Page:History of the Literature of Ancient Greece (Müller) 2ed.djvu/372

350 350 HISTORY OF THE the very person whom Ajax had hated most bitterly, comes forward on the side of Teucer, openly and distinctly acknowledging the excellences of the deceased warrior.* And thus Ajax, the noble hero, whom the Athenians too honoured as a hero of their race,f appears as a striking example of the divine Nemesis, and the more so as his heroism was altogether spotless in every other respect. § 10. In the Philoctetes, which was not represented till Olymp. 92. 3. B. c. 439, when the poet was eighty-five years old, Sophocles had to emulate not only iEschylus, but also Euripides, who had before this time endeavoured to impart novelty to the legend by making great alterations in it, and adding some very strange contrivances of his own. J Sophocles needed no such means to give a peculiar interest to the subject as treated by himself. He lays the chief stress on a skilful outline and consistent filling up of the characters ; it is the object of his drama to depict the results of these characters in the natural, and, to a certain extent, necessary developement of their peculiarities. In this piece, however, this psychological developement, starting from an hy- pothesis selected in the first instance and proceeding in accordance with it, leads to results entirely different from those contained in the original legend. In order to avoid this contest between his art and the old mythological story, Sophocles has been obliged for once to avail himself of a resource which he elsewhere despises, though it is fre- quently employed by Euripides, namely, the Deus ex machina, as it is called, i. e. the intervention of some deity, whose sudden appearance puts an end to the play of passions and projects among the persons whose actions are represented, and, as it were, cuts the Gordian knot with the sword. Sophocles having assumed that Ulysses has associated with himself the young hero Neoptolemus, in order to bring to Troy Philoctetes, or his weapons, we have from the beginning of the piece an interesting con- trast between the two heroes thus united for a common object. Ulysses violent change in the direction of the piece (k iU to havriov ruv vrgarroftsvav ftirafZoXri, Aristot. Poet. 11); the death of Ajax, on the other hand, lay quite in the direction which the drama had taken from the very beginning. + It is worthy of remark that he speaks only of the sword of Eurysaces, and not of Philaeus, from whom the family of Miltiades and Cimon derived their descent. Sophocles manifestly avoids the appearance of paying intentional homage to dis- tinguished families. Euripides had feigned that the Trojans also sent an embassy to Philoctetes and offered him the sovereignty in return for his aid, in order (as Dio Chrysostom remarks. Oral. 52. p. 549) to give himself an opportunity of introducing the long speeches, pro and con, of which he is so fond. Ulysses, disguised as a Greek whom his countrymen before Troy had ill-used, endeavours to induce him to assist his countrymen, rather than the enemy. The proper solution of the difficulties in this piece is still very doubtful.
 * It is not till this incident that we have the Peripeteia, which was always a