{10}
"In der Beurtheilung des Hellenischen Alterthums soll der Scharfsinnige
nicht aus sich herauszuspinnen suchen, was nur aus der Verbindung
mannichfacher Ueberlieferungen gewonnen werden kann."--BÖCKH.
THE reader will have observed that the word TRAGEDY, which is
generally associated with the works of Æschylus, does not occur either
in the general title-page of this translation, or in the special
superscriptions of the separate pieces; in the one place the designation
"LYRICAL DRAMAS" being substituted, and in the other "LYRICO-DRAMATIC
SPECTACLE." This change of the common title, by which these productions
are known in the book-world, was not made from mere affectation, or the
desire of singularity, but from the serious consideration that "the
world is governed by names," and that the word "tragedy" cannot be used
in reference to a serious lyrico-dramatic exhibition on the ancient
Greek stage, without importing a host of modern associations that will
render all healthy sympathy with the Æschylean drama, and all sound
criticism, extremely difficult. Names, indeed, are a principal part of
the hereditary machinery with which the evil Spirit of Error in the
region of thought, as well as in that of action, juggles the plain
understandings of men that they become the sport of every quibble, and
believe a lie. By means of names the plastic soul of man contrives at
first, often crudely enough, to express some part of a great truth, and
make it publicly recognised; but when, in the course of natural growth
and progress the thing has been altered, while the word, transmitted
from age to age, and itinerant from East to West, remains; then the
vocal sign performs its natural functions as a signifier of thought no
longer, but is as a mask, which either tells a complete lie, or looks
with the one-half of its face a meaning which the other half (seen only
by the learned) is sure to contradict. I have, therefore, thought it
convenient to do away with this cause of misunderstanding in the
threshold: and the purpose of the few remarks that follow is to make
plain to the understanding of the most unlearned the reason of the
terminology which I have adopted, and guard him yet more fully against
the misconceptions which are {11} sure to arise from suffering his
chamber of thought to be preoccupied by the echoes of a false
nomenclature.
If the modern spectator of a tragedy of Shakespere or Sheridan Knowles
comes from the vivid embodiments of a Faucit or a Macready, to the
perusal of what are called the "tragedies of Æschylus," and applies the
subtle rules of representative art there exemplified, to the extant
remains of the early Greek stage, though he will find some things
strikingly conceived and grandly expressed, and a general tone of poetic
elevation, removed alike from what is trivial, and what is morbid; yet
he must certainly be strangely blinded by early classical
prepossessions, if he fails to feel that, as a whole, a Greek tragedy,
when set against the English composition of the same name, is
exceedingly narrow in its conception, meagre in its furniture,
monotonous in its character, unskilful in its execution, and not seldom
feeble in its effort. No doubt a generous mind will be disposed to look
with a kindly and even a reverent sympathy on the inferiority of the
infant fathers of that most difficult of all the poetic arts, which has
now, in this late age of the world, under the manly British training,
exhibited such sturdiness of trunk, such kingliness of stature, and such
magnificence of foliage; it may be also, that the novelty and the
strangeness of some things in the Greek tragedy--to those at least who
have not had their appetite palled by early Academic appliances--may
afford a pleasant compensation for what must appear its glaring
improprieties as falling under the category of a known genus of poetic
art; still, to the impartial and experienced frequenter of a first-rate
modern theatre, the first effect of an acquaintance with the old Greek
tragedy is apt to be disappointment. He will wonder what there is in
these productions so very remarkable that the select youth of Great
Britain should, next to their mother's milk, be made to suck in them,
and and them only, as the great intellectual nutriment of the
fresh-fledged soul, till, in the regular course of things, they are fit
to be fed on Church and State controversies and Parliamentary reports,
and other diet not always of the lightest digestion; and he will be apt
to imagine that in this, as in other cases, an over-great reverence for
antiquity has made sensible men bow the knee to idols--that learned
professors, like other persons, have their hobby-horses, which they are
fond of over-riding--and that no sane man should believe more than the
half of what is said by a professional trumpeter. All this will be very
right in the circumstances, and very true so far. But the frequenter of
the modern theatre must consider farther--if he wishes to be
just--whether he be not violating one of {12} the great proprieties of
nature, in rushing at once from the narrow confined gas-lighted boxes of
a modern theatre into the large sweeping sun-beshone tiers of an ancient
one. No man goes from a ball-room into a church without a certain decent
interval, and, if possible, a few moments of becoming preparation. So it
is with literary excursions. We must be acclimatized in the new country
before we can feel comfortable. We must not merely deliver our criticism
thus (however common such a style may be)--_I expected to find that; I
find this; and I am disappointed;_ but we must ask the deeper and the
only valuable question--_What ought I to have expected to find, what
shall I surely find of good, and beautiful, and true, if my eyes are
open, and my free glance pointed in the right direction?_ In short, if a
man will enjoy and judge a Greek "tragedy," he must seek to know not
what it is in reference to the general idea of tragedy which he brings
with him from modern theatrical exhibitions, but what it was to the
ancient Greeks, sitting in the open air, on their wooden bench, or on
their seat hewn from the native rock, with the merry Bacchic echoes in
their ears, long before Aristotle laid down those nice rules of tragic
composition which only Shakespere might dare to despise.
