But as all that was sung in Tragedy was, according to Aristotle's Expression, call'd the Chorus in the Singular Number; and yet its being in the Singular was no reason why each part (when it was divided into several) should not be call'd the Chorus too; and so several Chorus's be introduc'd: just so in the Episode, each Incident, and each part of the Fable and the Action, is not only stil'd a part of the Episode, but even an Entire Episode. 'Tis in this sense that [1] Aristotle said, the Madness of Orestes, and his Cure by Expiatory Sacrifices, were two Episodes. This Term taken in this sense signifies each part of the Action exprest in the Model, and first Constitution of the Fable; such as the Absence and Travels of Ulysses the Disturbance of his Family, and his Presence which re-adjusted all things.
Aristotle tells us of a third sort of Episodes, when he says, that whatever is comprehended and exprest in the first Platform of the Fable is Proper, and the other Things are Episodes. [2] This is what he says just after he had propos'd the Model of the Odysseïs. We must then in the Odysseïs it self examine what this third sort of Episode is, the better to know wherein it differs from the second. We shall see how the Incidents he calls proper, are absolutely necessary: and how those, which he distinguishes by the Name of Episodes, are in one sense necessary and probable; and in another sense not at all necessary, but such as the Poet had liberty to make use of, or not.
After Homer had laid the first Ground-work of the Fable, and prepar'd the Model, such as we have observ'd it to be, it was not then at his Choice to make or not make Ulysses absent from his Country. This Absence was Essential: [3] Aristotle stiles and places it among those things that are proper to the Fable. But the Adventure of Antiphates, that of Circe, of the Sirens, of Scylla, of Charybdis, &c. he does not call such. The Poet was left at his full liberty to have made choice of any other, as well as these things. So that, they are only probable, and such Episodes as are distinct from the main Action, to which in this sense they are neither proper nor necessary.
But now let us see in what sense they are necessary thereto. Since the Absence of Ulysses was necessary, it follows, that not being at home, he must be somewhere else. Though then the Poet had his liberty to make use of none of these particular Adventures we mention'd, and he made choice of; yet had he not an absolute liberty of making use of none at all: but if he had omitted these, he had been necessarily oblig'd to substitute others
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