Euripides (Donne)/Chapter 8
CHAPTER VIII.
THE PHŒNICIAN WOMEN.—THE SUPPLIANTS.—THE CHILDREN OF HERCULES.—THE PHRENZY OF HERCULES.
"Both tugging to be victors, breast to breast,
Yet neither conqueror nor conquered;
So is the equal poise of this fell war."
—"HENRY VI.," 3d Part.
Even did space permit, it is unnecessary to dwell minutely upon several of the plays of Euripides. The seven extant dramas of Æschylus and the same number of those of Sophocles deserved and admitted of analysis, and already seven pieces of their rival's have passed under review. Of the ten which remain, some were occasional plays; others have apparently no connection with one another, even did we happen to know the trilogy to which they belonged. Of these, some would seem to have been composed for a special purpose—either local, as complimentary to Athens, or political, with a view to the affairs of Greece when they were produced. For English readers they retain little interest; yet although their merits as dramas are slight, they, like all the author's writings, contain some admirable poetry, or some effective scenes and situations.
In the "Phœnician Women," Euripides displays some of his greatest defects in the construction of a tragedy, and some of his most conspicuous beauties as a pathetic and picturesque writer. As to its plot, it is cumbrous; and, what is still worse, he competes in it with the "Antigone" of Sophocles and the "Seven against Thebes" of Æschylus. Jocasta, who in "Œdipus the King" destroys herself, is alive again in this drama. The brothers, whose rivalry and death by each other's hand were familiar to all, repeat their duel, and the devotion of Antigone to her blind father and her younger brother is brought or rather crammed into it at the end. We have, in fact, almost a trilogy pressed into a single member of it, and in consequence the "Phœnician Women" is, with the exception of the "Œdipus at Colonus," the longest of extant Greek tragedies. Euripides forgot the sound advice given by the poetess Corinna to her youthful rival, Pindar. He had been, she thought, too profuse in his mythological stories, and therefore advised him for the future "to sow with the hand and not with the sack."
As the story of the "Phœnician Women" has in the main been already told in the volume of this series devoted to Æschylus, and also as many English readers are acquainted with the "Frères Ennemis" of Racine, it is not perhaps necessary to detail again the tale of Eteocles and Polynices. It will suffice to present a portion of one or two scenes, so as to give some idea of the pure ore that lies embedded in this tragical conglomerate. The scene in which the old servant of the royal house leads Antigone to a tower whence she gazes upon the Argive host encamped around Thebes, even though it is borrowed from that book of the Iliad in which Helen surveys from the walls of Troy the Achæan chieftains, exhibits a master's hand. The servant can point out to his young mistress the leaders of the Argives, and describe the blazonry of their shields, because he has been in their camp, when he took to Polynices the offer of a truce. After carefully exploring the ground to make sure that no Theban is in sight, whose gaze might light on the maiden, he says to her:—
"Come then, ascend this height, let thy foot tread
These stairs of ancient cedar, thence survey
The plains beneath: see what an host of foes
At Dirce's fount encamp, and stretch along
The valley where Ismenus rolls his stream."
Antigone, at her first view from the palace-roof, exclaims:—
"Awful Diana, virgin goddess, see
The field all brass glares like the lightning's blaze."
The old man then points out to her the captains of the numerous host which Polynices has led thither to assert his rights. Among other heroes, he singles out one as likely to interest his young mistress. "Seest thou," he says,
"That chief now passing o'er the stream
Of Dircè?
Antig.Different he, of different guise
His arms. Who is the warrior?
Phor.Tydeus he,
The son of Œneus.
Antig.What! the prince who made
The sister of my brother's bride his choice?"
The young and graceful Parthenopæus, the proud boaster Capaneus, and Hippomedon, that "haughty king," are pointed out; but Antigone casts only a passing glance on these, and yearns to behold her brother. "Where is my Polynices, tell me?" "He is standing there near the tomb of Niobe," is the reply. I see him, but indistinctly," says the princess, "I see the semblance of his form:"—
"O could I, like a nimble-moving cloud,
Fly through the air, borne on the wingèd winds,
Fly to my brother: I would throw my arms
Round his dear neck, unhappy youth, so long
An exile. Mark him, good old man, mark
How graceful in his golden arms he stands,
And glitters like the bright sun's orient rays.
Serv. The truce will bring him hither: in this house
His presence soon will fill thy soul with joy."
