Note 737 — Chapter V · THE WORKS OF EURIPIDES (continued 2)

Professor Gilbert Murray (Euripides and his Age, pp. 160 sqq.) has some beautiful and striking observations on the epiphany of Apollo and its effect on the raving mortals below: a trance falls upon them from which they awake purged of hate and anger. But could Euripides, can we, attribute this to a god who has commanded matricide? And the effect is largely spoiled by Orestes (vv. 1666 sqq.): “Prophetic Loxias, what oracles are thine! Thou art not, then, a lying prophet, but a true. Yet had I begun to dread lest, when I heard thy voice as I thought, it was that of a fiend.” ... These are not the tones of blissful faith.