Let us inquire, therefore, setting aside alike Shaksperian examples and
Aristotelian canons, what the τραγῳδία, or "tragedy," was to
the ancient Greeks. Nor have we far to seek. The name, when the modern
paint is rubbed off, declares its own history; and we find that the main
idea of the old word τραγῳδία--as, by the way, the _only_ idea of
the modern word τραγουδι[f1]--is A SONG. Of the second part of this
word, we have preserved the root in our English words _ode_, _melody_,
_monody_, _threnody_, and the other half of the word means _goat_;
whether that descriptive addition to the principal substantive came
from the circumstance that the song was originally sung by persons
habited like goats,[f2] or from other circumstances connected with the
worship of Dionysus, to whom this animal was sacred, is of no
importance for our present purpose. The main fact to which we have to
direct attention, is that the word _tragedy_, when analysed, bears
upon its face, and in the living Greek tongue proclaims loudly to the
present hour, that the essential character of this species of
poetry--when the name was originally given to it--was lyrical, and
{13} not at all dramatic or tragic, in the modern sense of these
words. A drama, in modern language, means an action represented by
acting persons; and a tragedy is such a represented action, having a
sad issue; but neither of these elements belonged to the original
Greek tragedy, as inherited from his rude predecessors by Æschylus,
nor (as we shall immediately show) do they form the prominent or
characteristic part of that exhibition, as transmitted by him to his
successors. With regard to the origin of the Greek "goat-song," and
its condition previous to the age of Æschylus, there is but one
uncontradicted voice of tradition on the subject; the curious
discussions and investigations of the learned affecting only certain
minute points of detail in the progress, which have no interest for
the general student. That tradition is to the effect that the Greek
lyrical drama, as we find it in the extant works of Æschylus, arose
out of the Dithyrambic hymns sung at the sacred festivals of the
ancient Hellenes in honour of their god Dionysus, or, as he is
vulgarly called, Bacchus; hymns which were first extemporized under
the influence of the stimulating juice of the grape,[f3] and then sung
by a regularly trained Chorus, under the direction of the famous
Methymnean minstrel, Arion.[f4] The simplest form which such hymns,
under such conditions, could assume, was that of a circular dance by a
band of choristers round the statue or the altar of the god in whose
honour the hymn was sung. This is not a matter peculiar to Greece, but
to be found at all times, and all over the world, wherever there are
men who are not mere brutes. So in the description of the religious
practices of the ancient Mexicans, our erudite poet SOUTHEY has the
following beautiful passage, picturing a sacred choral dance round the
altar of sacrifice:--
Round the choral band
The circling nobles gay, with gorgeous plumes,
And gems which sparkled to the midnight fire,
Moved in the solemn dance; each in his hand,
In measured movements, lifts the feathery shield,
And shakes a rattling ball to measured sounds;
With quicker steps, the inferior chiefs without,
{14}
Equal in number, but in just array,
The spreading radii of the mystic wheel
Revolved; and outermost, the youths roll round,
In motions rapid as their quickened blood.
Now, according to the general tradition of old Greek commentators and
lexicographers, the Dithyramb or Bacchic Hymn was also called a
_Circular Hymn_[f5] an expression which a celebrated Byzantine
writer has interpreted to mean "_a hymn sung by a chorus standing in a
ring round the altar._"[f6] It is, no doubt, true that the phrase
χορὸς κύκλιος, or circular chorus, does not necessarily
mean a chorus of this description; the term, as has been ingeniously
observed,[f7] like our own word _roundelay_, and the German
_Rund-gesang_, being capable of an equally natural application to a hymn
composed of parts, that run back to the point from which they started,
and form, as it were, a circle of melody. But, whatever etymologists may
make of the word, the fact that there were hymns sung by the ancient
Greeks in chorus round the altars of their gods is not denied; and
seems, indeed, so natural and obvious, that we shall assume it as the
first form of the "goat-song," in which form it continued up to a period
which it is impossible to define; the only certainty being that,
whereas, in olden times, it was composed of fifty men, it was afterwards
diminished to twelve or fifteen, and arranged in the form of a military
company in regular rank and file.[f8] Such a chorus, therefore, was
the grand central trunk out of which the Attic tragedy branched and
bloomed to such fair luxuriance of verbal melody. We shall now trace, if
we can, the natural steps of progress.
