spoils one or two later plays. Next, the self-sacrificing
girl appears for the first time. To Euripides the worthier sex was not the
male, possessed of political power and therefore tyrannous, but the
female. He first drew attention to its splendid heroism. He is the
champion of the scorned or neglected elements of civilisation.

The Andromache is a picture of the hard lot of one who is not
merely a woman, but a slave. Hector’s wife fell to Neoptolemus on the
capture of Troy and bore him a son called Molossus. Later he married
Hermione, daughter of Menelaus and Helen; the marriage was childless and
Hermione, who loved her husband, persecuted Andromache. She took advantage
of her husband’s absence to bring matters to a head. Andromache exposed
her child, herself flying to a temple of Thetis when Menelaus arrived to
visit his daughter. Hermione enters richly attired, covered with jewels
“not given by her husband’s kin, but by her father that she may speak her
mind.” She reviles Andromache as a slave with no Hector near and commands
her to quit sanctuary. Menelaus brings the child; after a long discussion
he threatens to kill him if Andromache does not abandon the altar, but
promises to save him if she obeys. In this dilemma she prefers to die if
she can thus save her son; but when Menelaus secures her he passes the
child to his daughter to deal with him as she will. Betrayed and helpless,
Andromache breaks out into a long denunciation of Spartan perfidy.

Peleus, grandfather of Neoptolemus, hearing the tumult intervenes. After
more rhetoric he takes Andromache and Molossus under his protection and
cows Menelaus, who leaves for Sparta on urgent business. When her father
departs, Hermione fears her husband’s vengeance on her maltreatment of the
slave and child whom he loves. Resolving on suicide, she is checked by the
entry of Orestes who is passing through Phthia to Dodona. She begs him to
take her away from the land or back to her father. Orestes reminds her of
the old compact which their parents made to unite them; he has a grievance
against Neoptolemus apart from his frustrated wedlock, for he had called
him a murderer of his mother. He had therefore taken measures to
assassinate him at Delphi, whither he had gone to make his peace with
Apollo.

Hearing of Hermione’s flight Peleus returns, only to hear more serious
news. Orestes’ plot had succeeded and Neoptolemus had been overwhelmed. In
consternation he fears the loss of his own life in old age. His
goddess-wife Thetis appears and bids him marry Andromachus to Hector’s
brother Helenus; Molossus would found a mighty kingdom, while Peleus would
become immortal after the burial of Neoptolemus.

A very old criticism calls this play “second rate”. Dramatically it is
worthless, for it consists of three episodes loosely connected. The
motives for Menelaus’ return and Hermione’s flight with an assassin from a
husband she loved are not clear, while the Deus ex machina adds
nothing to the story. It is redeemed by some splendid passages, but is
interesting as revealing a further development of Euripides’ thought. He
here makes the slave, another downtrodden class, free of the privileges of
literature, for to him none is vile or reprobate. The famous painting Captive
Andromache indicates to us the loneliness of slavery.

The same subject was treated more successfully in the Hecuba: she
has received her immortality in the famous players’ scene in Hamlet.
The shade of Polydorus, Hecuba’s son, outlines the course of the action.
Hecuba enters terrified by dreams about him and her daughter Polyxena. Her
forebodings are realised when she hears from a Chorus of fellow-captives
that the shade of Achilles has demanded her daughter’s sacrifice. Odysseus
bids her face the ordeal with courage. She replies in a splendid pathetic
appeal. Reminding him how she saved him from discovery when he entered
Troy in disguise, she demands a requital.

He sympathises but dare not dishonour the mighty dead. Polyxena intervenes
to point out the blessings death will bring her.

Bidding Odysseus lead her to death, she takes a touching and beautiful
farewell. Her latter end is splendidly described by Talthybius.

A serving woman enters with the body of Polydorus; she is followed by
Agamemnon who has come to see why Hecuba has not sent for Polyxena’s
corpse. In hopeless grief she shows her murdered son, begging his aid to a
revenge and promising to exact it without compromising him. A message
brings on the scene Polymestor, her son’s Thracian host with his sons. In
a dialogue full of terrible irony Hecuba inquires about Polydorus, saying
she has the secret of a treasure to reveal. He enters her tent where is
nobody but some Trojan women weaving. Dismissing his guards, he lets the
elder women dandle his children, while the younger admire his robes. At a
signal they arose, slew the children and blinded him. On hearing the
tumult, Agamemnon hurries in; turning to him, the Thracian demands
justice, pretending he had slain Polydorus to win his favour. Hecuba
refutes him, pointing out that it was the lust for her son’s gold which
caused his death. Agamemnon decides for Hecuba, whereupon Polymestor turns
fay, prophesying the latter end of Agamemnon, Hecuba and Cassandra.

The strongest and weakest points of Euripides’ appeal are here apparent.
The play is not one but two, the connection between the deaths of both
brother and sister being a mere dream of their mother. The poet tends to
rely rather upon single scenes than upon the whole and is so far romantic
rather than classical. His power is revealed in the very stirring call he
makes upon the emotions of pity and revenge; because of this Aristotle
calls him the most tragic of the poets.

The Supplices, written about 421, carries a little further the
history of the Seven against Thebes. A band of Argive women, mothers of
the defeated Seven, apply to Aethra, mother of Theseus, to prevail on her
son to recover the dead bodies. Adrastus, king of Argos, pleads with
Theseus who at first refuses aid but finally consents at the entreaties of
his mother. His ultimatum to Thebes is delayed by the arrival of a herald
from that city. A strange discussion of the comparative merits of
democracy and tyranny leads to a violent scene in which Theseus promises a
speedy attack in defence of the rights of the dead.

In the battle the Athenians after a severe struggle won the victory; in
the moment of triumph Theseus did not enter the city, for he had come not
to sack it but to save the dead. Reverently collecting them he washed away
the gore and laid them on their biers, sending them to Athens. In an
affecting scene Adrastus recognises and names the bodies. At this moment
Evadne enters, wife of the godless Capaneus who was smitten by the
thunderbolt; she is demented and wishes to find the body to die upon it.
Her father Iphis comes in search of her and at first does not see her, as
she is seated on a rock above him. His pleadings with her are vain; she
throws herself to her death. At the sight Iphis plunges into a wild
lament.

Theseus returns with the children of the dead champions to whom he
presents the bodies. He is about to allow Adrastus to convey them home
when Athena appears. She advises him to exact an oath from Adrastus that
Argos will never invade Attica. To the Argives she prophecies a vengeance
on Thebes by the Epigoni, sons of the Seven.

This play is very like the Heraclidae but adds a new feature; drama
begins to be used for political purposes. The play was written at the end
of the first portion of the Peloponnesian war, when Argos began to enter
the world of Greek diplomacy. This illegitimate use of Art cannot fail to
ruin it; Art has the best chance of making itself permanent when it is
divorced from passing events. But there are other weaknesses in this
piece; it has some fine and perhaps some melodramatic situations; here and
there are distinct touches of comedy.

The Ion is a return to Euripides’ best manner. Hermes in a prologue
explains what must have been a strange theme to the audience. Ion is a
young and nameless boy who serves the temple of Apollo in Delphi. There is
a mystery in his birth which does not trouble his sunny intelligence.
Creusa, daughter of Erectheus King of Athens, is married to Xuthus but has
no issue. Unaware that Ion is her son by Apollo, she meets him and is
attracted by his noble bearing. A splendid dialogue of tragic irony
represents both as wishing to find the one a mother, the other a son.
Creusa tells how she has come to consult the oracle about a friend who
bore a son to the god and exposed him. Ion is shocked at the immorality of
the god he serves; he refuses to believe that an evil god can claim to
deliver righteous oracles. Addressing the gods as a body, he states the
problem of the play.

Xuthus embraces Ion as his son in obedience to a command he has just
received to greet as his child the first person he meets on leaving the
shrine. Ion accepts the god’s will but longs to know who is his mother.
Seeing an unwonted dejection in him Xuthus learns the reason. Ion is
afraid of the bar on his birth which will disqualify him from residence at
Athens, where absolute legitimacy was essential; his life at Delphi was in
sharp contrast, it was one of perfect content and eternal novelty. Xuthus
tells him he will take him to Athens merely as a sightseer; he is afraid
to anger his wife with his good fortune; in time he will win her consent
to Ion’s succession to the throne.

Creusa enters with an old man who had been her father’s Tutor. She learns
from the Chorus that she can never have a son, unlike her more lucky
husband who has just found one. The Tutor counsels revenge; though a
slave, he will work for her to the end.

The two decide to poison Ion when he offers libations. But the plot failed
owing to a singular chance. The birds in the temple tasted the wine and
one that touched Ion’s cup died immediately. Creusa flees to the altar,
pursued by Ion who reviles her for her deed. At that moment the old
Prophetess appears with the vessel in which she first found Ion. Creusa
recognises it and accurately describes the child’s clothing which she wove
with her own hands; mother and son are thus united. The play closes with
an appearance of Athena, who prophesies that Ion shall be the founder of
the great Ionian race, for Apollo’s hand had protected him and Creusa
throughout.

The central problem of this piece is whether the gods govern the world
righteously or not. No more vital issue could be raised; if gods are
wicked they must fall below the standard of morality which men insist on
in their dealings with one another. Ion is the Greek Samuel; his naturally
reverent mind is disturbed at any suggestion of evil in a deity. His
boyish faith in Apollo is justified and Euripides seems to teach in
another form the lesson that “except we become as children, we cannot
enter the kingdom of Heaven.”

The Hercules Furens belongs to Euripides’ middle period.
Amphitryon, father of Heracles, and Megara, the hero’s wife, are in Theban
territory waiting for news. They are in grave danger, for Lycus, a new
king, threatens to kill them with Heracles’ children, as he had already
slain Megara’s father. He has easy victims in Amphitryon, “naught but an
empty noise”, and Megara, who is resigned to the inevitable. Faced with
this terror, Amphitryon exclaims:—

As they are led out to slaughter, Amphitryon makes what he is sure is a
vain appeal to Heaven to send succour. At that moment the hero himself
appears. Seeing his family clad in mourning, he inquires the reason. At
first his intention is to attack Lycus openly, but Amphitryon bids him
wait within; he will tell Lycus that his victims are sitting as suppliants
on the hearth; when the King enters Heracles may slay him without trouble.

When vengeance has been taken Iris descends from heaven, sent by Hera to
stain Heracles with kindred bloodshed. She summons Madness who is
unwilling to afflict any man, much less a famous hero. Reluctantly
consenting she sets to work. A messenger rushes out telling the sequel.
Heracles slew two of his children and was barely prevented from destroying
his father by the intervention of Athena. He reappears in his right mind,
followed by Amphitryon who vainly tries to console him. Theseus who
accompanied Heracles to the lower world hurries in on hearing a vague
rumour. To him Heracles relates his life of never-ending sorrow. Conscious
of guilt and afraid of contaminating any who touch him, he at length
consents to go to Athens with Theseus for purification. He departs in
sorrow, bidding his father bury the slain children.

Like the Hecuba, this play consists of two very loosely connected
parts. The second is decidedly unconvincing. Madness has never been
treated in literature with more power than in Hamlet and Lear. Besides
Shakespeare’s work, the description in the mouth of a messenger, though
vivid enough, is less effective, for “what is set before the eyes excites
us more than what is dropped into our ears” as Horace remarks. But the
point of the play is the seemingly undeserved suffering which is the lot
of a good character. This is the theme of many a Psalm in the Bible; its
answer is just this—”Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth.”

In 415 Euripides told how Hecuba lost her last remaining child Cassandra.
The plot of the Trojan Women is outlined by Poseidon and Athena who
threaten the Greeks with their hatred for burning the temples of Troy.
After a long and powerful lament the captive women are told their fate by
the herald Talthybius. Cassandra is to be married to Agamemnon. She rushes
in prophesying wildly. On recovering calm speech she bids her mother crown
her with garlands of victory, for her bridal will bring Agamemnon to his
death, avenging her city and its folk. Triumphantly she passes to her
appointed work of ruin.

Andromache follows her, assigned to Neoptolemus. She sadly points out how
her faithfulness to Hector has brought her into slavery with a proud
master.

This despair is rendered more hopeless when she learns that the Greeks
have decided to throw her little son Astyanax from the walls.

Menelaus comes forward, gloating at the revenge he hopes to wreak on
Helen. On seeing him Hecuba first prays:—

She continues:—

Hecuba and Helen then argue about the responsibility for the war. The
latter in shameless impudence pleads that she has saved Greece from
invasion and that Love who came with Paris to Sparta was the cause of her
fault. Hecuba ridicules the idea that Hera and Artemis could desire any
prize of beauty. It was lust of Trojan gold that tempted Helen; never once
was she known to bewail her sin in Troy, rather she always tried to
attract men’s eyes. Such a woman’s death would be a crown of glory to
Greece. Menelaus says her fate will be decided in Argos. Talthybius brings
in the body of Astyanax, over which Hecuba bursts into a lament of
exceptional beauty and then passes out to slavery.

In this drama Euripides draws upon all his resources of pathos. It is a
succession of brilliantly conceived sorrows. Cassandra’s exulting prophecy
of the revenge she is to bring is one of the great things in Euripides. In
this play we have a most vivid picture of the destructive effects of evil,
an inevitable consequence of which it is that the woman, however innocent
she may be, always pays. Hecuba drank the cup of bereavement to the very
last drop.

The Electra, acted about 418, is characteristic. Electra has been
compelled to marry a Mycenean labourer, a man of noble instincts who
respects the princess and treats her as such. Both enter the scene; the
man goes to labour for Electra, “for no lazy man by merely having God’s
name on his lips can make a livelihood without toil”. Orestes and Pylades
at first imagine Electra to be a servant; learning the truth they come
forward and question her. She tells the story of her mother’s shame and
Aegisthus’ insolence which Orestes promises to recount to her brother,
“for in ignorant men there is no spark of pity anywhere, only in the
learned.” The labourer returns and by his speech moves Orestes to declare
that birth is no test of nobility. Electra sends him to fetch an old Tutor
of her father to make ready for her two guests; he departs remarking that
there is just enough food in the house for one day.

The old Tutor arrives in tears; he has found a lock of hair on Agamemnon’s
tomb. Gazing intently on the two strangers, he recognises Orestes by a
scar on the eyebrow. They then proceed to plot the death of their enemies.
Orestes goes to meet Aegisthus is close by sacrificing, and presently
returns with the corpse, at which Electra hurls back the taunts and jeers
he had heaped on her in his lifetime. She had sent to her mother saying
she had given birth to a boy and asking her to come immediately.

Orestes quails before the coming murder, but Electra bids him be loyal to
his father. Clytemnestra on her arrival querulously defends her past,
alleging as her pretext not the death of Iphigeneia but the presence of a
rival, Cassandra. Electra after refuting her invites her inside the
wretched hut to offer sacrifice for her newly born child, where she is
slain by Orestes. At the end of the play the Dioscuri, Castor and Pollux,
bid Pylades marry Electra, tell Orestes he will be purified in Athens and
prophesy that Menelaus and Helen, just arrived from Egypt, will bury
Agisthus real Helen never went to Troy, a wraith of her being sent there
with Paris.

The startling realism of this drama is apparent. The poverty of Electra,
the more certain identification of Orestes by a scar than by a lock of
hair, the mention of Cassandra as the real motive for the murder of
Agamemnon all indicate that Euripides was not content with the accepted
legend. His Clytemnestra is a feeble creation even by the side of that of
Sophocles.

Stesichorus in a famous poem tells how Helen blinded him for maligning
her; she never went to Troy; it was a wraith which accompanied Paris. Such
is the central idea of a very strange play, the Helen. The scene is
in Egypt. Teucer, banished by his father, meets the real Helen; to her
amazement he tells of her evil reputation and of the great war before
Troy, adding that Menelaus is sailing home with another Helen. The latter
enters, to learn that he is in Egypt, where the real Helen has lived for
the last seventeen years. Warned by a prophetess Theonoe that her husband
is not far off, Helen comes to be reunited to him. A messenger from the
coast announces that the wraith has faded into nothingness.

Helen then warns Menelaus of her difficult position. She is wooed by
Theoclymenus, king of the land, brother of Theonoe. Menelaus in despair
thinks of killing himself and Helen to escape the tyrant. Theonoe holds
their fate in her hands; Helen pleads with her; “It is shameful that thou
shouldest know things divine, and not righteousness.” Menelaus declares
his intention of living and dying with his wife. The prophetess leaves
them to discover some means of escape which Helen devises. Pretending that
Menelaus is a messenger bringing news of her husband’s death at sea, she
persuades the tyrant to provide a ship and rowers that Helen may perform
the last rites to the dead on the element where he died. At the right
moment the Greek sailors overpowered the rowers and sailed home with the
united pair.

Very commonly real drama suffers the fate which has overtaken it in this
piece; it declines into melodrama. Here are to be found all the stock
melodramatic features—a bold hero, a scheming beauty, a confidante,
a dupe, the murder of a ship’s crew. Massinger piloted Elizabethan drama
to a similar end. Given an uncritical audience melodrama is the surest
means of filling the house. Reality matters little in such work; the facts
of life are like Helen’s wraith, when they become unmanageable they vanish
into thin air.

About 412 the Iphigeneia in Tauris appeared. South Russia was the
seat of a cult of Artemis; the goddess spirited Iphigeneia to the place
when her father sacrificed her at Aulis. Orestes, bidden by Apollo to
steal an image of the goddess to get his final purification, comes on the
stage with Pylades; on seeing the temple they are convinced of the
impossibility of burgling it. A shepherd describes to Iphigeneia their
capture, for strangers were taken and offered to the goddess without
exception. One of the two was seized with a vision of the avenging
deities; attacked by a band of peasants both were overpowered after a
stubborn resistance. Formerly Iphigeneia had pitied the Greeks who landed
there; now, warned of Orestes’ death by a dream, she determines to kill
without mercy. One of them shall die, the other taking back to Greece a
letter. Orestes insists on dying himself, reminding Pylades of his duty to
Electra. When the letter is brought Pylades swears to fulfil his word, but
asks what is to happen if the ship is wrecked. Iphigeneia reads the letter
to him; it is addressed to Orestes and tells of his sister’s weary exile.
After the recognition is completed, Orestes relates the horrors of his
life and begs his sister to help him to steal the all-important image.

Thoas, the King of the land, learns from her that the two Greeks are
guilty of kindred murder; their presence has defiled the holy image which
needs purification in the sea as well as the criminals. The priestess
obtains permission to bind the captives and take the image to be cleansed
with private mystic rites. The plot succeeds; Orestes’ ship puts in; after
a struggle the three board it, carrying the image with them. Thoas is
prevented from pursuit by an intervention of Athena.

Goethe used this play for his drama of the same name; he made Thoas the
lover of Iphigeneia, whom he represents as the real image whom Orestes is
to remove. Her departure is not compassed by a stratagem, but is permitted
by the King, a man of singular nobility and self-denial.

The Phaenissae has been much admired in all ages. Jocasta tells how
after the discovery of his identity Oedipus blinded himself but was shut
up by his two sons whom he cursed for their impiety. Eteocles then usurped
the rule while Polyneices called an Argive host to attack Thebes. A Choral
description of this army is succeeded by an unexpected entry into the city
of Polyneices who meets his mother and tells her of his life in exile. She
sends for Eteocles in the hope of reconciling her two sons. Polyneices
promises to disband his forces if he is restored to his rights, but
Eteocles, enamoured of power, refuses to surrender it. Jocasta vainly
points out to him the burden of rule, nor can she persuade Polyneices not
to attack his own land.

When the champions have taken up their position at the gates, Teiresias
tells Creon that Thebes can be saved by the sacrifice of his own son
Menoeceus. Creon refuses to comply and urges his son to escape. Pretending
to obey Menoeceus threw himself from the city walls. The struggle at the
gates is followed by a challenge to Polyneices issued by Eteocles to
settle the dispute in single combat. Jocasta and Antigone rush out to
intervene, too late. They find the two lying side by side at death’s door.
Eteocles is past speech, but Polyneices bids farewell to his mother and
sister, pitying his brother “who turned friendship into enmity, yet still
was dear”. In agony, Jocasta slays herself over her sons’ bodies.

Led in by Antigone, Oedipus is banished by Creon, who forbids the burial
of Polyneices. After touching the dead Jocasta and his two sons, he passes
to exile and rest at Colonus.

The harsh story favoured by Sophocles has been greatly humanised by
Euripides, who could not accept all the savagery of the received legend.
Apart from the unexplained presence of Polyneices in the city, the plot is
excellent. The speeches are vigorous and natural, the characters
thoroughly human. The criticising and refining influence of Euripides is
manifest throughout, together with a simple and noble pathos.

An ancient critic says of the Orestes, written in 408, “the drama
is popular but of the lowest morality; except Pylades, all are villains”.
Electra meets Helen, unexpectedly returned from Egypt to Argos with
Menelaus, who sends her daughter Hermione with offerings to the tomb of
Agamemnon. Electra’s opinion of her is vividly expressed.

The Chorus accidentally awakens Orestes who is visited by a wild vision of
haunting Furies. When he regains sanity he begs the assistance of
Menelaus, his last refuge. His uncle, a broken reed, is saved from
committing himself by the entry of Tyndareus, father of Clytemnestra and
Helen. He righteously rebukes the bloodthirsty Orestes, though he is aware
of the evil in his two daughters. Orestes breaks out into an insulting
speech which alienates completely his grandfather. Menelaus, when appealed
to again, hurries out to try to win him back.

