in which he exhibited Œneus, Têlephus, Thyestês, Inô, and
other heroic characters, were unmercifully derided,[1] though it
seems that their position and circumstances had always been
painfully melancholy; but the effeminate pathos which Euripidês
brought so nakedly into the foreground, was accounted unworthy
of the majesty of a legendary hero. And he incurred still greater obloquy on another point, on which he is allowed even by hie
enemies to have only reproduced in substance the preëxisting
tales,—the illicit and fatal passion depicted in several of his
female characters, such as Phædra and Sthenobrca. His opponents admitted that these stories were true, but contended that
they ought to be kept back and not produced upon the stage,
a proof both of the continued mythical faith and of the more
sensitive ethical criticism of his age.[2] The marriage of the six
- ↑ Aristophan. Ran. 840.—
(
Greek characters)
See also Aristophan. Acharn. 385-422. For an unfavorable criticism upon such proceeding, see Aristotat. Poet. 27.
- ↑ Aristophan. Ran. 1050.—
Eurip. (Greek characters)
Æsch. (Greek characters)
In the Hercules Furens, Euripidês outs in relief and even exaggerates the
(
Greek characters)
Eurip. (Greek characters),
Æsch. (Greek characters)
For the character of the language and measures of Euripides, as represent- ed by Æschylus, see also v. 1 297, and Pac. 527. Philosophical discussion was introduced by Euripidês (Dionys. Hal. Ars Khetor. viii. 10-ix. 11) about the Melanippê, where the doctrine of prodigies (greek missing}}) appears to have been argued. Quintilian (x. 1) remarks that to young beginners in judicial pleading. the study of Euripidês was much more specially profitable than that of Sopnoklês: compare Dio Chrysostom, Orat. xviii. vol. i. p. 477, Reisk.
In Euripidês the heroes themselves sometimes delivered moralizing discourses: (Greek characters) (Welcker, Griechisch.
Tragöd. Eurip. Stheneb. p. 782). Compare the fragments of his Belleroplion (15-25, Matthiae), and of his Chrysippus (7, ib.). A striking story is found in Seneca, Epistol. 115 ; and Plutarch, de Audiend. Poetis, c. 4. t. i. p.
70, Wytt.