Let us suppose that the Leader of a Chorus, trained to sing hymns in
honour of the gods, is going to make them sing publicly a hymn {15} in
honour of Ζεύς ἱκέσιος--Jove, in his benign character as the
friend of the friendless, and the protector of suppliants. Instead of a
vague general supplication in the abstract style to which we are
accustomed in our forms of prayer, what could be more natural than for a
susceptible and lively Greek to conceive the persons of the Chorus as
engaged in some particular act of supplication, well known in the sacred
traditions of the people, whose worship he was leading, and to put words
in their mouths suitable to such a situation? This done, we have at once
_drama_, according to the etymological meaning of the word; that is to
say, a represented _action_. The Chorus represents certain persons, we
shall say, the daughters of Danaus, fugitives from their native Libya,
arrived on the stranger coast of Argolis, and in the act of presenting
their supplications to their great celestial protector. Such an
exhibition, if we will not permit it to be called by the substantive
name of _drama_, is, at all events, a dramatized hymn; an ode so
essentially dramatic in its character, that it requires but the addition
of a single person besides the Chorus to form a complete action; for an
action, like a colloquy, is necessarily between two parties--meditation,
not action, being the natural business of a solitary man. Now, the
single person whose presence is required to turn this dramatized hymn
into a proper lyrical drama is already given. The Leader of the Chorus,
or the person to whom the singing band belonged, and who superintended
its exhibitions, is such a person. He has only, in the case supposed, to
take upon himself the character of the person, the king of the Argives,
to whom the supplication is made, to indicate, by word or gesture, the
feelings with which he receives their address, and finally to accept or
reject their suit; this makes a complete action, and a lyrical drama
already exists in all essentials, exactly such as we read the skeleton
of it at the present hour, in the SUPPLIANTS of Æschylus. To go a
step beyond this, and add (as has been done in our play) another actor
to represent the party pursuing the fugitives, is only to bring the
situation already existing to a more violent issue, and not essentially
to alter the character of the exhibition. Much less will the mere
appendage of a guide or director to the main body of the Chorus, in the
shape of a father, brother, or other accessory character, change the
general effect of the spectacle. The great central mass which strikes
the eye, and fills ear and heart with its harmonious appeals, remains
still what it was, even before the leader of the band took a part in the
lyric exhibition. The dramatized lyric, and the lyrical drama, differ
from one another only according to the simile already used, as a tree
with two or three branches differs from a tree with a simple stem. {16}
The main body and stamina are the same in each. The SONG is the soul
of both.
The academic student, who is familiar with these matters, is aware that
what has been here constructed hypothetically, as a natural result of
the circumstances, is the real historical account of the origin and
progress of the Greek tragedy, as it is shortly given in a well-known
passage of Diogenes Laertius. "In the oldest times," says that
biographer of the philosophers, "the Chorus alone went through the
dramatic exhibition (διεδραματίζεν) in tragedy; afterwards
Thespis, to give rest to the Chorus, added one actor distinct from the
singers; then Æschylus added a second, and Sophocles a third; which
gave to tragedy its complete development."[f9] The reason mentioned
here for the addition of the first actor by Thespis, is a very probable
one. The convenience or ease of the singers contributed, along with the
lively wit of the Greeks, and a due regard for the entertainment of the
spectators, to raise the dramatized ode, step by step, into the lyrical
drama.
In the above account, two secondary circumstances connected with this
transition, have not been mentioned. The _first_ is, that the jocund and
sometimes boisterous hymn, in honour of the wine-god, should have passed
into the lyrical representation of an action generally not at all
connected with the worship or history of that divinity; and, _secondly_,
that this action should have changed its tone from light to grave, from
jocular to sad, and become, in fact, what we, in the popular language of
modern times, call _tragic_. Now, for the first of these circumstances,
I know nothing that can be said in the way of historical philosophy,
except that man is fond of variety, that the Greek genius was fertile,
and that accident often plays strange tricks with the usages and
institutions of mortal men. For the other point, there can be no doubt
that the worship of the god of physical and animal joy, being violent in
its character, had its ebb as well as its flow, its broad-gleaming
sunshine not without the cloud, its wail as well as its rejoicing.
