started it, because we thought that we should seem out of fashion at the present day, when almost every man has a theory about Athens and the Athenians, if we did not set up a little paradox of our own.

Whatever may be thought of this, three reasons are given why Aristophanes, designing to assail the sophists, should have chosen to personify them in the character of Socrates:-1st, because the populace of Athens did regard Socrates as no better than a quibbling sophist:-2d, because Aristophanes did not dare lay hands on the known leaders of that school, such as Protagoras of Abdera, Polus of Agrigentum, Hippias of Elea, and Gorgias of Leontium, men of high standing in their several cities, and much esteemed at Athens, and that he regarded it as more prudent to fix on an obscure native citizen, whose singularities and affectation made him a fair subject of ridicule; and, 3d, because Socrates omitted no occasion to testify his disapprobation of the character and productions of the comic theatre; and thus provoked the personal hostility of Aristophanes.

To these reasons, we think, the most entire and perfect reply may be made.-To the first, that although the common Athenians might confound the keen Socratic method, with the quibbling dialectics of the sophists, Aristophanes was too sagacious to partake the error. If he knew enough of the man, to think him sufficiently notorious to be made the hero of his piece, and to be able to bring him in a bodily and mental caricature on the stage, he must have known also, that instead of being a sophist, he was the declared enemy of that class of men; that he was pursuing them with the same zeal with which Aristophanes pursued him, and that half his instructions to his disciples, if the dialogues of Plato furnish a test, were made up of the exposure, refutation, and pursuit of the sophists. How then is it credible, that Aristophanes should have selected him as a representative of that class of men? Here, therefore, we see the irrelevancy of what has been so forcibly and eloquently urged against their principles and character. Allow the sophists to be, as they are described, the most corrupt of corrupters, poisoners of the mind, betrayers of the rising generation, intellectual quacks, so much the more impossible was it for any one out of the dregs of the people to confound Socrates with them. The discreeter course would have been, on the part of the champions of Aristophanes, not to aggravate

the depravity of the sophists; for in proportion as that is aggravated, men will be slow to think that Socrates, however far from perfect, could have been confounded by the lynx-eyed sagacity of Aristophanes with them ;-but, as we have done. above, to hint that, after all, the sophists were not so very bad but that good men might be found in their ranks, and that, though some of their number might run into a depraved excess, yet that others were virtuous and enlightened. This would have been agreeable to those principles of human nature, at which we glanced above, and have found a striking parallel in the society of jesuits, in modern times; a society which appears far differently in the provincial letters, and in the monuments of patient learning and the deeds of laborious charity throughout the globe, which have immortalized its members. It is true the difficulty would then have presented itself, not why Aristophanes should have so maltreated Socrates, but why he should have fallen so unmercifully on the sophists. This, however, would have been a difficulty far less considerable. The fairest men find no difficulty in representing the whole body of their opponents, in the most odious light. An opposite sect or party shall be held up to the bitterest scorn and detestation. Epithets shall be bestowed on it, which if just would make all whom it embraced of necessity most infamous ;-all the time that not a particle of personal hatred is felt against individuals, who are excluded by the saving qualification, that no personal allusion is designed.

The second reason why Aristophanes should have fixed on Socrates, as the representative of the sophists, viz. that he was afraid to attack the well known and powerful leaders of that school, Protagoras, Polus, and Gorgias, is extremely feeble.Where,' says Wieland very justly, did Aristophanes get this timidity he, who was not afraid, in the Knights, to make such a furious attack on one of the heads of the republic, an idol of the people, at the very zenith of his power; he, who did not fear to introduce upon the stage, and expose to their own contempt, the sovereign people of Athens themselves, under the character of a pusillanimous and doting burgess?' This is to contradict the historical traits of the character of Aristophanes, and if the contradiction could with justice be made, if it could be proved that Aristophanus had this fear; that not daring to assail the strong, he assailed the weak, not presuming to denounce the rich and popular stranger, he fell

upon the humble and obscure Athenian, not venturing actually to attack the sophists, by the names of their avowed leaders, he let loose all his acrimony on an eccentric humorist, whose singularities caused the mob to confound him with them, if this could be proved-whatever becomes of the character of Socrates, that of Aristophanes is made most contemptible.

But not more contemptible than it is made in the third reason given above, viz. that he cherished a personal enmity to Socrates, because the latter was hostile to the comic stage. To place a man like Socrates in so odious a light, as the hero of the Clouds, because he has expressed an opinion against the poet's profession, to make this personal quarrel the pretence for calumny so broad, coarse, and unsparing, and for persecution so malignant, is to confess its author to be poorspirited in feeling and base in principle, beyond all that he has himself alleged against Socrates, or his defenders have maintained against the sophists.