Pylades suggests that he and Orestes should plead their case before the
Argive Assembly, which was to try them for murder of Clytemnestra. A very
brilliant and exciting account of the debate tells how the case was lost
by Orestes himself, who presumed to lecture the audience on the majesty of
the law he himself had broken. He and Electra are condemned to be stoned
that very day. Determined to ruin Menelaus before they die, they agree to
kill Helen, the cause of all their troubles, and to fire the fortified
house in which they live. Electra adds that they should also seize
Hermione and hold her as a check on Menelaus’ fury for the death of Helen.
The girl is easily trapped as she rushes into the house hearing her
mother’s cries for help. Soon after a Trojan menial drops from the first
story. He tells how Helen and Hermione have so far escaped death, but the
rest is unknown to him. In a ghastly scene Orestes hunts the wretch over
the stage, but finally lets him go as he is not a fit victim for a free
man’s sword. Almost immediately the house is seen to be ablaze; Menelaus
rushes up in a frenzy, but is checked by the sight of Orestes with
Hermione in his arms. When Menelaus calls for help, Orestes bids Pylades
and Electra light more fires to consume them all. A timely appearance of
Apollo with Helen deified by his side saves the situation.

It is plain that Euripides has here completely rejected the old legend. He
never makes Orestes even think of pleading Apollo’s command to him to slay
his mother. He is concerned with the defence which a contemporary
matricide might make before a modern Athenian assembly and with the
fitting doom of self-destruction which would overtake him. Like Vanity
Fair, the play shows us the life of people who try to do without God.

The Bacchae is one of Euripides’ best plays. In the absence of
Pentheus the King, Cadmus and Teiresias join in the worship of the new god
Dionysus at Thebes. Pentheus returns to find that noble women, including
Agave, his own mother, have joined the strange cult brought to the place
by a mysterious Lydian stranger “whose hair is neatly arranged in curls,
his face like wine, his eyes as full of grace as Aphrodite’s”.

Teiresias advises him to welcome the god, Cadmus to pretend that he is
divine, even if he is only a mortal; this new religion is the natural
outlet of the desire for innocent revelry born in both sexes. The Lydian
is arrested and brought before Pentheus, whom he warns that the god will
save him from insult, but Pentheus hurries him away into a dungeon.

The Chorus of Bacchae are alarmed on hearing a tumult. The stranger
appears to tell how Pentheus was made mad by Dionysus in the act of
imprisoning him. The King in amazement sees his prisoner standing free
before him and becomes furiously angry on hearing that his mother has
joined a new revel on Mount Cithaeron. The stranger suggests that he
should go disguised as a Bacchante to see the new worship. When he appears
transformed, the Lydian comments with exquisite and deadly irony on his
appearance. His fate is vividly and terribly painted. Placing him in a
pine, the stranger suddenly disappeared, while the voice of Dionysus
summoned the rout to punish the spy. Rushing to the tree, the woman tore
it up by the roots and then rent Pentheus piecemeal, Agave herself leading
them on.

She comes in holding what she imagines to be a trophy. Cadmus slowly
reveals to her the horror of her deed, the proof of which is her son’s
head in her grasp. Dionysus himself comes in to point out that this
tragedy is the result of the indignity which Thebes put upon him and his
mother Semele. Broken with grief, Agave passes out slowly to her
banishment. The Bacchae was composed in Macedonia; it contains all the
mystery of the supernatural. Dionysus’ character is admirably drawn, while
the infatuation of Pentheus is a fitting prelude to his ruin. The cult of
Dionysus was essentially democratic, intended for those who could claim no
share in aristocratic ritual: hence its popularity and prevalence. We may
regard the Bacchae as the poet’s declaration of faith in the worship which
gave Europe the Drama; it is altogether fitting that he who has left us
the greatest number of tragedies should have been chosen by destiny to
bequeath us the one drama which tells of one of the adventures of its
patron deity.

The Iphigeneia in Aulis was written in the last year of the poet’s
life. Agamemnon sends a private letter to his wife countermanding an
official dispatch summoning her and Iphigeneia. This letter is intercepted
by Menelaus, who upbraids his brother; later, seeing his distress, he
advises him to send the women home again. But public opinion forces the
leader to obey Artemis and sacrifice his daughter. When he meets his wife
and child, he tries to temporise but fails. Achilles meets Clytemnestra
and is surprised to hear that he is to marry Iphigeneia, such being the
bait which brought Clytemnestra to Aulis. Learning the real truth, she
faces her husband, pleading for their daughter’s life. Iphigeneia at first
shrinks from death; the army demands her sacrifice, while Achilles is
ready to defend her. The knot is untied by Iphigeneia herself, who
willingly at last consents to die to save her country.

This excellent play shows no falling in dramatic power; it was imitated by
Racine and Schiller. The figures are intensely human, the conflict of
duties firmly outlined, the pathos sincere and true, there is no divine
appearance to straighten out a tangled plot. Thus Euripides’ career ends
as it began, with a story of a woman’s noble self-sacrifice.

The poet’s popularity is indicated by the number of his extant dramas and
fragments, both of which exceed in bulk the combined work of Aeschylus and
Sophocles. All classes of writers quoted him, philosophers, orators,
bishops. In his own lifetime Socrates made a point of witnessing his
plays; the very violence of Aristophanes’ attack proves Euripides’ potent
influence; his lost drama Melanippe turned the heads of the
Athenians, the whole town singing its odes. Survivors of the Sicilian
disaster won their freedom by singing his songs to their captors,
returning to thank their liberator in person; the fragments of Menander
discovered in 1906 contain many reminiscences of him, even slaves quoting
passages of him to their masters. For it was the very width of his appeal
that made him universally loved; women and slaves in his view were every
whit as good as free-born men, sometimes they were far nobler. If drama is
the voice of a democracy, the Athenians had found a more democratic
mouthpiece than they had bargained for.

With the educated men it was different. They suspected a poet who was
upsetting their tradition. Besides, they were asked to crown a person who
told them in play after play that they were really like Jason, Menelaus,
Polymestor, poor creatures if not quite odious. He made them see with
painful clearness that the better sex was the one which they despised, yet
which was sure one day to find the utterance to which it had a right in
virtue of its greater nobility. The feminism of Euripides is evident
through his whole career; it is an insult to our powers of reading to
imagine that he was a woman-hater. It is then not to be wondered at that
he won the prize only five times, and it can hardly be an accident that he
gained it once with the Hippolytus, which on a surface view condemns the
female sex.

For the officials could not see that Euripides was not a man only, he was
a spirit of development. Privilege and narrowness in every form he hated;
he demanded unlimited freedom for the intelligence. The narrow circle of
legends, the conventional unified drama, state religion, a
pseudo-democracy based on slavery he fearlessly criticised. Rationalism,
humanism, free speculation were his watchwords; he was always trying new
experiments in his art, introducing politics, philosophy, melodrama and
trying to get rid of the chorus wherever he could. He was a living and a
contemporary Proteus, pleading like an advocate in a lawsuit, discussing
political theory, restating unsolved problems in modern form and seasoning
his work with his own peculiar and often elevating pathos. Such a man was
anathema to conservative Athens.

But to us he is one of ourselves. He exactly hits off our modern taste,
with its somewhat sentimental tendency, its scepticism, love of
excitement, and its great complexity. We know we have many moods and
passions which strangely blend and thwart each other; these we treat in
our novels, and Euripides’ plays are a sort of novel, but for the divine
appearances in the last scenes. He shows us the inevitable end of actions
of beings exactly like ourselves, acting from merely human motives,
neither higher nor lower than we, though perhaps disguised under heroic
names. He is in a word the first modern poet.

TRANSLATIONS:

A. S. Way, Loeb Series. This verse translation is the most successful; it
renders the choric odes with skill.

Professor Gilbert Murray has published verse translations of various
plays. He is an authority on the text. His volume on Euripides in the Home
University Library is admirable.

Euripides the Rationalist and Four Plays of Euripides by A.
W. Verrall are well known; the latter is particularly stimulating. The
views it expounds are original but not traditional.

See Symonds’ Greek Poets as above.

ARISTOPHANES

At the end of the Symposium Plato represents Socrates as convincing
both Agathon, a tragedian, and Aristophanes that the writer of tragedy
will be able to write comedy also. That the two forms are not wholly
divorced is clear from the history of ancient drama itself: Each dramatist
competed with four plays, three tragedies and a Satyric drama. What this
last is can be plainly seen in the Cyclops of Euripides, which
relates in comic form the adventures of Odysseus and Silenus in the
monster’s company. Further, the tendency of tragedy was inevitably towards
comedy. The extant work of Aeschylus and Sophocles is not without comic
touches; but the trend is clearer in Euripides who was an innovator in
this as in many other matters. Laughter and tears are neighbours; a happy
ending is not tragic; loosely connected scenes are the essence of Old
Comedy, and loosely written tragic dialogue (common in Euripides’ later
work) closely resembles the language of comedy, which is practically prose
in verse form. The debt which later comedy owed to Euripides is great;
reminiscences of him abound; he is quoted directly and indirectly; his
stage tricks are adopted and his realistic characters are the very
population of the Comic stage.

The logically developed plot is the characteristic of serious drama. Old
Comedy, its antithesis, is often a succession of scenes in which the
connection is loose without being impossible. In it the unexpected is
common, for it is an escape from the conventions of ordinary life, a thing
of causes and effects. It might be more accurate to say that farce is a
better description of the work which is associated with the name of
Aristophanes.

This writer was born about 448, was a member of the best Athenian society
of the day, quickly took the first place as the writer of comedy and died
about 385. He saw the whole of the Peloponnesian war and has given us a
most vivid account of the passions it aroused and its effect on Athenian
life. He first won the prize in 425, when he produced the Acharnians
under an assumed name. Pericles had died in 429; the horrors of war were
beginning to make themselves felt; the Spartans were invading Attica,
cutting down the fruit-trees and compelling the country folk to stream
into the city. One of these, Dicaeopolis enters the stage. It is early
morning; he is surprised that there is no popular meeting on the appointed
day. He loathes the town and longs for his village; he had intended to
heckle the speakers if they discussed anything but peace. Ambassadors from
foreign nations are announced; seeing them he conceives the daring project
of making a separate peace with the Spartan for eight drachmae. His
servant returns with three peaces of five, ten and thirty years; he
chooses the last.

A chorus of angry Acharnians rush in to catch the traitor; they are
charcoal burners ruined by the invasion. Dicaeopolis seizes a charcoal
basket, threatening to destroy it if they touch him. Anxious to spare
their townsman, the basket, they consent to hear his defence, which he
offers to make with his neck on an executioner’s block. He is afraid of
the noisy patriotism appealed to by mob-orators and of the lust for
condemning the accused which is the weakness of older men. Choosing from
Euripides’ wardrobe the rags in which Telephus was arrayed to rouse the
audience to pity, he boldly ventures to plead the cause of the Spartans,
though he hates them for destroying his trees. He asserts that “Olympian
Pericles who thundered and lightened and confounded Greece” caused the war
by putting an embargo on the food of their neighbour Megara, his pretext
being a mere private quarrel.

The Chorus are divided; his opponents send for Lamachus, the swashbuckling
general; the latter is discomfited and Dicaeopolis immediately opens a
market with the Peloponnesians, Megarians and Boeotians, but not with
Lamachus. In an important choral ode the poet justifies his existence. By
his criticism he puts a stop to the foreign embassies which dupe the
Athenians; he checks flattery and folly; he never bribes nor hoodwinks
them, but exposes their harsh treatment of their subjects and their love
of condemning on groundless charges the older generation which had fought
at Marathon.

The play ends with a trading scene; a Boeotian in exchange for Copaic eels
takes an Athenian informer, an article unknown in Boeotia. Lamachus
returns wounded while Dicaeopolis departs in happy contrast to celebrate a
feast of rustic jollity.

Aristophanes’ chief butts were Cleon, Socrates and Euripides; the last is
treated with good nature in this play. To modern readers the comedy is
important for two reasons; first, it attacks the strange belief that a
democracy must necessarily love peace; Aristophanes found it as full of
the lust for battle as any other form of government; all it needed was a
Lamachus to rattle a sword. Again, the unfailing source of war is plainly
indicated, trade rivalry. War will continue as long as there are markets
to capture and rivals to exclude from them.

In the next year, 424, Aristophanes produced the Knights, the most
violent political lampoon in literature. The victim was Cleon who had
succeeded Pericles as popular leader. He was at the height of his glory,
having captured the Spartan contingent at Pylos, prisoners who were of
great importance for diplomatic purposes. The comedy is a scathing
criticism of democracy; the subject is so controversial that it will be
best to give some extracts without comment.

Two servants of Demos (the People) steal the oracles of the Paphlagonian
(the babbler, Cleon) while he is asleep. To their joy they find that he
will govern Demos’ house only until a more abominable than he shall
appear, namely a sausage-seller. That person immediately presenting
himself is informed of his high calling. At first he is amazed. “I know
nothing of refinement except letters, and them, bad as they are, badly.”
The answer is:

To his objection that he cannot look after a democracy the reply is,

The Paphlagonian Cleon runs in bawling that they are conspiring against
the democracy. They call loudly for the Knights, who enter as the Chorus
to assist them against Cleon, encouraging the sausage-seller to show the
brazen effrontery which is the mob-orator’s sole protection, and to prove
that a decent upbringing is meaningless. Nothing loth, he redoubles
Cleon’s vulgarity on his head. Cleon rushes out intending to inform the
Upper House of their treasons; the sausage-seller hurries after him, his
neck being well oiled with his own lard to make Cleon’s slanders slip off.
A splendid ode is sung in the meantime; it contains a half-comic account
of Aristophanes’ training in his art and a panegyric on the old spirit
which made Athens great. The sausage-seller returns to tell of Cleon’s
utter defeat; he is quickly followed by Cleon, who appeals to Demos
himself, pointing out his own services.

The sausage-seller refutes him.

Cleon, the new Themistocles, is deposed from his stewardship.

He appeals to some oracles of Bacis, but the sausage-seller has better
ones of Bacis’ elder brother Glanis. The Chorus rebuke Demos, whom all men
fear as absolute, for being easily led, for listening to the newest comer
and for a perpetual banishment of his intelligence. In a second contest
for Demos’ favours Cleon is finally beaten when it appears that he has
kept some dainties in his box while the sausage-seller has given his all.
An appeal to an oracle prophesying his supplanter—one who can steal,
commit perjury and face it out—so clearly applies to the
sausage-seller that Cleon retires.

After a brief absence Demos appears with his new friend—but it is a
different Demos, rid of his false evidence and jury system, the Demos of
fifty years before. He is ashamed of his recent history, of his preferring
doles to battleships. He promises a speedy reform, full pay to his
sailors, strict revision of the army service rolls, an embargo on Bills of
Parliament. To his joy he recovers the Thirty Years’ peace which Cleon had
hidden away, and realises at last his longing to escape from the city into
the country.

This violent attack on Cleon was vigorously met; Aristophanes was
prosecuted and seems to have made a compromise. In his next comedy, the Clouds
(which was presented in 423) he changes his victim. Strepsiades, an old
Athenian, married a high-born wife of expensive tastes; their son
Pheidippides developed a liking for horses and soon brought his father to
the edge of ruin. The latter requests the son to save him by joining the
academy conducted by Socrates, where he can learn the worse argument which
enables its possessor to win his case. Aided by it he can rid his father
of debt. As the son flatly refuses, the old man decides to learn it
himself. Entering the school he sees maps and drawings of all kinds and
finally descries Socrates himself, far above his head in a basket, high
among the clouds, studying the sun. Strepsiades begs him to teach him the
Worse Argument at his own price. After initiating him, Socrates summons
his deities the Clouds, who enter as the Chorus. These are the guardian
deities of modern professors, seers, doctors, lazy long-haired long-nailed
fellows, musicians who cultivate trills and tremolos, transcendental
quacks who sing their praises. The old gods are dethroned, a vortex
governing the universe. The Chorus tells Socrates to take the old man and
teach him everything.

The ode which follows contains the poet’s claim to be original.

Socrates returns with Strepsiades, whom he can teach nothing. The Chorus
suggest he should bring his son to learn from Socrates how to get rid of
debts. At first Pheidippides refuses but finally agrees, though he warns
his father that he will rue his act. The Just and Unjust arguments come
out of the academy to plead before the Chorus. The former draws a picture
of the old-fashioned times when a sturdy race of men was reared on
discipline, obedience and morality—a broad-chested vigorous type. In
utter contempt the latter brands such teaching as prehistoric. Pleasure,
self-indulgence, a lax code of morality and easy tolerance of little
weaknesses are the ideal. The power of his words is such that the Just
Argument deserts to him.

Strepsiades, coached by his son, easily circumvents two money-lenders and
retires to his house. He is soon chased out by his son, who when asked to
sing the old songs of Simonides and Aeschylus scorned the idea, humming
instead an immoral modern tune of Euripides’ making. A quarrel inevitably
followed; Strepsiades was beaten by his son who easily proved that he had
a right to beat his mother also. Stung to the quick the old man burns the
academy; when Socrates and his pupils protest, he tells them they have but
a just reward for their godlessness.

The Socrates here pilloried is certainly not the Socrates of history; his
teaching was not immoral. But Aristophanes is drawing attention to the
evil effects produced by the Sophists, who to the ordinary man certainly
included Socrates. The importance of this play to us is clear. We are a
nation of half-trained intelligences. Our national schools are frankly
irreligious, our teachers people of weak credentials. Parental discipline
is openly flouted, pleasure is our modern cult. Jazz bands, long-haired
novelists and poets, misty philosophers, anti-national instructors are the
idols of many a pale-faced and stunted son of Britain. The reverence which
made us great is decadent and openly scoffed at. What is the remedy?
Aristophanes burnt out the pestilent teachers. We had better not copy him
till we are satisfied that the demand for them has ceased. A nation gets
the instruction for which it is morally fitted. There is but one hope; we
must follow the genuine Socratic method, which consisted of quiet
individual instruction. Only thus will we slowly and patiently seize this
modern spirit of unrest; our object should be not to suppress it—it
is too sturdy, but to direct its energies to a better and a more noble
end.

Finding that the Clouds had been too wholesome to be popular,
Aristophanes in 422 returned to attack Cleon in the Wasps. Early in
the morning Bdelycleon (Cleon-hater) with his two servants is preventing
his father Philocleon from leaving the house to go to the jury-courts. The
old man’s amusing attempts to evade their vigilance are frustrated,
whereupon he calls for assistance. Very slowly a body of old men dressed
as wasps, led by boys carrying lanterns, finds its way to the house to act
as Chorus. They make many suggestions to the father to escape; just as he
is gnawing through the net over him his son rushes in. The wasps threaten
him with their formidable stings. After a furious conflict truce is
declared. Bdelycleon complains of the inveterate juryman’s habit of
accusing everybody who opposes them of aiming at establishing a tyranny.
Father and son consent to state their case for the Chorus to decide
between them.

Philocleon glories in the absolute power he exercises over all classes;
his rule is equal to that of a king. To him the greatest men in Athens bow
as suppliants, begging acquittal. Some of these appeal to pity, others
tell him Aesop’s fables, others try to make him laugh. Most of all, he
controls foreign policy through his privilege of trying statesmen who
fail. In return for his duties he receives his pay, goes home and is
petted by his wife and family. Bdelycleon opens thus:

After giving a rough estimate of the total revenue of Athens, he subtracts
from it the miserable sum of three obols which the jurymen receive as pay.
Where does the remainder go? It is evident that the jurymen are the mere
catspaw of the big unscrupulous politicians who get all the profit and
incur none of the odium. This argument convinces both the Chorus and
Philocleon, old heroes of Marathon who created the Empire.

The latter asks what he is to do. His son promises to look after him,
allowing him to gratify at home his itch for trying disputes. Two dogs are
brought in; by a trick the son makes his father acquit instead of condemn.
He then dresses him up decently and instructs him in the etiquette of a
dinner-party, whither they proceed. But the old man behaves himself
disgracefully, beating everyone in his cups. He appears with a flute-girl
and is summoned for assault by a vegetable-woman, whose goods he has
spoiled, and by a professional accuser. His insolence to his victims is
checked by his son who thrusts him into the house before more accusers can
appear.

It is sometimes believed that democracy is a less corrupt form of polity
than any other. Aristophanes in this play exposes one of its greatest
weaknesses.

Flattered by the sense of power which the possession of the vote brings
with it, the enfranchised classes cannot always see that they easily
become the tools of the clever rogues who get themselves elected to office
by playing on the fears of the electors. The Athenian voter was as easily
scared by the word “tyranny” as the modern elector is by “capital”. The
result is the same. Not only do the so-called lower orders sink into an
ignorant slavery; they use their power so brainlessly and so mercilessly
that they are a perfect bugbear to the rest.

Literary men’s prophecies rarely come true. In 421 the Peace,
produced in March, was followed almost immediately by a compact between
Athens and Sparta for fifty years. An old farmer, Trygaeus, sails up to
heaven on the back of a huge beetle, bidding his family farewell for three
days. He meets Hermes, who tells him that Zeus in disgust has surrendered
men to the war they love. War himself has hidden Peace in a deep pit, and
has made a great mortar in which he intends to grind civilisation to
powder. He looks for the Athenian pestle, Cleon, but cannot find him—the
Spartan pestle Brasidas has also been mislaid; both were lost in Thrace.
Before he can find another pestle Trygaeus summons all men to pull Peace
out of her prison. Hermes at first objects, but is won over by offers of
presents. At length the goddess is discovered with her two handmaids,
Harvest and Mayfair.

