avarice hateful: Plautus and Goldoni have only made it ridiculous. The
profound and poetical avarice of Jaques possesses something plaintive in
its tone, which almost excites our sympathy, and never our laughter; he is
represented as a worshipper of gold, somewhat as an old Persian might be
of the sun, and he does not raise our contempt by the absurdities of
domestic economy. But Harpagon is thoroughly detestable, and is in fact
detested by his neighbours, domestics, and children. All these dramatists
are accused of having exhibited rather an allegorical representation of
avarice, than the living likeness of a human Being influenced by that
odious propensity. “Plautus,” says Hurd, “and also Moliere, offended in
this, that for the picture of the avaricious man they presented us with a
fantastic unpleasing draught of the passion of avarice—I call it a
fantastic draught, because it hath no archetype in nature, and it is
farther an unpleasing one; from being the delineation of a simple passion,
unmixed, it wants
‘The lights and shades, whose well accorded strife
Gives all the strength and colour of our life.’”
This may in general be true, as there are certainly few unmingled
passions; but I suspect that avarice so completely engrosses the soul,
that a simple and unmixed delineation of it is not remote from nature.
“The Euclio of Plautus,” says King, in his _Anecdotes_, “the Avare of
Moliere, and Miser of Shadwell, have been all exceeded by persons who have
existed within my own knowledge(236).”
_Bacchides_:—is so called from two sisters of the name of Bacchis, who are
the courtezans in this play. In a prologue, which is supposed to be spoken
by Silenus, mounted on an ass, it is said to be taken from a Greek comedy
by Philemon. This information, however, cannot be implicitly relied on, as
the prologue was not written in the time of Plautus, and is evidently an
addition of a comparatively recent date. Some indeed have supposed that it
was prefixed by Petrarch; but at all events the following lines could not
have been anterior to the conquest of Greece by the Romans:—
“Samos quæ terra sit, nota est omnibus:
Nam maria, terras, monteis, atque insulas
Vostræ legiones reddidere pervias.”
The leading incident in this play—a master’s folly and inadvertence
counteracting the deep-laid scheme of a slave to forward his interest, has
been employed by many modern dramatists for the groundwork of their plots;
as we find from the _Inavertito_ of Nicolo Barbieri, sirnamed Beltramo,
the _Amant Indiscret_ of Quinault, Moliere’s _Etourdi_, and Dryden’s _Sir
Martin Mar-all_.
The third scene of the third act of this comedy, where the father of
Pistoclerus speaks with so much indulgence of the follies of youth, has
been imitated in Moliere’s _Fourberies de Scapin_, and the fifth scene of
the fourth act has suggested one in _Le Marriage Interrompu_(237), by
Cailhava. If it could be supposed that Dante had read Plautus, the
commencement of Lydus’ soliloquy before the door of Bacchis, might be
plausibly conjectured to have suggested that thrilling inscription over
the gate of hell, in the third Canto of the _Inferno_—
“Pandite, atque aperite propere januam hanc Orci, obsecro!
Nam equidem haud aliter esse duco; quippe cui nemo advenit,
Nisi quem spes reliquere omnes ——
Per me si va nella città dolente:
Per me si va nell eterno dolore:
Per me si va tra la perduta gente.
* * * * * *
Lasciate ogni speranza, voi, che entrate.”
_Captivi_.—The subject and plot of the _Captivi_ are of a different
description from those of Plautus’ other comedies. No female characters
are introduced; and, as it is said in the epilogue, or concluding address
to the spectators,
—— “Ad pudicos mores facta hæc fabula est:
Neque in hâc subagitationes sunt, ullave amatio,
Nec pueri suppositio, nec argenti circumductio;
Neque ubi amans adolescens scortum liberet, clam suum patrem.”
Though no females are introduced in it, the _Captivi_ is the most tender
and amiable of Plautus’ plays, and may be regarded as of a higher
description than his other comedies, since it hinges on paternal affection
and the fidelity of friendship. Many of the situations are highly
touching, and exhibit actions of generous magnanimity, free from any
mixture of burlesque. It has indeed been considered by some critics as the
origin of that class of dramas, which, under the title of _Comedies
Larmoyantes_, was at one time so much admired and so fashionable in
France(238), and in which wit and humour, the genuine offspring of Thalia,
are superseded by domestic sentiment and pathos.
