Phormio (Morgan 1894)/Prologue
THE PROLOGUE
By J. B. Greenough
That this to all be prospered is our prayer;
Patrons of noble arts and judges fair,
We are to act a play, a Latin one,
By Tully witnessed and by Roscius done,
The work of Terence ; with such names as these
To recommend us, we must surely please.
I called it Latin, I was partly wrong;
No doubt the verses to that tongue belong;
But incidents and thought are purely Greek,
The Latin part is but the words we speak.
For just as that we call an English play
Is what some Frenchman clever in that way
Has made before ; so Romans thought no shame
To take from Greece and publish in their name.
What use, then, now to offer you a play
Not even native and long past its day,
A scenic outh'ne when in Greek 't was made,
And now a faded shadow of that shade?
Because while ages keep their steady pace,
The aims and nature of the human race
Continue still the same ; their fear and woe,
Their joys and their desires, no changes show.
The Latin that we speak in Grecian dress
Mirrors the nature of our age no less.
Only the outward acts and garb are old,
The rest is fresh as when 't was first unrolled.—
In that you savv another play of late
Unwitting Oedipus's crimes and fate,
Those vvere the deeds of heroes, tragic themes
For which subHmity well fitted seems,
The practised art of actors, fine array
And setting, with the fame of rare display.
Our aim is lower. Mortal men are we,
And so content the mimickers to be
Of human joys and griefs; the gods may care
For their own matters, men are our affair.
Yet pray these lowly things do not disown,
They touch us nearer being better known,
The woes of Hecuba we've long outgrown.—
Epidicazomenos was the Grecian name,
In Latin, though, it Phormio became;
Because the ' star,' a parasite, is one
Named Phormio, by whom the most is done.
Do you, adopting Terence' famous line,
' I am a man; all that is man's is mine,'
Regard our novel efifort with good will,
That generous arts may thrive among us still.