A change immediately comes over the faces of men. In pure joy they laugh
through their bruises. Hermes explains to the farmers who form the Chorus
why Peace left the earth. It was the trade rivalry which first drove her
away; at Athens the subject cities fomented strife with Sparta, then the
country population flocked to the city, where they fell easy victims to
the public war-mongers, who found it profitable to continue the struggle.
The god then offers to Trygaeus Harvest as a bride to make his vineyards
fruitful. In the ode which follows the poet claims that he first made
comedy dignified

Returning to earth Trygaeus sends Harvest to the Council, while the
marriage sacrifice is made ready. A soothsayer endeavours to impose on the
rustics with prophecies that the Peace will be a failure. Trygaeus refutes
him with a quotation from Homer. “Without kin or law or home is a man who
loveth harsh strife between peoples.” The makers of agricultural
implements quickly sell all their stock, while the makers of helmets,
crests and breastplates find their market gone. A glad wedding song forms
the epilogue.

Aristophanes believed that the war meant an extinction of civilisation and
loathed it because it was useless. What would he have thought of the
barbarous and bloodthirsty Great War of our own day? The causes which
produced both struggles were identical—trade rivalry and a set of
jingoes who found that war paid. But he was mistaken in believing that
peace was the normal condition of Greek life. He was born just before the
great period began during which Pericles gave Greece a long respite from
quarrels, and seems to have been quite nonplussed by what to him was an
abnormal upheaval. His bright hopes soon faded and he seems to have given
up thinking about peace or war during a period of eight years. In the
meanwhile Athens had attacked Sicily; perhaps a change had come over
comedy itself owing to legal action. At any rate, the old and virulent
type of political abuse was becoming a thing of the past; the next play,
the Birds, produced in 414, abandons Athens altogether for a new
and charming world in which there was a rest from strife.

Two Athenians, Peithetairus (Persuasive) and Euelpides (Sanguine) reach
the home of the Hoopoe bird, once a mortal, to find a happier place than
their native city. Suddenly, as the bird describes the happy careless life
of his kind, Peithetairus conceives the idea of founding a new bird city
between earth and heaven. The Hoopoe summons his friends to hear their
opinion; as they come in he names them to the wondering Athenians. At
first the Birds threaten to attack the mortals, their natural enemies.
They listen, however, to Peithetairus’ words of wisdom.

A truce is made. Peithetairus tells them the Birds once ruled the world
but have been deposed, becoming the prey of those who once worshipped
them. They should ring round the air, like Babylon, with mighty baked
bricks and send an ultimatum to the gods, demanding their lost kingdom and
forbidding a passage to earth; another messenger should descend to men to
require from them due sacrifices. The Birds agree; the two companions
retire to Hoopoe’s house to eat the magic root which will turn them into
winged things. After a choral panegyric on the bird species Peithetairus
returns to name the new city Cloudcuckootown, whose erection is taken in
hand. Impostors make their appearance, a priest to sacrifice, a poet to
eulogise, an oracle-dealer to promise success, a mathematician to plan out
the buildings, an overseer and a seller of decrees to enact by-laws; all
are summarily ejected by Peithetairus.

News comes that the city is already completed. Suddenly Iris darts in, on
her way to earth to demand the accustomed sacrifices from men which the
new city has interrupted; she is sent back to heaven to warn the gods of
their coming overthrow. A herald from earth brings tidings that more than
a myriad human beings are on their way to settle in the city. A
parent-beater first appears, then a poet, then an informer—all being
firmly dealt with. Prometheus slips in under a parasol, to advise
Peithetairus to demand from Zeus his sceptre and with it the lady Royalty
as his bride. Poseidon, Heracles and an outlandish Triballian god after a
long discussion make terms with the new monarch, who goes with them to
fetch his bride. A triumphant wedding forms the conclusion.

The purpose of this comedy has been the subject of much discussion. As a
piece of literature it is exquisite. It lifts us out of a world of hard
unpleasant fact into a region where life is a care-free thing, bores or
impostors are banished and the reign of the usurper ends. The play is not
of or for any one particular period; it is really timeless, appealing to
the ineradicable desire we all have for an existence of joy and light,
where dreams always come true and hope ends only in fulfilment. It is
therefore one of man’s deathless achievements; the power of its appeal is
evident from the frequency with which it has been revived—it was
staged at Cambridge this very year. Staged it will be as long as men are
what they are.

Having learned that men are a naturally combative race, lusting for blood,
the poet saw it was hopeless to bring them to terms. Nor could he for ever
live in Cloudcuckootowns; he therefore bethought him of another expedient
for obtaining peace. In 411 he imagines the women of Athens, Peloponnese
and Boeotia combining to force terms on the men by deserting their homes,
under the leadership of Lysistrata. She calls a council of war,
explaining her plot to capture the Acropolis. A Chorus of men rush in to
smoke them out, armed with firebrands, but are met by a Chorus of women
bearing pitchers to quench the flames. An officer of the Council comes to
argue with Lysistrata, who points out that in the first part of the war
(down to 421) the women had kept quiet, though aware of men’s
incompetence; now they have determined to control matters. They are
possessed of the Treasury, their experience of household economy gives
them a good claim to organise State finance; they grow old in the absence
of their husbands; a man can marry a girl however old he is. A woman’s
prime soon comes; if she misses it, she sits at home looking for omens of
a husband; women make the most valuable of all contributions to the State,
namely sons. The officer retires to report to the Council.

Lysistrata, seeing a weakness in the women’s resolution, encourages them
with an oracle which promises victory if they will only persist. A herald
speedily arrives from Sparta announcing a similar defection in that city.
Ambassadors of both sides are brought to Lysistrata who makes a splendid
speech.

She points out that both sides have been guilty of injustice; both should
make surrenders and agree to a peace which is duly ratified. The Chorus of
men believe that Athenian ambassadors should go to Sparta in their cups:—

Odes of thanksgiving wind up the piece.

Exactly twenty years earlier Euripides in the Medea had written the
first protest against women’s subjection to an unfair social lot. By a
strange irony of fortune his most severe critic Aristophanes was the first
man in Europe to give utterance to their claim to a political equality.
True, he does so in a comedy, but he was speaking perhaps more seriously
than he would have us think. Women do contribute sons to the State; they
do believe that they are as capable as men of judging political questions—with
justice, in a system where no qualifications but twilight opinions are
necessary. On this ground they have won the franchise. Nor has the
feminist movement really begun as yet. We may see women in control of our
political Acropolis, forcing the world to make peace to save our chances
of becoming ultimately civilised.

The Thesmophoriazousae, staged in 411, is a lampoon on Euripides.
That poet with his kinsman Mnesilochus calls at the house of Agathon, a
brother tragedian whose style is amusingly parodied. Euripides informs him
that the women intend to hold a meeting to destroy him for libel; they are
celebrating the feast of the Thesmophoria. As Agathon refuses an
invitation to go disguised and defend Euripides, Mnesilochus undertakes
the dangerous duty; his disguise is effected on the stage with comic
gusto. At the meeting the case against the poet is first stated; he has
not only lampooned women, he has taught their husbands how to counter
their knaveries and is an atheist. Mnesilochus defends him; women are
capable of far more villainies than even Euripides has exposed. The
statement of these raises the suspicions of the ladies who soon unmask the
intruder, inquiring of him the secret ritual of the Thesmophoria.

One of them goes to the Town Council to find out what punishment they are
to inflict.

Mnesilochus meanwhile snatches a child from the arms of one of them,
holding it as a hostage. To his amazement it turns out to be a wine-stoup.
He vainly tries some of the dodges practised in Euripides’ plays to bring
him to the rescue. The Chorus meantime expose the folly of calling women
evil.

A better plan would be

In an amusing series of scenes Euripides enters dressed up as some of his
own characters to save Mnesilochus. A borough officer enters with a
policeman whom he orders to bind the prisoner and guard him. More
disguises are adopted by Euripides who succeeds at last in freeing his
kinsman by pretending to be an old woman with a marriageable daughter whom
the policeman can have at a price. When the latter goes to fetch the money
Euripides and his relative disappear.

The poet has in this play very skilfully palmed off on Euripides his own
attack on women. We have already seen what Euripides’ attitude was to the
neglected sex. Feminine deceit has been a stock theme in all ages; it had
already been treated in Greek literature and was to be passed through
Roman literature to the Middle Ages, in which period it received more than
its due share of attention. In itself it is a poor theme, good enough
perhaps as a stand-by, for it is sure to be popular. Those who pose as
woman-haters might consider the words of the Chorus in this play.

The most violent attack on Euripides was delivered after his death by
Aristophanes in the Frogs, written in 405. This famous comedy is so
well-known that a brief outline will suffice. It falls into two parts. The
first describes the adventures of Dionysus who with his servant Xanthias
descends to the lower world to bring back Euripides. The god and his
servant exchange parts according as the persons they meet are friendly or
hostile. In the second part the three great tragedians are brought on the
scene. Euripides, who has just died, tries to claim sovereignty in Hades;
Sophocles, “gentle on earth and gentle in death” withdraws his claim,
leaving Aeschylus to the contest. The two rivals appoint Dionysus, the
patron of drama, to act as umpire. In a series of admirable criticisms the
weaknesses of both are plainly indicated. Finally Dionysus decides to take
back Aeschylus.

This play is as popular as the Birds. It contains one or two touches of
low comedy, but these are redeemed by the spirit of inexhaustible jollity
which sets the whole thing rocking with life and gaiety. It is an original
in Greek literature, being the first piece of definitely literary
criticism. A long experience had made the sense of the stage a second
nature to Aristophanes who here criticises two rival schools of poetry as
a dramatist possessed of inside professional knowledge. So far his work is
of the same class as Cicero’s De Oratore and Reynolds’ Discourses.
His object, however, was not to preserve a balance of impartiality but to
condemn Euripides as a traitor to the whole tradition of Attic tragedy. He
does so, but not without giving his reasons—and these are good and
true. No person is qualified to judge the development of Greek tragedy who
has not weighed long and carefully the second portion of the Frogs.

In 393 Aristophanes broke entirely new ground in the Ecclesiazousae
(women in Parliament), a discussion of social and economic problems.
Praxagora assembles the women of Athens to gain control of the city. They
meet early in the morning, disguise themselves with beards and open the
question.

They proceed to the Assembly to execute their plot.

On the opening of the discussion one Euaeon proposed a scheme of wholesale
spoliation of the property owners to support the poor. Then a white-faced
citizen arose and proposed flatly that women should rule, that being the
one thing which had never yet been tried. The motion was carried with
great enthusiasm, the men declaring that “an old proverb says all our
senseless and foolish decisions turn out for good”. When Praxagora returns
to the stage, she declares she intends to introduce a system of absolute
communism. All citizens are to live and dine in common and possess wives
in common, existing on the work of slaves. Any person who refuses to
declare his wealth is to be punished by losing his rations, “the
punishment of a man through his belly being the worst insult he can
suffer”. A vivid description of the workings of the new system ends the
play.

Aristophanes is no doubt criticising Plato’s Republic, but allowing
for altered circumstances we cannot go far wrong if we see here a picture
of the suggested remedy for the social distress which is inseparable from
a great war. At Athens, beaten and impoverished, there must have been
widespread discontent; the foundation upon which society was built must
have been criticised, its inequalities being emphasised by idealists and
intriguers alike. Our own generation has to face a similar situation. We
have seen women in Parliament and we are deluged by a flood of communistic
idealism emanating from Russia. Its one commendation is that it has never
yet been tried among us and many simple folk will applaud the philosophy
which persuades itself that all our mistakes will somehow come right in
the end. The problem of finding somebody to do the work was easily solved
in ancient Athens where the slaves were three times as numerous as the
free. England, possessing no slaves, would under communism be unable to
feed herself and would die of starvation.

The Plutus, written in 388 is a singular work. An honest old man
Chremylus enters with Carion “his most faithful and most thievish
servant”. They are holding fast a blind old man, in obedience to an oracle
of Apollo. After a little questioning the stranger admits that he is
Plutus, the god of wealth. Wild with joy they invite him to their house.
He does not like houses, for they have never brought him to any good.

Learning that Chremylus is honest and poor he consents to try once again.

The rumour gets abroad that Chremylus has suddenly grown rich; his
acquaintance reveal their true characters as they come to question him
about his luck. The goddess Poverty enters, to be cross-examined by
Chremylus who has suggested that Plutus should recover his sight under the
healing care of Asclepius. Before the care is effected, she points out the
dangers of his project. He is well-meaning, but foolish; Poverty is not
Mendicancy, it means a life of thrift, with nothing left over but with no
real want; it is the source of the existence of all the handicrafts, nor
can the slaves be counted on to do the work if everybody becomes rich, for
nobody will sell slaves if he has money already. Riches on the other hand
are the curse of many; wealth rots men, causing gout, dropsy and bloated
insolence; the gods themselves are poor, otherwise they would not need
human sacrifice.

The cure is successful; Plutus recovers his eyes and can see to whom he
gives his blessings; the good and the rascals alike receive their due
reward. The change which wealth produces in men’s natures is most
admirably depicted in the Epilogue.

This is an Allegory dramatised with no little skill. The piece is full of
the shrewdest hits at our human failings, aimed, however, with no
ill-nature. Aristophanes’ power of characterisation here shows no
falling-off. Fortune’s fickleness is proverbial and has received frequent
literary treatment. Men’s first prayer is for wealth; poverty, according
to Dr. Johnson, is evidently a great evil because it needs such a long
defence. Yet it is only the well-meaning but utterly unpractical idealists
who desire to make us all prosperous—

Some are not fit for riches, being ignorant of their true function;
self-indulgence and moral rottenness follow wealth; because of the abuse
of the power which wealth brings, we are taught that it is hard for the
rich to enter the kingdom of heaven.

It is difficult to convey an adequate impression of Aristophanes to the
English reader. Long excerpts are impossible and undesirable. Comedy is
essentially a mirror of contemporary life; it contains all kinds of
references to passing political events and transient forms of social life;
its turns of language are peculiar to its own age. We who are familiar
with Shakespeare know that one of our chief difficulties in reading him is
the constant reference to what was obvious to the Elizabethan public but
is dark to us. Yet the plays of Aristophanes in an English translation
such as that of Frere read far more like modern work than the comedies of
Ben Jonson, for the society in which Aristophanes moved was far more akin
to ours. It was democratic, was superficially educated, was troubled by
socialistic and communistic unrest exactly as we are. Some of our modern
thinkers would be surprised to find how many of their dreamings were
discussed twenty-three centuries ago by men quite as intelligent and
certainly as honest.

Aristophanes’ greatest fault is excessive conservatism. He gives us a most
vivid description of the evils and abuses of his own time, yet has no
remedy except that of putting back the hands of the clock some fifty
years. Marathon, Aeschylus, the nascent democracy were his ideal and he
was evidently put out by the ending of the period of “Periclean calm.” He
then has no solution for the problems in front of him. But it might be
asked whether a dramatist’s business is not rather to leave solutions to
the thinker, concerning himself only with mirroring men’s natures. With
singular courage and at no small personal risk this man attacked the great
ones of his day, scourging their hypocrisies and exposing the real
tendencies of their principles. If he has opened our eyes to the
objections to popular government and popular poetry and has made us aware
of the significance of the feminist movement, let us be thankful; we shall
be more on our guard and be less easily persuaded that problems are new or
that they are capable of a final solution.

On the other hand, we shall find in him qualities of a most original type.
His spirits are inexhaustible, he laughs heartily and often without malice
at the follies of the mass of men; Cleon and Euripides were anathema to
him, but the rest he treats as Fluellen did Pistol: “You beggarly knave,
God bless you”. His lyrics must be classed with the best in Greek poetry.
Like Rabelais this rollicking jolly spirit disguises his wisdom under the
mask of folly, turning aside with some whimsical twist just when he is
beginning to be too serious. He will repay the most careful reading, for
his best things are constantly turning up when least expected. His
political satire ceasing with the death of Cleon, he turned to the land of
pure fancy among the winged careless things; he then raised the woman’s
question, started literary criticism and ended with Allegory. To few has
such a noble cycle of work been vouchsafed; we owe him at least a debt of
remembrance, for he loved us as our brother.

TRANSLATIONS:

Frere (verse). This spirited version of five plays is justly famous.
Various plays have been rendered into verse by Rogers (Bell). The
translation is on the whole rather free. The volumes contain excellent
introductions and notes.

No prose translation of outstanding merit has appeared.

The Greek tragedians have not received their due from translators and
admirers. There is nothing in English drama inspired by Greece to compare
with the French imitations of Seneca, Plautus and Terence.

HERODOTUS

Greek historical literature follows the same course of development as
Greek poetry; it begins in epic form in Ionia and ends in dramatic type at
Athens.

Herodotus, “the father of History”, was born at Halicarnassus in Asia
Minor about 484 B.C. He travelled widely over the East, Egypt, North
Africa and Greece. He was acquainted with the Sophoclean circle, joined
the Athenian colony at Thurii in South Italy and died there before the end
of the century. His subject was the defeat of the Persian attack on Greece
and falls into three main divisions. In the first three books he tells how
Persian power was consolidated: in the next three he shows how it flooded
Russia, Thrace and Greece, being stemmed at Marathon in 490; the last
three contain the story of its final shattering at Salamis and Plataea in
480 and of the Greek recoil on Asia in 479. It is thus a “triple wave of
woes” familiar to Greek thought. His dialect is Ionic, which he adopted
because it was the language of narrative poetry and prose.

His introduction leads at once into Romance; he intends to preserve the
memory of the wonderful deeds of Greeks and Barbarians, the cause of their
quarrel being the abductions of women, Io, Europe, Medea, Helen. A more
recent aggressor was Croesus, King of Lydia, who attacked the Greek
seaboard. The earlier reigns of Lydian kings are recounted in a series of
striking narratives. Gyges was the owner of the famous magic ring which
made its possessor invisible. His policy of expansion was continued by his
son and grandson. But Croesus, his great-grandson, was the wealthiest of
all, extending his realm from as far as the Halys, the boundary of Cyrus’
Persian Empire. Solon’s famous but fictitious warning to him to “wait till
the end comes before deciding whether he had been happy” left him unmoved.
Soon clouds began to gather. A pathetic misadventure robbed him of his
son; the growing power of Persia alarmed him and he applied to Delphi for
advice. The oracle informed him that if he crossed the Halys he would ruin
a mighty Empire and suggested alliance with the strongest state in Greece.
Finding that Athens was still torn by political struggles consequent upon
the romantic banishments and restorations of Peisistratus, he joined with
Sparta which had just overcome a powerful rival, Tegea in Arcadia.

Croesus crossed the Halys in 554. After fighting an indecisive battle he
retired to his capital Sardis. Cyrus unexpectedly pursued him. The Lydian
cavalry stampeded, the horses being terrified by the sight and odour of
the Persian camel corps. Croesus shut himself up in Sardis which he
thought impregnable. An excellent story tells how the Persians scaled the
most inaccessible part of the fortress. Croesus was put on a pyre and
there remembered the words of Solon. Cyrus, dreading a similar revolution
of fortune, tried in vain to save him from the burning faggots; the fire
was too fierce for his men to quench, but Apollo heard Croesus’ prayer and
sent a rainstorm which saved him. Being reproached by the fallen monarch
who had poured treasure into his temple, Apollo replied that he had staved
off ruin for three full years, but could not prevail against Fate;
besides, Croesus should have asked whose Empire he was to destroy; at
least Apollo had delivered him from death. The Lydian portion ends with a
graphic description of laws, customs and monuments.

The rise of Persia is next described. Assyria, whose capital was Nineveh,
was destroyed by Cyaxares of Media, whose capital was Ecbatana. His son
Astyages in consequence of a dream married his daughter Mandané to a
Persian named Cambyses. A second dream made him resolve to destroy her
child Cyrus who, like Oedipus, was saved from exposure by a herdsman.
Later, on learning Cyrus’ identity, Astyages punished Harpagus whom he had
bidden to remove the child. Harpagus sowed mutiny in the Median army,
giving the victory to the Persians in 558. Cyrus proceeded to attack the
Asiatic Greeks, of whom the Phocaeans left their home to found new states
in Corsica and Southern Gaul; the other cities surrendered. Babylon was
soon the only city in Asia not subject to Persia. Cyrus diverted the
course of the Euphrates and entered the town in 538. In an attack on
Tomyris, queen of a Scythian race, Cyrus was defeated and slain in 529.

His son Cambyses determined to invade Egypt, the eternal rival of the
Mesopotamian kings. Herodotus devotes his second book to a description of
the marvels of Egypt, through which he travelled as far as Elephantiné on
the border of Ethiopia. He opens with a plain proof that Egypt is not the
most ancient people, for some children were kept apart during their first
two years, nobody being allowed to speak with them. They were then heard
to say distinctly the word “bekos” which was Phrygian for “bread”. This
evidence of Phrygian antiquity satisfied even the Egyptians.