Hegio, an Ætolian gentleman, had two sons, one of whom, when only four
years old, was carried off by a slave, and sold by him in Elis. A war
having subsequently broken out between the Elians and Ætolians, Hegio’s
other son was taken captive by the Elians. The father, with a view of
afterwards ransoming his son, by an exchange, purchased an Elian prisoner,
called Philocrates, along with his servant Tyndarus; and the play opens
with the master, Philocrates, personating his slave, while the slave,
Tyndarus, assumes the character of his master. By this means Tyndarus
remains a prisoner under his master’s name, while Hegio is persuaded to
send the true Philocrates, under the name of Tyndarus, to Elis, in order
to effect the exchange of his son. The deception, however, is discovered
by Hegio before the return of Philocrates; and the father, fearing that he
had thus lost all hope of ransoming his child, condemns Tyndarus to labour
in the mines. In these circumstances, Philocrates returns from Elis with
Hegio’s son, and also brings along with him the fugitive slave, who had
stolen his other son in infancy. It is then discovered that Tyndarus is
this child, who, having been sold to the father of Philocrates, was
appointed by him to wait on his son, and had been gradually admitted to
his young master’s confidence and friendship.
There has been a great dispute among critics and commentators, whether the
dramatic unities have been strictly observed in this comedy. M. De Coste,
in the preface to his French translation of the _Captivi_, maintains, that
the unities of place, and time, and action, have been closely attended to.
Lessing, who translated the play into German, adopted the opinion of De
Coste with regard to the observance of the unities, and he has farther
pronounced it the most perfect comedy that, in his time, had yet been
represented on the stage(239). A German critic, whose letter addressed to
Lessing is published in that author’s works(240), has keenly opposed these
opinions, discussing at considerable length the question of the unities of
action, time, and place, as also pointing out many supposed
inconsistencies and improbabilities in the conduct of the drama. He
objects, in point of verisimilitude, to the long and numerous _aparts_—the
soliloquies of the parasite, which begin the first three acts,—the
frequent mention of the market-places and streets of Rome, while the scene
is laid in a town of Greece,—and the sudden as well as unaccountable
appearance of Stalagmus, the fugitive slave, at the end of the drama. The
most serious objection, however, is that which relates to the violation of
the dramatic unity of time. The scene is laid in Calydon, the capital of
Ætolia; and, at the end of the second act, Philocrates proceeds from that
city to Elis, transacts there a variety of affairs, and returns before the
play is concluded. Between these two places the distance is fifty miles;
and in going from one to the other it was necessary to cross the bay of
Corinth. It is therefore impossible (contends this critic,) that De Coste
can be accurate in maintaining that the duration of the drama is only
seven or eight hours. Allowing the poet, however, the greatest poetical
license, and giving for his play the extended period of twenty-four hours,
it is scarcely possible that the previous parts of the drama could have
been gone through, and the long voyage accomplished, in this space of
time. But it farther appears, that Plautus himself did not wish to claim
this indulgence, and intended to crowd the journey and all the preceding
dramatic incidents into twelve hours at most. He evidently means that the
action should be understood as commencing with the morning: Hegio says, in
the second scene of the first act,
“Ego ibo ad fratrem, ad alios captivos meos,
Visum ne nocte hâc quippiam turbaverint;”
and it is evident that the action terminates with the evening meal, the
preparations for which conclude the fourth act. To all this Lessing
replied, that there was no reason to suppose that the scene was laid in
Calydon, or that the journey was made to the town of Elis, and that it
might easily have been accomplished within the time prescribed by the
dramatic rule of unities, if nearer points of the Ætolian and Elian
territories be taken than their capitals.
Some of the characters in the _Captivi_ are very beautifully drawn. Hegio
is an excellent representation of a respectable rich old citizen: He is
naturally a humane good-humoured man, but his disposition is warped by
excess of paternal tenderness. There is not in any of the comedies of
Plautus, a more agreeable and interesting character than Tyndarus: and no
delineation can be more pleasing than that of his faithful attachment to
Philocrates, by whom he was in return implicitly trusted, and considered
rather in the light of a friend than a slave. In this play, as in most
others of Plautus, the parasite is a character somewhat of an episodical
description: He goes about prowling for a supper, and is associated to the
main subject of the piece only by the delight which he feels at the
prospect of a feast, to honour the return of Hegio’s son. The parasites of
Plautus are almost as deserving a dissertation as Shakspeare’s clowns.
