Of Religion. (continued 2)

It was not required, that those who aspired to the victory should enter the lists, and drive their chariots in person. Their being spectators of the games, or even sending their horses thither, was sufficient; but in either case, it was previously necessary to register the names of the persons for whom the horses were to run, either in the chariot or single horse-races.

At the time that the city of Potidæa surrendered to Philip, three couriers brought him advices; the first, that the Illyrians had been defeated in a great battle by his general Parmenio; the second, that he had carried the prize of the horse-race in the Olympic games; and the third, that the queen was delivered of a son. Plutarch seems to insinuate, that Philip was equally delighted with each of these circumstances.148

Hiero sent horses to Olympia, to run for the prize, and caused a magnificent pavilion to be erected for them.149 Upon this occasion Themistocles harangued the Greeks, to persuade them to pull down the tyrant's pavilion, who had refused his aid against the common enemy, and to hinder his horses from running with the rest. It does not appear that any regard was had to this remonstrance; for we find, by one of Pindar's odes, composed in honour of Hiero, that he won the prize in the equestrian races.

No one ever carried the ambition of making a great figure [pg lxviii] in the public games of Greece so far as Alcibiades,150 in which he distinguished himself in the most splendid manner, by the great number of horses and chariots which he kept only for the races. There never was either private person or king that sent, as he did, seven chariots at once to the Olympic games, wherein he carried the first, second, and third prizes; an honour no one ever had before him. The famous poet Euripides celebrated these victories in an ode, of which Plutarch has preserved a fragment. The victor, after having made a sumptuous sacrifice to Jupiter, gave a magnificent feast to the innumerable multitude of spectators at the games. It is not easy to comprehend, how the wealth of a private person should suffice for so enormous an expense: but Antisthenes, the scholar of Socrates, who relates what he saw, informs us, that many cities of the allies, in emulation of each other, supplied Alcibiades with all things necessary for the support of such incredible magnificence; equipages, horses, tents, sacrifices, the most exquisite provisions, the most delicate wines; in a word, all that was necessary to the support of his table or train. The passage is remarkable; for the same author assures us, that this was not only done when Alcibiades went to the Olympic games, but in all his military expeditions and journeys by land or sea. “Wherever,” says he, “Alcibiades travelled, he made use of four of the allied cities as his servants. Ephesus furnished him with tents, as magnificent as those of the Persians; Chios took care to provide for his horses; Cyzicum supplied him with sacrifices, and provisions for his table; and Lesbos gave him wine, with whatever else was requisite for his house.”

I must not omit, in speaking of the Olympic games, that the ladies were admitted to dispute the prize in them as well as the men; and that many of them obtained it. Cynisca, sister of Agesilaus, king of Sparta, first opened this new path of glory to her sex, and was proclaimed conqueror in the race of chariots with four horses.151 This victory, of which till then there had been no example, did not fail of being celebrated with all possible splendour.152 A magnificent monument was erected at Sparta in honour of Cynisca;153 and the Lacedæmonians, though otherwise very little sensible to the charms of poetry, appointed a poet to transmit this new triumph to posterity, and to immortalize its memory by an inscription in verse. She herself dedicated a chariot of brass, drawn by four horses, in [pg lxix] the temple of Delphi;154 in which the charioteer was also represented; a certain proof that she did not drive it herself. In process of time, the picture of Cynisca, drawn by the famous Apelles, was annexed to it, and the whole adorned with many inscriptions in honour of that Spartan heroine.155

Of the honours and rewards granted to the victors.

These honours and rewards were of several kinds. The acclamations of the spectators in honour of the victors were only a prelude to the prizes designed them. These prizes were different wreaths of wild olive, pine, parsley, or laurel, according to the different places where the games were celebrated. Those crowns were always attended with branches of palm, that the victors carried in their right hands; which custom, according to Plutarch,156 arose (perhaps) from a property of the palm-tree, which displays new vigour the more endeavours are used to crush or bend it, and is a symbol of the courage and resistance of the champion who had obtained the prize. As he might be victor more than once in the same games, and sometimes on the same day, he might also receive several crowns and palms.

When the victor had received the crown and palm, a herald, preceded by a trumpet, conducted him through the Stadium, and proclaimed aloud the name and country of the successful champion, who passed in that kind of review before the people, whilst they redoubled their acclamations and applauses at the sight of him.

When he returned to his own country, the people came out in a body to meet him, and conducted him into the city, adorned with all the marks of his victory, and riding upon a chariot drawn by four horses. He made his entry not through the gates, but through a breach purposely made in the walls. Lighted torches were carried before him, and a numerous train followed to do honour to the procession.

The athletic triumph almost always concluded with feasts made for the victors, their relations, and friends, either at the expense of the public, or by private individuals, who regaled not only their families and friends, but often a great part of the spectators. Alcibiades,157 after having sacrificed to the Olympian Jupiter, which was always the first care of the victor, treated the whole assembly. Leophron did the same, as Athenæus [pg lxx] reports;158 who adds, that Empedocles of Agrigentum, having conquered in the same games, and not having it in his power, being a Pythagorean, to regale the people with flesh or fish, caused an ox to be made of a paste, composed of myrrh, incense, and all sorts of spices, of which pieces were given to all who were present.

One of the most honourable privileges granted to the Athletic victors, was the right of precedency at the public games. At Sparta it was a custom for the king to take them with him in military expeditions, to fight near his person, and to be his guard; which, with reason, was judged very honourable. Another privilege, in which advantage was united with honour, was that of being maintained for the rest of their lives at the expense of their country. That this expense might not become too chargeable to the state, Solon159 reduced the pension of a victor in the Olympic games to five hundred drachmas;160 in the Isthmian to a hundred;161 and in the rest in proportion. The victor and his country considered this pension, less as a relief of the champion's indigence, than as a mark of honour and distinction. They were also exempted from all civil offices and employments.

The celebration of the games being over, one of the first cares of the magistrates, who presided in them, was to inscribe, in the public register, the name and country of the Athletæ who had carried the prizes, and to annex the species of combat in which they had been victorious. The chariot-race had the preference to all other games. Hence the historians, who date occurrences by the Olympiads, as Thucydides, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Diodorus Siculus, and Pausanias, almost always express the Olympiad by the name and country of the victors in that race.

The praises of the victorious Athletæ were amongst the Greeks one of the principal subjects of their lyric poetry. We find, that all the odes of the four books of Pindar turn upon it, each of which takes its title from the games in which the combatants signalized themselves, whose victories those poems celebrate. The poet, indeed, frequently enriches his matter, by calling in to the champion's assistance, incapable alone of inspiring all the enthusiasm necessary, the aid of the gods, heroes, and princes, who have any relation to his subject; and to support the flights of imagination, to which he abandons himself. Before Pindar, the poet Simonides practised the [pg lxxi] same manner of writing, intermingling the praises of the gods and heroes with those of the champions, whose victories he sang. It is related upon this head,162 that one of the victors in boxing, called Scopas, having agreed with Simonides for a poem upon his victory, the poet, according to custom, after having given the highest praises to the champion, expatiated in a long digression to the honour of Castor and Pollux. Scopas, satisfied in appearance with the performance of Simonides, paid him however only the third part of the sum agreed on, referring him for the remainder to the Tyndaridæ, whom he had celebrated so well. And in fact he was well paid by them, if we may believe the sequel; for, at the feast given by the champion, whilst the guests were at table, a servant came to Simonides, and told him, that two men, covered with dust and sweat, were at the door, and desired to speak with him in all haste. He had scarce set his foot out of the chamber, in order to go to them, when the roof fell in, and crushed the champion, with all his guests, to death.

Sculpture united with poetry to perpetuate the fame of the champions. Statues were erected to the victors, especially in the Olympic games, in the very place where they had been crowned, and sometimes in that of their birth also; which was commonly done at the expense of their country. Amongst the statues which adorned Olympia, were those of several children of ten or twelve years old, who had obtained the prize at that age in the Olympic games. They did not only raise such monuments to the champions, but to the very horses, to whose swiftness they were indebted for the Agonistic crown: and Pausanias163 mentions one, which was erected in honour of a mare, called Aura, whose history is worth repeating. Phidolas her rider, having fallen off in the beginning of the race, the mare continued to run in the same manner as if he had been upon her back. She outstripped all the rest; and upon the sound of the trumpets, which was usual toward the end of the race to animate the competitors, she redoubled her vigour and courage, turned round the goal; and, as if she had been sensible that she had gained the victory, presented herself before the judges of the games. The Eleans declared Phidolas victor, with permission to erect a monument to himself and the mare, that had served him so well.

[pg lxxii]

The different Taste of the Greeks and Romans, in regard to Public Shows.

Before I make an end of these remarks upon the combats and games so much in estimation amongst the Greeks, I beg the reader's permission to make a reflection, that may serve to explain the difference of character between the Greeks and Romans, with regard to this subject.

The most common entertainment of the latter, at which the fair sex, by nature tender and compassionate, were present in throngs, was the combat of the gladiators, and of men with bears and lions; in which the cries of the wounded and dying, and the abundant effusion of human blood, supplied a grateful spectacle for a whole people, who feasted their cruel eyes with the savage pleasure of seeing men murder one another in cool blood; and in the times of the persecutions, with the tearing in pieces of old men and infants, of women and tender virgins, whose age and weakness are apt to excite compassion in the hardest hearts.

