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TO THE MEMORY OF

ARTHUR AMSON,

(BORN IN MISSOURI, JULY 1, 1855; DIED AT LEIPZIG, JULY 7, 1875)

WHOSE EARLY LOSS NO FUTURE EARTHLY GAIN

CAN EVER MAKE GOOD TO ME,

I DEDICATE

THESE FEW GLEANINGS FROM THE FIELD IN WHICH

HE WAS SO EAGER AND SO WELL FITTED

TO BE A REAPER, AS A SMALL

TRIBUTE OF AN AFFECTION IN WHICH TIME

HAS NO INHERITANCE.

a 3

Upon a broken tombstone of the Prime,

When youths, who loved the gods, were loved again And rapt from sight, two human forms remain. One, shrunk with years and hoary with their rime, Gropes for the hand of one who sits sublime

And, calm in large-limbed youth, prepares to drain
The cup
of endless life. In vain in vain !
He cannot reach beyond the screen of time.
So, Arthur, as our human years go by,

I stand and blindly grope for thy dear hand,
And listen for a whisper from thy tongue.
In vain! in vain! I only hear Love cry:
"He feasts with gods upon the eternal strand;

For they in whom the gods delight die young."

PREFACE.

THE following essays, with the exception of a portion of the third, were written last summer at Domodossola, with no other aid than that afforded by a portion of my own library which I had brought hither with me. The first three are archæological, and have a certain connection, the second and third being developments of points that came up in connection with the first; the fourth is hermeneutical, and stands by itself.

Of the four essays, the first is at once the most important and the most likely to encounter hostile criticism. I cannot and do not expect that, running, as it does, in the teeth of so much inveterate prejudice, it will escape severe treatment. Nor do I wish that it should. On the contrary, I shall be beyond measure pleased to see it refuted, in whatever spirit, from the first page to the last, provided only this refutation proceed upon a basis of facts and ancient testimonies, and not upon one of modern assumptions and authorities. For these I have ex

tremely little regard, being convinced that we are only just beginning to comprehend the spirit and principles of Greek art, and are, therefore, in no position to deal authoritatively with it.

The results arrived at in the second and third essays are not so important in themselves as they are in their bearing upon other things.

The fourth essay is an attempt to find some rational meaning and purpose in a play that has been very much admired, and, as it seems to me, very little understood. I shall, no doubt, be charged with having degraded it and brought the characters, especially Oidipous, down to the level of very ordinary men and women. If it is I who have done so, it is a grievous fault, and grievously ought I to answer for it; but if Sophoklês has done so, and I have merely shown that he has, then I ought to be acquitted. And, after all, I do not see that a play is any worse because the artist has had skill enough to lay bare in it the tragedies that lie concealed in the characters of ordinary men and women, or that a weak, sentimental, well-meaning despot, a prosaic, strong-minded, robust woman, and a Jesuitical churchwarden are not interesting enough and tragical enough to be placed on the stage. Such people seem to me far more instructive studies than any number of fictitious demigods and heroes, however melodramatic their actions and fate may be. In any case, if I have wronged Oidipous, he is sure to find plenty of defenders in these sentimental days of ours.