Parasite, as is well known, was a name originally applied in Greece to
persons devoted to the service of the gods, and who were appointed for the
purpose of keeping the consecrated provisions of the temples. Diodorus of
Sinope, as quoted by Athenæus(241), after speaking of the dignity of the
sacred parasites of Hercules, (who was himself a noted _gourmand_,)
mentions that the rich, in emulation of this demi-god, chose as followers
persons called parasites, who were not selected for their virtues or
talents, but were remarkable for extravagant flattery to their superiors,
and insolence to those inferiors who approached the persons of their
patrons. This was the character which came to be represented on the stage.
We learn from Athenæus(242), that a parasite was introduced in one of his
plays by Epicharmus, the founder of the Greek comedy. The parasite of this
ancient dramatist lay at the feet of the rich, eat the offals from their
tables, and drank the dregs of their cups. He speaks of himself as of a
person ever ready to dine abroad when invited, and when any one is to be
married, to go to his house without an invitation—to pay for his good
cheer by exciting the merriment of the company, and to retire as soon as
he had eat and drunk sufficiently, without caring whether or not he was
lighted out by the slaves(243). In the most ancient comedies, however,
this character was not denominated parasite, and was first so called in
the plays of Araros, the son of Aristophanes, and one of the earliest
authors of the middle comedy. Antiphanes, a dramatist of the same class,
has given a very full description of the vocation of a parasite. The part,
however, did not become extremely common till the introduction of the new
comedy, when Diphilus, whose works were frequently imitated on the Roman
stage, particularly distinguished himself by his delineation of the
parasitical character(244). In the Greek theatre, the part was usually
represented by young men, dressed in a black or brown garb, and wearing
masks expressive of malignant gaiety. They carried a goblet suspended
round their waists, probably lest the slaves of their patrons should fill
to them in too small cups; and also a vial of oil to be used at the bath,
which was a necessary preparation before sitting down to table, for which
the parasite required to be always ready at a moment’s warning(245).
It was thus, too, that the character was represented on the Roman stage;
and it would farther appear, that the parasites, in the days of Plautus,
carried with them a sort of Joe Miller, as a manual of wit, with which
they occasionally refreshed their vivacity. Thus the parasite, in the
_Stichus_, says,
“Ibo intro ad libros, et discam de dictis melioribus;”
and again—
“Libros inspexi, tam confido, quam potest,
Me meum obtenturum ridiculis meis.”
The parasite naturally became a leading character of the Roman stage. In
spite of the pride and boasted national independence of its citizens, the
whole system of manners at Rome was parasitical. The connection between
patron and client, which was originally the cordial intercourse of
reciprocal services, soon became that of haughty superiority on the one
side, and sordid adulation on the other. Every client was in fact the
parasite of some patrician, whose litter he often followed like a slave,
conforming to all his caprices, and submitting to all his insults, for the
privilege of being placed at the lowest seat of the patron’s table, and
there repaying this indelicate hospitality by the most servile flattery.
On the stage, the principal use of the parasite was to bring out the other
characters from the canvass. Without Gnatho, the Thraso of Terence would
have possessed less confidence; and without his flatterer, Pyrgopolinices
would never have recollected breaking an elephant’s thigh by a blow of his
fist.
The parasite, in the _Captivi_, may be considered as a fair enough
representative of his brethren in the other plays of Plautus. He submits
patiently to all manner of ignominious treatment(246)—his spirits rise and
sink according as his prospects of a feast become bright or clouded—he
speaks a great deal in soliloquies, in which he talks much of the jests by
which he attempted to recommend himself as a guest at the feasts of the
Great, but we are not favoured with any of these jests. In such
soliloquies, too, he rather expresses what would justly be thought of him
by others, than what even a parasite was likely to say of himself.