Although, not among the leading characters, Menœceus, the son of Creon, Jocasta's brother, is a most interesting one. The prophet Tiresias has declared that Thebes must be taken by the Seven, unless this youth will die for the people. In deep distress Creon implores his son to quit this fatal land. Menœceus, "with an honest fraud," deceiving his father, freely gives his life. He says:—
"Were it not base
While those, whom no compulsion of the gods,
No oracle demands, fight for their country,
Should I betray my father, brother, city,
And like a craven yield to abject fear?
No—by Jove's throne among the golden stars—
No, by the blood-stained Mars, I'll take my stand
Upon the highest battlement of Thebes,
And from it, as the prophet's voice gave warning,
I'll plunge into the dragon's gloomy cave,
And free this suffering land."
The interview between the brothers is too long for extract, and would be marred by compression. One of the sentiments, however, expressed by the fierce and unjust Eteocles, is so truly in Shakespeare's vein, that we cannot pass it over. The usurping Theban king says:—
"For honour I would mount above the stars,
Above the sun's high course, or sink beneath
Earth's deepest centre, might I so obtain
This idol of my soul, this worshipt power
Of regal state; and to another never
Would I resign her; but myself engross
The splendid honour: it were base indeed
To barter for low rank a kingly crown.
And shame it were that he who comes in arms,
Spreading o'er this brave realm the waste of war,
Should his rude will enjoy: all Thebes would blush
At my dishonour, did I, craven-like,
Shrink from the Argive spear, and to his hand
Resign my rightful sceptre."
Hotspur speaks much in the same strain of "honour:"—
"By heaven, methinks it were an easy leap
To pluck bright honour from the pale-faced moon;
Or dive into the bottom of the deep,
Where fathom-line could never touch the ground,
And pluck up drownèd honour by the locks;
So he, that doth redeem her thence, might wear
Without co-rival all her dignities."
By the voluntary death of Menœceus victory is on the Theban side. The description of the battle is among the most striking of dramatic war-scenes. A messenger then enters with further tidings. He tells Jocasta that her sons have agreed to spare further shedding of blood, and to decide their quarrel by single combat. Here is a new woe added to the many calamities of the house of Laïus. Jocasta hurries to prevent this unnatural duel, but arrives too late. A second messenger then describes the deadly strife in which the brothers have fallen, and also Jocasta's death by her own hands. The bodies of the two fratricides are brought on the stage, and a funeral wail is sung by Antigone and the Chorus. For her a new tragedy is commencing. Reft of her mother, her betrothed Menœceus, and her brothers, she is forbidden by Creon, now become regent of Thebes, to perform the last functions for her dear Polynices. The tragedy concludes with her declaration that man may make cruel laws, and forbid the rites of sepulture, but she will obey a higher law, that of nature, and do meet honour to the dead. That no circumstance of sorrow may be wanting to Antigone's lot, blind, old, discrowned Œdipus is sentenced to banishment for ever from his late kingdom. His sons unrighteously deposed him; he rashly cursed them in his ire: the curse has been fatal to his whole house, and now falls on his own head. He who, by baffling the Sphinx, won a kingdom, goes forth from it a beggar to eat the bitter bread of exile. With him goes his daughter, the one steadfast star left to guide him on his dark way. The shade of Laïus is at length appeased: the sceptre has for ever departed from the house of Labdacus.
"The Suppliants" is, as regards the time of action, a sequel to "The Phœnicians" and "The Seven against Thebes" of Æschylus. Creon persists in denying the rites of sepulture to the fallen Argive chieftains. The commander of that disastrous expedition, Adrastus, now the sole survivor of the seven, hurries to Eleusis on the Athenian border, accompanied by the widows and sons of the slain, and takes refuge at the altar of Demeter. A passage from "The Two Noble Kinsmen" of Fletcher explains far better than the prologue of the Greek tragedy does the errand of the Suppliants:—
"We are six queens, whose sovereigns fell before
The wrath of cruel Creon: who endure
The beaks of ravens, talons of the kites,
And pecks of crows, in the foul fields of Thebes:
He will not suffer us to burn their bones,
To urn their ashes, nor to take th' offence
Of mortal loathsomeness from the blest eye
Of holy Phœbus, but infects the winds
With stench of our slain lords. Oh, pity, Duke!