In Greece these combats were absolutely unknown, and were only introduced into some cities, after their subjection to the Roman people. The Athenians, however, whose distinguishing characteristics were benevolence and humanity, never admitted them into their city;164 and when it was proposed to introduce the combats of the gladiators, that they might not be outdone by the Corinthians in that point, “First throw down,” cried out an Athenian165 from the midst of the assembly, “throw down the altar, erected above a thousand years ago by our ancestors to Mercy.”

It must be allowed that in this respect the conduct and wisdom of the Greeks were infinitely superior to that of the Romans. I speak of the wisdom of Pagans. Convinced that the multitude, too much governed by the objects of sense to be sufficiently amused and entertained with the pleasures of the understanding, could be delighted only with sensible objects, both nations were studious to divert them with games and shows, and such external contrivances, as were proper to affect the senses; in the institution of which, each evinced and followed its peculiar inclination and disposition.

The Romans, educated in war, and accustomed to battles, always retained, notwithstanding the politeness upon which [pg lxxiii] they piqued themselves, something of their ancient ferocity; and hence it was, that the effusion of blood, and the murders exhibited in their public shows, far from inspiring them with horror, formed a grateful entertainment to them.

The insolent pomp of triumphs flowed from the same source, and argued no less inhumanity. To obtain this honour, it was necessary to prove, that eight or ten thousand men had been killed in battle. The spoils, which were carried with so much ostentation, proclaimed, that an infinity of worthy families had been reduced to the utmost misery. The innumerable troop of captives had been free persons a few days before, and were often distinguishable for honour, merit, and virtue. The representation of the towns that had been taken in the war, explained that they had sacked, plundered, and burnt the most opulent cities; and had either destroyed or enslaved their inhabitants. In short, nothing was more inhuman, than to drag kings and princes in chains before the chariot of a Roman citizen, and to insult their misfortunes and humiliation in that public manner.

The triumphal arches, erected under the emperors, where the enemies appeared with chains upon their hands and legs, could proceed only from a haughty fierceness of disposition, and an inhuman pride, that took delight in immortalizing the shame and sorrow of subjected nations.

The joy of the Greeks after a victory was far more modest.166 They erected trophies indeed, but of wood, a substance of no long duration, which time would soon consume; and these it was prohibited to renew. Plutarch's reason for this is admirable.167 After time had destroyed and obliterated the marks of dissension and enmity that had divided nations, it would have been the excess of odious and barbarous animosity, to have thought of reestablishing them, to perpetuate the remembrance of ancient quarrels, which could not be buried too soon in silence and oblivion. He adds, that the trophies of stone and brass, since substituted to those of wood, reflect no honour upon those who introduced the custom.

I am pleased with the grief depicted on Agesilaus's countenance,168 after a considerable victory, wherein a great number of his enemies, that is to say, of Greeks, were left upon the field, and to hear him utter with sighs and groans, these words, so full of moderation and humanity: “Oh unhappy Greece, to deprive thyself of so many brave citizens, and to destroy [pg lxxiv] those who had been sufficient to have conquered all the Barbarians!”

The same spirit of moderation and humanity prevailed in the public shows of the Greeks. Their festivals had nothing mournful or afflictive in them. Every thing in those feasts tended to delight, friendship, and harmony: and in that consisted one of the greatest advantages which resulted to Greece, from the solemnization of these games. The republics, separated by distance of country, and diversity of interests, having the opportunity of meeting from time to time, in the same place, and in the midst of rejoicing and festivity, allied themselves more strictly with one another, stimulated each other against the Barbarians and the common enemies of their liberty, and made up their differences by the mediation of some neutral state in alliance with them. The same language, manners, sacrifices, exercises, and worship, all conspired to unite the several little states of Greece into one great and formidable nation; and to preserve amongst them the same disposition, the same principles, the same zeal for their liberty, and the same fondness for the arts and sciences.

Of the Prizes of Wit, and the Shows and Representations of the Theatre.

I have reserved for the conclusion of this head another kind of competition, which does not at all depend upon the strength, activity, and address of the body, and may be called with reason the combat of the mind; wherein the orators, historians, and poets, made trial of their capacities, and submitted their productions to the censure and judgment of the public. The emulation in this sort of dispute was so much the more lively and ardent, as the victory in question might justly be deemed to be infinitely superior to all others, because it affects the man more nearly, is founded on his personal and internal qualities, and decides upon the merit of his intellectual capacity; which are advantages we are apt to aspire after with the utmost vivacity and passion, and of which we are least of all inclined to renounce the glory to others.

It was a great honour, and at the same time a most sensible pleasure, for writers, who are generally fond of fame and applause, to have known how to unite in their favour the suffrages of so numerous and select an assembly as that of the Olympic games; in which were present all the finest geniuses of Greece, and all who were most capable of judging of the excellency [pg lxxv] of a work. This theatre was equally open to history, eloquence, and poetry.

Herodotus read his history169 at the Olympic games to all Greece, assembled at them, and was heard with such applause, that the names of the nine Muses were given to the nine books which compose his work, and the people cried out wherever he passed, “That is he, who has written our history, and celebrated our glorious successes against the Barbarians so excellently.”

All who had been present at the games, caused afterwards every part of Greece to resound with the name and glory of this illustrious historian.

Lucian, who writes the fact which I have related, adds, that after the example of Herodotus, many of the sophists and rhetoricians went to Olympia, to read the harangues of their composing; finding that the shortest and most certain method of acquiring a great reputation in a little time.

Plutarch observes,170 that Lysias, the famous Athenian orator, contemporary with Herodotus, pronounced a speech in the Olympic games, wherein he congratulated the Greeks upon their reconciliation with each other, and their having united to reduce the power of Dionysius the Tyrant, as upon the greatest action they had ever done.

We may judge of the eagerness of the poets to signalize themselves in these solemn games, from that of Dionysius himself.171 That prince, who had the foolish vanity to believe himself the most excellent poet of his time, appointed readers, called in Greek, ῥαψωδοὶ (Rhapsodists,) to read several pieces of his composing at Olympia. When they began to pronounce the verses of the royal poet, the strong and harmonious voices of the readers occasioned a profound silence, and they were heard at first with the greatest attention, which continually decreased as they went on, and turned at last into downright horse-laughs and hooting; so miserable did the verses appear. He comforted himself for this disgrace by a victory he gained some time after in the feast of Bacchus at Athens, in which he caused a tragedy of his composition to be represented.172

The disputes of the poets in the Olympic games were nothing, in comparison with the ardour and emulation that prevailed at Athens; which is what remains to be said upon this subject, and therefore I shall conclude with it: taking occasion to give my readers, at the same time, a short view of the shows and representations of the theatre of the ancients.

[pg lxxvi]

Those who would be more fully informed on this subject, will find it treated at large in a work lately made public by the reverend father Brumoi the Jesuit; a work which abounds with profound knowledge and erudition, and with reflections entirely new, deduced from the nature of the poems of which it treats. I shall make considerable use of that piece, and often without citing it; which is not uncommon with me.

Extraordinary Fondness of the Athenians for the Entertainments of the Stage. Emulation of the Poets in disputing the Prizes in those Representations. A short Idea of Dramatic Poetry.

No people ever expressed so much ardour and eagerness for the entertainments of the theatre as the Greeks, and especially the Athenians. The reason is obvious: as no people ever demonstrated such extent of genius, nor carried so far the love of eloquence and poesy, taste for the sciences, justness of sentiments, elegance of ear, and delicacy in all the refinements of language. A poor woman, who sold herbs at Athens, discovered Theophrastus to be a stranger, by a single word which he affectedly made use of in expressing himself.173 The common people got the tragedies of Euripides by heart. The genius of every nation expresses itself in the people's manner of passing their time, and in their pleasures. The great employment and delight of the Athenians were to amuse themselves with works of wit, and to judge of the dramatic pieces, that were acted by public authority several times a year, especially at the feasts of Bacchus, when the tragic and comic poets disputed for the prize. The former used to present four of their pieces at a time; except Sophocles, who did not think fit to continue so laborious an exercise, and confined himself to one performance, when he disputed the prize.

The state appointed judges, to determine upon the merit of the tragic or comic pieces, before they were represented in the festivals. They were acted before them in the presence of the people; but undoubtedly with no great preparation. The judges gave their suffrages, and that performance, which had the most voices, was declared victorious, received the crown as such, and was represented with all possible pomp at the expense of the republic. This did not, however, exclude such pieces, as were only in the second or third class. The best had not [pg lxxvii] always the preference; for what times have been exempt from party, caprice, ignorance, and prejudice? Ælian174 is very angry with the judges, who, in one of these disputes, gave only the second place to Euripides. He accuses them of judging either without capacity, or of suffering themselves to be bribed. It is easy to conceive the warmth and emulation, which these disputes and public rewards excited amongst the poets, and how much they contributed to the perfection, to which Greece carried dramatic performances.

