Page:Aristotle s Poetics Butcher.djvu/22

 text of this edition differs from that of the last:—

vii. 6. 1451a 9. Here I keep the reading of the MSS.,. Schmidt's correction for seemed at first sight to be confirmed by the Arabic, but, as Vahlen argues (Hermeneutische Bemerkungen zu Aristoteles' Poetik, 1897), this is doubtful, and a more fundamental objection the question arises whether the correction can, after all, convey the sense intended. Can the words as emended refer to a known practice in present time, 'as is the custom on certain other occasions also,' i.e. in certain other contests, the of the law-courts being thus suggested? As to this I have always had misgivings. Further observation has convinced me that can only mean 'at some other time also,' in an indefinite past or future. With (sc. ) the reference must be to the past. This lands us in a serious difficulty, for the use of the in regulating dramatic representations is otherwise unheard of. Still it is conceivable that a report of some such old local custom had reached the ears of Aristotle, and that he introduces it in a parenthesis with the of mere hearsay.

ix. 7. 1451b 21. I accept Welcker's for . Professor Bywater is, I think, the first editor who has admitted this conjecture into the text.

xvii. 5. 1455b 22. I restore the MSS. reading, which has been given up by almost all editors, even the most conservative. Hitherto a parallel was wanting for the required