Thou purger of the earth, draw thy feared sword
That does good turns to the world: give us the bones
Of our dead kings, that we may chapel them,
And of thy boundless goodness take some note
That for our crowned heads we have no roof
Save this, which is the lion's and the bear's,
And vault for everything."
Through the mediation of Æthra, mother of Theseus, king of Athens, the Suppliants are enabled to bring their wrongs before him. Theseus at first is unwilling to espouse their cause: to do so will embroil Athens in a war with Thebes. He is by no means a cheerful giver of aid: revolving in his soul "the various turns of chance below," he expatiates on the uncertainty of human greatness, and hints that Adrastus himself is an instance of the folly of interfering with other people's business. But Æthra, whose woman's nature is deeply moved by the tears of the widowed queens, will hear of no denial; and Theseus at last, though reluctantly, promises to take up their cause. Just as he is despatching a herald to Creon to demand the bodies of the slain, a Theban messenger comes with a peremptory mandate from Creon that Adrastus and his companions be delivered up. It must be owned that, at this juncture, Theseus is rather a proser. Forgetting the urgency of the case—that dogs and vultures may already be preying on the dead—he discourses on the comparative merits of aristocratic and popular government, and on the sin of refusing burial even to enemies. Theseus in the end consents to do what, to be done well, ought to be done quickly. He sends back the Theban herald, after rating him soundly, with a stem response to his master. He follows at the herald's heels, defeats Creon, and brings back to Eleusis the bodies of the Argive princes. The Chorus enters in procession, chanting a dirge. Adrastus speaks the funeral oration. The dead are then placed on a pyre, and when it is kindled, Evadne, wife of the boaster Capaneus, leaps on his pile. Finally, a deity appears as mediator. Minerva ratifies a treaty between Argos and Athens, and predicts that, at no distant day, the now worsted Argos will, in its turn, humble the pride of Thebes.
In this tragedy there is a monotony of woe, not relieved, as in the case of "The Trojan Women" of Euripides, by a series of beautiful choral odes and picturesque situations. The red flames of the six funeral pyres, indeed, must have been effective; and a second Chorus of youths, the orphaned sons of the chieftains, have deepened the pathos excited by the suppliant queens. By it the dramatist employed two of his favourite modes of touching the spectators—the aid of women and the introduction of children. Perhaps he had witnessed that sad and solemn spectacle at which Pericles pronounced the encomium over the firstlings of the slain in the Peloponnesian war, and so transferred to a mimic scene the reality of a people's mourning.
"The Children of Hercules" need not detain us long, its drift being very similar to that of the tragedy of "The Suppliants." Apparently it was written at a time when Argos was recovering some of her earlier importance among Dorian states, owing to the strain put upon the resources of Sparta by the length of her war with Athens. The Argives, it might be feared, were inclined to throw their weight into the scale of Thebes and Lacedæmon, and stood in need of some timely advice. The children of Hercules, hunted by their enemies, and driven to take sanctuary at Marathon, where the scene of action is laid, were sheltered by Athens, and from these fugitives the Argives of the time of Euripides were supposed to descend. Let Argos now bear in mind this good service: let her remember also the many and grievous wrongs done to her by the cruel and faithless Spartans. If Thebes and the Argive government enabled Sparta to enfeeble Athens, and so disturb the balance of power in Greece, who would be the gainer by such league? Who the loser would be it was not difficult to foresee. When was Sparta, in her prosperity, ever faithful to her allies, or even commonly just? What had Thebes ever done for Argos to make alliance with her desirable? Who had been the real benefactors of the Argive people, their kinsfolk in blood, or the Ionians of Attica? With Athens to aid her, she might regain the position she once held among the Dorian race: but if Athens fell she would be as the Messenians were now, little more than an appanage of the kings or ephors of her powerful neighbour.
Passing over this play as historically rather than dramatically interesting to modern readers, we come now to "The Phrenzy of Hercules," which for some fine scenes in it, and some very curious Euripidean theology, deserves attention. It presents no tokens of having been a hurried or occasional composition. Amphitryon, who delivers the prologue, is, with Megara, the wife of Hercules, and her sons, cruelly treated by Lycus, king, or more properly the usurping tyrant, of Thebes. He, an adventurer from Eubœa, had slain Creon, lord of that city; and to insure himself on his throne, has ordered Megara, Creon's daughter, and her children by Hercules, for execution. Her husband is at the time detained in Hades, whither he has gone on a very hazardous expedition, and his family despair of his return. Lycus, his "wish being father to the thought," is of the same opinion; but fearing that the young Heracleids may some day requite him for the murder of their grandfather Creon, he resolves, like Macbeth, to put his mind at ease by despatching all "Banquo's issue." But on this point both the tyrant and his victims are mistaken, for just as Amphitryon, Megara, and the children, are being led forth to death, Hercules returns, rescues his family, and delivers Thebes from its Eubœan intruder.