Whether Dionysus meant the sun, or only wine, which is the produce of
the solar heat, or both, it is plain that his worshippers would have to
lament his departure, at least as often as they hailed his advent; and,
in this natural alternation, a foundation was laid for the separation of
the original Dithyrambic {17} Chorus into a wild, sportive element,
represented by the Aristophanic comedy, and a deeply serious, meditative
element represented by tragedy. But we must beware, in reference to
Æschylus at least, of supposing that the lyrical drama, as exhibited by
him, however solemn and awe-inspiring, was necessarily sad, or, as we
say, tragic in its issue. Aristotle indeed, in his famous treatise, lays
down the doctrine that the main object of tragic composition is to
excite pity and terror, and that Euripides, "though in other respects he
manages badly, is in this respect the most tragic of the tragedians,
that the most of his pieces end unfortunately."[f10] But there is
not the slightest reason, in the nature of things, why a solemn dramatic
representation, any more than a high-toned epical narrative, should end
unfortunately. The Hindoo drama, for one, never does;[f11] and, in
the case of our poet, it is plain that the great trilogy, of which the
Orestes is the middle piece, is constructed upon the principle of
leading the sympathizing spectator through scenes of pity and terror, as
stations in a journey, but finally to a goal of moral peace and
harmonious reconciliation. That the great trilogy of the PROMETHEUS,
of which only one part remains, had an equally fortunate termination, is
not to be doubted. Here, therefore, we see another impertinence in that
modern word _tragedy_, which, in the superscriptions of these plays, I
have been so careful to eschew.
We shall now examine one or two of the Æschylean pieces by a simple
arithmetical process, and see how essentially the lyrical element
predominates in their construction. Taking Wellauer's edition, and
turning up the SUPPLIANTS, I find that that play, consisting
altogether of 1055 lines, is opened by a continuous lyric strain of 172
lines. Then we have dialogue, in part of which the Chorus uses lyric
measures to the extent of 22 lines. Then follows a short choral song of
only 20 lines. The next Chorus comprises 76 lines, and the next 70.
After this follows another dialogue, in which the Chorus, being in great
mental agitation, use, according to the uniform practice of Æschylus,
lyric measures to the extent altogether of 20 verses. Then follows
another regular choral hymn of 47 lines. After that a violent lyrical
altercation between the Chorus and a new actor, to the amount of 74
lines, in the most impassioned lyrical rhythm. Then follow 14 lines of
anapæsts; and the whole concludes with a grand lyrical finale of 65
lines: altogether 580--considerably more than the half of the piece by
bare arithmetic, and equal to two-thirds of it fully, if we consider how
much more time the singing, with the musical accompaniments, must have
occupied than the simple {18} declamation. No more distinct proof could
be required how essentially the account of Diogenes Laertius is right;
how true it is that the choral part of the Æschylean drama is both its
body and its soul, while the dialogic part, to use the technical
language of Aristotle's days, was, in fact, only an ἐπεισόδιον (from
which our English word _Episode_) or thing thrown in between the main
choral acts of the representation, for the sake of variety to the
spectators, and, as the writer says, of rest to the singers. We thus
see, also, what an incorrect and indefinite idea of the Æschylean drama
Aristotle had when he says--so far as we can gather his meaning--that
"Æschylus first added a second actor; he also abridged the chorus, and
made the dialogue the principal part of tragedy."[f12] The last
article, so far as the play of the SUPPLIANTS is concerned, is simply
not true. Let us make trial of another play. The AGAMEMNON, which, for
many reasons, is one of the best for testing the mature genius of the
bard, contains about 1600 lines; and, without troubling the reader with
details, it will be found that about the half of this number is written
in lyric measures. When we consider, further, that the most splendid
imaginative pictures, and the wildest bursts of passion, all the
interest, the doubt, and the anxiety, the fear, the terror, the surprise,
and the final issue, are, according to the practice of Æschylus,
regularly thrown into lyric measures, we shall be convinced that
Aristotle (if we rightly apprehend him) was altogether mistaken when he
led the moderns to imagine that the father of tragedy had really given
such a preponderance to the dialogic element, that the lyric part is to
be looked on, in his productions, as in any way subordinate. Unless it
be the PROMETHEUS, I do not know a single extant play of Æschylus in
which the lyric element occupies a position which, in actual
representation, would justify the dictum of the Stagyrite. And even in
this play, let it be observed, how grandly the poet makes his anapæsts
swell and billow with sonorous thunder in the finale; as if to make
amends for the somewhat prolix epic recitals with which he had occupied
the spectator, and to prove that a Greek tragedy could never be true to
itself, unless it left upon the ear, in its last echoes, the permanent
impression of its original character as a SONG.
