Page:Euripides the Rationalist.djvu/30

14 Very clear indeed should be the testimony which is to overbalance such passages as these. The evidence adduced is the old evidence in favour of Admetus' hospitality, "the highest social virtue recognized by a Greek".

The hospitable man embodied for them the virtues, not only of the modern philanthropist, but also of the enlightened diplomatist: he established and maintained friendly relations with other states, gaining for his city allies, and for her people friends and protectors in foreign lands, and that in days when without such, not only was travel perilous, but, even commerce was difficult and precariousConjugal affection shrank into insignificance beside such a traitIt was his duty to his country to neglect no means of prolonging his usefulness.

The nature and merit of Admetus' hospitality, as actually exercised towards Heracles in the play, will be considered hereafter. Here we will only remark that the public benefit of his function as host would have been more clearly perceived, and the sympathy of the audience on this ground better secured, if it had obtained some notice upon the stage, if for example the gratitude of Pherae had been alleged by his friends as likely to protect him from the obloquy which he anticipates. The statements of Mr Way's paragraph have much truth as generalities about Greek life, but when we ask whether the action and character of Admetus were such as to bring him within the benefit of the doctrine, nothing explicit can be produced, nothing but "considerations which presuppose" the paramount value of his life. Surely this is unsatisfactory.

But although Mr Way, so far as I can judge, has by no means proved that an Athenian jury would have acquitted his client, he does not leave the matter where it was. In the first place he has pointed out with desirable precision what the Admetus of Euripides lacks. The paragraph above cited indicates excellently the sort of beneficence by which an Admetus might have been justified in the eyes of a Greek audience, and which Aeschylus or Sophocles would, we may presume, have made prominent. That Euripides omits to notice or provide such a trait is among the things which show either that he has ill-executed his design, or that we misconceive it. And further, as against Browning, who is cited as representing the enemies of Admetus, Mr Way assuredly has a case, though not perhaps