The dramatic poem introduces the persons themselves, speaking and acting upon the stage: in the epic, on the contrary, the poet only relates the different adventures of his characters. It is natural to be delighted with fine descriptions of events, in which illustrious persons and whole nations are interested; and hence the epic poem had its origin. But we are quite differently affected with hearing those persons themselves, with being the confidents of their most secret sentiments, and auditors and spectators of their resolutions, enterprises, and the happy or unhappy events attending them. To read and see an action, are quite different things; we are infinitely more moved with what is acted, than with what we merely read. Our eyes as well as our minds are addressed at the same time. The spectator, agreeably deceived by an imitation so nearly approaching life, mistakes the picture for the original, and thinks the object real. This gave birth to dramatic poetry, which includes tragedy and comedy.

To these may be added the satiric poem, which derives its name from the satyrs, rural gods, who were always the chief characters in it; and not from the “satire,” a kind of abusive poetry, which has no resemblance to this, and is of a much later date. The satiric poem was neither tragedy nor comedy, but something between both, participating of the character of each. The poets, who disputed the prize, generally added one of these pieces to their tragedies, to allay the gravity and solemnity of the one, with the mirth and pleasantry of the other. There is but one example of this ancient poem come down to us, which is the Cyclops of Euripides.

I shall confine myself upon this head to tragedy and comedy; both which had their origin amongst the Greeks, who looked upon them as fruits of their own growth, of which they could never have enough. Athens was remarkable for an extraordinary appetite of this kind. These two poems, which were for a long time comprised under the general name of tragedy, [pg lxxviii] received there by degrees such improvements, as at length raised them to their highest perfection.

The Origin and Progress of Tragedy. Poets who excelled in it at Athens; Æschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides.

There had been many tragic and comic poets before Thespis; but as they had made no alterations in the original rude form of this poem, and as Thespis was the first that made any improvement in it, he was generally esteemed its inventor. Before him, tragedy was no more than a jumble of buffoon tales in the comic style, intermixed with the singing of a chorus in praise of Bacchus; for it is to the feasts of that god, celebrated at the time of the vintage, that tragedy owes its birth.

La tragédie, informe et grossière en na'ssant,

N'étoit qu'un simple chœur, où chacun en dansant,

Et du dieu des raisins entonnant les louanges,

S'éfforçoit d'attirer de fertiles vendanges.

Là, le vin et la joie éveillant les esprits,

Du plus habile chantre un bouc étoit le prix.

Formless and gross did tragedy arise,

A simple chorus, rather mad than wise;

For fruitful vintages the dancing throng

Roar'd to the god of grapes a drunken song:

Wild mirth and wine sustain'd the frantic note,

And the best singer had the prize, a goat.175

Thespis made several alterations in it, which Horace describes after Aristotle, in his Art of Poetry. The first176 was to carry his actors about in a cart, whereas before they used to sing in the streets, wherever chance led them. Another was to have their faces smeared over with wine-lees, instead of acting without disguise, as at first. He also introduced a character among the chorus, who, to give the actors time to rest themselves and to take breath, repeated the adventures of some illustrious person; which recital, at length, gave place to the subjects of tragedy.

[pg lxxix]

Thespis fut le premier, qui barbouillé de lie,

Promena par les bourgs cette heureuse folie,

Et d'acteurs mal oinés chargeant un tombereau,

Amusa les passans d'un spectacle nouveau.177

First Thespis, smear'd with lees, and void of art,

The grateful folly vented from a cart;

And as his tawdry actors drove about,

The sight was new, and charm'd the gaping rout.

A.M. 3440. Ant. J.C. 564.

Thespis lived in the time of Solon.178 That wise legislator, upon seeing his pieces performed, expressed his dislike, by striking his staff against the ground; apprehending that these poetical fictions and idle stories, from mere theatrical representations, would soon become matters of importance, and have too great a share in all public and private affairs.

A.M. 3464. Ant. J.C. 540.

It is not so easy to invent, as to improve the inventions of others. The alterations Thespis made in tragedy, gave room for Æschylus to make new and more considerable of his own. He was born at Athens, in the first year of the sixtieth Olympiad. He took upon him the profession of arms, at a time when the Athenians reckoned almost as many heroes as citizens. He was at the battles of Marathon, Salamis, and Platæa, where he did his duty.

A.M. 3514. Ant. J.C. 490.

But his disposition called him elsewhere, and put him upon entering into another course, where no less glory was to be acquired; and where he was soon without any competitors. As a superior genius, he took upon him to reform, or rather to create tragedy anew; of which he has, in consequence, been always acknowledged the inventor and father. Father Brumoi, in a dissertation which abounds with wit and good sense, explains the manner in which Æschylus conceived the true idea of tragedy from Homer's epic poems. The poet himself used to say, that his works were the remnants of the feasts given by Homer in the Iliad and Odyssey.

Tragedy therefore took a new form under him. He gave masks179 to his actors, adorned them with robes and trains, and [pg lxxx] made them wear buskins. Instead of a cart, he erected a theatre of a moderate elevation, and entirely changed their style; which from being merry and burlesque, as at first, became majestic and serious.

Eschyle dans le chœur jetta les personages:

D'un masque plus honnête habilla les visages:

Sur les ais d'un théâtre en public exhaussé

Fit paroître l'acteur d'un brodequin chaussé.180

From Æschylus the chorus learnt new grace:

He veil'd with decent masks the actor's face,

Taught him in buskins first to tread the stage,

And rais'd a theatre to please the age.

But that was only the external part or body of tragedy. Its soul, which was the most important and essential addition of Æschylus, consisted in the vivacity and spirit of the action, sustained by the dialogue of the persons of the drama introduced by him; in the artful working up of the stronger passions, especially of terror and pity, which, by alternately afflicting and agitating the soul with mournful or terrible objects, produce a grateful pleasure and delight from that very trouble and emotion; in the choice of a subject, great, noble, interesting, and contained within due bounds by the unity of time, place, and action: in short, it is the conduct and disposition of the whole piece, which, by the order and harmony of its parts, and the happy connection of its incidents and intrigues, holds the mind of the spectator in suspense till the catastrophe, and then restores him his tranquillity, and dismisses him with satisfaction.

The chorus had been established before Æschylus, as it composed alone, or next to alone, what was then called tragedy. He did not therefore exclude it, but, on the contrary, thought fit to incorporate it, to sing as chorus between the acts. Thus it supplied the interval of resting, and was a kind of person of the drama, employed either181 in giving useful advice and salutary [pg lxxxi] instructions, in espousing the party of innocence and virtue, in being the depository of secrets, and the avenger of violated religion, or in sustaining all those characters at the same time according to Horace. The coryphæus, or principal person of the chorus, spoke for the rest.

In one of Æschylus's pieces, called the Eumenides, the poet represents Orestes at the bottom of the stage, surrounded by the Furies, laid asleep by Apollo. Their figure must have been extremely horrible, as it is related, that upon their waking and appearing tumultuously on the theatre, where they were to act as a chorus, some women miscarried with the surprise, and several children died of the fright. The chorus at that time consisted of fifty actors. After this accident, it was reduced to fifteen by an express law, and at length to twelve.

I have observed, that one of the alterations made by Æschylus in tragedy, was the mask worn by his actors. These dramatic masks had no resemblance to ours, which only cover the face, but were a kind of case for the whole head, and which, besides the features, represented the beard, the hair, the ears, and even the ornaments used by women in their head-dresses. These masks varied according to the different pieces that were acted. The subject is treated at large in a dissertation of M. Boindin's, inserted in the Memoirs of the Academy of Belles Lettres.182

I could never comprehend, as I have observed elsewhere,183 in speaking of pronunciation, how masks came to continue so long upon the stage of the ancients; for certainly they could not be used, without considerably deadening the spirit of the action, which is principally expressed in the countenance, the seat and mirror of what passes in the soul. Does it not often happen, that the blood, according as it is put in motion by different passions, sometimes covers the face with a sudden and modest blush, sometimes enflames it with the heat of rage and fury, sometimes retires, leaving it pale with fear, and at others diffuses a calm and amiable serenity over it? All these affections are strongly imaged and distinguished in the lineaments of the face. The mask deprives the features of this [pg lxxxii] energetic language, and of that life and soul, by which it is the faithful interpreter of all the sentiments of the heart. I do not wonder, therefore, at Cicero's remark upon the action of Roscius.184 “Our ancestors,”' says he, “were better judges than we are. They could not wholly approve even Roscius himself, whilst he performed in a mask.”

A.M. 3509. Ant. J.C. 495.

Æschylus was in the sole possession of the glory of the stage, with almost every voice in his favour, when a young rival made his appearance to dispute the palm with him. This was Sophocles. He was born at Colonos, a town in Attica, in the second year of the seventy-first Olympiad. His father was a blacksmith, or one who kept people of that trade to work for him. His first essay was a masterpiece.

A.M. 3534. Ant. J.C. 470.

When, upon the occasion of Cimon's having found the bones of Theseus, and their being brought to Athens, a dispute between the tragic poets was appointed, Sophocles entered the lists with Æschylus, and carried the prize against him. The ancient victor, laden till then with the wreaths he had acquired, believed them all lost by failing of the last, and withdrew in disgust into Sicily to king Hiero, the protector and patron of all the learned in disgrace at Athens. He died there soon after in a very singular manner, if we may believe Suidas. As he lay asleep in the fields, with his head bare, an eagle, taking his bald crown for a stone, let a tortoise fall upon it, which killed him. Of ninety, or at least seventy, tragedies, composed by him, only seven are now extant.