Three observations strike me, that may conveniently be stated as
corollaries from the above remarks. _First_, That those translators have
erred who, whether from carelessness, or from ignorance, or from a
desire to accommodate the ancient tragedy as much as possible to the
modern, have given an undue predominance to blank {19} verse in their
versions, making it appear as if the spoken part of the Æschylean
tragedy bore a much larger proportion, than it really does, to the sung.
_Second_, Those critics have erred who, applying the principles of
modern theatrical criticism to the chaunted parts of the ancient lyrical
drama, have found many parts dull or wearisome, extravagant, and even
ridiculous, which, there can be no doubt, with their proper musical
accompaniment, were the most impressive, and the most popular parts of
the representation. _Third_, We err altogether, when we judge of the
excellence of an ancient Greek drama as a composition, by its effect on
us when reading it. The SUPPLIANTS, for instance, is generally
considered a stupid play; because it wants grand contrasts of character
and striking dramatic situations, and contains so much of mere
reiterated supplication. But this reiteration, though wearisome to us
who read the text-book of the lost opera, was, in all probability, that
on which the ravished ears of the devout ancient auditors dwelt with
most voluptuous delight. In general, without re-creating some musical
accompaniment, and dwelling with ear and heart on the frequent
variations of the lyric burden of the piece, a man is utterly incapable
of passing any sane judgment on an Æschylean drama. Such a piece may
contain in abundance everything that the auditors desired and enjoyed,
and yet be very stupid now to us who merely read and criticise.
The fact of the matter is, that the marshalled band of singers, however
satisfactory to an ancient audience, who looked principally for musical
excitement in their tragedies, and not for an interesting plot, was not
at all calculated for allowing a dramatic genius to bring out those
tragic situations in which the modern reader delights; but rather stood
directly in the way of such an effect. The fine development of character
under the influence of various delicate situations, and in collision
with different persons, all acting their part in some complex knot of
various-coloured life, could not be exhibited in a performance where a
band of singers on whom the eye of the spectators principally rested,
and who formed the great attraction for the masses,[f13] constantly
occupied the central ground, and constantly interfered with every thing
that was either said or done, whether it was convenient for them to do
so or not. For a perfect tragedy, as conceived scientifically by
Aristotle, and executed with a grand practical instinct by Shakespere,
the Chorus was, in the very nature {20} of the thing, an incumbrance and
an impediment. It was only very seldom that the persons of that body
could form such an important part of the action, and come forward with
such a startling dramatic effect as in the Eumenides. Too often they
were obliged to hang round the action as an atmosphere, or look at it as
spectators; spectators either impartial altogether, and then too wise
for dramatic sympathy, or half-partial, and then, by indecision of
utterance, often making themselves ridiculous, as in a noted scene of
the Agamemnon (p. 81), or contemptible, as in the Antigone.[f14] The
proper position of the Chorus in a regularly constructed drama, is,
like the witches in Macbeth, to form a mysterious musical background
(not a _fore_-ground, as in the Greek tragedy), or to circle, as in
the opera of Masaniello, the principal character with a
band of associates naturally situated to assist and cheer him on to his
grand enterprise. But the Greek Chorus, even in the time of Sophocles
and Euripides, who enlarged the spoken part, was too independent, too
stationary, too central a nucleus of the representation, not to impede
the movements of the acting persons who performed the principal parts.
