The Eleven Comedies, vol 1 | Page 3

folly of a nation that lets itself be cajoled by vain and
empty flatteries, to preach peace to fellow-citizens enamoured of war,
was to fulfil a dangerous rôle, that would never have appealed, we may
feel sure, to a mere vulgar ambition.
Moreover his genius, pre-eminently Greek as it is, has an instinctive
horror of all excesses, and hits out at them wherever he marks their
existence, whether amongst the great or the humble of the earth.
Supposing the Aristocracy, having won the victory the Poet desired,

had fallen in turn into oppression and misgovernment, doubtless
Aristophanes would have lashed its members with his most biting
sarcasms. It is just because Liberty is dear to his heart that he hates
government by Demagogues; he would fain free the city from the
despotism of a clique of wretched intriguers that oppressed her. But at
the same time the Aristocracy favoured by our Author was not such as
comes by birth and privilege, but such as is won and maintained by
merit and high service to the state.
In matters of morality his satires have the same high aims. How should
a corrupted population recover purity, if not by returning to the old
unsullied sources from which earlier generations had drawn their
inspiration? Accordingly we find Aristophanes constantly bringing on
the stage the "men of Marathon," the vigorous generation to which
Athens owed her freedom and her greatness. It is no mere childish
commonplace with our poet, this laudation of a past age; the facts of
History prove he was in the right, all the novelties he condemns were as
a matter of fact so many causes that brought about Athenian decadence.
Directly the citizen receives payment for attending the Assembly, he is
no longer a perfectly free agent in the disposal of his vote; besides, the
practice is equivalent to setting a premium on idleness, and so ruining
all proper activity; a populace maintained by the state loses all energy,
falls into a lethargy and dies. The life of the forum is a formidable
solvent of virtue and vigour; by dint of speechifying, men forget how to
act. Another thing was the introduction of 'the new education,' imported
by 'the Sophists,' which substituted for serious studies, definitely
limited and systematically pursued, a crowd of vague and subtle
speculations; it was a mental gymnastic that gave suppleness to the wits,
it is true, but only by corrupting and deteriorating the moral sense, a
system that in the long run was merely destructive. Such, then, was the
threefold poison that was destroying Athenian morality--the triobolus,
the noisy assemblies in the Agora, the doctrines of the Sophists; the
antidote was the recollection of former virtue and past prosperity,
which the Poet systematically revives in contrast with the turpitudes
and trivialities of the present day. There is no turning back the course
of history; but if Aristophanes' efforts have remained abortive, they are
not therefore inglorious. Is the moralist to despair and throw away his

pen, because in so many cases his voice finds no echo?
Again we find Aristophanes' literary views embodying the same good
sense which led him to see the truth in politics and morals. Here
likewise it is not the individual he attacks; his criticism is general. His
adversary is not the individual Euripides, but under his name depraved
taste and the abandonment of that noble simplicity which had produced
the masterpieces of the age of Pericles. Euripides was no ordinary
writer, that is beyond question; but the very excellence of his qualities
made his influence only the more dangerous.
Literary reform is closely connected with moral regeneration, the
decadence of the one being both cause and effect of the deterioration of
the other. The author who should succeed in purifying the public taste
would come near restoring to repute healthy and honest views of life.
Aristophanes essayed the task both by criticism and example--by
criticism, directing the shafts of his ridicule at over-emphasis and
over-subtlety, by example, writing himself in inimitable perfection the
beautiful Attic dialect, which was being enervated and effeminated and
spoiled in the hands of his opponents.
Even the Gods were not spared by the Aristophanic wit and badinage;
in 'Plutus,' in 'The Birds,' in 'The Frogs,' we see them very roughly
handled. To wonder at these profane drolleries, however, is to fail
altogether to grasp the privileges of ancient comedy and the very nature
of Athenian society. The Comic Poets exercised unlimited rights of
making fun; we do not read in history of a single one of the class
having ever been called to the bar of justice to answer for the audacity
of his dramatic efforts. The same liberty extended to religious matters;
the Athenian people, keen, delicately organized, quick to see a joke and
loving laughter