The parasite is not a character which has been very frequently represented
on the modern stage. It is not one into which an Italian audience, who are
indifferent to good cheer, would heartily enter. Accordingly, the parasite
is not a common character in the native drama of Italy, and is chiefly
exhibited in the old comedies of Ariosto and Aretine, which are directly
imitated from the plays of Plautus or Terence; but even in them this
character does not precisely coincide with the older and more genuine
school of parasites. Ligurio, who is called the parasite in the
_Mandragora_ of Machiavel, rather corresponds to the intriguing slave than
to the parasite of the Roman drama; or at least he resembles the more
modern parasites, who, like the Phormio of Terence, ingratiated themselves
with their patrons by serviceable roguery, rather than by flattery.
Ipocrito, who, in Aretine’s comedy of that name, is also styled the
parasite, is a sort of Tartuffe, with charitable and religious maxims
constantly in his mouth. He does not insinuate himself into the confidence
of his patrons by a gaping admiration of their foolish sayings, but by
extolling their virtues, and smoothing over their vices; and so far from
being treated with any sort of contumely, he is held in high
consideration, and interposes in all domestic arrangements.
It is still more difficult to find a true parasite on the English stage.
Sir John Falstaff, though something of a parasite, is as original as he is
inimitable. Lazarillo, the hungry courtier in Beaumont and Fletcher’s
_Woman Hater_, and Justice Greedy, in Massinger’s _New Way to Pay Old
Debts_, to whom Sir Giles Overreach gives the command of the kitchen, and
absolute authority there, in respect of the entertainment, are rather
epicures in constant quest of delicacies, than hungry parasites, who
submit to any indignity for the sake of a meal. Lazarillo’s whole intrigue
consists of schemes for being invited to dine where there was an umbrana’s
head, and we are told that
—— “He hath a courtly kind of hunger,
And doth hunt more for novelty than plenty;”
and Justice Greedy’s delight is placed in rich canary, a larded pheasant,
or a red deer baked in puff paste. Mosca, in Ben Jonson’s _Volpone_, who
grasps at presents made to him by the legacy-hunters of his patron, and
who at length attempts to defraud the patron himself, is a parasite of
infinitely greater artifice and villainy than any of those in Plautus; and
in the opinion of the late editor of Jonson, outweighs the aggregate merit
of all Plautus’s parasites. Colax, who, in the _Muses’ Looking-Glass_ of
Randolph, chimes in with the sentiments of each character, approving, by
an immense variety of subtle arguments, every extreme of vice and folly,
appears to flatter all those allegorical representations of the passions
exhibited in this drama, rather from courtesy than want. He tells us,
indeed, that
“’Tis gold gives Flattery all her eloquence;”
but this part of his character is not brought prominently forward, nor is
he represented as a glutton or epicure. Perhaps the character which comes
nearest to the parasite of the _Captivi_ is in a play not very generally
known, the _Canterbury Guests_, by Ravenscroft.
But although it might be difficult to find a precise copy in modern times
of the parasite of the _Captivi_, its principal plot has been repeatedly
imitated, particularly in an old English drama, _The Case is altered_,
supposed to have been written by Ben Jonson, and published in some
editions of his works. Count Ferneze, a nobleman of Vicenza, and who
corresponds to Hegio, lost a son called Camillo, when Vicenza was taken by
the French. His other son, Paulo, is afterwards made prisoner by the same
enemies. Chamont, the French general, and Camillo Ferneze, who, under the
name of Gaspar, had entered into the French service, are taken prisoners
by the Italians; and while in captivity they agree to change names, and
apparent situations. Camillo, who passes for Chamont, is carefully
retained in confinement at Vicenza, while that general is despatched by
the Count Ferneze to procure the ransom of his son Paulo. The Count having
subsequently detected the imposture, Camillo is put in fetters and ordered
for execution. Chamont, however, returns with Paulo, whom he had now
redeemed, and the Count afterwards discovers, by means of a tablet hanging
round his neck, that the youth Camillo, whom he was treating with such
severity, was the son whom he had lost during the sack of Vicenza.