Nor have those of Sophocles escaped the injury of time better, though one hundred and seventeen in number, and according to some one hundred and thirty. He retained to extreme old age all the force and vigour of his genius, as appears from a circumstance in his history. His children, unworthy of so great a father, upon pretence that he had lost his senses, summoned him before the judges, in order to obtain a decree, that his estate might be taken from him, and put into their hands. He made no other defence, than to read a tragedy he was at that time composing, called Œdipus at Colonos, with which the judges were so charmed, that he carried his cause unanimously; and his children, detested by the whole assembly, got nothing by their suit, but the shame and infamy due to so flagrant ingratitude. He was twenty times crowned victor. Some say he expired in repeating his Antigone, for [pg lxxxiii] want of power to recover his breath, after a violent endeavour to pronounce a long period to the end; others, that he died of joy upon his being declared victor, contrary to his expectation. The figure of a hive was placed upon his tomb, to perpetuate the name of Bee, which had been given him, from the sweetness of his verses: whence, it is probable, the notion was derived, of the bees having settled upon his lips when in his cradle.

A.M. 3599. Ant. J.C. 405.

He died in his ninetieth year, the fourth of the ninety-third Olympiad, after having survived Euripides six years, who was not so old as himself.

A.M. 3524. Ant. J.C. 480.

The latter was born in the first year of the seventy-fifth Olympiad, at Salamis, whither his father Mnesarchus and mother Clito had retired when Xerxes was preparing for his great expedition against Greece. He applied himself at first to philosophy, and, amongst others, had the celebrated Anaxagoras for his master. But the danger incurred by that great man, who was very near being made the victim of his philosophical tenets, inclined him to the study of poetry. He discovered in himself a genius for the drama, unknown to him at first; and employed it with such success, that he entered the lists with the great masters of whom we have been speaking. His works185 sufficiently denote his profound application to philosophy. They abound with excellent maxims of morality; and it is in that view that Socrates in his time, and Cicero long after him,186 set so high a value upon Euripides.

One cannot sufficiently admire the extreme delicacy expressed by the Athenian audience on certain occasions, and their solicitude to preserve the reverence due to morality, virtue, decency, and justice. It is surprising to observe the warmth with which they unanimously reproved whatever seemed inconsistent with them, and called the poet to an account for it, notwithstanding his having a well-founded excuse, as he had given such sentiments only to persons notoriously vicious, and actuated by the most unjust passions.

Euripides had put into the mouth of Bellerophon a pompous panegyric upon riches, which concluded with this thought: “Riches are the supreme good of the human race, and with reason excite the admiration of the gods and men.” The whole theatre cried out against these expressions; and he would have been banished directly, if he had not desired the sentence to [pg lxxxiv] be respited till the conclusion of the piece, in which the advocate for riches perished miserably.

He was in danger of incurring serious inconveniences from an answer he puts into the mouth of Hippolytus. Phædra's nurse represented to him, that he had engaged himself under an inviolable oath to keep her secret. “My tongue, it is true, pronounced that oath,” replied he, “but my heart gave no consent to it.” This frivolous distinction appeared to the whole people, as an express contempt of the religion and sanctity of an oath, that tended to banish all sincerity and good faith from society and the intercourse of life.

Another maxim187 advanced by Eteocles in the tragedy called the Phœnicians, and which Cæsar had always in his mouth, is no less pernicious: “If justice may be violated at all, it is when a throne is in question; in other respects, let it be duly revered.” It is highly criminal in Eteocles, or rather in Euripides, says Cicero, to make an exception in that very point, wherein such violation is the highest crime that can be committed. Eteocles is a tyrant, and speaks like a tyrant, who vindicates his unjust conduct by a false maxim; and it is not strange that Cæsar, who was a tyrant by nature, and equally unjust, should lay great stress upon the sentiments of a prince whom he so much resembled. But what is remarkable in Cicero, is his falling upon the poet himself, and imputing to him as a crime the having advanced so pernicious a principle upon the stage.

Lycurgus, the orator,188 who lived in the time of Philip and Alexander the Great, to reanimate the spirit of the tragic poets, caused three statues of brass to be erected, in the name of the people, to Æschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides; and having ordered their works to be transcribed, he appointed them to be carefully preserved amongst the public archives, from whence they were taken from time to time to be read; the players not being permitted to represent them on the stage.

The reader expects, no doubt, after what has been said relating to the three poets, who invented, improved, and carried [pg lxxxv] tragedy to its perfection, that I should point out the peculiar excellencies of their style and character. For that I must refer to father Brumoi, who will do it much better than it is in my power. After having laid down, as an undoubted principle, that the epic poem, that is to say Homer, pointed out the way for the tragic poets; and having demonstrated, by reflections drawn from human nature, upon what principles and by what degrees this happy imitation was conducted to its end, he goes on to describe the three poets above mentioned, in the most lively and brilliant colours.

Tragedy took at first from Æschylus its inventor, a much more lofty style than the Iliad; that is, the magnum loqui mentioned by Horace. Perhaps Æschylus, who had a full conception of the grandeur of the language of tragedy, carried it too high. It is not Homer's trumpet, but something more. His pompous, swelling, gigantic diction, resembles rather the beating of drums and the shouts of battle, than the noble harmony of the trumpets. The elevation and grandeur of his genius would not permit him to speak the language of other men, so that his Muse seemed rather to walk in stilts, than in the buskins of his own invention.

Sophocles understood much better the true excellence of the dramatic style: he therefore copies Homer more closely, and blends in his diction that honeyed sweetness, from whence he was denominated “the Bee,” with a gravity that gives his tragedy the modest air of a matron, compelled to appear in public with dignity, as Horace expresses it.

The style of Euripides, though noble, is less removed from the familiar; and he seems to have affected rather the pathetic and the elegant, than the nervous and the lofty.

As Corneille, says father Brumoi in another place, after having opened to himself a path entirely new and unknown to the ancients, seems like an eagle towering in the clouds, from the sublimity, force, unbroken progress, and rapidity of his flight; and, as Racine, in copying the ancients in a manner entirely his own, imitates the swan, that sometimes floats upon the air, sometimes rises, then falls again with an elegance of motion, and a grace peculiar to herself; so Æschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, have each of them a particular characteristic and method. The first, as the inventor and father of tragedy, is like a torrent rolling impetuously over rocks, forests, and precipices; the second resembles a canal,189 which flows [pg lxxxvi] gently through delicious gardens; and the third a river, that does not follow its course in a continued line, but loves to turn and wind his silver wave through flowery meads and rural scenes.

This is the character which father Brumoi gives of the three poets, to whom the Athenian stage was indebted for its perfection in tragedy. Æschylus190 drew it out of its original chaos and confusion, and made it appear in some degree of lustre; but it still retained the rude unfinished air of things in their beginning, which are generally defective in point of art and method. Sophocles and Euripides added infinitely to the dignity of tragedy. The style of the first, as has been observed, is more noble and majestic; of the latter, more tender and pathetic; each perfect in their way. In this diversity of character, it is difficult to decide which is most excellent. The learned have always been divided upon this head; as we are at this day, with respect to the two poets of our own nation,191 whose tragedies have made our stage illustrious, and not inferior to that of Athens.

I have observed, that the tender and pathetic distinguishes the compositions of Euripides, of which Alexander of Pheræ, the most cruel of tyrants, was a proof. That barbarous man, upon seeing the Troades of Euripides acted, found himself so moved with it, that he quitted the theatre before the conclusion of the play, professing that he was ashamed to be seen in tears for the distress of Hecuba and Andromache, who had never shown the least compassion for his own citizens, of whom he had butchered such numbers.

When I speak of the tender and pathetic, I would not be understood to mean a passion that softens the heart into effeminacy, and which, to our reproach, is almost alone, or at least more than any other passion received upon our stage, though rejected by the ancients, and condemned by the nations around us of greatest reputation for their genius, and taste for the sciences and polite learning. The two great principles for moving the passions amongst the ancients, were terror and pity.192 And, indeed, as we naturally refer every thing to ourselves, or our own particular interest, when we see persons of [pg lxxxvii] exalted rank or virtue sinking under great evils, the fear of the like misfortunes, with which we know that human life is on all sides invested, seizes upon us, and from a secret impulse of self-love we find ourselves sensibly affected with the distresses of others: besides which, the sharing a common nature193 with the rest of our species, makes us sensible to whatever befalls them. Upon a close and attentive inquiry into those two passions, they will be found the most deeply inherent, active, extensive, and general affections of the soul; including all orders of men, great and small, rich and poor, of whatever age or condition. Hence the ancients, accustomed to consult nature, and to take her for their guide in all things, with reason conceived terror and compassion to be the soul of tragedy; and that those affections ought to prevail in it. The passion of love was in no estimation amongst them, and had seldom any share in their dramatic pieces; though with us it is a received opinion, that they cannot be supported without it.

