πρακτὲ ἠθικός he inculcates a contempt of popular opinion, which was particularly necessary at Athens, amidst a fickle and fluctuating people; a patient endurance of calamities; an abstaining from revenge; and an elevation of the mind, directing itself to things honest and eternal; his views, however, are often defective' and exceptionable. He evidently represents that policy and those laws as best, in which a community of wives and of children, as well as of riches, should be allowed *. Clement of Alexandria endeavours to put a construction upon his words which they will not bear, representing him as recommending only common right in all, to lay claim to those that were unmarried. In other instances, Plato expresses sentiments which are utterly unjustifiable. The opinions of this great writer are brought forth with distinguished eloquence, and Cicero seems to speak with admiration of his intelligence and power of language. The beauty and modulation of his periods have given his style a kind of middle character between prose and poetry. De Legibus, vol. ii. lib. v. p. 739. Edit. Stephan. + Clem. Alex. Strom. lib. iii. § 2. p. 515. CHAP. XVI. Aristophanes. ARISTOPHANES was an Athenian, the son of Philip; he lived about 434 years before the birth of Christ. His eminence as a comic writer is to be estimated by a reference to local and temporary circumstances, and it is well known that the productions, both of the comic and tragic muse, were of great importance at Athens; the disposition of the people inclining them much to delight in the drama, particularly in those satirical comedies, which were rendered subservient to the expression of political feelings, and of enmity to individuals. The licence, permitted in this respect, was carried to a great extent; and the failings of men of the highest worth were allowed to become the subject of ludicrous exposure and derision. Aristophanes was accustomed not only to satirize the Athenians at large, but he particularly directed his severity against Euripides in his Frogs, and in his Thesmophoriazusæ. In the Clouds he represented Socrates as instructing a youth to become a sophist, who is rendered as much disposed to defend wrong as right; and in his I, he attacked Cleon a demagogue, and occasioned his being fined five talents His comedy, entitled 'Eg, produced great effect, being performed when the Athenians, and all the Grecians indeed, wearied with the Peloponnesian war, were panting for peace. Eleven plays only remain of above fifty which Aristophanes produced: they are written with remarkable purity of style; it was this excellency, it may be presumed, which rendered his works highly esteemed by Plato and Chrysostom, and indeed induced the former to recommend them to Dionysius as models of language; the latter writer acquired probably from them that sharp, and vehement severity of censure, particularly of women, in which he expressed his reprehensions. The nature of the writings of Aristophanes • Vid. Fabric. in Aristoph. Comed. lib. ii. c. 21. will preclude the expectation of much that may have reference to particulars, connected with the subject of this work; it appears however, that in the play entitled, the Birds, there is a passage containing in a kind of burlesque representation some of those traditionary notions, which the Grecians of his time derived, probably from the Phoenicians, with respect to Chaos and the original rudiments of creation, formed at the beginning. rens. The chorus represents Chaos and Night, black Erebus and broad Tartarus to have existed before the earth, the air, or the hea It describes dark winged night to have produced first an inflated egg in the boundless bosom of Erebus, from which, in the revolution of time, desirable love sprang forth, radiant with golden wings on his shoulders, swift as the raging winds. It states love, mixing with black winged Chaos, to bave hatched the race of birds amidst the broad shadows of Tartarus, and to have brought them forth to light; that afterwards, by an intermixture effected by love, the heavens, the ocean, and the earth were produced, and the immortal race of blessed gods. This passage of Aristophanes is quoted by Lucian and Suidas. It resembles the cosmogony of Hesiod. The chorus speaks also of man's being formed of mud, and compares him to a dream. One of Aristophanes' plays is stiled repéλa, the clouds, and it is observable that the centaurs were called vioi vepeλv. The Hebrew word, ha, has νεφελῶν. been thought to signify apostates from the true worship, from to contend. It is not known to what age Aristophanes attained; his Plutus was produced in the last year of the 97th Olympiad, about 388 years before Christ. Plato wrote an epigram upon. him to the following effect +. The graces sought a lasting Fane to find, Aristophanes adopted the philosophical opinion, which prevailed among the more enlightened of his countrymen, distinguishing between Jupiter and the rest of the Gods §. Opribes. 1. 693-703. Edit. Brunck. vol. ii. + See Philopatris. † Αἱ χάριτες τέμενός τι λαβεῖν ὅπερ ἐχὶ πεσεῖται § Πλυτά. |