The _Captivi_ is also the foundation of _Les Captifs_, a comedy of Rotrou,
where a father, afflicted by the captivity of a son, purchases all the
slaves exposed to sale in Ætolia, in the hope of recovering his child. The
interest and vivacity of the play, which is one of the best of its author,
are supported by the pleasantries of a parasite, and a variety of
ingenious incidents. Ginguené has mentioned, in the _Histoire Litteraire
d’Italie_, that the _Captivi_ must also have suggested the _Suppositi_, a
comedy by the author of the _Orlando Furioso_. Ariosto, however, has made
the incidents of the _Captivi_ subservient to a love intrigue, and not to
the deliverance of a prisoner. Whilst Erostrato, a young gentleman, acts
the part of a domestic in the house of his mistress’s father, his servant,
Dulippo, personates his master, and studies in his place at the university
of Ferrara. At the conclusion of the piece, Dulippo is discovered to be
the son of an old and rich doctor of laws, who was the rival in love of
Erostrato. There is a parasite in this play as in the _Captivi_, but the
character of the doctor is new, and the scenes chiefly consist of the
schemes which are laid by the master and servant to disappoint his views
as to the lady of whom Erostrato is enamoured.
_Casina_. This play is so called from the name of a female slave, on whom,
though she does not once appear on the stage, the whole plot of the drama
hinges. It is said in the prologue to have been translated from Diphilus,
a Greek writer of the new comedy, by whom it was called Κληρουμενοι, the
Lot Drawers. Diphilus was a contemporary of Menander; he was distinguished
by his comic wit and humour and occasionally by the moral sententious
character of his dramas, of which he is said to have written a hundred,
and from which larger fragments have been preserved than from any Greek
plays belonging to the new comedy. Notwithstanding what is said in the
Delphine Plautus, it is evident from its terms, that the prologue could
not have been prefixed by the dramatist himself, but must have been
written a good many years after his death, on occasion of a revival of the
_Casina_. It would appear from it that the plays of Plautus had rather
gone out of fashion immediately after his death; but the public at length,
tired with the new comedies, began to call for the reproduction of those
of Plautus—
“Nam, nunc novæ quæ prodeunt comœdiæ,
Multo sunt nequiores, quam nummi novi,
Nos postquam rumores populi intelleximus,
Studiose expetere vos Plautinas fabulas,
Antiquam ejus edimus comœdiam.”
From the same prologue it would seem that this play, when first
represented, had surpassed in popularity all the dramatic productions of
the time—
“Hæc quum primùm acta est, vicit omnes fabulas.”
It cannot, indeed, be denied, that, in the _Casina_, the unities of time
and place are rigidly observed, and, in point of humour, it is generally
accounted inferior to none of Plautus’s dramas. The nature, however, of
the subject, will admit only of a very slight sketch. The female slave,
who gives name to the comedy, is beloved by her master, Stalino, and by
his son, Euthynicus,—the former of whom employs Olympio, his bailiff in
the country, and the latter his armour-bearer, Chalinus, to marry Casina,
each being in hopes, by this contrivance, to obtain possession of the
object of his affections. Cleostrata, Stalino’s wife, suspecting her
husband’s designs, supports the interests of her son, and, after much
dispute, it is settled, that the claims of the bailiff and armour-bearer
should be decided by lot. Fortune having declared in favour of the former,
Stalino obtains the loan of a neighbour’s house for the occasion, and it
is arranged, that its mistress should be invited for one evening by
Cleostrata; but the jealous lady counteracts this plan by declining the
honour of the visit. At length all concur in making a dupe of the old man.
Chalinus is dressed up in wedding garments to personate Casina, and the
play concludes with the mortification of Stalino, at finding he had been
imposed on by a counterfeit bride.
The plan here adopted by Stalino for securing possession of Casina, is
nearly the same with that pursued by the Count Almaviva, in Beaumarchais’
prose comedy, _Le Marriage de Figaro_; where the Count, with similar
intentions, plans a marriage between Suzanne and his valet-de-chambre,
Figaro, but has his best-laid schemes invariably frustrated. The
concluding part of the _Casina_ has probably, also, suggested the whole of
the _Marescalco_, a comedy of the celebrated Aretine, which turns on the
projected nuptials of the character who gives name to the piece, and whose
supposed bride is discovered, during the performance of the marriage
ceremony, to be a page of the Duke of Mantua, dressed up in wedding
garments, in a frolic of the Duke’s courtiers, in order to impose on the
Marescalco. Those scenes in the _Ragazzo_ of Lodovico Dolce, where a
similar deception is practised and where Giacchetto, the disguised youth,
minutely details the event of the trick of which he was made the chief
instrument, have also been evidently drawn from the same productive
origin.(247)