Evening star., 1927-12-11
The Story of Civilization


u1e knows her best9-
And will some man but take her,
+ pays a dover,
And he, poor fool, takes home the
poison flower;
/ Laughs to hang jewels on the
deadly thing
He joys IN; labors for her robe
wearing
/ Till wealth and peace are dead.
He Smarts the less
! In whose high seat is set moth
ingnCSs,
A woman naught availing Worst
Of an
The wise deep thdushted,
And VET it was this same Eurip'dcs
who provoked the taunts of ArlSto'
phanes by condemning the secluslon
Of woman IN Greece. and supporting
1.-The rebellion OF the hetairai; this same
/ Euripides who, i'm play after play,
showed the world from the standpoint
! Of suffering women.
II the HeCuha we meet the queen
/ of Troy desolate in defeat. She has
( lost her bravest son in battle with
! Achilles. now she commissions Polym.
nestor to hide and protect her younger
/ son. Polydorus, from the Greeks
/ Then the willy Odysseus comes to tell
/ her that The shade of Achilles de
mands a living victim. and that her
/ Youngest daughter. PolyXena, has
been selected for the sacrifice. She
reminds Odysseus how once she
saved his life when he was captured
as a spy within the Trojan lines; he
answers, with primitive caSuistrY
/ that therefore he owes much To her,
but nothing TO PolyXcna. PolyNena is
slain: and as she dies the news is
brought to Hccuba that polYmnestor
has murdered Polydorus. She be
comes insane with bitter rage; and
urinc Polymnestor into her chamber
she tears cut his eyes,
1t was ruthless story, but again a
story hravely told; once more it sought
! to moderate the ferocity of war by
showing the woe of the vanquished
it ridiculed the lying Odysseus, idol
! of Greek legend and Greek sophistry,
it exposed the blood-thirst of the
gods and it revealed again the suffer
/ ing with which life requites mother
hood for its continuance.
Nay. know We not?-this burden
hath always lain
On the devious being of woman;
yea, burdens twain.
The burden of viii and the bur
den of Pain.
These lines might have been the
motto of one of Euripides' greatest
plays. Medea. Nedea is the half-saV-
age daughter of the King of Colchis
where Jason has come seeking the
Golden Fleece She falls in love with
Jason. deceives C'f1eeces'0 her father
| to set the Fleece. kills her brother
when he attacks Jason, and goes back
to 1olcos as JaSon's unwedded wife.
There she wins the throne for him
by poisoning Pelias. To this point
she is woman at her worst, knowing
no commandment but love
But Jason tires of her. exhausted by
her barbGric passions; and when
Creon, King of Corinth. offers him his
daughter in marriage. he accepts.
With the moral insensitivity of an
| animal he takes Medea with him to
Corinth as his cOncubne. Her de-
spairing protest is one of the supreme
passages in Euripides:
OF all things upon earth that
bleed and grow,
A herb most bruised is woman.
We must pay
Our store of gold, boarded for
that one day,
To buy us some mans love; and
10, they bring
A master of our flesh! There
comes the sting.
Of the whole shame. And then
the jeopardy
For good or i'll, what shall that
master be.
Home never taught her that-how
best TO guide
| Toward peace the thing that
sleepeth at her side.
And she who. laboring long, shall
find some way
Whereby her lord may bear with
her. nor fray
His yoke too fiercely, blessed is
the breath
That woman draws! Else let her
pray for death
Her lord, If he be wearied of her
face
Within doors, gets him forth;
some merrier place
VIII ease his heart; but she waits
on, her whole
Vision enchained on a single soul.
And when they say tits they that
face the call
from all
Peril. False mocking! Sooner
would | stand
Three times to ace their battles,
shield in hand,
Than bear one child.
Creon comes to exile her. she begs
him for one days stay, which he
| grants; and that day suffices for her
revenge. She sends the new princess
a subtly poisoned robe; and when the
| princess puts it on she is consumed in
| fire. Creon. trying to rescue her, is
| burned to death. Then Medea, driven
| to that insanity in which love and
| hate are one, embraces the two chill
| dren she has borne to Jason, kills
| them, and drives off with their dead
| bodies before Jasons eyes.
| X X X
The Sceptic.