It is worth our trouble to examine briefly in what manner this passion, which has always been deemed a weakness and a blemish in the greatest characters, got such footing upon our stage. Corneille, who was the first who brought the French tragedy to any perfection, and whom all the rest have followed, found the whole nation enamoured with the perusal of romances, and little disposed to admire any thing not resembling them. From the desire of pleasing his audience, who were at the same time his judges, he endeavoured to move them in the manner they had been accustomed to be affected; and, by introducing love in his scenes, to bring them the nearer to the predominant taste of the age for romance. From the same source arose that multiplicity of incidents, episodes, and adventures, with which our tragic pieces are crowded and obscured; so contrary to probability, which will not admit such a number of extraordinary and surprising events in the short space of four-and-twenty hours; so contrary to the simplicity of ancient tragedy; and so adapted to conceal, by the assemblage of so many different objects, the sterility of the genius of a poet, more intent upon the marvellous, than upon the probable and natural.

Both the Greeks and Romans have preferred the iambic to the heroic verse in their tragedies; not only because the first has a kind of dignity better adapted to the stage, but, whilst it approaches nearer to prose, retains sufficiently the air of poetry to please the ear; and yet has too little of it to put the audience [pg lxxxviii] in mind of the poet, who ought not to appear at all in representations, where other persons are supposed to speak and act. Monsieur Dacier makes a very just reflection on this subject. He says, that it is the misfortune of our tragedy to have almost no other verse than what it has in common with epic poetry, elegy, pastoral, satire, and comedy; whereas the learned languages have a great variety of versification.

This inconvenience is highly obvious in our tragedy; which consequently is obliged to lose sight of nature and probability, as it obliges heroes, princes, kings, and queens, to express themselves in a pompous strain in their familiar conversation, which it would be ridiculous to attempt in real life. The giving utterance to the most impetuous passions in an uniform cadence, and by hemistichs and rhymes, would undoubtedly be tedious and offensive to the ear, if the charms of poetry, the elegance of expression, and the spirit of the sentiments, and perhaps, more than all of them, the resistless force of custom, had not in a manner subjected our reason, and spread a veil before our judgment.

It was not chance, therefore, which suggested to the Greeks the use of iambics in their tragedy. Nature itself seems to have dictated that kind of verse to them. Instructed by the same unerring guide, they made choice of a different versification for the chorus, better adapted to the motions of the dance, and the variations of the song; because it was necessary for poetry here to shine out in all its lustre, whilst the mere conversation between the real actors was suspended. The chorus was an embellishment of the representation, and a relaxation to the audience, and therefore required more exalted poetry and numbers to support it, when united with music and dancing.

Of the Old, Middle, and New Comedy.

Whilst tragedy was thus rising to perfection at Athens, comedy, the second species of dramatic poetry, and which, till then, had been much neglected, began to be cultivated with more attention. Nature was the common parent of both. We are sensibly affected with the dangers, distresses, misfortunes, and, in a word, with whatever relates to the lives and conduct of illustrious persons; and this gave birth to tragedy. And we are as curious to know the adventures, conduct, and defects of our equals; which supply us with occasions of laughing, and being merry at the expense of others. Hence comedy derives itself; which is properly an image of private life. Its design is to expose defects and vices upon the stage, [pg lxxxix] and, by affixing ridicule to them, to make them contemptible; and, consequently, to instruct by diverting. Ridicule, therefore, (or, to express the same word by another, pleasantry,) ought to prevail in comedy.

This species of entertainment took at different times three different forms at Athens, as well from the genius of the poets, as from the influence of the government, which occasioned various alterations in it.

The old comedy, so called by Horace,194 and which he dates after the time of Æschylus, retained something of its original rudeness, and the liberty it had been used to take of throwing out coarse jests and reviling the spectators from the cart of Thespis. Though it was become regular in its plan, and worthy of a great theatre, it had not learnt to be more reserved. It represented real transactions, with the names, dress, gestures, and likeness, in masks, of whomsoever it thought fit to sacrifice to the public derision. In a state where it was held good policy to unmask whatever carried the air of ambition, singularity, or knavery, comedy assumed the privilege to harangue, reform, and advise the people upon their most important interests. No one was spared in a city of so much liberty, or rather licentiousness, as Athens was at that time. Generals, magistrates, government, the very gods were abandoned to the poet's satirical vein; and all was well received, provided the comedy was diverting, and the Attic salt not wanting.

In one of these comedies,195 not only the priest of Jupiter determines to quit his service, because no more sacrifices are offered to the god; but Mercury himself comes, in a starving condition, to seek his fortune amongst mankind, and offers to serve as a porter, sutler, bailiff, guide, door-keeper; in short, in any capacity, rather than return to heaven. In another,196 the same gods, reduced to the extremity of famine, from the birds having built a city in the air, whereby their provisions are cut off, and the smoke of incense and sacrifices prevented from ascending to heaven, depute three ambassadors in the name of Jupiter to conclude a treaty of accommodation with the birds, upon such conditions as they shall approve. The chamber of audience, where the three famished gods are received, is a kitchen well stored with excellent game of all sorts. Here Hercules, deeply smitten with the smell of roast [pg xc] meat, which he apprehends to be more exquisite and nutritious than that of incense, begs leave to make his abode, and to turn the spit, and assist the cook upon occasion. The other pieces of Aristophanes abound with strokes still more satirical and severe upon the principal divinities.

I am not much surprised at the poet's insulting the gods, and treating them with the utmost contempt, as from them he had nothing fear; but I cannot help wondering at his having brought the most illustrious and powerful persons of Athens upon the stage, and presuming to attack the government itself, without any manner of respect or reserve.

Cleon having returned triumphant, contrary to the general expectation, from the expedition against Sphacteria, was looked upon by the people as the greatest captain of that age. Aristophanes, to set that bad man in a true light, who was the son of a tanner, and a tanner himself, and whose rise was owing solely to his temerity and impudence, was so bold as to make him the subject of a comedy,197 without being awed by his power and influence: but he was obliged to play the part of Cleon himself, and appeared for the first time upon the stage in that character; not one of the comedians daring to represent it, nor to expose himself to the resentment of so formidable an enemy. His face was smeared over with wine-lees; because no workman could be found, that would venture to make a mask resembling Cleon, as was usual when persons were brought upon the stage. In this piece he reproaches him with embezzling the public treasures, with a violent passion for bribes and presents, with craft in seducing the people, and denies him the glory of the action at Sphacteria, which he attributes chiefly to the share his colleague had in it.

In the Acharnians, he accuses Lamachus of having been made general, rather by bribery than merit. He imputes to him his youth, inexperience, and idleness; at the same time that he, and many others, whom he covertly designates, convert to their own use the rewards due only to valour and real services. He reproaches the republic with their preference of the younger citizens to the elder, in the government of the state, and the command of their armies. He tells them plainly, that when peace shall be concluded, neither Cleonymus, Hyperbolus, nor many other such knaves, all mentioned by name, shall have any share in the public affairs; they being always ready to accuse their fellow-citizens of crimes, and to enrich themselves by such informations.

[pg xci]

In his comedy called the Wasps, imitated by Racine in his Plaideurs, he exposes the mad passion of the people for prosecutions and trials at law, and the enormous injustice frequently committed in passing sentence and giving judgment.

The poet,198 concerned to see the republic obstinately bent upon the unhappy expedition to Sicily, endeavours to excite in the people a thorough disgust for so ruinous a war, and to inspire them with the desire of a peace, as much the interest of the victors as the vanquished, after a war of several years' duration, equally pernicious to each party, and capable of involving all Greece in ruin.

None of Aristophanes's pieces explains better his boldness, in speaking upon the most delicate affairs of the state in the crowded theatre, than his comedy called Lysistrata. One of the principal magistrates of Athens had a wife of that name, who is supposed to have taken it into her head to compel Greece to conclude a peace. She relates, how, during the war, the women inquiring of their husbands the result of their counsels, and whether they had not resolved to make peace with Sparta, received no answers but imperious looks, and orders to mind their own business: that, however, they perceived plainly to what a low condition the government was declined: that they took the liberty to remonstrate mildly to their husbands upon the sad consequences of their rash determinations, but that their humble representations had no other effect than to offend and enrage them: that, at length, being confirmed by the general opinion of all Attica, that there were no longer any men in the state, nor heads for the administration of affairs, their patience being quite exhausted, the women had thought it proper and advisable to take the government upon themselves, and preserve Greece, whether it would or no, from the folly and madness of its resolves. “For her part, she declares, that she has taken possession of the city and treasury, in order,” says she, “to prevent Pisander and his confederates, the four hundred administrators, from exciting troubles, according to their custom, and from robbing the public as usual.” (Was ever any thing so bold?) She goes on to prove, that the women only are capable of retrieving affairs by this burlesque argument; that admitting things to be in such a state of perplexity and confusion, the sex, accustomed to untangling their threads, were the only persons to set them right again, as being best qualified with the necessary address, patience, and moderation. The Athenian politics are [pg xcii] thus made inferior to those of the women, who are only represented in a ridiculous light, to turn the derision upon their husbands, who were engaged in the administration of the government.

