The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1927-12-19

TN a fragment remaining from
i Heracles the Euripidean protes
rises again:
Say not there be adultererS In
heaven,
Nor prisoner gods and Jailers; long
ago
My heart hath named it vile and
and shall not alter;
Nor one god master nor another
thrall.
God, if he be God, lacketh
naught. All these
Are dead unhappy tales Of min
strelsy."
And in another fragment complet,
negatiop gets the upper hand:
Doth some one say that there be
gods above?
There are not; no there are not.
Let no fool,
Led by the old false fable, thus
deceive you.
Look at the facts themselves,
yielding my words
No undue credence; for I say that
kings
Kill, rob, break oaths, lay cities
waste by fraud,
And doing thus are happier than
those
Who live calm, pious lives day aft
er day.
How many little states that serve
the gods
Are subject, to the goddess but
more strong,
Made slaves by might Of a Supe-
rior army"
He laughs bitterly at the Kafma
the inevitable Justice, that com
forted Aeschylus:-
These words that thou wilt
praise,
The Equal and the justin all
mems ways
I have not found theml These be
names, not things"
The good are not rewarded in hi:
plays; everybody suffers; and nearl,
all his dramas end in broodinl
despair, a fatalism without hope:-
Great treasure halls hath zeus
in heaven,
From whence to man strange
doons be given,
Past hope or fear.
And the end men looked for
cometh not,
And a path there is where no man
I thought:
So hath it fallen here"
q q
THE LAST PLAY
CEHIND this growing darkness O
- the later plays lay domeSti,
tragedy and the advancing terror O
the war. His countrymen spoke O
EuripideS as morose and solitar!
sceptic; his friends observed tina
"even at his wine he was not gay.
Study the bust OF him in the Brit.
ish Museum; 1t Is a noble face, bu
furrowed with doubt and suffering
OF him at least EccelesiasteS' bite,
words came true:-"In much wisdom
is much grief; and he that in.
creaseth knowledge increaseth sor.
row."
He had poor luck with marriage
for marriage was not made for
geniuseS. Hume writes, little unre-
liably:-"I have somewhere reaC
that the republic Of Athens, having
lost many Of its citizens by war anC
pestilence, allowed every man tx
marry two wives, in order the sooner
to repair the waste which had beer
made by these calamities.
The poet Euripides happened Il
be coupled to noisy vixens, who Sc
plagued him with their jealousies
and quarrels that he became evel
after professed woman hater." The
number 1.-TWO" is an unnecessary ex-
aggeration; polygamy is not indis.
pensable to marital happiness.
Story also has it that his wife
after living with him fifty years
became his enemy, and joined the
crowd that thought Euripides
should be, ashamed to be right
when his country was wrong.
In one Of his plays EuripideS
predicting failure, had pleaded
against sending an Athenian feet
to attack the city Of Syracuse; the
fleet had gone nevertheless and had
suffered complete catastrophe.
Nothing is so perilous for q
prophet Of Ill as the fulhllment of
his prophecy: the event proves his
completely.
So : the greatest of ancient
dramatistS, bent with the weight
Of three Score years and twelve.
went into voluntary exile to spend
his last days at the court Of