In this second book there is hardly a single leading feature of Egyptian
civilisation which is not discussed. The Nile is the life of the land;
being anxious to solve the riddle of its annual rise, Herodotus dismisses
as unreasonable the theory that the water is produced by the melting snow,
for the earth becomes hotter as we proceed further south, and there cannot
be snow where there is intense heat. The sun is deflected from its course
in winter, which derangement causes the river to run shallow in that
season. The religious practice of the land are well described, including
the process of embalming; oracles, animals, medicine, writing, dress are
all treated. He notes that in Egyptian records the sun has twice risen in
the west and twice set in the east.

A long list of dynasties is relieved with many an excellent story, notably
the very famous account of how Rhampsonitis lost his treasures and failed
to find the robber until he offered him a free pardon; having found him he
said the Egyptians excelled all the world in wisdom, and the robber all
the Egyptians. The Pyramids are described; transmigration is discussed and
emphasis is laid upon the growing popularity of Greek mercenaries. The
book closes with the brilliant reign of Amasis, who made overtures to the
Greek oracles, allied himself with Samos and permitted the foundation of
an important Greek colony at Naucratis.

The third book opens with the invasion of Egypt by Cambyses in 525 on
account of an insult offered him by Amasis. A Greek mercenary named Phanes
gave the Persians information of the one means of attacking through the
desert. After a fierce battle at Pelusium Egypt was beaten; for years
afterwards skulls of both armies lay around, the Persian heads being
easily broken by a pebble, the Egyptian scarcely breakable by stones. In
victory Cambyses outraged Psammenitus, the defeated King; a fruitless
expedition against Ethiopia and the Ammonians followed. The Egyptians were
stirred by the arrival of their calf-god Apis; Cambyses mockingly wounded
him and was punished with madness, slaying his own kindred and committing
deeds of impiety.

At that time Egypt was leagued with the powerful island of Samos, ruled by
Polycrates, a tyrant of marvellous good fortune. Suspecting some coming
disaster to balance it, Amasis urged him to sacrifice his dearest
possession to avert the evil eye. Polycrates threw his ring into the sea;
it was retrieved by a fisherman. On hearing this, Amasis severed his
alliance.

In the absence of Cambyses two Magi brothers stirred up revolt in Susa,
one pretending to be Smerdis, the murdered brother of Cambyses. That
monarch wounded himself in the thigh as he mounted his horse. The wound
festered and caused speedy death. Meanwhile the false Smerdis held the
sovereignty. He was suspected by Otanes, a noble whose daughter Phaedymé
was married to him. At great personal risk she discovered that the King
was without ears, a manifest proof that he was a Magian. Otane thens
joined with six other conspirators to put the usurper down. Darius, son of
Hystaspes, warned them that their numbers were too large for secrecy,
advising immediate action. The two pretenders had meanwhile persuaded
Prexaspes, a confidant of Cambyses, to assure the Persians that Smerdis
really ruled. Prexaspes told the truth and then threw himself to death
from the city walls. This news forced the conspirators’ hands; rushing
into the palace, they were luckily able to slay the usurpers.

The next question was, who should reign? Herodotus turned these Persians
into Greeks, making them discuss the comparative merits of monarchy,
oligarchy and democracy. They decided that their horses should choose the
next king; he whose steed should first neigh should rule. Darius had a
cunning groom named Oebares; that evening he took the horse and his mare
into the market-place; next morning on reaching the same spot the horse
did not fail to seat his master on the throne in 521. A review of the
Persian Empire follows, with a description of India and Arabia.

Polycrates did not long survive. He was the first Greek to conceive the
idea of a maritime empire. He was foully murdered by the Persian Oroetes,
who decoyed him to the mainland by an offer of treasure and then crucified
him. In the retinue of Polycrates was a physician, Democedes of Croton,
who was captured by Oroetes. His fame spread to Susa at a time when no
court doctor could treat Darius’ sprained foot. Democedes was sent for and
effected the cure; later he healed the Queen Atossa of a boil. Instructed
by him she advised Darius to send a commission of fifteen Persians to spy
out the Greek mainland under Democedes’ guidance. After an exciting series
of adventures the physician succeeded in returning to his native city. But
the idea of an invasion of Greece had settled on Darius’ mind. First,
however, he took Samos, giving it to Syloson, Polycrates’ brother who
years before in Egypt had made him a present of a scarlet cloak while he
was a mere guardsman. Darius consolidated his power in Asia by the capture
of the revolted province of Babylon through the self-sacrifice of Zopyrus,
son of one of the seven conspirators. The vivid story of his devotion is
one of the very greatest things in Herodotus.

Persia being thus mistress of all Asia, of Samos and the seaboard, began
to dream of subduing Greece itself. But first Darius determined to conquer
his non-Greek neighbours. The fourth book describes the attack which
Darius himself led against the Scythians in revenge for the twenty-eight
years’ slavery they inflicted on the Medes. A description of Scythia is
relieved by an account of the circumnavigation of Africa by the
Phoenicians and the voyage of Scylax down the Indus and along the coast of
Africa to Egypt.

The war on the Scyths was dramatic and exciting, both sides acting in the
spirit of chivalry. Crossing the Bosporus, Darius advanced through Thrace
to the Danube which he spanned with a bridge. The Scyths adopted the
favourite Russian plan of retreating into the interior, destroying the
crops and hovering round the foe; they further led the Persians into the
territories of their own enemies. This process at last wearied Darius; he
sent a herald to challenge them to a straight contest or to become his
vassals. The reply came that if Darius wished a conflict he had better
outrage their ancestral tombs; as for slavery, they acknowledged only Zeus
as their master. But the threat of slavery did its work. A detachment was
sent to the Danube to induce the Ionian Greeks to strike for freedom by
breaking down the bridge they were guarding, thus cutting off Darius’
retreat. To the King himself a Scythian herald brought a present of a
bird, a mouse, a frog and five arrows, implying that unless his army
became one of the creatures it would perish by the arrows. The Scyths
adopted guerilla tactics, leaving the Persians no rest by night and
offering no battle by day. At last Darius began his retreat. One division
of the Scythian horsemen reached the bridge before their foes, again
asking the Ionians to destroy it. The Greeks pretended to consent,
breaking down the Scythian end of it. Darius at last came to the place; to
his dismay he found the bridge demolished. He bade an Egyptian Stentor
summon Histiaeus, the Greek commandant, who brought up the fleet and saved
the Persian host which retired into Asia.

In 509 a second expedition was dispatched against Barca, a colony of
Cyrene. The history of the latter is graphically described, the first king
being Battus, the Stammerer, who founded it in obedience to the directions
of Apollo. Cyrene was brought under Cambyses’ sway by Arcesilaus who had
been banished. He misinterpreted an oracle and cruelly killed his enemies
in Barca. When he was assassinated in that town his mother Pheretima fled
from the metropolis Cyrene to Aryandes, the Persian governor in Egypt.
Backed by armed force she besieged Barca which resisted bravely for nine
months; at the end of that term an agreement was made that Barca should
pay tribute and remain unassailed as long as the ground remained firm on
which the treaty was made. But the Persians had undermined the spot,
covering planks of wood with a loose layer of earth. Breaking down the
planks they rushed in and took the town, Pheretima exacting a horrible
vengeance. Yet she herself died soon after, eaten of worms. “Thus,”
remarks the historian, “do men, by too severe vengeances, draw upon their
own heads the divine wrath.”

The fifth book begins the concentration on purely Greek history. Darius
had left Megabazus in command in Europe, retiring himself to Sardis. In
that city he was much struck by the appearance of a Paeonian woman and
ordered Megabazus to invade the country. He subdued it and Macedonia in
506-4, but in the process some of his commanders were punished for an
insult to Macedonian women, revenge being taken by Alexander, son of King
Amyntas; a bride shut the lips of a party sent to discover their fate. In
Thrace, Megabazus began to suspect Histiaeus, the Ionian who had saved
Darius and in return had been given a strong town, Myrcinus on the River
Strymon. The King by a trick drew Histiaeus to Sardis and took him to the
Capital, leaving his brother Artaphernes as governor in Sardis. But
Histiaeus had been succeeded in Miletus by his nephew Aristagoras; to him
in 502 came certain nobles from Naxos, one of the Cyclades isles, begging
restoration from banishment. He decided to apply to Artaphernes for
Persian help; this the viceroy willingly gave as it would further the
Persian progress to the objective, the Greek mainland, across the Aegean
in a direct line. The Persian admiral Megabates soon quarrelled with
Aristagoras about the command and informed the Naxians of the coming
attack. The expedition thus failed. Aristagoras, afraid to face Artaphemes
whose treasure he had wasted, decided on raising a revolt of the whole of
Ionia; at that very moment a slave came to him from his uncle in Susa with
a message tattooed on his head, bidding him rebel.

Aristagoras first applied to Sparta for aid. When arguments failed, he
tried to bribe the king Cleomenes. In the room was the King’s little
daughter Gorgo. Hearing Aristagoras gradually raise his offer from ten to
fifty talents, the child said, “Father, depart, or the stranger will
corrupt thee”. Aristagoras received a better welcome at Athens. That city
in 510 had expelled Hippias, the tyrant son of Peisistratus, who appealed
to Artaphernes for aid. Hearing this, the Athenians sent an embassy asking
the satrap not to assist the exile, but the answer was that if they wished
to survive, they must receive their ruler back. Aristagoras therefore
found the Athenians in a fit frame of mind to listen. They lent him a
fleet of twenty sail and marched with him to Sardis which they captured
and burned in 501. The revolt speedily spread over all the Asiatic
sea-coast. On hearing of the Athenians for the first time, Darius directed
a slave to say to him thrice a day, “Sire, remember the Athenians”. He
summoned Histiaeus and accused him of complicity in the revolt, but
Histiaeus assured him of his loyalty and obtained permission to go to the
coast. Meanwhile the Persians took strong action against the rebels,
subduing many towns and districts. The book ends with the flight of
Aristagoras to Myrcinus and his death in battle against the Thracians in
496.

The next book opens with the famous accusation of Histiaeus by
Artaphernes: “Thou hast stitched this boot and Aristagoras hath put it
on.” Histiaeus in fear fled to his own city Miletus; being disowned there,
he for a time maintained a life of privateering, but was eventually
captured and crucified by Artaphernes. The Ionian revolt had been narrowed
down to Miletus and one or two less important towns. The Greeks assembled
a fleet, but a spirit of insubordination manifesting itself they were
defeated at sea in the battle of Lade in 495. Next year Miletus fell but
was treated with mercy. At Athens the news caused the greatest
consternation; a dramatic poet named Phrynichus ventured to stage the
disaster; the people wept and fined him a thousand talents, forbidding any
similar presentation in future. Stamping out the last embers of revolt in
Asia the Persians coasted along Thrace; before their advance the great
Athenian Miltiades was compelled to fly from the Dardanelles to his native
city. In 492 Mardonius was appointed viceroy of Asia Minor. He reorganised
the provincial system and then attempted to double the perilous promontory
of Athos, but only a remnant of his forces returned to Asia.

Next year Darius sent to all the Greek cities demanding earth and water,
the tokens of submission. The islanders obeyed including Aegina, the
deadly foe of Athens. A protest made by the latter led to a war between
the two states in which Athens was worsted. Sparta itself had just been
torn by an internal dissension between two claimants of the throne, one of
whom named Demaratus had been ejected and later fled to the Persian court.
The great expedition of 490 sailed straight across the Aegean, commanded
by Datis and Artaphernes. Their primary objective was Eretria in Euboea, a
city which had assisted the Ionians in their revolt. The town was speedily
betrayed, the inhabitants being carried aboard the Persian fleet. Guided
by Hippias the armament landed at the bay of Marathon, twenty-five miles
from Athens. A vain appeal was sent to Sparta for succours; Athens,
supported by the little Boeotian city of Plataea, was left to cope with
the might of Persia.

It was fortunate that the Athenians could command the services of
Miltiades who had already had some experience of the Persian methods of
attack. The details of the great battle that followed depend upon the sole
authority of Herodotus among the Greek writers. Many difficulties are
caused by his narrative, but it seems certain that Miltiades was in
command on the day on which the battle was actually fought. He apparently
clung to the hills overlooking the plain and bay of Marathon until the
Persian cavalry were unable to act. Seizing the opportunity, he led his
men down swiftly to the combat; his centre which had been purposely
weakened was thrust back but the two wings speedily proved victorious,
then converged to assist the centre, finally driving the foe to the sea
where a desperate conflict took place. The Persians succeeded in embarking
and promptly sailed round the coast to Athens, but seeing the victors in
arms before the town they sailed back to Asia. The Spartan reinforcements
which arrived too late for the battle viewed the Persian dead and returned
after praising the Athenians.

A slight digression tells the amusing story how the Athenian Hippocleides
in his cups lost the hand of the princess of Sicyon because he danced on
his head and waved his legs about, shouting that he didn’t care. The great
victor Miltiades did not long survive his glory. His attempt to reduce the
island of Paros, which had sided with Persia, completely failed. Returning
to Athens he was condemned and fined, shortly after dying of a mortified
thigh.

In the third portion Herodotus gradually rises to his greatest height of
descriptive power. Darius resolved on a larger expedition to reduce
Greece. He made preparations for three years, then a revolt in Egypt
delayed his plans and his career was cut short by death in 485. His
successor Xerxes was disinclined to invade Europe, but was overborne by
Mardonius his cousin. A canal was dug across the peninsula of Athos, a
bridge was built over the Hellespont, and provisions were collected. A
detailed account of the component forces is given, special mention being
made of Artemisia, Queen of Herodotus’ own city, who was to win great
glory in the campaign. The army marched over the Hellespont and along the
coast, the fleet supporting it; advancing through Thessaly, it reached the
pass of Thermopylae, opposite Euboea, in 480.

On the Greek side was division; the Spartans imagined that their duty was
to save the Peloponnese only; they were eager to build a wall across the
isthmus of Corinth, leaving the rest of Greece to its fate. But Athens had
produced another genius named Themistocles. Shortly before the invasion
the silver mines at Laureium in Attica had yielded a surplus; he persuaded
the city to use it for building a fleet of two hundred sail to be directed
against Aegina. When the Athenians got an oracle from Delphi which stated
that they would lose their land but be saved by their wooden walls, he
interpreted the oracle as referring to the fleet. Under his management the
city built more ships. The Council of Greece held at the Isthmus of
Corinth decided that an army should defend Thermopylae while the fleet
supported it close by at Artemisium. The Persian fleet had been badly
battered in a storm as it sailed along the coast of Magnesia, nearly four
hundred sail foundering; the remainder reached safe anchorage in the
Malian gulf, further progress being impossible till the Greek navy was
beaten or retired.

At Thermopylae the advance-guard was composed of Spartans led by Leonidas
who determined to defend the narrow pass. A Persian spy brought the news
to Xerxes that this small body of warriors were combing their hair. The
King sent for Demaratus, the ex-Spartan monarch, who assured him that this
was proof that the Spartans intended to fight to the death. After a delay
of four days the fight began. The Spartans routed all their opponents
including the famous Immortals, the Persian bodyguard. At length a traitor
Ephialtes told Xerxes of a path across the mountains by which Leonidas
could be taken in the rear. Learning from deserters and fugitives that he
had been betrayed, Leonidas dismissed the main body, himself advancing
into the open. After winning immortal glory he and his men were destroyed
and the way to Greece lay open to the invader.

In three naval engagements off Artemisium the Greek fleet showed its
superiority; a detachment of two hundred sail had been sent round the
island of Euboea to block up the exit of the channel through which the
Greek navy had to retreat, but a storm totally destroyed this force. When
the army retreated from Thermopylae the Greek ships were obliged to retire
to the Isthmus; in spite of much opposition the Athenians compelled
Eurybiades the Spartan admiral to take up his station at Salamis, whither
the Persian navy followed. Their army had advanced through Boeotia,
attacking Delphi on the way. The story was told how Apollo himself
defended his shrine, hurling down rocks on the invaders and sending
supernatural figures to discomfit them. Entering Attica the barbarian host
captured a deserted Athens, Xerxes sending the glad news to his subjects
in the Persian capital.

The Greeks were with difficulty persuaded not to abandon the sea
altogether. Themistocles was bitterly opposed in his naval policy by
Adeimantus, the Corinthian; it was only by threatening to leave Greece
with their fleet that the Athenians were able to bring the allies to
reason. By a stroke of cunning Themistocles forced their hands; a
messenger went to Xerxes with news of the Greek intention to retreat; on
hearing this the Persians during the night blocked up the passages round
Salamis and landed some of their best troops on a little island called
Psyttaleia. The news of this encircling movement was brought to the allies
by Aristides, a celebrated Athenian who was in exile, and was confirmed by
a Tenian ship which deserted from the Persians. Next morning the Greeks
sailed down the strait to escape the blockade and soon the famous battle
began. Among the brave deeds singled out for special mention none was
bolder than that of Artemisia who sank a friend to escape capture. The
remainder of the Persian captains had no chance of resisting, being
huddled up in a narrow channel. Seeing Artemisia’s courage Xerxes remarked
that his men had become women, his women men. The rout of the invaders was
quickly completed, the chief glory being won by Aegina and Athens; the
victory was consummated by the slaughter of the troops on Psyttaleia. The
Persian monarch sent tidings of this defeat to his capital and in terror
of a revolt in Ionia decided to retreat, leaving Mardonius in command of
picked troops. He hurriedly passed along the way he had come, almost
disappearing from Herodotus’ story.

Mardonius accompanied him to Thessaly and Macedonia; he sent Alexander,
King of the latter country, as an envoy to Athens, offering to rebuild the
temples and restore all property in exchange for an alliance. Hearing the
news the Spartans in fear for themselves sent a counter-embassy. The
Athenian reply is one of the great things in historical literature. “It
was a base surmise in men like the Spartans who know our mettle. Not all
the gold in the world would tempt us to enslave our own countrymen. We
have a common brotherhood with all Greeks, a common language, common
altars and sacrifices, common nationality; it would be unseemly to betray
these. We thank you for your offer to support our ruined families, but we
will bear our calamities as we may and will not burden you. Lead out your
troops; face the enemy in Boeotia and there give him battle.”

The last book relates the consequences of the Athenian reply to Alexander.
Mardonius advanced rapidly to Athens, which he captured a second time. The
Spartans were busy keeping the feast of Hyacinthia; only an Athenian
threat to come to terms with the foe prevailed on them to move. Mardonius
soon evacuated Attica, the ground being too stony for cavalry, and
encamped near Plataea. The Greeks followed, taking the high ground on
Mount Cithaeron. A brave exploit of the Athenian infantry in defeating
cavalry heartened the whole army. After eleven days’ inaction, Mardonius
determined to attack, news of his plan being brought secretly at night to
the Athenians by Alexander. The Spartans, afraid of facing the Persians,
exchanged places with the Athenians; when this movement was discovered by
Mardonius, he sent a challenge to the Spartans to decide the battle by a
single conflict between them and his Persian division. Receiving no reply,
he let his cavalry loose on the Greeks who began to retire to a place
called the Island, where horse could not operate. This action took place
during the night. When morning broke the battle began. The Persian wicker
shields could not resist their enemies’ weapons; the host fled and after
Mardonius fell was slaughtered in heaps. The Greek took vengeance on the
Thebans who had acted with the Persians, of whom a mere remnant reached
Asia under the command of Artabazus.

The victorious Greek fleet had advanced as far as Delos, commanded by
Leotychides, a Spartan of royal blood. To them came an embassy from Samos,
urging an attack on the Persians encamped on Mycale. It is said that the
battle was fought on the same day as that of Plataea and that a divine
rumour ran through the Greek army that their brothers had gained the day.
In the action at Mycale the Athenians took the palm of valour, bursting
the enemy’s line and storming his entrenchments. This victory freed Ionia;
it remained only to open the Dardanelles. The Spartans returned home, but
the Athenians crossed from Abydos in Asia to Sestos, the strongest
fortress in the district. The place was starved into surrender; with its
capture ends the story of Persia’s attempt to destroy European
civilisation.

In this great Epic nothing is more obvious than the terror the Greeks felt
when they first faced the Persians. The numbers arrayed against them were
overwhelming, their despondency was justifiable. It required no little
courage from a historian to tell the awkward truth—that Herodotus
did tell it is no small testimony to his veracity. Yet only a little
experience was needed to convince the Greeks that they were superior on
both land and sea. Once the lesson was learned, they never forgot it.
Mycale is the proof that they remembered it well. This same consciousness
of superiority animated two other Greek armies, one deserted in the middle
of Asia Minor, yet led unmolested by Xenophon through a hostile country to
the shores of the Black Sea—the other commanded by Alexander the
Great who planted Greek civilisation over every part of his conquests,
from the coast to the very gates of Persia itself.

Modern history seems to have lost all powers of interesting its readers.
It is as dull as political economy; it suspects a stylist, questions the
accuracy of its authorities, tends to minimise personal influence on
events, specialises on a narrow period, emphasises constitutional
development, insists on the “economic interpretation” of an age and at
times seems quite unable to manage with skill the vast stores of knowledge
on which it draws. To it Herodotus is often a butt for ridicule; his
credulity, inability to distinguish true causes, belief in divine
influences, love of anecdote and chronological vagueness are serious
blemishes. But to us Herodotus is literature; we believe that he himself
laughs slyly at some of the anecdotes he has rendered more piquant by a
pretended credulity; this quick-witted Greek would find it paid him to
assume innocence in order to get his informers (like his critics) to go on
talking. Like Froissart, Joinville, de Comines and perhaps even like
Macaulay he wishes to write what will charm as well as what will instruct.