These extracts from Aristophanes, taken almost word for word from father Brumoi, seemed to me very proper to give an insight into that poet's character, and the genius of the ancient comedy, which was, as we see, a satire of the most poignant and severe kind, that had assumed to itself an independency from respect to persons, and to which nothing was sacred. It is no wonder that Cicero condemns so licentious and uncurbed a liberty. It might, he says,199 have been tolerable, had it attacked only bad citizens, and seditious orators, who endeavoured to raise commotions in the state, such as Cleon, Cleophon, and Hyperbolus; but when a Pericles, who for many years had governed the commonwealth both in war and peace with equal wisdom and authority (he might have added, and a Socrates, declared by Apollo the wisest of mankind) is brought upon the stage to be laughed at by the public, it is as if our Plautus or Nævius had attacked the Scipios, or Cæcilius had dared to revile Marcus Cato in his plays.

That liberty is still more offensive to us, who are born, and live under a monarchical government, which is far from being favourable to licentiousness. But without intending to justify the conduct of Aristophanes, which is certainly inexcusable, I think, to judge properly of it, it would be necessary to lay aside the prejudices of birth, nations, and times, and to imagine we live in those remote ages in a state purely democratical. We must not fancy Aristophanes to have been a person of little consequence in his republic, as the comic writers generally are in our days. The king of Persia had a very different idea of him.200 It is a known story, that in an audience of the Greek ambassadors, his first inquiry was after a certain comic poet (meaning Aristophanes) that put all Greece in motion, and gave such effectual counsels against him. Aristophanes did that upon the stage, which Demosthenes did afterwards in the public assemblies. The poet's reproaches were no less animated than the orator's. In his comedies he uttered the [pg xciii] same sentiments as he had a right to deliver from the public rostrum. They were addressed to the same people, upon the same occasions of the state, the same means of success, and the same obstacles to their measures. In Athens the whole people were the sovereign, and each of them had an equal share in the supreme authority. Upon this they were continually intent, were fond of discoursing upon it themselves, and of hearing the sentiments of others. The public affairs were the business of every individual, on which they were desirous of being fully informed, that they might know how to conduct themselves on every occasion of war or peace, which frequently offered, and to decide upon their own, as well as upon the destiny of their allies or enemies. Hence rose the liberty taken by the comic poets, of discussing affairs of the state in their performances. The people were so far from being offended at it, or at the manner in which those writers treated the principal persons of the state, that they conceived their liberty in some measure to consist in it.

Three poets201 particularly excelled in the old comedy; Eupolis, Cratinus, and Aristophanes. The last is the only one of them, whose pieces have come down to us entire; and, out of the great number which he composed, eleven are all that remain. He flourished in an age when Greece abounded with great men, and was contemporary with Socrates and Euripides, whom he survived. During the Peloponnesian war, he made his greatest figure; less as a writer to amuse the people with his comedies, than as a censor of the government, retained to reform the state, and to be almost the arbiter of his country.

He is admired for an elegance, poignancy, and happiness of expression, or, in a word, that Attic salt and spirit, to which the Roman language could never attain, and for which Aristophanes202 [pg xciv] is more remarkable than any other of the Greek authors. His particular excellence was raillery. None ever touched what was ridiculous in the characters whom he wished to expose with such success, or knew better how to convey it in all its full force to others. But it would be necessary to have lived in his times, to be qualified to judge of this. The subtle salt and spirit of the ancient raillery, according to father Brumoi, is evaporated through length of time, and what remains of it is become flat and insipid to us; though the sharpest part will retain its vigour throughout all ages.

Two considerable defects are justly imputed to this poet, which very much obscure, if not entirely efface, his glory. These are, low buffoonery, and gross obscenity; and it has in vain been attempted to offer, in excuse for the first of these faults, the character of his audience; the bulk of which generally consisted of the poor, the ignorant, and dregs of the people, whom, however, it was as necessary to please, as the learned and the rich. The depraved taste of the lower order of people, which once banished Cratinus and his company, because his scenes were not grossly comic enough for them, is no excuse for Aristophanes, as Menander could find out the art of changing that grovelling taste, by introducing a species of comedy, not altogether so modest as Plutarch seems to insinuate, yet much less licentious than any before his time.

The gross obscenities, with which all Aristophanes's comedies abound, have no excuse; they only denote to what a pitch the libertinism of the spectators, and the depravity of the poet, had proceeded. Had he even impregnated them with the utmost wit, which however is not the case, the privilege of laughing himself, or of making others laugh, would have been too dearly purchased at the expense of decency and good manners.203 And in this case it may well be said, that it were better to have no wit at all, than to make so ill a use of it.204 F. Brumoi is very much to be commended for having taken care, in giving a general idea of Aristophanes's writings, to throw a veil over those parts of them that might have given offence to modesty. Though such behaviour be the indispensable rule of religion, it is not always observed by those who pique themselves most on their erudition, and sometimes prefer the title of scholar to that of Christian.

The old comedy subsisted till Lysander's time; who, upon having made himself master of Athens, changed the form or [pg xcv] the government, and put it into the hands of thirty of the principal citizens. The satirical liberty of the theatre was offensive to them, and therefore they thought fit to put a stop to it. The reason of this alteration is evident, and confirms the reflection made before upon the privilege which the poets possessed of criticizing with impunity the persons at the head of the state. The whole authority of Athens was then invested in tyrants. The democracy was abolished. The people had no longer any share in the government. They were no more the prince; their sovereignty had expired. The right of giving their opinions and suffrages upon affairs of state was at an end; nor dared they, either in their own persons or by the poets, presume to censure the sentiments and conduct of their masters. The calling persons by their names upon the stage was prohibited: but poetical ill-nature soon found the secret of eluding the intention of the law, and of making itself amends for the restraint which was imposed upon it by the necessity of using feigned names. It then applied itself to discover what was ridiculous in known characters, which it copied to the life, and from thence acquired the double advantage of gratifying the vanity of the poets, and the malice of the audience, in a more refined manner: the one had the delicate pleasure of putting the spectators upon guessing their meaning, and the other of not being mistaken in their suppositions, and of affixing the right name to the characters represented. Such was the comedy, since called the Middle Comedy, of which there are some instances in Aristophanes.

It continued till the time of Alexander the Great, who, having entirely assured himself of the empire of Greece by the defeat of the Thebans, caused a check to be put upon the licentiousness of the poets, which increased daily. From thence the New Comedy took its birth, which was only an imitation of private life, and brought nothing upon the stage but feigned names, and fictitious adventures.

Chacun peint avec art dans ce nouveau miroir,

S'y vit avec plaisir, ou crut ne s'y pas voir.

L'avare des premiers rit du tableau fidèle

D'un avare souvent tracé sur son modèle;

Et mille fois un fat, finement exprimé,

Méconnut le portrait sur lui-mème formé.

In this new glass, whilst each himself survey'd,

He sat with pleasure, though himself was play'd:

The miser grinn'd whilst avarice was drawn,

Nor thought the faithful likeness was his own;

His own dear self no imag'd fool could find,

But saw a thousand other fops design'd.205

[pg xcvi]

This may properly be called fine comedy, and is that of Menander. Of one hundred and eighty, or rather eighty plays, according to Suidas, composed by him, all of which Terence is said to have translated, there remain only a few fragments. We may form a judgment of the merit of the originals from the excellence of the copy. Quintilian, in speaking of Menander, is not afraid to say,206 that with the beauty of his works, and the height of his reputation, he obscured, or rather obliterated, the fame of all other writers in the same way. He observes in another passage,207 that his own times were not so just to his merit as they ought to have been, which has been the fate of many others; but that he was sufficiently made amends by the favourable opinion of posterity. And indeed Philemon, a comic poet, who flourished about the same period, though older than Menander, was preferred before him.

The Theatre of the Ancients described.

I have already observed, that Æschylus was the first founder of a fixed and durable theatre adorned with suitable decorations. It was at first, as well as the amphitheatres, composed of wooden planks, the seats in which rose one above another; but those having one day broke down, by having too great a weight upon them, the Athenians, excessively enamoured of dramatic representations, were induced by that accident to erect those superb structures, which were imitated afterwards with so much splendour by the Roman magnificence. What I shall say of them, has almost as much relation to the Roman as the Athenian theatres; and is extracted entirely from M. Boindin's learned dissertation upon the theatre of the ancients,208 who has treated the subject in its fullest extent.

The theatre of the ancients was divided into three principal parts; each of which had its peculiar appellation. The division for the actors was called in general the scene, or stage; that for the spectators was particularly termed the theatre, which must have been of vast extent,209 as at Athens it was capable of containing above thirty thousand persons; and the orchestra, which amongst the Greeks was the place assigned for [pg xcvii] the pantomimes and dancers, though at Rome it was appropriated to the senators and vestal virgins.

The theatre was of a semicircular form on one side, and square on the other. The space contained within the semicircle was allotted to the spectators, and had seats placed one above another to the top of the building. The square part in the front of it was appropriated to the actors; and in the interval, between both, was the orchestra.

The great theatres had three rows of porticoes, raised one upon another, which formed the body of the edifice, and at the same time three different stories for the seats. From the highest of those porticoes the women saw the representation, sheltered from the weather. The rest of the theatre was uncovered, and all the business of the stage was performed in the open air.

Each of these stories consisted of nine rows of seats, including the landing-place, which divided them from each other, and served as a passage from side to side. But as this landing-place and passage took up the space of two benches, there were only seven to sit upon, and consequently in each story there were seven rows of seats. They were from fifteen to eighteen inches in height, and twice as much in breadth; so that the spectators had room to sit at their ease, and without being incommoded by the legs of the people above them, no foot-boards being provided for them.