As a form of art, therefore, the Greek tragedy, so soon as it attempted
to assume the scientific ground so acutely seized on by the subtle
analysis of Aristotle, was necessarily clumsy and incongruous. The lyric
element, which was always the most popular element, refused to be
incorporated with the acting element, and yet could not be altogether
displaced; a position of scenic affairs which has strangely perplexed
not a few modern critics, looking for a dramatic plot with all the
dramatic proprieties in a composition where the old Hellenic spectator
only felt a hymn to Jove; and curiously tasking their wits to find
excuses for a poet like Euripides, who, with blossoming lyrics and
sonorous rhetoric, might gain the prize of the "goat-song," even over
the head of a Sophocles, and yet, in point of dramatic propriety, as we
demand it in our modern plays, be constantly perpetrating enormities
which a clever schoolboy at Westminster or Eton might avoid.[f15]
{21}
So much for the artistic form of the Æschylean drama. As for the
matter, it was essentially a combination of mythological, legendary, and
devotional elements, such as naturally belonged to a people whose
religion was intimately blended with every passion of the human heart,
and every chance of human life, and whose gods were only a sort of
glorified men, as their men sometimes were nothing less than mortal
gods. The Greek lyrical dramas were part of the great public exhibitions
at the great feasts of Bacchus, which took place, some in the winter
season, and some in the spring of the year;[f16] and in this respect
they bear a striking resemblance both to the Hindoo dramas (for which
see WILSON), to the so-called mysteries and moralities of mediæval
piety, and to the sacred dramas of Metastasio, exhibited to the court at
Vienna. And what sort of an aspect does ancient polytheistic piety
present, what sort of an attitude does it maintain, in these
compositions? An aspect surprisingly fair, considering what motley
confusion it sprang from, an attitude singularly noble, seeing how
nearly it was allied to mere animal enjoyment, and how prone was its
degeneration into the mire of the grossest sensuality. The pictured
pages of Livy, and brazen tablets of the grave Roman senate still
extant, tell only too true a tale into what a fearful mire of
brutishness the fervent worship of Dionysus might plunge its votaries.
And yet out of this Bacchantic worship, so wild, so animal, and so
sensual, arose the Greek tragedy, confessedly amongst the most
high-toned moral compositions that the history of literature knows. Our
modern Puritans, who look upon the door of a theatre (according to the
phrase of a famous Edinburgh preacher) as the gate of hell, might take
any one of these seven plays which are here presented in an English
dress, and with the simple substitution of a few Bible designations for
Heathen ones, find, so far as moral and religious doctrine is concerned,
that, with the smallest possible exercise of the pruning-knife, they
might be exhibited in a Christian Church, and be made to subserve the
purposes of practical piety, as usefully as many a sermon. The following
passage from the Agamemnon is not a solitary gem from a heap of rubbish,
but the very soul and significance of the Æschylean drama:--
"For Jove doth teach men wisdom, sternly wins
To virtue by the tutoring of their sins;
Yea! drops of torturing recollection chill
The sleeper's heart; 'gainst man's rebellious will
Jove works the wise remorse:
Dread Powers, on awful seats enthroned, compel
Our hearts with gracious force."
{22}
The only serious charge that, to my knowledge, has ever been made
against the morality of the Greek drama, is that in it "an innocent
person, one in the main of a virtuous character, through no crime of his
own, nay not by the vices of others, but through mere FATALITY AND
BLIND CHANCE, is involved in the greatest of all human miseries." This
is the critical judgment of Dr. Blair (lecture xlvi.) in reference to
the famous Labdacidan story of Œdipus.[f17] Now, though the
personal history of Œdipus contains many incidents that expose it
justly to criticism, especially when brought upon the stage in a
modernized dress by modern French or other poets (which abuse the
learned Doctor no doubt had principally in view); yet, as applied to the
whole Labdacidan story, or to the subjects of the Greek drama generally,
the allegation is either extremely shallow, or altogether false. There
is no destiny or fatality of any kind in the Æschylean drama, other
than that which, according to the Mosaic record, drove Adam out of
Paradise; that destiny which a divine decree, seeing the end in the
beginning, has prepared, and that fatality which makes a guilty man not
merely the necessary architect of his own misery, but the propagator of
a moral contagion, more or less, to the offspring that inherits his
pollution and his curse. On this subject I need make no lengthened
observations here, as I have brought it and other points of moral and
religious feeling prominently forward, both in the introductory
observations to the separate plays, and in various places of the notes.
I shall only say that the reader who does not find a high moral purpose
and a deep religious meaning in the specimens of ancient Greek worship
now submitted to his inspection, has no eye for what is best in these
pages, and had better throw the book down. The Germans, who look deeper
into these matters than we have either time, inclination, or, in the
general case, capacity to do, have written volumes on the
subject.[f18] To me it has seemed more suitable to the genius of the
English reader merely to hint the existence of this rich mine of moral
wealth, leaving to the quiet thinker where, amid our various political
and ecclesiastical clamour, he may have found a corner, to work out the
vein with devout spade and mattock for himself.