Yet as a historian Herodotus is great; he sifts evidence, some of which he
mentions only to reject it; the substantial accuracy of his statements has
been borne out by inscriptions; in fact, his value to-day is greater than
it was last century. If a man’s literary bulk is measured by the greatness
of his subject, Herodotus cannot be a mean writer. His theme is nothing
less than the history of civilisation itself as far as he could record it;
his broad sweep of narrative may be taken to represent the wide
speculation of a philosophic historian as opposed to the narrower and more
intense examination of a short period which is characteristic of the
scientific historian. He tells us of the first actual armed conflict
between East and West, the never-ending eternally romantic story. As
Persia fought Greece, so Rome subdued Carthage, Crusader attacked Saladin,
Turkey submerged half Europe, Russia contended with Japan. The atmosphere
of Herodotus is the unchanging East of the Bible, inscrutable Egypt,
prehistoric Russia, barbarous Thrace, as well as civilised Greece, Africa,
India; had he never written, much information would have been
irretrievably lost, for example, the account of one of the “Fifteen
decisive battles” in history. Let him be judged not as a candidate for
some Chair of Ancient History in some modern University, but as the
greatest writer of the greatest prose-epic in the greatest literature of
antiquity.

Of his inimitable short stories it is difficult to speak with measured
praise; it is dangerous to quote them, they are so perfect that a word
added or omitted might spoil them. His so-called digressions have always
some cogent reason in them; they are his means of including in the
panorama a scene essential to its completeness. The narrow type of history
writing has been tried for some centuries; all that it seems able to
accomplish is to go on narrowing itself until it cannot enjoy for
recording or remembering. It is a refreshing experience to move in the
broad open regions of history in which Herodotus trod. If it is impossible
to combine accurate research with the ecstasy of pure literature, be it
so. Herodotus will be read with joy and laughter and sometimes with tears
when some of our modern historians have been superseded by persons even
duller than themselves.

TRANSLATIONS:

Rawlinson’s edition with a version contains essays of the greatest value.
It has been the standard for two generations and is not likely to be
superseded.

The Loeb Series contains a version by A. D. Godley.

The great annotated edition of the text by R. W. Macan (Oxford) is the
result of a lifetime’s work. It contains everything necessary to confirm
the claims of the historian.

The Great Persian War, by Grundy (London), is valuable.

See Bury, Ancient Greek Historians (Macmillan).

THUCYDIDES

History, like an individual’s life, is a succession of well-defined
periods. Herodotus took as his subject a long cycle of events; the shorter
period was first treated by Thucydides who introduced methods which
entitle him to be regarded as the first modern historian. Born in Attica
in 471 he was a victim of the great plague, was exiled for his failure to
check Brasidas at Eion in 424 and spent the rest of his life in collecting
materials for his great work. His death took place about 402.

His preface is remarkable as outlining his creed. First he states his
subject, the Peloponnesian war of 431-404; he then tests by an appeal to
reason the statements in old legends and in Homer, arguing from analogy or
from historical survivals in his own time to prove that various important
movements were caused or checked by economic influence. He uses his
imagination to prove that the importance of an event cannot be decided
from the extant remains of its place of origin, for if only the ruins of
both Sparta and Athens were left, Sparta would be thought to be
insignificant and Athens would appear twice as powerful as she really is.
Poetical exaggeration is easy and misleading, and ancient history is
difficult to determine by absolute proofs.

The essentially modern idea of history writing is here perfectly evident.

Having pointed out the significance of the war, not only to Greece but to
the whole of the world, he gives its causes. To him the real root of the
trouble was Sparta’s fear of Athenian power: the alleged pretexts were
different. The rise of Athens is rapidly described, her building of the
walls broken down by the Persians, her control of the island-states in a
Delian league which eventually became the nucleus of her Empire, her
alliance with Megara, a buffer-state between herself and Corinth. This
last saved her from fears of a land invasion; when she built for Megara
long walls to the sea she incurred the intense anger of Corinth which
smouldered for years and at last caused the Peloponnesian conflagration.
The reduction of Aegina in 451 compensated for the loss of Boeotia and
Egypt. Eventually the Thirty Years’ Peace was concluded in 445; Athens
gave up Megara, but retained Euboea; her definite policy for the future
was concentration on a maritime empire; she controlled nearly all the
islands of the Aegean and was mistress of the Saronic gulf, Aegina, “the
eyesore of the Peiraeus”, having fallen.

But if she was to confine her energies to the sea, it was essential that
she should be mistress of all the trade-routes which in ancient history
usually ran along the coast. On both east and west she found Corinth in
possession; a couple of quarrels with this city ruptured the peace. In the
west, Corinth had founded Corcyra (Corfu); this daughter colony quarrelled
with her mother and prevailed. In itself Corcyra was of little importance
in purely Greek politics, but it happened to possess a large navy and
commanded the trade-route to Sicily, whence came the corn supply. When
threatened with vengeance by Corinth, she appealed to Athens, where
ambassadors from Corinth also appeared. Their arguments are stated in the
speeches which are so characteristic of Thucydides. The Athenians after
careful consideration decided to conclude a defensive alliance with
Corcyra, for they dreaded the acquisition of her navy by Corinth. But
circumstances turned this into an offensive alliance, for Corinth attacked
and would have won a complete victory at sea but for timely Athenian
succour. In the east Athens was even more vitally concerned in trade with
the Hellespont, through which her own corn passed. On this route was the
powerful Corinthian city Potidaea, situate on the western prong of
Chalcidice. It had joined the Athenian confederacy but had secured
independence by building strong walls. When the Athenians demanded their
destruction and hostages as a guarantee, the town revolted and appealed to
the mother-city Corinth. A long and costly siege drained Athens of much
revenue and distracted her attention; but worst of all was the final
estrangement of the great trade rival whom she had thwarted in Greece
itself by occupying Megara, in the west by joining Corcyra, and in the
east by attacking Potidsea.

The final and open pretext for war was the exclusion of Megara from all
Athenian markets; this step meant the extinction of the town as a
trading-centre and was a definite set-back to the economic development of
the Peloponnese, of which Corinth and Megara were the natural avenues to
northern Greece. The cup was full; Athenian ambition had run its course.
The aggrieved states of the Peloponnese were invited to put their case at
Sparta; Corinth drew a famous picture of the Athenian character, its
restlessness, energy, adaptability and inventiveness. “In the face of such
a rival,” they added,

An Athenian reply failed to convince the allies of her innocence; one of
the Spartan Ephors forced the congress to declare that Athens had violated
the peace. A second assembly was summoned, at which the Corinthians in an
estimate of the Athenian power gave reasons for believing it would
eventually be reduced. They further appealed to what has never yet failed
to decide in favour of war—race antagonism; the Athenians and her
subjects were Ionians, whereas the Peloponnesians were mainly Dorians. The
necessary vote for opening hostilities was secured; but first an ultimatum
was presented. If Athens desired peace she must rescind the exclusion acts
aimed at Megara. At the debate in the Athenian assembly Pericles, the
virtual ruler, gave his reason for believing Athens would win; he urged a
demand for the withdrawal of Spartan Alien Acts aimed at Athens and her
allies and offered arbitration on the alleged grievances.

It is well to repeat the causes of this war: trade rivalry, naval
competition, race animosity and desire for predominance. Till these are
removed it is useless to expect permanent peace in spite of Leagues or
Tribunals or Arbitration Courts. Further, it should be noted that
Thucydides takes the utmost care to point out the excellent reasons the
most enlightened statesmen had for arriving at contradictory conclusions;
the event proved them all wrong without exception. The future had in store
at least two events which no human foresight could discover, and these
proved the deciding factors in the conflict.

The war began in 431 by a Theban attack on Plataea, the little town just
over the Attic frontier which had been allied with Athens for nearly a
century and protected her against invasion from the north. This city had
long been hated by Thebes as a deserter from her own league; it alone of
Boeotian towns had not joined the Persians. Burning with the desire to
capture it, a body of Thebans entered the place by night, seizing the
chief positions. But in the morning their scanty numbers were apparent;
recovering from panic the Plataeans overwhelmed the invaders and massacred
them. This open violation of the treaty kindled the war-spirit. Both sides
armed, Sparta being more popular as pretending to free Greece from a
tyrant. Their last ambassador on leaving Athenian territory said: “This
day will be the beginning of mighty woes for Greece”.

The Spartans invaded Attica, cutting down the fruit trees and forcing the
country folk into the city; the Athenians replied by ravaging parts of
Peloponnese and Megara. The funeral of the first Athenian victims of the
war was the occasion of a remarkable speech. Pericles in delivering it
expounds the Athenian ideal of life.

At the beginning of the next year a calamity which no statesman could have
foreseen overtook Athens. A mysterious plague of the greatest malignity
scourged the city, the mortality being multiplied among the crowds of
refugees. The city’s strength was seriously impaired, public and private
morality were undermined, inasmuch as none knew how long he had to live.
Discouraged by it and by the invasions the Athenians sent a fruitless
embassy to Sparta and tinned in fury on Pericles. He made a splendid
defence of his policy and gave them heart to continue the struggle; he
pointed out that it was better to lose their property and save the State
than save their property and lose the State; their fleet opened to them
the world of waters over which they could range as absolute masters. Soon
afterwards he died, surviving the opening of the war only two years and a
half; his character and abilities received due acknowledgment from
Thucydides.

At this point Sparta decided to destroy Plataea, the Athenian outpost in
Boeotia. A very brilliant description of the siege and counter-operations
reveals very clearly the Spartan inability to attack walled towns and
explains their objection to fortified friends. Leaving the town guarded
they retired for a time, to complete the work later. The war began to
spread beyond the Peloponnese to the north of the Corinthian gulf, the
control of which was important to both sides. The Acarnanians were
attacked by Sparta and appealed to the Athenian admiral Phormio. Two naval
actions in the gulf revealed the astonishing superiority of the Athenian
navy on the high seas. Threatened in her corn supply in the west, Sparta
began to intrigue with the outlying kingdoms on the north-east, the
“Thraceward parts” on the trade-route being the objective.

A spirit of revolt against Athenian rule appeared in Lesbos, which seceded
in 428. The chief town in this non-Ionic island was Mytilene, which sent
ambassadors to Sparta. Their speech clearly explains how the Athenians
were able to keep their hold on their policy; her policy (like that of
Rome) was to divide the allies by carefully grading their privileges,
playing off the weak against the stronger. The Spartans proved unable to
help and the Athenians easily blockaded the city, capturing it early in
427. In their anger they at first decided to slay all the inhabitants, but
a better feeling led to a reconsideration next day. In the Assembly two
great speeches were delivered. Pericles had been succeeded by Cleon, to
whom Thucydides seems to have been a little unjust. He opened his speech
with the famous remark that a democracy cannot govern an Empire; it is
liable to sudden fits of passion which make a consistent policy
impossible. He himself never changed his plans, but his audience were
different.

He pleaded for the rigorous application of the extreme penalty already
voted.

He was opposed by Diodotus, who appealed to the same principle as Cleon
did expediency.

This saner view prevailed. The doctrine of a “ruling passion” is a
remarkable contribution to Greek political thought, the abstract
personifications reading like the work of a poet or philosopher. An
exciting race against time is most graphically described. After great
exertions the ship bearing the reprieve arrived just in time to save
Mytilene. This act of mercy stands in sinister contrast with the treatment
the unhappy Plataeans received from the liberators of Greece. The citizens
were captured, Athens having strangely abandoned them in spite of her
promise to help. They were allowed to commemorate their services to
Greece, appealing in a most moving speech to the sacred ground of their
city, the scene of the immortal battle. All was in vain. The Thebans
accused them of flat treachery to Boeotia, securing their condemnation.
Corcyra similarly proved unprofitable; it was afflicted by fratricidal
dissensions which coloured one of Thucydides’ darkest pictures. As the war
went on it became clearer that it was a struggle between two rival
political creeds, democracy and oligarchy. To the partisans all other ties
were of little value, whether of blood or race or religion; only frenzied
boldness and unquestioning obedience to a party organisation were of any
consequence. This wretched spirit of feud was destined in the long run to
spell the doom of the Greek cities. In 427 the first mention was made of
the will-of-the-wisp which in time led Athens to her ruin. In her anxiety
to intercept the Peloponnesian corn she supported Leontini against
Syracuse, the leading Sicilian state. In Acarnania the capable general
Demosthenes after a series of movements not quite fruitless succeeded in
bringing peace to the jarring mountain tribes.

In 425 a most important event took place. As an Athenian squadron was
proceeding to Sicily it was forced to put in at Pylos, where many
centuries later Greece won a famous victory over the Turks. Demosthenes,
though he had no official command, persuaded his comrades to fortify the
place as a base from which to harry Spartan territory. It was situated in
the country which had once belonged to the Messenians who for generations
had been held down by the Spartan oligarchs. Deserters soon began to
stream in; the gravity of the situation was recognised by the Spartan
government who landed more than four hundred of their best troops on the
island of Sphacteria at the entrance to the bay. These were speedily
isolated by the Athenian navy; and news of the event filled all Greece
with excitement. A heated discussion took place at Athens, where Cleon
accused Nicias, the commander-in-chief, of slackness in not capturing the
blockaded force. Spartan overtures for a peace on condition of the return
of the isolated men proved vain; after a lively altercation with Nicias
Cleon made a promise to capture the Spartans within thirty days, a feat
which he accomplished with the aid of Demosthenes. Nearly three hundred
were found to prefer surrender to death; these were conveyed to Athens and
were an invaluable asset for bargaining a future peace.

A further success was the capture of Nisaea, the port of Megara, in 424,
but an attempt to propagate democracy in Boeotia ended in a severe defeat
at Delium; the fate of Plataea was a bad advertisement in an
oligarchically governed district. Worse was to follow. Brasidas, a Spartan
who had greatly distinguished himself at Pylos, passed through Thessaly
with a volunteer force, reaching Thrace and capturing some important
towns; the loss of one of these, Eion, caused the exile of the historian,
who was too late to save it. In 423 a truce for one year was arranged
between the combatants, but Brasidas ignored it, sowing disaffection among
the Athenian allies. His personal charm gave them a good impression of the
Spartan character and his offer of liberty was too attractive to be
resisted. His success was partly due to a deliberate misrepresentation of
the Athenian power which proved greater than it seemed to be. The two real
obstacles to peace were Brasidas and Cleon; at Amphipolis they met in
battle; a rash movement gave the Spartan an opportunity for an attack. He
fell in action, but the town was saved. Cleon was killed in the same
battle and the path to peace was clear. The truce for one year developed
into a regular settlement in 421, Nicias being responsible for its
negotiation in Athens. The chief clause provided that Athens should
recover Amphipolis in exchange for the Spartan captives.

The members of the Peloponnesian league considered themselves betrayed by
this treaty, for their hated rival Athens had not been humbled. Corinth
was the ringleader in raising disaffection. She determined to create a new
league, including Argos, the inveterate foe of Sparta. This state had
stood aloof from the war, nursing her strength and biding her time for
revenge. When Sparta failed to restore Amphipolis, the war party at
Athens, led by Alcibiades, formed an alliance with Argos to reduce Sparta;
but this policy alienated Corinth, who refused to act with her trade
rival. An Argive attack on Arcadia ended in the fierce battle of Mantinea
in 418, in which Sparta won a complete victory. Argos was forced to come
to terms, the new league was dissolved and Athens was once more confronted
by her combined enemies, her diplomacy a failure and her trump-card, the
Sphacterian prisoners, lost.

Next year she was guilty of an act of sheer outrage. Her fleet descended
on the island of Melos, which had remained neutral, though its inhabitants
were colonists from the Spartan mainland close by. Nowhere does the
dramatic nature of Thucydides’ work stand more clearly revealed than in
his account of this incident. He represents the Athenian and Melian
leaders as arguing the merits of the case in a regular dialogue,
essentially a dramatic device. The Athenian doctrine of Might and
Expediency is unblushingly preached and acted upon, in spite of Melian
protests; the island was captured, its population being slain or enslaved.
Such an act is a fitting prelude to the great disaster which forms the
next act of Thucydides’ drama.

In 416 Athens proceeded to develop her design of subjugating Sicily.
Segesta was at feud with Selinus; as the latter city applied to Syracuse
for aid, the former bethought her of her ancient alliance with Athens.
Next year the Sicilian ambassadors arrived with tales of unlimited wealth
to finance an expedition. Nicias, the leader of the peace party, vainly
counselled the Assembly to refrain; he was overborne by Alcibiades, whose
ambition it was to reduce not only Sicily but Carthage also. When the
expedition was about to sail most of the statues of Hermes in the city
were desecrated in one night. Alcibiades, appointed to the command with
Nicias and Lamachus, was suspected of the outrage, but was allowed to
sail. The fleet left the city with all the pomp and ceremony of prayer and
ritual, after which it showed its high spirits in racing as far as Aegina.

In Sicily itself Hermocrates, the great Syracusan patriot, repeatedly
warned his countrymen of the coming storm, advising them to sink all feuds
in resistance to the common enemy. He was opposed by Athenagoras, a
democrat who, true to his principles, suspected the story as part of a
militarist plot to overthrow the constitution. His speech is the most
violent in Thucydides, but contains a passage of much value.

The Athenians received a cold welcome wherever they went. At Catana they
found their state vessel waiting to convey Alcibiades home to stand his
trial; he effected his escape on the homeward voyage, crossing to the
Peloponnese. The great armament instead of thrusting at Syracuse wasted
its time and efficiency on side-issues, mainly owing to the cold
leadership of Nicias. This valuable respite was used to the full by
Hermocrates, who at a congress held at Camarina was insistent on the
racial character of the struggle between themselves who were Dorians and
the Ionians from Athens. This national antipathy contributed greatly to
the final decision of the conflict.

Passing to Sparta, Alcibiades deliberately betrayed his country. His
speech is of the utmost importance.

His view of democracy is contemptuous. “Nothing new can be said of what is
an admitted folly.” He then outlined the Athenian ambition; it was to
subdue Carthage and Sicily, bring over hosts of warlike barbarians,
surround and reduce the Peloponnese and then rule the whole Greek-speaking
world. He advised his hearers to aid Sicilian incapacity by sending a
Spartan commander; above all, he counselled the occupation of Deceleia, a
town in Attica just short of the border, through which the corn supply was
conveyed to the capital; this would lead to the capture of the
silver-mines at Laureium and to the decrease of the Athenian revenues. He
concluded with an attempt to justify his own treachery, remarking that
when a man was exiled, he must use all means to secure a return.

The Spartans had for some time been anxious to open hostilities; an act of
Athenian aggression gave them an opportunity. Meanwhile in Sicily Lamachus
had perished in attacking a Syracusan cross-wall. Left in sole command,
Nicias remained inactive, while Gylippus, despatched from Sparta, arrived
in Syracuse just in time to prevent it from capitulating. The seventh book
is the record of continued Athenian disasters. Little by little Gylippus
developed the Syracusan resources. First he made it impossible for the
Athenians to circumvallate the city; then he captured the naval stores of
the enemy, forcing them to encamp in unhealthy ground. Nicias had begged
the home government to relieve him of command owing to illness. Believing
in the lucky star of the man who had taken Nissea they retained him,
sending out a second great fleet under Demosthenes. The latter at once saw
the key to the whole situation. The Syracusan cross-wall which Nicias had
failed to render impassable must be captured at all costs. A night attack
nearly succeeded, but ended in total defeat. Demosthenes immediately
advised retreat; but Nicias obstinately refused to leave. In the meantime
the Syracusans closed the mouth of their harbour with a strong boom,
penning up the Athenian fleet. The famous story of the attempt to destroy
it calls out all the author’s powers of description. He draws attention to
the narrow space in which the action was fought. As long as the Athenians
could operate in open water they were invincible; but the Syracusans not
only forced them to fight in a confined harbour, they strengthened the
prows of their vessels, enabling them to smash the thinner Athenian craft
in a direct charge. The whole Athenian army went down to the edge of the
water to watch the engagement which was to settle their fate. Their
excitement was pitiable, for they swayed to and fro in mental agony,
calling to their friends to break the boom and save them. After a brave
struggle, the invaders were routed and driven to the land by the
victorious Syracusans.

Retreat by land was the only escape. A strategem planned by Hermocrates
and Nicias’ superstitious terrors delayed the departure long enough to
enable the Syracusans to secure the passes in the interior. When the army
moved away the scene was one of shame and agony; the sick vainly pleaded
with their comrades to save them; the whole force contrasted the proud
hopes of their coming with their humiliating end and refused to be
comforted by Nicias, whose courage shone brightest in this hour of defeat.
Demosthenes’ force was isolated and was quickly captured; Nicias’ men with
great difficulty reached the River Assinarus, parched with thirst.
Forgetting all about their foes, they rushed to the water and fought among
themselves for it though it ran red with their own blood. At last the army
capitulated and was carried back to Syracuse. Thrown into the public
quarries, the poor wretches remained there for ten weeks, scorched by day,
frost-bitten by night. The survivors were sold into slavery.

So ends the most heartrending story in Greek history, told with absolute
fidelity by a son of Athens and a former general of her army.

