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self points out iu an introduction "the circumscription of time, 

 wherein the whole drama begins and ends, is according to ancient 

 rule, and best example, within the space of twenty-four hours," 

 The result is a play which, however successful as an attempt to 

 show the characteristics of an ancient play, appears too stiff and 

 formal for our stage ; but Milton says he never intended it for 

 the stage : it was for the study, and by its suitability to the study 

 it must be judged. It is an action which is not to be acted, a 

 play not to be played. 



Of the poets after Milton none is so deserving of notice, in 

 respect to the matter we are discussing, as Shelley. Besides his 

 rather diffuse translation of the Cyclops of Euripides, he pro- 

 duced on the model of the Persa3 a drama entitled " Hellas," 

 referring to the attempts of the Greeks to regain their freedom. 

 In the play of iEschylus, the victory of the ancient Greeks over 

 the vast armies and fleets of the Persians is celebrated in 

 triumphant war-song ; in Shelley's " Hellas " there is the ex- 

 pression of hope for a similar success of modern Greeks over 

 the Turks. At the time the play was written the decision of the 

 contest was in suspense ; but the calamities announced by the 

 messengers, and the prognostications of the dire results which 

 were likely to follow, give an excellent representation of the 

 power with which ^schylus describes the total destruction of 

 the Persian fleet, and the unutterable hardships suffered in the 

 retreat. Objection would no doubt be taken to one matter in 

 which he has imitated the ancients : he gives to the messengers 

 and subordinate actors the same exalted style of speech as to 

 the principal speakers. Where the first object of Tragedy was 

 to represent all with dignity, as was the custom at Athens, it 

 became necessary to use the same style of language for whatever 

 classes of characters were conversing ; but our English fashion 

 is correctly to represent the style of speech of the class to which 

 the spokesman belongs, and liigh-toned poetical language for 

 unpoetical messengers seems to us much out of place. 



In another drama of Shelley's, the "Prometheus Unbound," 

 we have a sequel to the Prometheus of ^schylus. The Greek 

 play recounts the chaining of the hero to a rock for having in- 

 fringed the rights of highest Zeus : he foretells the ultimate 

 overthrow of his oppressor, and the English poet continues the 

 story of his deliverance. From the torments of " Heaven's 

 winged hound " and " the tempest- walking Furies " the Titan is 

 deUvered by the victory of Demogorgon over Jupiter. Shelley 

 does not fetter his powers by attempting to transfer to his writings 

 the images, the sentiments, and the expressions, of his original. 

 He grasps with firmness the mode of treating his subject, he 

 flings before himself, as clearly as iEschylus would, the picture 

 of the struggling hero, and he glories in the freedom achieved 