{23}
A few words must now be said on the DANCE, as an essential part
of the lyrical element of the Greek tragedy. Our sober British, stern
Protestant, and precise Presbyterian notions, make it very difficult for
us to realize this peculiarity. Even the old Heathen Roman could say,
"Nemo fere saltat sobrius, nisi forte insanit";[f19] much more
must it be hard for a modern Presbyterian Christian to recognise, in the
twinkling-footed celerity of the merry dance, an exercise which a pious
old Dorian could look upon as an indispensable part of an act of public
worship. To read the weighty moral sentences of a solemn Æschylean
Chorus, and then figure to ourselves their author as a dancing-master,
is an unnatural and almost painful transition of thought to a Christian
man in these times; and yet Athenæus tells us, that the author of the
Prometheus really was a professor of the orchestric art, and a very
cunning one too.[f20] The fundamental truth of the case is, that the
religion of the Greeks was not, like ours, a religion only of moral
emotions and theological principles, but a religion of the whole man,
with rather too decided a tendency, in some parts, it must be confessed,
towards a disturbance of the equipoise on the side of the senses. But,
whatever may be thought of Bacchic orgies and other associate rites,
with regard to dancing, there is plainly nothing in the exercise, when
decorously conducted, inconsistent either with dignity, or with piety;
and the feelings of ancient Romans and modern Presbyterians on the
subject, must be regarded as the mere products of arbitrary association.
Certain it is, that all the Greek philosophers looked upon dancing as an
essential element, not only in the education of a gentleman, but in the
performance of public worship; nay, even among the severe Jews, we read
that David, on occasion of a great religious festival, danced before the
Lord; and only an idle woman called him an idle fellow for doing so. We
need not be surprised, therefore, if among the merry Greeks, professing
a religion fully as much of physical enjoyment as of moral culture,
orchestric evolutions, along with sacred hymns, formed an essential part
of the tragic exhibitions belonging to the feasts of the great god
Dionysus. On the details of this matter, we are sadly wanting in
satisfactory information; but that the fact was so, there can be no
doubt.[f21] The only point with regard to which there is room for a
serious difference of opinion is, whether every performance of the {24}
Chorus in full band included dancing, or whether it was only introduced
occasionally, as the ballet in our modern operas. On this point, the
greatest authority in Greek Literature at present living has declared
strongly in favour of the latter view; and, in doing so, he has been
followed by one of the first philologers of our own country;[f22]
and as I have not been led, in the course of my studies, to make any
particular examination of this subject, I am loath to contradict
anything proceeding from such an authoritative quarter. One great branch
of the evidence, I presume, on which this view is supported, lies in the
words of the old Scholiast to the choral chaunt in the Phœnissae of
Euripides, beginning with these words, Τύριον (ὀ)ιδμα λιπῦσ῎ ἔβαν.
"This chaunt," says the annotator, "is what is called a στάσιμον, or
_standing_ chorus; for when the Chorus, after the πάροδος, remaining
motionless, sings a hymn arising out of the subject of the play, this
song is called a στάσιμον. A πάροδος, on the other hand, is a song sung
as they are marching into the orchestra on the first entrance."[f23]
Now, no doubt, if this matter be taken with a literal exactitude, the
expression, ἀκίνητος, or _without moving_, will exclude dancing; but if
we merely take it generally, as opposed to the great sweeping evolutions
of the Chorus, and as implying only a permanent occupation of the same
ground in the centre of the orchestra, by the band, as a whole, while
the individual members might change their places in the most graceful
and beautiful variety of forms, we are thus saved from the harshness of
giving to the orchestric element, in many plays, a subordinate position,
equally at variance with the original character of the Chorus, and with
the place which the dance held as a prominent part of Greek social
life.[f24] With regard to Æschylus, in particular, I do not see how
I should be acting in consistency with the testimony of Athenæus just
quoted, if I were to assign such a small proportion of the choric
performances to orchestric accompaniment, as Boeckh and Donaldson have
done in their editions of the play of Sophocles, which the genius of
Miss Faucit has rendered so dear to the friends of the drama in this
country. It would be easy to show, from internal evidence such as Boeckh
finds in what he calls the Orchestric Chorus, or ἐμμέλεια of the
Antigone, that certain choruses of Æschylus are more adapted for
violent and extensive orchestric movements than others. But I have
thought it more prudent, considering {25} the general uncertainty that
surrounds this matter, not to make any allusion to dancing in any one
performance of the Chorus more than another; contenting myself with
carefully distinguishing everywhere between the anapæstic parts where
the Chorus is plainly making extensive movements, and the CHORAL HYMN
with regular Strophe and Antistrophe, which is sung when they are placed
in their proper position in a square band round the _Thymele_ (θυμέλη),