Each of these stories of benches were divided in two different manners; in their height by the landing-places, called by the Romans Præcinctiones, and in their circumferences by several staircases, peculiar to each story, which intersecting them in right lines, tending towards the centre of the theatre, gave the form of wedges to the quantity of seats between them, from whence they were called Cunei.

Behind these stories of seats were covered galleries, through which the people thronged into the theatre by great square openings, contrived for that purpose in the walls next the seats. Those openings were called Vomitoria, from the multitude of people crowding through them into their places.

As the actors could not be heard to the extremity of the theatre, the Greeks contrived a means to supply that defect, and to augment the force of the voice, and make it more distinct and articulate. For that purpose they invented a kind of large vessels of copper, which were disposed under the seats of the theatre, in such a manner, as made all sounds strike upon the ear with more force and distinctness.

The orchestra being situated, as I have observed, between [pg xcviii] the two other parts of the theatre, of which one was circular, and the other square, it participated of the form of each, and occupied the space between both. It was divided into three parts.

The first and most considerable was more particularly called the orchestra, from a Greek word210 that signifies to dance. It was appropriated to the pantomimes and dancers, and to all such subaltern actors as played between the acts, and at the end of the representations.

The second was named θυλέλη, from its being square, in the form of an altar. Here the chorus was generally placed.

And in the third the Greeks disposed their band of music. They called it ὑποσκήνιον, from its being situate at the bottom of the principal part of the theatre, to which they gave the general name of the scene.

I shall describe here this third part of the theatre, called the scene; which was also subdivided into three different parts.

The first and most considerable was properly called the scene, and gave its name to this whole division. It occupied the whole front of the building from side to side, and was the place allotted for the decorations. This front had two small wings at its extremity, from which hung a large curtain, that was let down to open the scene, and drawn up between the acts, when any thing in the representation made it necessary.

The second, called by the Greeks indifferently προσκήνιον, and λοτεῖον and by the Romans proscenium, and pulpitum, was a large open space in front of the scene, in which the actors performed their parts, and which, by the help of the decorations, represented either a public square or forum, a common street, or the country; but the place so represented was always in the open air.

The third division was a part reserved behind the scenes, and called by the Greeks παρασκήνιον. Here the actors dressed themselves, and the decorations were locked up. In the same place were also kept the machines, of which the ancients had abundance in their theatres.

As only the porticoes and the building of the scene were roofed, it was necessary to draw sails, fastened with cords to masts, over the rest of the theatre, to screen the audience from the heat of the sun. But as this contrivance did not prevent the heat, occasioned by the perspiration and breath of so numerous an assembly, the ancients took care to allay it by a kind of rain; conveying the water for that use above the porticoes, [pg xcix] which falling again in form of dew through an infinity of small pores concealed in the statues, with which the theatre abounded, did not only diffuse a grateful coolness all around, but the most fragrant exhalations along with it; for this dew was always perfumed. Whenever the representations were interrupted by storms, the spectators retired into the porticoes behind the seats of the theatre.

The fondness of the Athenians for representations of this kind cannot be expressed. Their eyes, their ears, their imagination, their understanding, all shared in the satisfaction. Nothing gave them so sensible a pleasure in dramatic performances, either tragic or comic, as the strokes which were aimed at the affairs of the public; whether pure chance occasioned the application, or the address of the poets, who knew how to reconcile the most remote subjects with the transactions of the republic. They entered by that means into the interests of the people, took occasion to soothe their passions, authorize their pretensions, justify, and sometimes condemn, their conduct, entertain them with agreeable hopes, instruct them in their duty in certain nice conjunctures; in consequence of which they often not only acquired the applauses of the spectators, but credit and influence in the public affairs and counsels: hence the theatre became so grateful and so interesting to the people. It was in this manner, according to some authors, that Euripides artfully adapted his tragedy of Palamedes211 to the sentence passed against Socrates; and pointed out, by an illustrious example of antiquity, the innocence of a philosopher, oppressed by malignity supported by power and faction.

Accident was often the occasion of sudden and unforeseen applications, which from their appositeness were very agreeable to the people. Upon this verse of Æschylus, in praise of Amphiaraus,

—— 'Tis his desire

Not to appear, but be the great and good,

the whole audience rose up, and unanimously applied it to Aristides.212 The same thing happened to Philopœmen at the Nemæan games. At the instant he entered the theatre, these verses were singing upon the stage:

—— He comes, to whom we owe

Our liberty, the noblest good below.

[pg c]

All the Greeks cast their eyes upon Philopœmen,213 and with clapping of hands and acclamations of joy expressed their veneration for the hero.

In the same manner at Rome, during the banishment of Cicero,214 when some verses of Accius,215 which reproached the Greeks with their ingratitude in suffering the banishment of Telamon, were repeated by Æsop, the best actor of his time, they drew tears from the eyes of the whole assembly.

Upon another, though very different, occasion, the Roman people applied to Pompey the Great some verses to this effect:

'Tis our unhappiness has made thee great;216

and then addressing the people;

The time shall come when you shall late deplore

So great a power confided to such hands;

the spectators obliged the actor to repeat these verses several times.

Fondness for Theatrical Representations one of the principal Causes of the Decline, Degeneracy, and Corruption of the Athenian State.

When we compare the happy times of Greece, in which Europe and Asia resounded with nothing but the fame of the Athenian victories, with the later ages, when the power of Philip and Alexander the Great had in a manner reduced it to slavery, we shall be surprised at the strange alteration in that republic. But what is most material, is the investigation of the causes and progress of this declension; and these M. de Tourreil has discussed in an admirable manner in the elegant preface to his translation of Demosthenes's orations.

There were no longer, he observes, at Athens any traces of that manly and vigorous policy, equally capable of planning good and retrieving bad success. Instead of that, there remained only an inconsistent loftiness, apt to evaporate in pompous decrees. They were no more those Athenians, who, when menaced by a deluge of barbarians, demolished their houses to build ships with the timber, and whose women stoned the abject wretch to death that proposed to appease the great king by tribute or homage. The love of ease and pleasure [pg ci] had almost entirely extinguished that of glory, liberty, and independence.

Pericles, that great man, so absolute, that those who envied him treated him as a second Pisistratus, was the first author of this degeneracy and corruption. With the design of conciliating the favour of the people, he ordained that upon such days as games or sacrifices were celebrated, a certain number of oboli should be distributed amongst them; and that in the assemblies in which affairs of state were to be discussed, every individual should receive a certain pecuniary gratification in right of being present. Thus the members of the republic were seen for the first time to sell their care in the administration of the government, and to rank amongst servile employments the most noble functions of the sovereign power.

It was not difficult to foresee where so excessive an abuse would end: and to remedy it, it was proposed to establish a fund for the support of the war, and to make it a capital crime to advise, upon any account whatsoever, the application of it to other uses: but, notwithstanding, the abuse always subsisted. At first it seemed tolerable, whilst the citizen, who was supported at the public expense, endeavoured to deserve it by doing his duty in the field for nine months together. Every one was to serve in his turn, and whoever failed was treated as a deserter without distinction: but at length the number of the transgressors carried it against the law; and impunity, as it commonly happens, multiplied their number. People accustomed to the delightful abode of a city, where feasts and games were perpetually taking place, conceived an invincible repugnance for labour and fatigue, which they looked upon as unworthy of free-born men.

It was therefore necessary to find amusement for this indolent people, to fill up the great void of an unactive, useless life. Hence arose principally their fondness, or rather frenzy, for public shows. The death of Epaminondas, which seemed to promise them the greatest advantage, gave the final stroke to their ruin and destruction. “Their courage,” says Justin,217 “did not survive that illustrious Theban. Freed from a rival, who kept their emulation alive, they sunk into a lethargic sloth and effeminacy. The funds for armaments by land and sea were soon lavished upon games and feasts. The seaman's and soldier's pay was distributed to the idle citizen. An indolent and luxurious mode of life enervated every breast. The representations of the theatre were preferred to the exercises of the [pg cii] camp. Valour and military knowledge were entirely disregarded. Great captains were in no estimation; whilst good poets and excellent comedians engrossed the universal applause.”

Extravagance of this kind makes it easy to comprehend in what multitudes the people thronged to the dramatic performances. As no expense was spared in embellishing them, exorbitant sums were sunk in the service of the theatre. “If,” says Plutarch,218 “an accurate calculation were to be made what each representation of the dramatic pieces cost the Athenians, it would appear, that their expenses in playing the Bacchanalians, the Phœnicians, Œdipus, Antigone, Medea, and Electra, (tragedies written either by Sophocles or Euripides,) were greater than those which had been employed against the Barbarians, in defence of the liberty and for the preservation of Greece.” This gave a Spartan just reason to exclaim, on seeing an estimate of the enormous sums laid out in these contests of the tragic poets, and the extraordinary pains taken by the magistrates who presided in them,219 “that a people must be void of sense to apply themselves in so warm and serious a manner to things so frivolous. For,” added he, “games should be only games; and nothing is more unreasonable than to purchase a short and trivial amusement at so great a price. Pleasures of this kind agree only with public rejoicings and seasons of festivity, and were designed to divert people at their leisure hours; but should by no means interfere with the affairs of the public, nor the necessary expenses of the government.”

