The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1927-12-17
-- THE STORY OF CIVILIZATION ---
Myth-LOUing Greeks Become ReqliStS
Written for The Times By VIII Duramt


Subtly poisoned robe, and when the
princess puts it on she is consumed
in fire. Creon, trying to rescue her,
Is burned toi death.
Then Medea, driven to that in
sanity in which love and hate are
one, embraces the two children she
has borne to Jason, kills them and
drives of with their dead bodies
before Jason's eyes.
The Sceptic
DACK of this dark philosophy is
- a doubt that reaches to the very
foundations of life.
1t begins as Scepticism of myth
ology, resolved to expose the legends
Of Greece in all their brutality and
absurdity
Euripities delights to tell a myth
so literally that its incredibility
leaps to the eye; he spares no de-
tails Of horror to show the barbaric
nature of these tales. And with
persistent subtlety he suggests a ra-
tionalistic Interpretation of every
apparent Intervention of the gods.
In Alcestis we have a miracle
analysed by nuance.
Legend told how the fates or fu-
rieS had decreed the death of Ad-
metus, King of Pherae; how Apol-
10 had prevailed upon them to ac-
cept a substitute; how when no one
else seemed anxious to be sacrificed,
AcestiS, Admetus' wife, consented
to die in his place, and how the god
Heracles (Hercules) had come and
raised her from the dead. How does
EuripideS retell the tale?
He sees it first of all as a COM
edy; here is a husband glad to get
rid of his wife, and burying her
within a few hours Of her death
with proteStations of his love.
And here is fat Hercules, the
strong man, coming to visit his old
friend Admetus, establishing him
self firstS in the kitchen, gorging
himself with food and drink, and
rising to ecstasies of intoxication.
The servants think he is high
wayman:--
Some fellow ripe for wickedness,
Robber or pirate"
When --ercules learns that the
wife of his friend is dead he falls
into a rage and (too stupid to
understand AdmetuS' happiness)
rushes off to snatch her from the
grave.
He meets Death (personified as
terrible person.. argues and brow
beats him into relinquishing Alcestis
and brings her home triumphantly,
to AdmetuS' dismay.
The lady, Euripides suggests, was
never dead, and miracles are moth
ing very wonderful when you find
them out.
This suavely indirect method of
undermining superstition is used to
fine effect in one of Euripides' mas
terpieces, 1.-THE Hippolytus."
The play is named for hand
some lad who lives the open-air ca
reer of hunter, scorning women
and domesticity.
Aphrodite, goddess If love. does
not relish such neglect and VOWS
vengeance on the youth. Through
her divine influence Phaedra, wife
Of Theseus, falls in love with Hip
polytus, who is Theseus' natural
son.
But Hippolytus repuIses her, and
she dies of passion unfulfilled, while
her nurse utters lines that might
have come from Hamlet:
"Yet all mans life is but ailing and
dim,
And rest upon the earth comes
never,
But if any far-off state there be
Bearer than life to mortality,
The hand of the Dark hath hold
thereof,
And mist is under and mist above,
And so we are sick for life, and
cling
On earth to this nameless and
shining thing.
For other life is a fountain sealed,
And the deeps below us arc UNI
revealed,
And we drift on legends forever"
Theseus finds in his dead wife'S
hand a note accusing Hippolytus Of
Seducirlg her. ;
The unhappy father calls upon
the gods to slay his son; and Posei-
don, hearing him, sends sea lion
out Of the waves to oyerturn Hip
polytus' chariot and feighten his