The Essay of Wieland, to which we have appealed, and of which we are following the train, among its other merits has this, that it is a professed plea neither for Aristophanes nor Socrates; but an attempt philosophically and historically to explain the literary enigma, as announced at the beginning. The explanation may be reduced to these following points.The popular comedy of Athens was an amusement of the mass of the citizens at their festivals, and particularly at the feasts of Bacchus. The comic poets were the ministers of the popular taste and feeling, and bound to provide topics for ridicule and laughter. The natural progress was from timid and general allusion, to direct personality, and lastly to systematic caricature of characters and persons on the stage. In proportion as this license increased, the nature of things denianded that it should have no effect, beyond that immediately designed, the amusement of a petulant populace. Where character is held sacred and personalities are forbidden either by public sentiment or law, a slight attack upon it awakens sensation, and must be submitted to or repelled, on the peril of retaining or forfeiting the public confidence. But where the license is familiar and notorious, and characters are habitually vilified, for no other reason than that they are notorious, and with no other object than to amuse the curiosity of an idle populace, then the instrument, once so powerful, loses its effect. Euripides,' says Wieland, remained, notwithstanding the Frogs, New Series, No. 10.

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and the Ecclesiasuza, one of the most favored and respected of the tragic poets; and Nicias continued unshaken at the head of his party. Cleon, but shortly after the representation of the Knights, received the command of the army against Brasidas, and Hyperbolus, the eternal and the indiscriminate butt of the comedians, was named to the elevated post of Hierompemon.' Nor was the case different with Socrates: though we sometimes see his final persecution and death ascribed in part to this attack of Aristophanes, it is to be recollected that twentyfour years elapsed between the acting of the Clouds and the prosecution by Anytus. When therefore we consider that whatever effect was produced on the public standing of Socrates by the Clouds, must have been greatest at the moment when the play was brought out,—the rather as the paucity of books limited to narrower bounds, than with our modern notions we are able to realise, the operation of literary agents,-we shall be inclined to admit, that the case of Socrates furnishes another illustration of the harmlessness of these attacks from the comic stage. Such being the nature of his weapon, used rather to divert the audience by its flourish and glitter, than to inflict mortal wounds by its edge, Aristophanes seized it, with his youthful grasp. What opinion we have of the motives, with which he might employ it, and of the feelings with which he would select his objects, will depend a good deal on the estimation which we form of the personal character of Aristophanes. We do not scruple to yield our entire assent to Wieland on this head. The ancient biographies give us little or no information on the subject; nor is it doing Aristophanes or any man injustice to judge him by his works. We do not hesitate from these to deny him any title to our respect as a truly good man. In admiration of his talents, we yield to none. In relish for what is truly beautiful in his poetry, (and much of every sort of beauty may be found in it,) we would as little be thought to fail. We are by no means desirous to withhold our applause from the courage, with which he assailed some of the vices and vicious men of the day; nor do we deny that his political and moral maxims are in the main sound. As a writer he is beyond praise, and the rather for having distrusted his own inspiration and his own popularity, and for having bestowed on his productions the most exemplary study and care. But here the tribute to his character, in our poor judgment, must stop. His writings are incontestably marked with an ir

ritable, unreflecting, and remorseless temper. He often derides the distinction of true and false, and confounds them for the amusement of his audience. He indulges in bestialities so gross, that no change of times-no supposed peculiarity of ancient taste, can apologise for them, and he scorns and trifles with what other men held sacred, with a levity inconsistent with a good heart. A learned and sagacious critic has declared, that Aristophanes puts a violence on himself, and says, It was not the bent of his mind to be immoral; though, like Swift, he might not care to wade through a little nastiness, for the sake of a joke. There is no wallowing in the mud, no indecency that clings to its ground, or reluctantly gives way, “ with many a longing, lingering look behind." We are constrained to differ, in toto, from this judgment. The fine strains are not the body and general tissue of the piece, blemished or even set off by the base foil. Aristophanes is ready at all moments, and on all occasions, to drop into hideous, indescribable, impious indecency. The modern book, which should only intimate his sins but for the sake of condemning them, would never be admitted into honest circulation. The modern scholar, who should dare to make a vernacular translation of the Lysistrata, would never be able to hold up his head in good company; and the printer, who should publish it, would be hunted down by the law. We are aware of the state of Athenian society. It was very different (heaven be praised) from our own. On looking into their classical authors of all departments, there is a certain tinge of grossness in them, which is not wicked; but appears to have had its origin in a general want of delicacy, and is to our minds far less offensive and pernicious, than the detestable inclination of Gibbon, on all occasions, to clothe indecent pleasantry in decent words. But this is all, we do not find, in the classical writings of the Greeks, the proofs of a state of manners, which furnish us any apology for the insane. filthiness of Aristophanes. Homer, with the exception of a few broad phrases, which evidently are what the obscenity of Aristophanes evidently is not, the style of a rude and simple age, is highly pure; and yet the Odyssey, which carried the poet through so many scenes of private and domestic life, would have furnished abundant occasion for the opposite quality, had the taste of the times required it. It may be excepted to this example, that between the age of Homer and that of the Athenian democracy, the female character underwent an