After all, says Plutarch, in the passage which I have already cited, of what utility have these tragedies been to Athens, though so much boasted by the people, and admired by the rest of the world? I find that the prudence of Themistocles enclosed the city with strong walls; that the fine taste and magnificence of Pericles improved and adorned it; that the noble fortitude of Miltiades preserved its liberty; and that the moderate conduct of Cimon acquired it the empire and government of all Greece. If the wise and learned poetry of Euripides, the sublime diction of Sophocles, the lofty buskin of Æschylus, have obtained equal advantages for the city of Athens, by delivering it from impending calamities, or by adding to its glory, I am willing (he goes on) that dramatic pieces should be placed in competition with trophies of victory, the poetic theatre with the field of battle, and the compositions of the poets with the great exploits of the generals. But what a [pg ciii] comparison would this be? On the one side would be seen a few writers, crowned with wreaths of ivy, and dragging a goat or an ox after them, the rewards and victims assigned them for excelling in tragic poetry: on the other, a train of illustrious captains, surrounded by the colonies which they founded, the cities which they captured, and the nations which they subjected. It is not to perpetuate the victories of Æschylus and Sophocles, but in remembrance of the glorious battles of Marathon, Salamis, Eurymedon, and many others, that so many feasts are celebrated every month with such pomp by the Grecians.

The inference which Plutarch draws from hence, in which we ought to agree with him, is,220 that it was the highest imprudence in the Athenians thus to prefer pleasure to duty, fondness for the theatre to the love of their country, trivial shows to application to public business, and to consume, in useless expenses and dramatic entertainments, the funds intended for the support of fleets and armies. Macedon, till then obscure and inconsiderable, well knew how to take advantage of the Athenian indolence and effeminacy;221 and Philip, instructed by the Greeks themselves, amongst whom he had for several years applied himself successfully to the art of war, was not long before he gave Greece a master, and subjected it to the yoke, as we shall see in the sequel.

I am now to open an entirely new scene to the reader's view, not unworthy his curiosity and attention. We have seen two states of no great consideration, Media and Persia, extend themselves far and wide, under the conduct of Cyrus, like a torrent or a conflagration; and, with amazing rapidity, conquer and subdue many provinces and kingdoms. We shall see now that vast empire setting the nations under its dominion in motion, the Persians, Medes, Phœnicians, Egyptians, Babylonians, Indians, and many others; and falling, with all the forces of Asia and the East upon a little country, of very small extent, and destitute of all foreign assistance; I mean Greece. When, on the one hand, we behold so many nations united together, such preparations of war made for several years with so much diligence; innumerable armies by sea and land, and such fleets as the sea could hardly contain; and, on the other [pg civ] hand, two weak cities, Athens and Lacedæmon, abandoned by all their allies, and left almost entirely to themselves; have we not reason to believe, that these two little cities are going to be utterly destroyed and swallowed up by so formidable an enemy; and that no footsteps of them will be left remaining? And yet we shall find that they will prove victorious; and by their invincible courage, and the several battles they gain, both by sea and land, will make the Persian empire lay aside all thoughts of ever again turning their arms against Greece.

The history of the war between the Persians and the Greeks will illustrate the truth of this maxim, that it is not the number, but the valour of the troops, and the conduct of the generals, on which depends the success of military expeditions. The reader will admire the surprising courage and intrepidity of the great men at the head of the Grecian affairs, whom neither all the world in motion against them could deject, nor the greatest misfortunes disconcert; who undertook, with an handful of men, to make head against innumerable armies; who, notwithstanding such a prodigious inequality of forces, dared to hope for success; who even compelled victory to declare on the side of merit and virtue; and taught all succeeding generations what infinite resources are to be found in prudence, valour, and experience; in a zeal for liberty and our country; in the love of our duty; and in all the sentiments of noble and generous souls.

This war of the Persians against the Grecians will be followed by another amongst the Greeks themselves, but of a very different kind from the former. In the latter, there will scarce be any actions, but what in appearance are of little consequence, and seemingly unworthy of a reader's curiosity who is fond of great events; in this he will meet with little besides private quarrels between certain cities, or some small commonwealths; some inconsiderable sieges, (excepting that of Syracuse, one of the most important related in ancient history,) though several of these sieges were of no short duration; some battles between armies, where the numbers were small, and but little blood shed. What is it, then, that has rendered these wars so famous in history? Sallust informs us in these words: “The actions of the Athenians doubtless were great; and yet I believe they were somewhat less than fame will have us conceive of them. [pg cv] But because Athens abounded in noble writers, the acts of that republic are celebrated throughout the whole world as most glorious; and the gallantry of those heroes who performed them, has had the good fortune to be thought as transcendent as the eloquence of those who have described them.”222

Sallust, though jealous enough of the glory the Romans had acquired by a series of distinguished actions, with which their history abounds, yet does justice in this passage to the Grecians, by acknowledging, that their exploits were truly great and illustrious, though somewhat inferior, in his opinion, to their fame. What is then this foreign and borrowed lustre, which the Athenian actions have derived from the eloquence of their historians? It is, that the whole universe agrees in looking upon them as the greatest and most glorious that ever were performed: Per terrarum orbem Atheniensium facta pro maximis celebrantur. All nations, seduced and enchanted as it were with the beauties of the Greek authors, think that people's exploits superior to any thing that was ever done by any other nation. This, according to Sallust, is the service which the Greek authors have done the Athenians, by their excellent manner of describing their actions; and very unhappy it is for us, that our history, for want of similar assistance, has left a thousand brilliant actions and fine sayings unrecorded, which would have been put in the strongest light by the writers of antiquity, and have done great honour to our country.

But, be this as it may, it must be confessed, that we are not always to judge of the value of an action, or the merit of the persons who shared in it, by the importance of the event. It is rather in such sieges and engagements as we find recorded in the history of the Peloponnesian war, that the conduct and abilities of a general are truly conspicuous. Accordingly, it is observed, that it was chiefly at the head of small armies, and in countries of no great extent, that our best generals of the last age displayed their great capacity, and showed themselves not inferior to the most celebrated captains of antiquity. In actions of this sort chance has no share, and does not cover any oversights that are committed. Every thing is conducted and carried on by the prudence of the general. He is truly the soul of the forces, which neither act nor move but by his direction. He sees every thing, and is present every where. Nothing escapes his vigilance and attention. Orders are seasonably given, and seasonably executed. Contrivances, stratagems, false marches, real or feigned attacks, encampments, decampments; in a word, every thing depends upon him alone.

On this account, the reading of the Greek historians, such [pg cvi] as Thucydides, Xenophon, and Polybius, is of infinite service to young officers; because those historians, who were also excellent commanders, enter into all the particulars of the events which they relate, and lead the readers, as it were by the hand, through all the sieges and battles they describe; showing them, by the example of the greatest generals of antiquity, and by a kind of anticipated experience, in what manner war is to be carried on.

Nor is it only with regard to military exploits, that the Grecian history affords us such excellent models. We shall there find celebrated legislators, able politicians, magistrates born for government, men that have excelled in all arts and sciences, philosophers that carried their inquiries as far as was possible in those early ages, and who have left us such maxims of morality, as might put many Christians to the blush.

If the virtues of those who are celebrated in history may serve us for models in the conduct of our lives; their vices and failings, on the other hand, are no less proper to caution and instruct us; and the strict regard which an historian is obliged to pay to truth will not allow him to dissemble the latter, through fear of eclipsing the lustre of the former. Nor does what I here advance contradict the rule laid down by Plutarch, on the same subject, in his preface to the life of Cimon.223 He requires, that the illustrious actions of great men be represented in their full light; but as to the faults, which may sometimes escape them through passion or surprise, or into which they may be drawn by the necessity of affairs, considering them rather as a certain degree of perfection wanting to their virtue,224 than as vices or crimes that proceed from any corruption of the heart; such imperfections as these, he would have the historian, out of compassion to the weakness of human nature, which produces nothing entirely perfect, content himself with touching very lightly; in the same manner as an able painter, when he has a fine face to draw, in which he finds some little blemish or defect, does neither entirely suppress it, nor think himself obliged to represent it with a strict exactness, because the one would spoil the beauty of the picture, and the other would destroy the likeness. The very comparison Plutarch uses, shows, that he speaks only of slight and excusable faults. But as to actions of injustice, violence, and brutality, they ought not to be concealed or disguised on any pretence; nor can we suppose, that the same privilege should be allowed in [pg cvii] history as is in painting, which invented the profile, to represent the side-face of a prince who had lost an eye, and by that means ingeniously concealed so disagreeable a deformity.225 History, the most essential rule of which is sincerity, will by no means admit of such indulgences, as indeed would deprive it of its greatest advantage.

Shame, reproach, infamy, hatred, and the execrations of the public, which are the inseparable attendants on criminal and brutal actions, are no less proper to excite a horror for vice, than the glory, which perpetually attends good actions, is to inspire us with the love of virtue. And these, according to Tacitus, are the two ends which every historian ought to propose to himself, by making a judicious choice of what is most extraordinary both in good and evil, in order to occasion that public homage to be paid to virtue, which is justly due to it, and to create the greater abhorrence for vice, on account of that eternal infamy that attends it.226