The last book is remarkable for the absence of speeches; it is a record of
the continued intrigues which followed the Sicilian disaster. Upheavals in
Asia Minor brought into the swirl of plots Tissaphernes, the Persian
satrap, anxious to recover control of Ionia hitherto saved by Athenian
power. In 412 the Athenian subjects began to revolt, seventeen defections
being recorded in all. At Samos a most important movement began; the
democrats rose against their nobles, being guaranteed independence by
Athens. Soon they made overtures to Alcibiades who was acting with the
Spartan fleet; he promised to detach Tissaphernes from Sparta if Samos
eschewed democracy, a creed odious to the Persian monarchy. The Samians
sent a delegation to Athens headed by Pisander, who boldly proposed
Alcibiades’ return, the dissolution of the democracy in Samos and alliance
with Tissaphernes. These proposals were rejected, but the democracy at
Athens was not destined to last much longer, power being usurped by the
famous Four Hundred in 411. The Samian democracy eventually appointed
Alcibiades general, while in Athens the extremists were anxious to come to
terms with Sparta. This movement split the Four Hundred, the constitution
being changed to that of the Five Thousand, a blend of democracy and
oligarchy which won Thucydides’ admiration; the history concludes with the
victory of the Athenians in the naval action at Cynossema in 410.

The defects of Thucydides are evident; his style is harsh, obscure and
crabbed; it is sometimes said that he seems wiser than he really is mainly
because his language is difficult; that if his thoughts were translated
into easier prose our impressions of his greatness would be much modified.
Yet it is to be remembered that he, like Lucretius, had to create his own
vocabulary. It is a remarkable fact that prose has been far more difficult
to invent than poetry, for precision is essential to it as the language of
reasoning rather than of feeling. Instead of finding fault with a medium
which was necessarily imperfect because it was an innovation we should be
thankful for what it has actually accomplished. It is not always obscure;
at times, when “the lion laughed” as an old commentator says, he is almost
unmatched in pure narrative, notably in his rapid summary of the Athenian
rise to power in the first book and in the immortal Syracusan tragedy of
the seventh.

His merits are many and great; his conciseness, repression of personal
feeling, love of accuracy, careful research, unwillingness to praise
overmuch and his total absence of preconceived opinion testify to an
honesty of outlook rare in classical historians. Because he feels certain
of his detachment of view, he quite confidently undertakes what few would
have faced, the writing of contemporary history. Nowadays historians do
not trust themselves; we may expect a faithful account of our Great War
some fifty years hence, if ever. Not so Thucydides; he claims that his
work will be a treasure for all time; had any other written these words we
should have dismissed them as an idle boast.

For he is the first man to respect history. It was not a plaything; it was
worthy of being elevated to the rank of a science. As such, its events
must have some deep causes behind them, worth discovering not only in
themselves as keys to one particular period, but as possible explanations
of similar events in distant ages. Accordingly, he deemed it necessary to
study first of all our human nature, its varied motives, mostly of
questionable morality, next he studied international ethics, based frankly
on expediency. The results of these researches he has embodied (with one
or two exceptions) in his famous speeches. He surveyed the ground on which
battles were fought; he examined inscriptions, copying them with
scrupulous care; he criticised ancient history and contemporary versions
of famous events, many of which he found to be untrue. Further, his
anxiety to discover the real sources of certain policies made it necessary
for him to write an account of seemingly purposeless action in wilder or
even barbarous regions such as Arcadia, Ambracia, Macedonia; in
consequence his work embraces the whole of the Greek world, as he said it
would in his famous preface.

As an artist, he is not without his merits. The dramatic nature of his
plan has been frequently pointed out; to him the main plot is the
destruction not of Athens, but of the Periclean democracy, the overthrow
thereof being due to a conflict with another like it; hence the marked
change in the last book, in which the main dramatic interest has waned.
This dramatic form has, however, defeated its own objects sometimes, for
all the Thucydidean fishes talk like Thucydidean whales.

To us he is indispensable. We are a maritime power, ruling a maritime
empire, our potential enemies being military nations. He has warned us
that democracy cannot govern an empire. Perhaps our type of this creed is
not so full of the lust for domination and aggrandisement as was that of
Athens; it may be suspected that we are virtuous mainly because we have
all we need and are not likely to be tempted overmuch. But there is the
other and more subtle danger. The enemies within the state betrayed
Deceleia which safeguarded the food-supply. We have many Deceleias,
situate along the great trade-routes and needing protection. Once these
are betrayed we shall not hold out as Athens did for nearly ten years; ten
weeks at the outside ought to see our people starving and beaten, fit for
nothing but the payment of indemnities to the power which relieves us of
our inheritance.

TRANSLATIONS:—

The earliest is by Hobbes, the best is by Jowett, Oxford. Though somewhat
free, it renders with vigour the ideas of the original text.

The Loeb Series has a version by Smith.

Thucydides Mythistoricus, Cornford (Arnold), is an adverse
criticism of the historian; it points out the inaccuracies which may be
detected in his work.

Clio Enthroned by W. R. M. Lamb, Cambridge, should be read in
conjunction with the above. The author adopts the traditional estimate of
Thucydides.

See also Bury, Ancient Greek Historians, as above.

PLATO

Shortly after the outbreak of the Peloponnesian war Plato was born,
probably in 427. During the eighty years of his life he travelled to
Sicily at least twice, founded the Academy at Athens and saw the beginning
of the end of the Greek freedom. He represents the reflective spirit in a
nation which seems to appear when its development is well advanced. After
the madness of a long war the Athenians, stripped of their Empire for a
time, sought a new outlet for their restless energies and started to
conquer a more permanent kingdom, that of scientific speculation about the
highest faculties of the human mind.

The death of Socrates in 399 disgusted Plato; democracy apparently was as
intolerant as any other form of political creed. His writings are in a
sense a vindication of the honesty of his master, although the picture he
draws of him is not so true to life as that of Xenophon. The dialogues
fall into two well-marked classes; in the earlier the method and
inspiration is definitely Socratic, but in the later Socrates is a mere
peg on which Plato hung his own system. In itself the dialogue form was no
new thing; Plato adopted it and made it a thing of life and dramatic
power, his style being the most finished example of exalted prose in Greek
literature. The order in which the dialogues were written is a thorny
problem; there is good reason for believing that Plato constantly revised
some of them, removing the inconsistencies which were inevitable while he
was feeling his way to the final form which his speculations assumed. It
is perhaps best to give an outline of a series which exhibits some regular
order of thought.

It is sometimes thought that Philosophy has no direct bearing on practical
questions. A review of the Crito may dispel this illusion. In it
Socrates refuses to be tempted by his young friend Crito who offers to
secure his escape from prison and provide him a home among his own
friends. The question is whether one ought to follow the opinions of the
majority on matters of justice or injustice, or those of the one man who
has expert knowledge, and of Truth. The laws of Athens have put Socrates
in prison; they would say;

Socrates had by his long residence of seventy years declared his
satisfaction with the Athenian legal system. The laws had enabled him to
live in security; more, he could have taken advantage of legal protection
in his trial, and if he had been dissatisfied could have gone away to some
other city. What sort of a figure would he make if he escaped? Wherever he
went he would be considered a destroyer of law; his practice would belie
his creed; finally, the Laws say,

Sound and concrete teaching like this is always necessary, but is hardly
likely to be popular. The doctrine of disobedience is everywhere preached
in a democracy; violation of contracts is a normal practice and
law-breakers have been known to be publicly feasted by the very members of
our legislative body.

A different lesson is found in the Euthyphro. After wishing
Socrates success in his coming trial, Euthyphro informs him that he is
going to prosecute his father for manslaughter, assuring him that it would
be piety to do so. Socrates asks for a definition of piety. Euthyphro
attempts five—”to act as Zeus did to his father”; “what the gods
love”; “what all the gods love”; “a part of righteousness, relating to the
care of the gods”; “the saying and doing of what the gods approve in
prayer and sacrifice”. Each of these proves inadequate; Euthyphro
complains of the disconcerting Socratic method as follows:

It is noticeable that no definite result comes from this dialogue; Plato
was within his rights in refusing to answer the main question. Philosophy
does not pretend to settle every inquiry; her business is to see that a
question is raised. Even when an answer is available, she cannot always
give it, for she demands an utter abandonment of all prepossessions in
those to whom she talks—otherwise there will be no free passage for
her teaching. Though refuted, Euthyphro still retained his first opinions,
for his first and last definitions are similar in idea. To such a person
argument is mere waste of time.

An admirable illustration of Plato’s lightness of touch is found in the Laches.
The dialogue begins with a discussion about the education of the young
sons of Lysimachus and Melesias. Soon the question is raised “What is
courage?” Nicias warns Laches about Socrates; the latter has a trick of
making men review their lives; his practice is good, for it teaches men
their faults in time; old age does not always bring wisdom automatically.
Laches first defines courage as the faculty which makes men keep the ranks
in war; when this proves inadequate, he defines it as a stoutness of
spirit. Nicias is called in; he defines it as “knowledge of terrors and
confidence in war”; he is soon compelled to add “and knowledge of all good
and evil in every form”—in a word, courage is all virtue combined.
The dialogue concludes that it is not young boys but grown men of all ages
who need a careful education. This spirited little piece is full of
dramatic vigour—the remarks of Laches and Nicias about each other as
they are repeatedly confuted are most human and diverting.

Literary criticism is the subject of the Ion. Coming from Ephesus,
Ion claimed to be the best professional reciter of Homer in all Greece.
Acknowledging that Homer made him all fire, while other poets left him
cold, he is made to admit that his knowledge of poetry is not scientific;
otherwise he would have been able to discuss all poetry, for it is one.
Socrates then makes the famous comparison between a poet and a magnet;
both attract an endless chain, and both contain some divine power which
masters them. Ecstasy, enthusiasm, madness are the best descriptions of
poetic power. Even as a professional reciter Ion admits the necessity of
the power of working on men.

Homer is the subject of the Hippias Minor. At Olympia Hippias once
said that every single thing that he was wearing was his own handiwork. He
was a most inventive person—one of his triumphs being an art of
memory. In this dialogue he prefers the Iliad to the Odyssey because
Achilles was called “excellent” and Odysseus “versatile”. Socrates soon
proves to him that Achilles was false too, as he did not always keep his
word. He reminds Hippias that he never wastes time over the brainless,
though he listens carefully to every man. In fact, his cross-examination
is a compliment. He never thinks the knowledge he gains is his own
discovery, but is grateful to any who can teach him. He believes that
unwitting deceivers are more culpable than deliberate tricksters. Hippias
finds it impossible to agree with him, whereupon Socrates says that things
are for ever baffling him by their changeability; it is pardonable that
unlearned men like himself should err; when really wise people like
Hippias wander in thought, it is monstrous that they are unable to settle
the doubts of all who appeal to them.

Channides, the young boy after whom the dialogue was named, was the
cousin and ward of Critias, the infamous leader of the Thirty Tyrants. On
being introduced to him Socrates starts the discussion “What is
self-control?” The lad makes three attempts to answer; seeing his
confusion, Critias steps in, “angry with the boy, like a poet angry with
an actor who has murdered his poems”. But he is not more successful; his
three definitions are proved wanting.

The dialogue gives no definite answer to the discussion. It is a vivid
piece of writing; the contrast between the young lad and the elder cousin
whose pet phrases he copies is very striking.

In the Lysis the characters and the conclusion are similar. Lysis
is a young lad admired by Hippothales. The first portion of the dialogue
consists of a conversation between Lysis and Socrates; the latter
recommends the admirer to avoid foolish converse. On the entry of Lysis’
friend Menexenus, Socrates starts the question “What is friendship?” It
appears that friendship cannot exist between two good or two evil persons,
but only between a good man and one who is neither good nor bad, exactly
as the philosopher is neither wise nor ignorant, yet he loves knowledge.
Still this is not satisfactory; up conclusion being reached, Socrates
winds up with a characteristic remark; they think they are friends, yet
cannot say what friendship is. This dialogue was carefully read by
Aristotle before he gave his famous description in the Ethics: “A friend
is a second self”. Perhaps Socrates avoided a definite answer because he
did not wish to be too serious with these sunny children.

The Euthydemus is an amusing study of the danger which follows upon
the use of keen instruments by the unscrupulous. Euthydemus and his
brother Dionysodorus are two sophists by trade to whom words mean nothing
at all; truth and falsehood are identical, contradiction being an
impossibility. As language is meaningless, Socrates himself is quickly
reduced to impotence, recovering with difficulty. Plato was no doubt
satirising the misuse of the new philosophy which was becoming so popular
with young men. When nothing means anything, laughter is the only human
language left. The Cratylus is a similarly conceived diversion.
Most of it is occupied with fanciful derivations and linguistic
discussions of all kinds. It is difficult to say how far Plato is serious.
Perhaps the feats of Euthydemus in stripping words of all meaning urged
him to some constructive work—for Plato’s system is essentially
destructive first, then constructive. At any rate, he does insist on the
necessity for determining a word’s meaning by its derivation, and points
out that a language is the possession of a whole people.

In the Protagoras Socrates while a young man is represented as
meeting a friend Hippocrates, who was on his way to Protagoras, a sophist
from Abdera who had just arrived at Athens. Socrates shows first that his
friend has no idea of the seriousness of his action in applying for
instruction to a sophist whose definition he is unable to give.

They proceed to the house of Callias, where they find Protagoras
surrounded by strangers from every city who listened spell-bound to his
voice.

Protagoras readily promises that Hippocrates would be taught his system
which offers “good counsel about his private affairs and power to transact
and discuss political matters”. Socrates’ belief that politics cannot be
taught provokes one of the long speeches to which Plato strongly objected
because a fundamental fallacy could not be refuted at the outset,
vitiating the whole of the subsequent argument. Protagoras recounted a
myth, proving that shame and justice were given to every man; these are
the basis of politics. Further, cities punish criminals, implying that men
can learn politics, while virtue is taught by parents and tutors and the
State. Socrates asks whether virtue is one or many. Protagoras replies
that there are five main virtues, knowledge, justice, courage, temperance
and piety, all distinct. A long rambling speech causes Socrates to
protest; his method is the short one of question and answer. By using some
very questionable reasoning he proves that all these five virtues are
identical. Accordingly, if virtue is one it can be taught, not however, by
a sophist or the State, but by a philosopher, for virtue is knowledge.

This conclusion is thoroughly in harmony with Socrates’ system. Yet it is
probably false. Virtue is not mere knowledge, nor vice ignorance. If they
were, they would be intellectual qualities. They are rather moral
attributes; experience soon proves that many enlightened persons are
vicious and many ignorant people virtuous. The value of this dialogue is
its insistence upon the unity of virtue. A good man is not a bundle of
separate excellences; he is a whole. Possessing one virtue he potentially
has them all.

The Gorgias is a refutation of three distinct and popular notions.
Gorgias of Leontini used to invite young men to ask him questions, none of
whom ever put to him a query absolutely new. It soon appears that he is
quite unable to define Rhetoric, the art by which he lived. Socrates said
it was a minister of persuasion, that it in the long run concerned itself
with mere Opinion, which might be true or false, and could not claim
scientific Knowledge. Further, it implied some morality in its devotees,
for it dealt with what was just or unjust. Polus, a young and ardent
sophist, was compelled to assent to two very famous doctrines, first that
it is worse to do evil than to experience it, second, that to avoid
punishment was the worst thing for an offender. But a more formidable
adversary remained, one Callicles, the most shameless and unscrupulous
figure perhaps in Plato’s work. His creed is a flat denial of all
authority, moral or intellectual. It teaches that Law is not natural, but
conventional; that only a slave puts up with a wrong, and only weak men
seek legal protection. Philosophy is fit only for youths, for philosophers
are not men of the world. Natural life is unlimited self-indulgence and
public opinion is the creation of those who are too poor to give rein to
their appetites; the good is pleasure and infinite self-satisfaction is
the ideal. Socrates in reply points out the difference between the kinds
of pleasures, insists on the importance of Scientific knowledge of
everything, and proves that order is requisite everywhere—its
visible effects in the soul being Justice and Wisdom, not Riot. To prevent
injustice some art is needed to make the subject as like as possible to
the ruler; the type of life a man leads is far more important than length
of days. The demagogue who like Callicles has no credentials makes the
people morally worse, especially as they are unable to distinguish quacks
from wise men. Nor need philosophers trouble much about men’s opinions,
for a mob always blames the physician who wishes to save it. A delightful
piece of irony follows, in which Socrates twits Callicles for accusing his
pupils of acting with injustice, the very quality he instils into them.
Callicles, though refuted, advises Socrates to fawn on the city, for he is
certain to be condemned sooner or later; the latter, however, does not
fear death after living righteously.

Most men have held doctrines similar to those refuted here. There is an
idea abroad that what is “natural” must be intrinsically good, if not
godlike. But it is quite clear that “Nature” is a vague term meaning
little or nothing—it is higher or lower and natural in both forms.
Those who wish to know the lengths of impudence to which belief in the
sacredness of “Nature” can bring human beings might do worse than read the
Gorgias.

Plato’s dramatic power and fertility of invention are displayed fully in
the Symposium. Agathon had won the tragic prize and invited many
friends to a wine-party. After a slight introduction a proposition was
carried that all should speak in praise of Love. First a youth Phaedrus
describes the antiquity of love and gives instances of the attachments
between the sexes. Pausanias draws the famous distinction between the
Heavenly and the Vulgar Aphrodite; the true test of love is its
permanence. A doctor, Eryximachus, raises the tone of the discussion still
further. To him Love is the foundation of Medicine, Music, Astronomy and
Augury. Aristophanes tells a fable of the sexes in true comic style,
making each of them run about seeking its other half. Agathon colours his
account with a touch of tragic diction. At last it is Socrates’ turn. He
tells what he heard from a priestess called Diotima. Love is the son of
Fulness and Want; he is the intermediary between gods and men, is active,
not passive; he is desire for continuous possession of excellent things
and for beautiful creation which means immortality, for all men desire
perpetual fame which can come only through the science of the Beautiful.
In contemplation and mystical union with the Divine the soul finds its
true destiny, satisfying itself in perfect love.

At this moment Alcibiades arrives from another feast in a state of high
intoxication. He gives a most marvellous account of Socrates’ influence
over him and likens him in a famous passage to an ugly little statue which
when opened is all gold within. At the end of the dialogue one of the
company tells how Socrates compelled Aristophanes and Agathon to admit
that it was one and the same man’s business to understand and write both
tragedy and comedy—a doctrine which has been practised only in
modern drama.

In this dialogue we first seem to catch the voice of Plato himself as
distinct from that of Socrates. The latter was undoubtedly most keenly
interested in the more human process of questioning and refuting, his
object being the workmanlike creation of exact definitions. But Plato was
of a different mould; his was the soaring spirit which felt its true home
to be the supra-sensible world of Divine Beauty, Immortality, Absolute
Truth and Existence. Starting with the fleshly conception of Love natural
to a young man, he leads us step by step towards the great conclusion that
Love is nothing less than an identification of the self with the thing
loved. No man can do his work if he is not interested in it; he will hate
it as his taskmaster. But when an object of pursuit enthrals him it will
intoxicate him, will not leave him at peace till he joins his very soul
with it in union indissoluble. This direct communication of Mind with the
object of worship is Mysticism. It is the very core of the highest form of
religious life; it purifies, ennobles, and above all it inspires. To the
mystic the great prophet is the Athenian Plato, whose doctrine is that of
the Christian “God is love” converted into “Love is God”. It is not
entirely fanciful to suggest that Plato, in saying farewell to the
definitely Socratic type of philosophy, gave his master as his parting
gift the greatest of all tributes, a dialogue which is really the “praise
of Socrates”.

The intoxication of Plato’s thought is evident in the Phaedrus.
This splendid dialogue marks even more clearly the character of the new
wine which was to be poured into the Socratic bottles. Phaedrus and
Socrates recline in a spot of romantic beauty along the bank of the
Ilissus. Phaedrus reads a paradoxical speech supposed to be written by
Lysias, the famous orator, on Love; Socrates replies in a speech quite as
unreal, praising as Lysias did him who does not love. But soon he recants—his
real creed being the opposite. Frenzy is his subject—the ecstasy of
prophecy, mysticism, poetry and the soul. This last is like a charioteer
driving a pair of horses, one white, the other black. It soars upwards to
the region of pure beauty, wisdom and goodness; but sometimes the white
horse, the spirited quality of human nature, is pulled down by the black,
which is sensual desire, so that the charioteer, Reason, cannot get a full
vision of the ideal world beyond all heavens. Those souls which have
partially seen the truth but have been dragged down by the black steed
become, according to the amount of Beauty they have seen, philosophers,
kings, economists, gymnasts, mystics, poets, journeymen, sophists or
tyrants. The vision once seen is never quite forgotten, for it can be
recovered by reminiscence, so that by exercise each man can recall some of
its glories.

The dialogue then passes to a discussion of good and bad writing and
speaking. The truth is the sole criterion of value, and this can be
obtained only by definition; next there must be orderly arrangement, a
beginning, a middle and an end. In rhetoric it is absolutely essential for
a man to study human nature first; he cannot hope to persuade an audience
if he is unaware of the laws of its psychology; not all speeches suit all
audiences. Further, writing is inferior to speaking, for the written word
is lifeless, the spoken is living and its author can be interrogated. It
follows then that orators are of all men the most important because of the
power they wield; they will be potent for destruction unless they love the
truth and understand human nature; in short, they must be philosophers.