The taint of blood, however, is on the redresser of wrongs, and from it he must be purified by sacrifice to the gods. And now a worse foe to Hercules than Lycus had been assails him. Juno, whose ire against Jupiter's and Alcmena's son is as unappeasable as her hatred towards Paris and Troy, is not pleased with the turn matters are taking. It has been of no avail to send the object of her spleen to bring up Cerberus from below. Pluto has not, as she hoped her grimy brother-in-law would have done, clapped him into prison, nor Charon refused him homeward passage over the Styx. In the "Alcestis" we have had an impersonation of Death; in the drama now before us there is one of Madness (Lyssa), a daughter of Night, who bears the goddess's instructions to render Hercules a maniac. For this errand Madness has no relish: she is more scrupulous than the Queen of Gods. "It is shameful," she says, "to persecute one who has served mankind so well—destroying beasts of prey, and executing justice on many notorious thieves and cut-throats." But Iris, one of the Olympian couriers, tells Lyssa, whom she accompanies, that "Juno is not a person to be trifled with; that unless mortals in future be permitted to beard divinities, Hercules must be made to feel the full weight of celestial wrath. If a god or a goddess be out of temper, even the best and most valiant of men must smart." Reluctantly Lyssa complies with the divine hest. Hercules, while engaged in the expiatory sacrifice, goes suddenly distraught: conceiving them to be foes, he murders his wife and their three sons, narrowly misses sending his earthly father, Amphitryon, to the Shades, and is exhibited, after an interval filled up with a Choric song, bound, as a dangerous lunatic, with cords to a pillar. The bleeding corpses of his household lie before him. Restored to his right mind, he is appalled by his own deed. Theseus, whom Hercules has just before released from durance in Pluto's realm, comes on and offers to his deliverer ghostly consolation. The pair of friends depart for Athens, where the maniac shall be purged of his offence to heaven. Only in the city of the Virgin-goddess can rest and absolution be accorded to him.
In "The Suppliants" we have some insight into the political opinions of its author. In "The Phrenzy of Hercules" there is a glimpse of his theology. Very early in this drama are religious sentiments, not, indeed, of a very consistent nature, introduced. Amphitryon, for example, when his prospects are most gloomy, taxes Jupiter with unfair dealing towards his copartner in marriage, to his daughter-in-law Megara, and to his grandsons. But when Lycus has been slain, then the Chorus proclaims that a signal instance of divine justice has been shown. When Hercules regains his senses, Theseus labours to put his soul at ease by the following arguments:—
"This ruin from none other god proceeds
Than from the wife of Jove. Well thou dost know
To counsel others is an easier task
Than to bear ills: yet none of mortal men
Escape unhurt by fortune; not the gods,
Unless the stories of the bards be false.
Have they not formed connubial ties, to which
No law assents? Have they not galled with chains
Their fathers through ambition? Yet they hold
Their mansions on Olympus, and their wrongs
With patience bear. What wilt thou say, if thou,
A mortal born, too proudly shouldst contend
'Gainst adverse fortune?"
To which Hercules replies:—
"Ah me! all this is foreign to my ills.
I deem not of the gods, as having formed
Connubial ties to which no law assents,
Nor as opprest with chains: disgraceful this
I hold, nor ever will believe that one
Lords it o'er others: of no foreign aid
The God, who is indeed a God, hath need:
These are the idle fables of your bards."
However, he consents to go with Theseus to Athens, and will not add the guilt of suicide to that of homicide.
This play seems at no time to have been a favourite with either spectators or readers. For the former, this dose of Anaxagorean philosophy may have been too strong: for the latter, the piece may have seemed to follow "a course too bloody." Yet among the tragic spectacles on the Athenian stage, that of Hercules bound to a column, with the remains of his wife and children before him, and the terror-stricken looks of Amphitryon and his attendants, was surely one of the most affecting.