A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. By various writers. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

106 ElURIPIDES; EURIPIDES&
wards the close of his life, as a sort of recantatibn of Euripides, viz. the enervating tendency of his
of these views, and as an avowal that religious exhibitions of passion and suffering, beautiful as
mysteries are not to be subjected to the bold scru- they are, and well as they merit for him from
tiny of reason (see Muller, Gr. Lit. p. 379, Eumen. Aristotle the praise of being-" the most tragic of
~ 37; Keble, Prael. Acad. p. 609), it is but a sad poets." (Pout. 26.) The philosopher, however,
picture of a mind which, wearied with scepticism, qualifies this commendation by the remark, that,
and having no objective system of truth to satisfy while he provides thus admirably for the exciteit, acquiesces in what is established as a deadening ment of pity by his catastrophes, " he does not
relief from fruitless speculation. But it was not arrange the rest well" (el Ka'el're;Aa c) es
merely with respect to the nature and attributes of obcovopoe); and we may mention in conclusion the
the gods that Euripides placed himself in opposi- chief objections which, artistically speaking, have
tion to the ancient legends, which we find him been brought with justice against his tragedies.
altering in the most arbitrary manner, both as to We need but allude to his constant employment
events and characters. Thus, in the Orestes.. Me- of the "Deus ex machina," the disconnexion of
nelaUis comes before us as a selfish coward, and his choral odes from the subject of the play (Arist.
Helen as a worthless wanton; in the Helena, the Poet. 32; Hor. Ep. ad Pis. 191, &c.), and the
notion of Stesichorus is adopted, that the heroine extremely awkward and formal character of his
was never carried to Troy at all, and that it was a prologues. On these points some good remarks
mere escoAov of her for which the Greeks and will be found in Muller (Greek Lit. pp. 362-364)
Trojans fought (comp, Herod. ii. 112-120)3; and in Keble. (Prael. Acad. p. 590, &c.) Another
Andromache, the widow of Hector and slave of serious defect is the frequent introduction of frigid
Neoptolemus, seems almost to forget the past in?yvckcai and of philosophical disquisitions, making
her quarrel with Hermione and the perils of her Medea talk like a sophist, and Hecuba like a freepresent situation; and Electra, married by the thinker, and aiming rather at subtilty than simpolicy of Aegisthus to a peasant, scolds her hus- plicity. The poet, moreover, is too often lost in
band for inviting guests to dine without regard to the rhetorician, and long declamations meet us,
the ill-prepared state of the larder. In short, with equally tiresome with'those of Alfieri. They are
Euripides tragedy is brought down into the sphere then but dubious compliments which are paid him
of every-day life, ra oiceZa irpay1uaaTa, oes X Xp,0sO', in reference to these points by Cicero and by
ors &,vesouev (Arist. Ran. 957); men are repre- Quintilian, the latter of whom says that he is
sented, according to the remark of Aristotle so worthy to be compared with the most eloquent
often quoted (PoUt. 46), not as they ought to be, pleaders of the forum (Cic. ad Fam. xvi. 8; Quint.
but as they are; under the names of the ancient Inst. Or. x. 1); while Cicero so admired him, that
heroes, the characters of his own time are set be- he is said to have had in his hand his tragedy of
fore us; it is not Medea, or Iphigeneia, or Alcestis Medea at the time of his murder. (Ptol. Hephaest.
that is speaking, says Mr. Keble (Prael. Acad. v. 5.)
p. 59'6), but abstractedly a mother, a daughter, or Euripides has been called the poet of the soa wife. All this, indeed, gave fuller scope, perhaps, phists,-a charge by no means true in its full exfor the exhibition of passion and for those scenes tent, as it appears that, though he may not have
of tenderness and pathos in which Euripides espe- escaped altogether the seduction of the sophistical
cially excelled; and it will serve also to account in spirit, yet on the whole, the philosophy of Socrates,
great measure. for the preference given to his plays the great opponent of the sophists, exercised most
by the practical Socrates, who is said to have influence on his mind. (Hartung, Bur. Rest.
never entered the theatre unless when they were p. 128, &c.)
acted, as well as for the admiration felt for him by On the same principles on which he brought his
the poets of the new comedy, of whom Menander subjects and characters to the level of common life,
professedly adopted him for his model, while Phi- he adopted also in his style the every-day mode of
lemon declared that, if he could but believe in the speaking, and Aristotle (Rhet. iii. 2. ~ 5) commends
consciousness of the soul after death, he would him as having been the first to produce an effect
certainly hang himself to enjoy the sight of Euri- by the skilful employment of words from the ordipides. (Schlegel, Draam. Lit. lect. vii.; Aelian, V. nary language of men (comp. Long. de Subl. 31),'
H. ii. 13; Quint. Inst. Or. x. 1; Thom. Mag. Vit. peculiarly fitted, it may be observed, for the exEurip.; Meineke, JFragm. Corn. Graec. i. p. 286, pression of the gentler and more tender feelings.
iv. p. 48.) Yet, even as a matter of art, such a (See Shakspeare, Merch. of Venice, act v. sc. 1;
process can hardly be justified: it seems to partake comp.Miiller, Greek Lit. p. 366.)
too much of the fault condemned in Boileau's line: According to some accounts, Euripides wrote, in
Peindre Caton galant et Brutus dameret; all, 75 plays; according to others, 92. Of these,
and it is a graver question whether the moral ten- 18 are extant, if we omit the Rhesus, the genuinedency of tragedy was not impaired by it,-whether, ness of which has been defended by Vater and
in the absence especially of a fixed external stan- Hartung, while Valckenaer, Hermann, and Muller
dard of morality, it was not most dangerous to have, on good grounds, pronounced it spurious. To
tamper with what might supply the place of it, what author, however, or to what period it should
however ineffectually, through the medium of the be assigned, is a disputed point. (Valcken. Diatr,
imagination,-whether indeed it can ever be safe 9, 10; Hermann, de Rheso tragoedia, Opusc. vol.
to lower to thecommon level of humanity charac- iii.; Muller, Gr. Lit. p. 380, note.) A list is
ters hallowed by song and invested by tradition subjoined of the extant plays of Euripides, with
with an ideal grandeur, in cases where they do not their dates, ascertained or probable. For a fuller
tend by. the power of inveterate association to account the reader is referred to Muller (Gr. Lit.
colour or countenance evil. And there is another p. 367, &c.) and to Fabricius (Bibl. Graec. vol. ii.
obvious point, which should not be omitted while p. 239, &c.), the latter of whom gives a catalogue
we are speaking of the moral effect of the writings also of the lost dramas.