The like of this had nowhere been said before. It opened a new world to
human speculation. First, the teaching about oratory is of the highest
value. Plato’s quarrel with the sophists was based on their total
ignorance of the enormous power they exercised for evil, because they knew
not what they were doing. They professed to teach men how to speak well,
but had no conception of the science upon which the art of oratory rests.
In short, they were sheer impostors. Even Aristotle had nothing to add to
this doctrine in his treatise on Rhetoric, which contains a study
of the effects which certain oratorical devices could be prophesied to
produce, and provides the requisite scientific foundation. Again, the
indifference to or the ridicule of truth shown by some sophists made them
odious to Plato. He would have none of their doctrines of relativity or
flux. Nothing short of the Absolute would satisfy his soaring spirit. He
was sick of the change in phenomena, the tangible and material objects of
sense. He found permanence in a world of eternal ideas. These ideas are
the essence of Platonism. They are his term for universal concepts,
classes; there are single tangible trees innumerable, but one Ideal Tree
only in the Ideal world beyond the heavens. Nothing can possibly satisfy
the soul but these unchanging and permanent concepts; it is among them
that it finds its true home. Lastly, the tripartite division of the nature
of the soul here first indicated is a permanent contribution to
philosophy. Thus Plato’s system is definitely launched in the Phaedrus.
His subsequent dialogues show how he fitted out the hulk to sail on his
voyages of discovery.

The Meno is a rediscussion on Platonic principles of the problem of
the Protagoras: can virtue be taught? Meno, a general in the army
of the famous Ten Thousand, attempts a definition of virtue itself, the
principle that underlies specific kinds of virtues such as justice. After
a cross-examination he confesses his helplessness in a famous simile:
Socrates is like the torpedo-fish which benumbs all who touch it. Then the
real business begins. How do we learn anything at all? Socrates says by
Reminiscence, for the soul lived once in the presence of the ideal world;
when it enters the flesh it loses its knowledge, but gradually regains it.
This theory he dramatically illustrates by calling in a slave whom he
proves by means of a diagram to know something of geometry, though he
never learned it. Thus the great lesson of life is to practise the search
for knowledge—and if virtue is knowledge it will be teachable.

But the puzzle is, who are the teachers? Not the sophists, a discredited
class, nor the statesmen, who cannot teach their sons to follow them.
Virtue then, not being teachable, is probably not the result of knowledge,
but is imparted to men by a Divine Dispensation, just as poetry is. But
the origin of virtue will always be mysterious till its nature is
discovered beyond doubt. So Plato once more declares his dissatisfaction
with a Socratic tenet which identified virtue with knowledge.

The Phaedo describes Socrates’ discussion of the immortality of the
soul on his last day on earth. Reminiscence of Ideas proves pre-existence,
as in the Meno; the Ideas are similarly used to prove a continued
existence after death, for the soul has in it an immortal principle which
is the exact contrary of mortality; the Idea of Death cannot exist in a
thing whose central Idea is life. Such in brief is Socrates’ proof. To us
it is singularly unconvincing, as it looks like a begging of the whole
question. Yet Plato argues in his technical language as most men do
concerning this all-important and difficult question. That which contains
within itself the notion of immortality would seem to be too noble to have
been created merely to die. The very presence of a desire to realise
eternal truth is a strong presumption that there must be something to
correspond with it. The most interesting portion of this well-known
dialogue is that which teaches that life is really an exercise for death.
All the base and low desires which haunt us should be gradually eliminated
and replaced by a longing for better things. The true philosopher at any
rate so trains himself that when his hour comes he greets death with a
smile, the life on earth having lost its attractions.

Such is the connection between the Meno and the Phaedo; the
life that was before and the life that shall be hereafter depend upon the
Ideal world. That salvation is in this life and in the practical sphere of
human government is possible only through a knowledge of these Ideas is
the doctrine of the immortal Republic. This great work in ten books
is well known, but its unique value is not always recognised. It starts
with a discussion of Justice. Thrasymachus, a brazen fellow like Callicles
in the Gorgias, argues that Justice is the interest of the stronger
and that law and morality are mere conventions. The implications of this
doctrine are of supreme importance. If Justice is frank despotism, then
the Eastern type of civilisation is the best, wherein custom has once for
all fixed the right of the despot to grind down the population, while the
sole duty of the latter is to pay taxes. The moral reformation of law
becomes impossible; no adjustment of an unchanging decree to the changing
and advancing standard of public morality can be contemplated;
constitutional development, legal reformation and the great process by
which Western peoples have tried gradually to make positive law correspond
with Ethical ideals are mere dreams.

But the verbal refutation of Thrasymachus does not satisfy Glaucus and
Adeimantus who are among Socrates’ audience. In order to explain the real
nature of Justice, Socrates is compelled to trace from the very beginning
the process by which states have come into existence. Economic and
military needs are thoroughly discussed. The State cannot continue unless
there is created in it a class whose sole business it is to govern. This
class is to be produced by communistic methods; the best men and women are
to be tested and chosen as parents, their children being taken and
carefully trained apart for their high office. This training will be
administered to the three component parts of the soul, the rational, the
spirited and the appetitive, while the educational curriculum will be
divided into two sections, Gymnastic for the body and Artistic for the
mind—the latter including all scientific, mathematical and literary
subjects. After a careful search, in this ideal state Justice, the
principle of harmony which keeps all classes of the community coherent,
will show itself in “doing one’s own business”.

Yet even this method of describing Justice is not satisfactory to Plato,
who was not content unless he started from the universal concepts of the
Ideal world. The second portion of the dialogue describes how knowledge is
gained. The mind discards the sensible and material world, advancing to
the Ideas themselves. Yet even these are insufficient, for they all are
interconnected and united to one great and architectonic Idea, that of the
Good; to this the soul must advance before its knowledge can be called
perfect. This is the scheme of education for the Guardians; the
philosophic contemplation of Ideas, however, should be deferred till they
are of mature age, for philosophy is dangerous in young men. Having
performed their warlike functions of defending the State, the Guardians
are to be sifted, those most capable of philosophic speculation being
employed as instructors of the others. Seen from the height of the Ideal
world, Justice again turns out to be the performance of one’s own
particular duties.

This ideal society Plato admits to be a difficult aim for our weak human
nature; he stoutly maintains, however, that “a pattern of it is laid up in
heaven”, man’s true home. He mournfully grants that a declension from
excellence is often possible and describes how this rule of philosophers,
if established, would be expected to pass through oligarchy to democracy,
the worst form of all government, peopled by the democratic man whose soul
is at war with itself because it claims to do as it likes. The whole
dialogue ends in an admirable vision in which he teaches that man chose
his lot on earth in a preexisting state.

Such is a fragmentary description of this masterpiece. What is it all
about? First it is necessary to point out a serious misconception. Plato
is not here advocating universal communism; his state postulates a
money-making class and a labouring class also. Apart from the fact that he
explicitly mentions these and allows them private property, it would be
difficult to imagine that they are not rendered necessary by his very
description of Justice. Not all men are fit for government—and
therefore those who are governed must “do their particular business” for
which they are fitted; in some cases it is the rather mean business of
piling up fortunes. Communism is advocated as the only means of creating
first and then propagating the small Guardian caste. Nor again is the
caste rigid, for some of the children born of communistic intercourse will
be unfit for their position and will be degraded into the money-making or
property owning section. Communism to Plato is a high creed, too high for
everybody, fit only for the select and enlightened or teachable few.

Nor is the Republic an instance of Utopian theorising. It is a
criticism of contemporary Greek civilisation, intended to remove the
greatest practical difficulty in life. Man has tried all kinds of
governments and found none satisfactory. All have proved selfish and
faithless, governing for their own interests only. Kings, oligarchs,
democrats and mob-leaders have without exception regarded power as the
object to be attained because of the spoils of office. Political
leadership is thus a direct means of self-advancement, a temptation too
strong for weak human nature. As a well-known Labour leader hinted, five
thousand a year does not often come in men’s way. There is only one way of
securing honest government and that is Plato’s. A definite class must be
created who will exercise political power only, economic inclinations of
any sort disqualifying any of its members from taking office. The ruling
class should rule only, the money-making class make money only. In this
way no single section will tax the rest to fill its own pockets. The one
requisite is that these Guardians should be recognised as the fittest to
rule and receive the willing obedience of the rest. If any other sane plan
is available for preserving the governed from the incessant and rapacious
demands of tax-collectors, no record of it exists in literature. Practical
statesmanship of a high and original order is manifest in the Republic;
in England, where the official qualifications for governing are believed
to be equally existent in everybody whether trained or untrained in the
art of ruling, the Republic, if read at all, may be admired but is
sure to be misunderstood.

It seems that Plato’s teaching at the Academy raised formidable criticism.
The next group of dialogues is marked by metaphysical teaching. The Parmenides
is a searching examination of the Ideas. If these are in a world apart,
they cannot easily be brought into connection with our world; a big thing
on earth and the Idea of Big will need another Idea to comprehend both.
Besides, Ideas in an independent existence will be beyond our ken and
their study will be impossible. Socrates’ system betrays lack of
metaphysical practice; at most the Ideas should have been regarded as part
of a theory whose value should have been tested by results. This process
is exemplified by a discussion of the fundamental opposition between the
One and the infinite Many which are instances of it.

This criticism shows the advantage Plato enjoyed in making Socrates the
mouthpiece of his own speculations; he could criticise himself as it were
from without. He has put his finger on his own weak spot, the question
whether the Ideas are immanent or transcendent. The results of this
examination were adopted by the Aristotelian school, who suggested another
theory of Knowledge.

The Philebus discusses the question whether Pleasure or Knowledge
is the chief good. A metaphysical argument which follows that of the Parmenides
ends in the characteristic Greek distinction between the Finite and the
Infinite. Pleasure is infinite, because it can exist in greater or less
degree; there is a mixed life compounded of finite and infinite and there
is a creative faculty to which mind belongs. Pleasure is of two kinds; it
is sometimes mixed with pain, sometimes it is pure; the latter type alone
is worth cultivating and includes the pleasures of knowledge. Yet pleasure
is not an end, but only a means to it. It cannot therefore be the Good,
which is an end. Knowledge is at its best when it is dealing with the
eternal and immutable, but even then it is not self-sufficient—it
exists for the sake of something else, the good. This latter is
characterised by symmetry, proportion and truth. Knowledge resembles it
far more than even pure pleasure.

The Theaetetus discusses more fully the theory of knowledge. It
opens with a comparison of the Socratic method to midwifery; it delivers
the mind of the thoughts with which it is in travail. The first tentative
definition of knowledge is that it is sensation. This is in agreement with
the Protagorean doctrine that man is the measure of all things. Yet
sensation implies change, whereas we cannot help thinking that objects
retain their identity; if knowledge is sensation a pig has as good a claim
to be called the measure of all things as a man. Again, Protagoras has no
right to teach others if each man’s sensations are a law unto him. Nor is
the Heracleitean doctrine much better which taught that all things are in
a state of flux. If nothing retains the same quality for two consecutive
moments it is impossible to have predication, and knowledge must be
hopeless. In fact, sensation is not man’s function as a reasoning being,
but rather comparison. Neither is knowledge true opinion, for this at once
demands the demarcation of false opinion or error; the latter is negative,
and will be understood only when positive knowledge is determined. Perhaps
knowledge is true opinion plus reason; but it is difficult to decide what
is gained by adding “with reason”, words which may mean either true
opinion or knowledge itself, thus involving either tautology or a begging
of the question. The dialogue at least has shown what knowledge is not.

Locke, Berkeley and Hume, the eighteenth century sensation philosophers,
were similarly refuted by Kant. The mind by its mere ability to compare
two things proves that it can have two concepts at least before it at the
same time, and can retain them for a longer period than a mere passing
sensation implies. Yet the problem of knowledge still remains as difficult
as Plato knew it to be.

“Is the Sophist the same as the Statesman and the Philosopher?” Such is
the question raised in the Sophist. Six definitions are suggested,
all unsatisfactory. The fixed characteristic of the Sophist is his seeming
to know everything without doing so; this definition leads straight to the
concept of false opinion, a thing whose object both is and is not. “That
which is not” provokes an inquiry into what is, Being. Dualism, Monism,
Materialism and Idealism are all discussed, the conclusion being that the
Sophist is a counterfeit of the Philosopher, a wilful impostor who makes
people contradict themselves by quibbling.

The Politicus carries on the discussion. In this dialogue we may
see the dying glories of Plato’s genius. In his search for the true pastor
or king he separates the divine from the human leader; the true king alone
has scientific knowledge superior to law and written enactments which men
use when they fail to discover the real monarch. This scientific knowledge
of fixed and definite principles can come only from Education. A most
remarkable myth follows, which is practically the Greek version of the
Fall. The state of innocence is described as preceding a decline into
barbarism; a restoration can be effected only by a divine interposition
and by the growth of a study of art or by the influence of society. The
arts themselves are the children of a supernatural revelation.

The Timaeus and the long treatise the Laws criticise the
theories of the Republic. The former is full of world-speculations of a
most difficult kind, the latter admits the weakness of the Ideal State,
making concessions to inevitable human failings.

Though written in an early period, the Apology may form a fitting
end to these dialogues. Socrates was condemned on the charge of corrupting
the Athenian youth and for impiety. To most Athenians he must have been
not only not different from the Sophists he was never weary of exposing,
but the greatest Sophist of them all. He was unfortunate in his friends,
among whom were Critias the infamous tyrant and Alcibiades who sold the
great secret. The older men must have regarded with suspicion his
influence over the youth in a city which seemed to be losing all its
national virtues; many of them were personally aggrieved by his annoying
habit of exposing their ignorance. He was given a chance of escape by
acknowledging his fault and consenting to pay a small fine. Instead, he
proposed for himself the greatest honour his city could give any of her
benefactors, public maintenance in the town-hall.

His defence contains many superb passages and is a masterpiece of gentle
irony and subtle exposure of error. Its conclusion is masterly.

Two lessons of supreme importance are to be learned from Plato. In the
first place he insists on credentials from the accepted teachers of a
nation. On examination most of them, like Gorgias, would be found
incapable of defining the subjects for the teaching of which they receive
money. The sole hope of a country is Education, for it alone can deliver
from ignorance, a slavery worse than death; the uneducated person is the
dupe of his own passions or prejudices and is the plaything of the horde
of impostors who beg for his vote at elections or stampede him into
strikes.

Again, the possibility of knowledge depends upon accurate definition and
the scientific comparisons of instances. These involve long and fatiguing
thought and very often the reward is scanty enough; no conclusion is
possible sometimes except that it is clear what a thing cannot be. The
human intelligence has learned a most valuable lesson when it has
recognised its own impotence at the outset of an inquiry and its own
limitations at the end thereof. Knowledge, Good, Justice, Immortality are
conceptions so mighty that our tiny minds have no compasses to set upon
them. Better far a distrust in ourselves than the somewhat impudent and
undoubtedly insistent claim to certitude advanced by the materialistic
apostles of modern non-humanitarianism. When questioned about the
ultimates all human knowledge must admit that it hangs upon the slender
thread of a theory or postulate. The student of philosophy is more honest
than others; he has the candour to confess the assumptions he makes before
he tries to think at all.

At times it must be admitted that Plato sounds very unreal. His faults are
clear enough. The dialogue form makes it very easy for him to invent
questions of such a nature that the answer he wants is the only one
possible. Again, his conclusions are often arrived at by methods or
arguments which are frankly inadmissible; in the earlier dialogues are
some very glaring instances of sheer logical worthlessness. Frequently the
whole theme of discussion is such that no modern philosopher could be
expected to approve of it. A supposed explanation of a difficulty is
sometimes afforded by a myth, splendid and poetical but not logically
valid. Inconsistencies can easily be pointed out in the vast compass of
his speculations. It remained for Aristotle to invent a genuine method of
sorting out a licit from an illicit type of argument.

These faults are serious. Against them must be placed some positive
excellences. Plato was one of the first to point out that there is a
problem; a question should be asked and an answer found if possible, for
we have no right to take things for granted. More than this, he was
everywhere searching for knowledge, ridding himself of prejudice, doing in
perfect honesty the most difficult of all things, the duty of thinking
clearly. These thoughts he has expressed in the greatest of all types of
Greek prose, a blend of poetic beauty with the precision of prose.

But Plato’s praise is not that he is a philosopher so much as Philosophy
itself in poetic form. His great visions of the Eternal whence we spring,
his awe for the real King, the real Virtue, the real State “laid up in
Heaven” fill him with an inspired exaltation which lifts his readers to
the Heaven whence Platonism has descended. There are two main types of
men. One is content with the things of sense; using his powers of
observation and performing experiments he will become a Scientist; using
his powers of speculation he will become an Aristotelian philosopher;
putting his thoughts into simple and logical order, he will write good
prose. The other soars to the eternal principles behind this world, the
deathless forms or the general concepts which give concrete things their
existence. These perfect forms are the main study of the Artist, Poet,
Sculptor, whose work it is to give us comfort and pleasure unspeakable. So
long as man lives, he must have the perfection of beauty to gladden him,
especially if Science is going to test everything by the ruler or balance
or crucible. This love of Beauty is exactly Platonism. It has never died
yet. From Athens it spread to Alexandria, there to start up into fresh
life in the School of which Plotinus is the chief; its doctrines are
described for the English reader in Kingsley’s Hypatia. It planted
its seed of mysticism in Christianity, with which it has most strange
affinities. At the Renaissance this mystic element caught the imagination
of northern Europe, notably Germany. Passing to England, it created at
Cambridge a School of Platonists, the issue of whose thought is evident in
the poetry of Coleridge and Wordsworth. Its last outburst has been the
Transcendental teaching of the nineteenth century, so curiously Greek and
non-Greek in its essence.

For there is in our nature that undying longing for communion with the
Divine which the mere thought of God stirs within us. Our true home is in
the great world where Truth is everything, that Truth which one day we,
like Plato, shall see face to face without any quailing.

TRANSLATIONS:

The version in 4 volumes by Jowett (Oxford) is the standard. It contains
good introductions.

The Republic has been translated by Davies and Vaughan.

Two volumes in the Loeb Series have appeared.

A new method of translation of Plato is needed. The text should be clearly
divided into sections; the steps of the argument should be indicated in a
skeleton outline. Until this is done study of Plato is likely to cause
much bewilderment.

Plato and Platonism, by Pater, is still the best interpretation of
the whole system.

DEMOSTHENES

One of the most disquieting facts that history teaches is the inability of
the most enlightened and patriotic men to “discern the signs of the
times”. To us the collapse of the Greek city-states seems natural and
inevitable. Their constant bickerings and petty jealousies justly drew
down upon them the armed might of the ambitious and capable power which
destroyed them. Their fate may fill us with pity and our admiration for
those who fought in a losing cause may prejudice us against their
enslavers. But just as the Norman Conquest in the long run brought more
blessing than misery, so the downfall of the Greek commonwealths was the
first step to the conquering progress of the Greek type of civilisation
through the whole world. Our Harold, fighting manfully yet vainly against
an irresistible tendency, has his counterpart in the last defender of the
ancient liberties of Greece.

Demosthenes was born in 384 of a well-to-do business man who died eight
years later. The guardians whom he appointed appropriated the estate,
leaving Demosthenes and his sister in straitened circumstances. On coming
of age the young man brought a suit against his trustees in 363, of whom
Aphobus was the most fraudulent. Though he won the case, much of his
property was irretrievably lost. Nor were his first efforts at public
speaking prophetic of future greatness. His voice was thin, his demeanour
awkward, his speech indistinct; his style was laboured, being an obvious
blend of Thucydides with Isaeus, an old and practised pleader. Yet he was
ambitious and determined; he longed to copy the career of Pericles, the
noblest of Athenian statesmen. The stories of his self-imposed exercises
and their happy issue are well known; his days he spent in declaiming on
the sea-shore with pebbles in his mouth, his nights in copying and
recopying Thucydides; the speeches which have come down to us show clearly
the gradual evolution of the great style well worthy of the greatest of
all themes, national salvation.

It will be necessary to explain a convention of the Athenian law courts. A
litigant was obliged to plead his own case; if he was unable to compose
his own speech, he applied to some professional retailer of orations who
would write it for him. The art of these speech-writers was of varying
excellence. A first-class practitioner would not only discover the real or
the supposed facts of the dispute, he would divine the real character of
his client, and write the particular type of speech which would seem most
natural on such a person’s lips. Considerable knowledge of human nature
was required in such an exciting and delicate profession, although the
author did not always succeed in concealing his identity. Demosthenes had
his share of this experience; he wrote for various customers speeches on
various subjects; one concerns a dowry dispute, another a claim for
compensation for damage caused by a water-course, another deals with an
adoption, another was written for a wealthy banker. Assault and battery,
ship-scuttling, undue influence of attractive females on the weaker sex,
maritime trickery of all kinds, citizen rights, are all treated in the
so-called private speeches, of which some are of considerable value as
illustrating legal or mercantile or social etiquette.

Public suits were of the same nature; the speeches were composed by one
person and delivered by another. Such are the speech against Androtion
for illegal practices, against Timocrates for embezzlement and the
important speech against Aristocrates, in which for the first time
Demosthenes seems to have become aware of the real designs of Macedonia.
The speech against the law of Leptines, delivered in 354 by
Demosthenes himself, is of value as displaying the gradual development of
his characteristic style; in it we have the voice and the words of the
same man, who is talking with a sense of responsibility about a
constitutional anomaly.

