exercise of their office, the actors, who had this dress, gave its name to the comedy. to the comedy. This is the fame with that called Trabeata *, from Trabea, the dress of the confuls in peace, and the generals in triumph. The fecond fpecies introduced the fenators not in great offices, but as private men; this was called Toges, from Togata. The laft fpecies was named Tabernaria, from the tunic, or the common dress of the people, or rather from the mean houfes which were painted on the scene. There is no need of mentioning the farces, which took their name and original from Atella, an ancient town of Campania in Italy, because they differed from the low comedy only by greater licentioufnefs; nor of thofe which were called Palliates, from the Greek, a cloak, in which the Greek characters were dreffed upon the Roman ftage, because that habit only diftinguished the nation, not the dignity or character, like thofe which have been mentioned before. To fay truth, thefe are but trifling diftinctions; for, as we fhall fhew in the following pages, comedy may be more usefully and judiciously distinguished, by the general nature of its fubjects. As to the Romans, whether they had, or had not, reason for thefe names, they have left us fo little upon the subject which is come down to us, that we need not trouble ourfelves with a diftinction which affords us no folid fatisfaction. Plautus and Terence, the only authors of whom we are in poffeffion, give us a fuller notion of the real nature of their comedy, with refpect at leaft to their own times, than

Suet. de Claris Grammat, fays, that C. Geliffus, librarian to Auguftus, was the author of it.

can

can be received from names and terms, from which we have no real exemplification.

The Greek

CO

medy is reduced only to Arifto

phanes.

VII. Not to go too far out of our way, let us return to Aristophanes, the only poet in whom we can now find the Greek comedy. He is the fingle writer, whom the violence of time has in fome degree fpared, after having buried in darknefs, and almost in forgetfulness, fo many great men, of whom we have nothing but the names and a few fragments, and fuch flight memorials as are scarcely fufficient to defend them against the enemies of the honour of antiquity; yet these memorials are like the last glimmer of the fetting fun, which fcarce affords us a weak and fading light: yet from this glimmer we must endeavour to collect rays of fufficient ftrength to form a picture of the Greek comedy approaching as near as poffible to the truth.

Of the perfonal character of Aristophanes little is known; what account we can give of it muft therefore be had from his comedies. It can fcarcely be faid with certainty of what country he was: the invectives of his enemies fo often called in question his qualification as a citizen, that they have made it doubtful. Some faid, he was of Rhodes, others of Egena, a little island in the neighbourhood, and all agreed that he was a stranger. As to himself, he said that he was the fon of Philip, and born in the Cydathenian quarter; but he confeffed that fome of his fortune was in Egena, which was probably the original feat of his family. He was, however, formally declared a citizen of Athens, upon evidence, whether good or bad, upon a decifive judgment, and this for

3

having

having made his judges merry by an application of a faying of Telemachus*, of which this is the sense: "I am, as my mother tells me, the fon of Philip;

for my own part, I know little of the matter, for "what child knows his own father?" This piece of merriment did him as much good, as Archias received from the oration of Cicero †, who faid that that poet was a Roman citizen. An honour which, if he had not inherited by birth, he deserved for his genius.

Ariftophanes flourished in the age of the great men of Greece, particularly of Socrates and Euripides, both of which he outlived. He made a great figure during the whole Peloponnefian war, not merely as a comic poet by whom the people were diverted, but as the cenfor of the government, as a man kept in pay by the state to reform it, and almost to act the part of the arbitrator of the public. A particular account of his comedies will beft let us into his perfonal character as a poet, and into the nature of his genius, which is what we are most interested to know. It will, however, not be amifs to prepoffefs our readers a little by the judgments that had been paffed upon him by the critics of our own time, without forgetting one of the ancients that deferves great respect.

Ariftophanes cenfured and

praised.

pin,

VIII. "Ariftophanes," fays father Ra

"is not exact in the contrivance "of his fables; his fictions are not

probable; he brings real characters upon the stage "too coarsely and too openly. Socrates, whom he

Homer, Odyfey.

f Orat. pro Archia Poeta.

In the 85th year of the Olympiad, 437 before our Æra, and 317 of the foundation of Rome.

VOL. III.

C

ridicules

"ridicules fo much in his plays, had a more delicate "turn of burlefque than himself, and had his merri"ment without his impudence. It is true, that Arif "tophanes wrote amidft the confufion and licentiouf"nefs of the old comedy, and he was well acquainted "with the humour of the Athenians, to whom un"common merit always gave difguft, and therefore "he made the eminent men of his time the fubject "of his merriment. But the too great defire which "he had to delight the people by expofing worthy "characters upon the ftage, made him at the fame "time an unworthy man; and the turn of his genius "to ridicule was disfigured and corrupted by the in"delicacy and outrageoufnefs of his manners. After "all, his pleasantry confifts chiefly in new-coined

puffy language. The difh of twenty-fix fyllables, "which he gives in his last scene of his Female Ora"tors, would please few taftes in our days. His lan

guage is fometimes obfcure, perplexed and vulgar, "and his frequent play with words, his oppofitions "of contradictory terms, his mixture of tragic and "comic, of ferious and burlefque, are all flat; and "his jocularity, if you examine it to the bottom, is "all falfe. Menander is diverting in a more elegant cc manner; his style is pure, clear, elevated, and na"tural; he perfuades like an orator, and instructs "like a philofopher; and if we may venture to

judge upon the fragments which remain, it appears "that his pictures of civil life are pleafing, that he "makes every one fpeak according to his character, "that every man may apply his pictures of life to "himself, because he always follows nature, and feels "for the perfonages which he brings upon the stage.

"To conclude, Plutarch, in his comparison of these "authors, fays, that the Muse of Ariftophanes is an "abandoned prostitute, and that of Menander a modeft "woman."

It is evident that this whole character is taken from Plutarch. Let us now go on with this remark of father Rapin, fince we have already fpoken of the Latin comedy, of which he gives us a description.

"With respect to the two Latin comic poets, Plau"tus is ingenious in his defigns, happy in his concep❝tions, and fruitful of invention. He has, however, "according to Horace, fome low jocularities, and "thofe fmart fayings, which made the vulgar laugh, "made him be pitied by men of higher tafte. It is "true, that fome of his jefts are extremely good, but "others likewife are very bad. To this every man is expofed, who is too much determined to make fallies of merriment; they endeavour to raise that laughter by hyperboles, which would not arife by "a just representation of things. Plautus is not quite "fo regular as Terence in the fcheme of his designs, "or in the diftribution of his acts, but he is more

<

fimple in his plot; for the fables of Terence are "commonly complex, as may be feen in his Andrea, " which contains two amours. It was imputed as a "fault to Terence, that, to bring more action upon "the stage, he made one Latin comedy out of two "Greek; but then Terence unravels his plot more na

turally than Plautus, which Plautus did more na

turally than Aristophanes; and though Cafar calls "Terence but one half of Menander, because, though "he had foftnefs and delicacy, there was in him "fome want of sprightlinefs and ftrength; yet he has