or Bacchic altar, in the centre of the orchestra.[f25]
Having said so much with regard both to the form and substance of the
lyric portion of the Æschylean drama, I have said almost all that I was
anxious to say; for, in stating this matter clearly, I have brushed out
of the way the principal part of that host of modern associations which
is so apt to disturb our sympathetic enjoyment of the great masterpieces
of Hellenic art. Anything that might be said in detail on the iambic or
dialogic part of ancient tragedy would only serve to set in a yet
stronger light the grand fact which has been urged, that the strength of
the Greek drama lies in the singing, and not in the acting. It were easy
to show by an extensive analysis, that the classical "goat-singers" had
but very imperfect notions on the subject of stage dialogue; and that it
was a light thing for them to deal at large in mere epic description, or
rhetorical declamation, without offending the taste of a fastidious
audience, or sinning grossly against the understood laws of the sort of
composition which they exhibited.[f26] Notwithstanding Aristotle's
nicely-drawn distinction, the narrated, or purely epic parts of the
Greek tragedy, are often the best. This is the case not seldom even with
Æschylus, whose native dramatic power the voice of a master has judged
to be first-rate.[f27] But with him the infant state of the art, and
the insufficient supply of actors,[f28] combined with a radical
faultiness of structure, produced, in not a few instances, the same
anti-dramatic results as the want of dramatic genius in Euripides.
Further, to {26} use the language of Mr. Donaldson--"the narrowness and
distance of the stage rendered any (free and complex) grouping
unadvisable. The arrangement of the actors was that of a processional
bas relief. Their movements were slow, their gesticulations abrupt and
angular, and their delivery a sort of loud and deep-drawn sing-song,
which resounded throughout the immense theatre. They probably neglected
everything like _by-play_ and _making points_, which are so effective on
the English stage. The distance at which the spectators were placed
would prevent them from seeing those little movements and hearing those
low tones which have made the fortune of many a modern actor. The mask,
too, precluded all attempts at varied expression, and it is probable
that nothing more was expected from the performer than was looked for
from his predecessor, the rhapsode--viz., good recitation." These
observations, flowing from a realization of the known circumstances of
the case, will sufficiently explain to the modern reader the extreme
stiffness and formality which distinguishes the tragic dialogue of the
Greeks from that dexterous and various play of verbal interchange which
delights us so much in Shakespere and the other masters of English
tragedy. Every view, in short, that we can take, tends to fix our
attention on the musical and the religious elements, as on the
life-blood and vital soul of the Hellenic τραγῳδία; forces us
to the conclusion that, with a due regard to organic principle, its
proper designation is SACRED OPERA,[f29] and not TRAGEDY, in the
modern sense of the word {27} at all; and leads us to look on the
dramatic art altogether in the hands of Æschylus, not as an infant
Hercules strangling serpents, but as a Titan, like his own Prometheus,
chained to a rock, whom only, after many ages, a strong Saxon Shakespere
could unbind.
To conclude. If these observations shall seem to any conceived in a
style too depreciatory of the masterpieces of Hellenic art, such persons
will observe, that what has been here said of a negative character has
reference only to the form of these productions as works of art, and not
to their poetic contents. An unfortunate external arrangement is often,
as in the case of the German writer Richter, united in intimate
amalgamation with the richest and most exuberant energy of intellectual
and moral life. However imperfect the Greek "tragedies" are as forms of
artistic exhibition, they are not the less admirable, for the mass of
healthy poetic life of which they are the embodiment, and the grand
combination of artistic elements which they present. As among the
world's notable men there are some who are great rather by a harmonious
combination of the great healthy elements of humanity, than by the
gigantic development of any one faculty, so in literature there are
phenomena which must be measured by the mass of inward life which they
concentrate, not by the structural perfection of form which they
exhibit. The lyrical tragedy of the Greeks presents, in a combination
elsewhere unexampled, the best elements of our serious drama, our opera,
our oratorio, our public worship, and our festal recreations. The people
who prepared and enjoyed such an intellectual banquet were not
base-minded. Had their stability been equal to their susceptibility, the
world had never seen their equal. As it is, they are like to remain for
ages the great Hierophants of the intellectual world, whose influence
will always be felt even by those who are ignorant or impudent enough to
despise them; and among the various branches of art and science which
owed a felicitous culture to their dexterous and subtle genius, there is
certainly no phenomenon in the wide history of imaginative manifestation
more imposing and more significant than that which bears on its face the
signature of the rude god of wine, and his band of shaggy and
goat-footed revellers.