But for us the real Demosthenes is he who spoke on questions of State
policy. This subject alone can call out the best qualities in an orator as
distinct from a rhetorician; the tricks and bad arguments which are so
often employed to secure condemnation or acquittal in a law court are
inapplicable or undignified in a matter of vital national import. But
before the great enemy arose to threaten Greek liberty, it happened that
Fortune was kind enough to afford Demosthenes excellent practice in a
parliamentary discussion of two if not three questions of importance.

In 354 there was much talk of a possible war with Persia. Demosthenes
first addresses the sword-rattlers. “To the braggarts and jingoes I say
that it is not difficult—not even when we need sound advice—to
win a reputation for courage and to appear a clever speaker when danger is
very near. The really difficult duty is to show courage in danger and in
the council-chamber to give sounder advice than anybody else.” His belief
was that war was not a certainty, but it would be better to revise the
whole naval system. A detailed scheme to assure the requisite number of
ships in fighting-trim follows, so sensible that it commands immediate
respect. The speaker estimates the wealth of Attica, maps it out into
divisions, each able to bear the expense of the warships assigned to it.
To a possible objection that it would be better to raise the money by
increased taxation he answers with the grim irony natural to him (he seems
to be utterly devoid of humour).

He refuses to believe that a Greek mercenary army would fight against its
country, while the Thebans, who notoriously sided with Persia in 480,
would give much for an opportunity of redeeming this old sin against
Greece.

Such is the outline of the speech on the Navy-boards. Two years
later he displayed qualities of no mean order. Sparta and Thebes were
quarrelling for the leadership. Arcadia had revolted from Sparta, the
centre of the disaffection being Megalopolis; ambassadors from the
latter city and from Sparta begged Athenian aid. In the heat of the
excitement men’s judgments were not to be trusted. “The difficulty of
giving sound advice is well known,” says the orator.

The question was, should Athens join Thebes or Sparta, both ancient foes?

After a rapid calculation of possibilities he suggests the following plan.

The calm voice of the cool-headed statesman is everywhere audible in this
admirable little speech.

The power of discounting personal resentment and thinking soberly is
apparent in the speech for the Freedom of Rhodes, delivered about
this time. Rhodes had offended Athens by revolting in the Social war of
357-5 with the help of the well-known Carian king Mausolus. For a time
that monarch had treated Rhodes well; later he overthrew the democracy and
placed the power in the hands of the oligarchs. When Queen Artemisia
succeeded to the throne of Caria the democrats begged Athens to aid them
in recovering their liberty. Deprecating passion of any kind, Demosthenes
points out the real question at issue. The record of the oligarchs is a
bad one; to overthrow the democracy they had won over some of the leading
citizens whom they banished when they had attained their object. Their
faithless conduct promised no hope of a firm alliance with Athens. The
Rhodian question was to be the acid test of her political creed.

His conclusion is this.

These three speeches indicate plainly enough the kind of man who was soon
to make himself heard in a more important question. Instead of a frothy
and excitable harangue that might have been looked for in a warm-blooded
Southern orator we find a dignified and apparently cool-headed type of
speech based on sound sense, full of practical proposals, fearless, manly
and above all noble because it relies on righteousness. An intelligence of
no mean order has in each case discarded personal feeling and has pointed
out the one bed-rock fact which ought to be the foundation of a sound
policy. More than this; for the first time an Attic orator has
deliberately set to work to create a new type of prose, based on a cadence
and rhythm. This new language at times runs away with its inventor;
experience was to show him that in this matter as in all others the
consummate artist hides the art whereof he is master.

By 352 Greece had become aware that her liberties were to be threatened
not from the East, but from Macedonia. Trained in the Greek practice of
arms and diplomacy, her king Philip within seven years had created a
powerful military system. His first object was to obtain control of a
seaboard. In carrying out this policy he had to reduce Amphipolis on the
Strymon in Thrace, Olynthus in Chalcidice, and Athenian power centralised
in Potidaea, a little south of Olynthus, and on the other side of the Gulf
of Therma in Pydna and Methone. Pydna he secured in 357 by trickery;
Amphipolis had passed under his control through inexcusable Athenian
slackness earlier in the same year. Potidaea fell in 356 and Methone, the
last Athenian stronghold, in 353. Pagasae succumbed in 352; with it Philip
obtained absolute command of the sea-coast.

In the same year a Macedonian attempt to pass Thermopylae was met by
vigorous Athenian action; a strong force held the defile, preventing a
further advance southward. In the next year the Athenian pacifist party
was desirous of dropping further resistance. This policy caused the
delivery of the First Philippic. It is a stirring appeal to the
country to shake off its lethargy. Nothing but personal service would
enable her to recover the lost strongholds. “In my opinion,” it says, “the
greatest compelling power that can move men is the disgrace of their
condition. Do you desire to stroll about asking one another for news? What
newer news do you want than that a Macedonian is warring down Athens?
Philip sick or Philip dead makes no difference to you. If he died you
would soon raise up for yourselves another Philip if you continue your
present policy.”

With statesmanlike care Demosthenes makes concrete proposals for the
creation of a standing force of citizens ready to serve in the ranks; at
present their generals and captains are puppets for the pretty march-past
in the public square. He estimates the cost of upkeep and shows that it is
possible to maintain a force in perfect efficiency; he lays particular
stress on creating a base of operations in Macedonia itself, otherwise
fleets sailing north might be checked by trade winds. “Too late” is the
curse of Athenian action; a vacillating policy ruins every expedition.

He grimly refutes all those well-informed persons who “happen to know”
Philip’s object—we had scores of them in our own late war.

It should be remembered that these are the words of a young man of
thirty-four, unconnected with any party, yet capable of forming a sane
policy. That they are great words will be obvious to anyone who replaces
the name of Philip by that of his country’s enemy; the result is startling
indeed.

The last and most formidable problem Philip had yet to solve, the
destruction of Olynthus, the centre of a great confederation of thirty-two
towns. Military work against it was begun in 349 and led at once to an
appeal to Athens for assistance. The pacifists and traitors were busy
intriguing for Philip; Demosthenes delivered three speeches for Olynthus.
The First Olynthiac sounds the right note.

He warns his hearers that once Olynthus falls, there is nothing to hinder
Philip from marching straight on Athens.

A definite policy is then suggested.

By a perfectly scandalous abuse, the surplus funds of the State Treasury
had been doled out to the poor to enable them to witness plays in the
theatre, on the understanding that the doles should cease if war expenses
had to be met. In time the lower orders came to consider the dole as their
right, backed by the demagogues refused to surrender it. This theatre-fund
Demosthenes did not yet venture to attack, for it was dangerous to do so.
He had no alternative but to propose additional taxes on the rich. He
concludes with an admirable peroration.

The Second Olynthiac strikes a higher note, that of indignant
protest against the perfidy of Macedonian diplomacy.

A history of Macedonian progress shows the weak places in the system.

An exhortation to personal service is succeeded by a protest against a
parochial view of politics which causes petty jealousies and paralyses
joint action. The whole State should take its turn at doing some war duty.

In the Third Olynthiac Demosthenes takes the bull by the horns. The
insane theatre-doles were sapping the revenues badly needed for financing
the fight for existence. Olynthus at last was aware of her danger; she
could be aided not by passing decrees, but by annulling some.

With the same superb courage he tackles the demagogues who are the cause
of all the mischief.

A bitter contrast shows how the earlier popular leaders made Athens
wealthy, dominant and respected; the modern sort had lost territory, spent
a mint of money on nothing, alienated good allies and raised up a trained
enemy. But there is one thing to their credit, they had whitewashed the
city walls, had repaired roads and fountains. And the trade of public
speaking is profitable. Some of the demagogues’ houses are more splendid
than the public buildings; as individuals they have prospered in exact
proportion as the State is reduced to impotence. In fact, they have
secured control of the constitution; their system of bribery and
spoon-feeding has tamed the democracy and made it obedient to the hand. “I
should not be surprised,” he continues,

The doles he compares to the snacks prescribed by doctors; they cannot
help keep a patient properly alive and will not allow him to die. Personal
service and an end of gratuities is insisted upon.

What a speech is here! Doles, interruptions of men who tell the truth,
organised democratic corruption, waste of public money on whitewash are
familiar to the unhappy British tax-payer. Where is our Demosthenes who
dare appeal to the electorate to sweep the system and its prospering
advocates back into the darkness?

Having captured Olynthus in 348 and razed it to the ground, Philip
attacked Euboea. A further advance was checked by a disgraceful peace
engineered by Philocrates and Aeschines in 346. The embassy which obtained
it was dodged by Philip until he had made the maximum of conquest; he had
excluded the Phocians from its scope, a people of primary importance
because they controlled Thermopylae, but a week after signing the peace he
had destroyed Phocian unity and usurped their place on the great Council
which met at Delphi. This evident attack on the liberty of southern Greece
raised a fever of excitement at Athens. The war-party clamoured for
instant action; strangely enough Demosthenes advised his city to observe
the peace. In contrast with his fiery audience he speaks with perfect
coolness and calm. He reviews the immediate past, explains the shameful
part played by an actor Neoptolemus who persuaded Athens to make the
peace, then realised all his property and went to live in Macedon; he
describes the good advice he gave them which they did not follow, and
bases his claim to speak not on any cleverness but on his
incorruptibility.

In the present case the real point at issue is clear enough. It is a
question of fighting not Philip but the whole body of states who were
represented at the Delphic Council, for they would fly to arms at once if
Athens renounced the Peace; against such a combination she could
not survive, just as the Phocians could not cope with the combined attack
of Macedonia, Thessaly and Thebes, natural enemies united for a brief
moment to achieve a common end. After all, a seat on the Delphic Council
was a small matter; only fools would go to war for an unsubstantial
shadow.

Firmly planted in Greece itself, Philip started intriguing in
Peloponnesus, supporting Argos, Megalopolis and Messene against Sparta. An
embassy to these three cities headed by Demosthenes warned them of the
treacherous friendship. Returning to Athens in 344 he delivered his Second
Philippi, which contains an account of the speeches of the recent
tour. Philip acted while Athens talked.

Hence comes the intrigue against Sparta. He can dupe stupid people like
the Thebans, or the Peloponnesians; warning therefore is necessary. To the
latter he said:—

He then mentions the silly promises of advantages to come which induced
Athens to make the infamous Peace, and quotes the famous remark whereby
the traitor gang raised a laugh while in the act of selling their country.
“Demosthenes is naturally a sour and peevish fellow, for he drinks water.”
Drawing their attention to this origin of all their trouble, he asks them
to remember their names—at the same time remarking that even if a
man deserved to die, punishment should be suspended if it meant loss and
ruin to the State.

The next three years saw various Macedonian aggressions, especially in
Thrace. That country on its eastern extremity formed the northern coast of
the Dardanelles, named the Chersonese, important as safeguarding the corn
supplies which passed through the Straits. It had been in the possession
of Miltiades, was lost in the Peloponnesian war and was partly recovered
by Timotheus in 863. Diopeithes had been sent there with a body of
colonists in 346. Establishing himself in possession, he took toll of
passing traders to safeguard them against pirates and had collided with
the Macedonian troops as they slowly advanced to the Narrows. Philip sent
a protest to Athens; in a lively debate on the Chersonese early in
341 Demosthenes delivered a great speech.

First of all he shows that Diopeithes is really the one guarantee that
Philip will not attack Attica itself. In Thrace is a force which can do
great damage to Macedonian territory.

He suggests that Diopeithes should not be cast off but supported. Such a
plan will cost money, but it will be well spent for the sake of future
benefits.

He then turns to the pacifists, pointing out that it is useless to expect
a peace if the enemy is bent on a war of extermination. None but fools
would wait till a foe admits he is actually fighting if his actions are
clearly hostile. The traitors who sell the city should be beaten to death,
for no State can overcome the foe outside till it has chastised the enemy
within. The record of Macedonian duplicity follows; the hectoring
insolence of Philip is easily explained; Athens is the only place in the
world in which freedom of speech exists; so prevalent is it that even
slaves and aliens possess it. Accordingly Philip has to stop the mouths of
other cities by giving them territory for a brief period, but Athens he
can rob of her colonies and be sure of getting praise from the
anti-national bribe-takers. He concludes with a striking and elevated
passage describing the genuine statesman.

A deep and splendid courage in hopelessness is here manifest.

A little later in the same year was delivered the last and greatest of all
the patriotic speeches, the Third Philippic. Early in the speech
the whole object of the Macedonian threat is made apparent—the
jugular veins of Athens, her trade-routes.

Then the plot against all Greek liberty is explained.

The bitterness of this is intense in a man who generally refrains from
anything undignified in a public speech.

The cause of this disunion is bribery. In former times

To punish these seems quite hopeless.

He points to the fate of all the cities whom Philip flattered.

The doom of these cities it was not worth while to describe overmuch.

The universal appeal of this white-hot speech is its most noteworthy
feature. The next year the disgraceful peace was ended, the free
theatre-tickets withdrawn. All was vain. In 338 Athens and Thebes were
defeated at Chaeroneia; the Cassandra prophecies of the great patriot came
true. In 330 one more triumph was allowed him. He was attacked by the
traitor Aeschines and answered him so effectively in his speech on the
Crown that his adversary was banished. A cloud settled over the
orator’s later life; he outlived Alexander by little more than a year, but
when Antipater hopelessly defeated the allies at Crannon in 322 he
poisoned himself rather than live in slavery.

Of all the orators of the ancient world none is more suitable for modern
use than Demosthenes. It is true that he is guilty of gross bad taste in
some of his speeches—but rarely in a parliamentary oration. Cicero
is too verbose and often insincere. Demosthenes is as a rule short, terse
and forcible. It is the undoubted justice of his cause which gives him his
lofty and noble style. He lacks the gentler touch of humour—but a
man cannot jest when he sees servitude before the country he loves. With a
few necessary alterations a speech of Demosthenes could easily be
delivered to-day, and it would be successful. Even Philip is said to have
admitted that he would have voted for him after hearing him, and Aeschines
after winning applause for declaiming part of Demosthenes’ speech told his
audience that they ought to have heard the beast.

Yet all this splendid eloquence seems to have been wasted. The orator
could see much that was dark to his contemporaries, and spoke prophecies
true though vain. But the greatest thing of all was concealed from his
view. The inevitable day had dawned for the genuinely Greek type of city.
It was brilliant but it was a source of eternal divisions in a world which
had to be unified to be of any service. Its absurd factions and petty
leagues were really a hindrance to political stability. Further, the
essential vices of democracy cried aloud for a stern master, and found
him. Treason, bribery, appeals to an unqualified voting class, theft of
rich men’s property under legal forms, free seats in the theatre,
belittlement of a great empire, pacifism, love of every state but the
right one—these are the open sores of popular control. For such a
society only one choice is possible; it needs discipline either of
national service or national extinction. Its crazy cranks will not
disappear otherwise. Modern political life is democratic; those who
imagine that the voice of the majority is the voice of Heaven should
produce reasons for their belief. They will find it difficult to hold such
a view if they will patiently consider the hard facts of history and the
unceasing warnings of Demosthenes.

No account of Greek literature would be complete without a mention of the
influence which has revolutionised human thought. It is a strange
coincidence that Aristotle was born and died in the same years as
Demosthenes. His native town was Stagira; he trained Alexander the Great,
presided over the very famous Peripatetic School at Athens for thirteen
years and found time to investigate practically every subject of which an
ancient Greek could be expected to have any knowledge.

His method was the slow and very patient observation of individual facts.
He is the complement of Plato, who tended to neglect the fact for the
“idea” or general law or type behind it and logically prior to it.
Deductive reasoning was Plato’s method—that of the poet or great
artist, who worships not what he sees but the unseen perfect form behind;
inductive reasoning was Aristotle’s method—that of the ordinary man,
who respects what he sees that he may by patience find out what is the
unseen class to which it belongs. This latter has been the
foundation-stone of all modern science; in the main the resemblance
between Aristotle’s system of procedure and that of the greatest
liberators of the human mind, Bacon and Descartes, are more valuable than
the differences.

It would be difficult to mention any really great subject on which
Aristotle has not left some work which is not to be lightly disregarded.
His works are in the form of disjointed notes, taken down at his lectures
by his disciples. As a rule they are dry and precise, though here and
there rays of glory appear which prove that the master was capable of
poetic expression even in prose. A rather fine hymn has been ascribed to
him. As we might expect, he is weakest in scientific research, mainly
because he could not command the use of instruments familiar to us. That a
human being who possessed no microscope should have left such a detailed
account of the most minute marks on the bodies of fish and animals is an
absolute marvel; so perfect is his description that it cannot be bettered
to-day. Cuvier and Linnaeus are great names in Botany; Darwin said that
they were mere schoolboys compared with Aristotle—in other words,
botanical research had progressed thewrong way.

Many works have appeared on Ethics and Philosophy; few of them are likely
to survive as long as Aristotle’s Ethics and Metaphysics
Sometimes our modern philosophers seem to forget their obligation to
resemble human beings in their writings. We hear so much of mist and
transcendentalism, problems, theories, essays, critiques that a book of
Aristotle’s dry but exact definition seems like the words of soberness
after some nightmare. The man is not assaulting the air; his feet are on
firm ground. This is how he proceeds. “Virtue is a mean between excess and
defect.” In fact, his object appears to have been to teach something, not
to mystify everybody and to cover the honourable name of philosophy with
ridicule.

It is the same story everywhere. Do we want the best book on Rhetoric
or Politics? Aristotle may supply it, mainly because he took the
trouble to classify his instances and show the reason why things not only
are of such a kind, but must inevitably be so. A course of Aristotelian
study might profitably be prescribed to every person who thinks of talking
in public; he would at least learn how to respect himself and his
audience, however ignorant and powerful it may be; he would tend to use
words in an exact sense instead of indulging in the wild vagueness of
speech which is so common and so dangerous. This dry-as-dust philosopher
who cut up animals and plants and wrote about public speeches and
constitutions found time to give the world a book on Poetry. Modern scientists
sometimes deny their belief in the existence of such a thing as poetry, or
scoff at its value; no poetic treatise has yet appeared from them, for it
seems difficult for modern science to keep alive in its devotees the
weakest glimmerings of a sense of beauty. Herein their great founder and
father shows himself to be more humane than his so-called progressive
children. His Poetics was the foundation of literary criticism and
shows no sign of being superseded.

Turning his eyes upwards, he gave the world a series of notes on what he
saw there. Not possessing a telescope, he could but do his best with the
methods available. Let us not jeer at his results; rather let us remember
that this same astronomer found time to observe the heavens in addition to
revolutionising thought in the brief compass of sixty-two years.

For the miracle of miracles is this man’s universality of outlook. It
makes us ashamed of our own pretentiousness and swollen-headed pride when
we reflect what this great architectonic genius has performed. Just as our
bodies have decreased in size with the progress of history, so our
intelligences seem to have narrowed themselves since Aristotle’s day.
Great as our modern scientists are, there is not one of them who would be
capable of writing an acknowledged masterpiece on Ethics, Politics,
Rhetoric, Poetry, Metaphysics as well as on his own subject.

Nor have we yet mentioned this stupendous thinker’s full claim to absolute
predominance in intellectual effort. His works on Medicine were known to
and appreciated by the Arabs, who translated them and brought them to
Spain and Sicily when they conquered those countries. Averroes commented
on them and added notes of his own which contributed not a little to the
development of the healing art. More than this, and greatest of all,
during the later Middle Ages Aristotle’s system alone was recognised as
possessing universal value; it was taken as the foundation on which the
most famous and important Schoolmen erected their philosophies—Chaucer
mentions a clerk who possessed twenty books, a treasure indeed in those
days; it provided a European Church with a Theology and the cosmopolitan
European Universities with a curriculum. Greater honour than this no man
ever had or ever can have. Thus, although the Greek city-state seemed to
perish in mockery with Demosthenes, yet the Greek spirit of free
discussion which died in the great orator was set free in another form in
that same year; leaving Aristotle’s body, it ranged through the world
conquering and civilising. If in our ignorance and bigotry we try to kill
Greek literature, we shall find that, like the hero of the Bacchae,
we are turning our blows against our own selves, to the delight of all who
relish exhibitions of perfect folly.

TRANSLATIONS:

Kennedy’s edition is the best. It is vigorous and reads almost like an
English work.

Butcher’s Demosthenes is the standard introduction to the speeches.

Many reminiscences of Demosthenes are to be found in the speeches of Lord
Brougham.

ARISTOTLE

Politics. Jowett (Oxford). Welldon (Macmillan).

Poetics. Butcher (Macmillan). Bywater (Oxford).

Both contain excellent commentaries and notes.

Ethics. Welldon.

Rhetoric. Welldon. (Contains valuable analysis and notes.)

The article on Greek Science in the Legacy of Greece (Oxford)
should not be omitted.

AUTHORS OF GREECE

By the Reverend T. W. LUMB, M.A.

With an Introduction by The Reverend CYRIL ALINGTON, D.D.

AUTHOR’S PREFACE

INTRODUCTION

HOMER

AESCHYLUS

TRANSLATIONS:—

SOPHOCLES

TRANSLATIONS:

EURIPIDES

TRANSLATIONS:

ARISTOPHANES

TRANSLATIONS:

HERODOTUS

TRANSLATIONS:

THUCYDIDES

TRANSLATIONS:—

PLATO

TRANSLATIONS:

DEMOSTHENES

TRANSLATIONS:

ARISTOTLE

With an Introduction by
The Reverend CYRIL ALINGTON, D.D.