Greek Lyric Tragedy in Dramas of Swinburne 1 
Even the chorus, the usual representatives of convention and 
submission to the will of the gods, devote a whole ode to their 
injustice.” 
For the gods very subtly fashion 
Madness with sadness upon earth; 
Not knowing in any wise compassion, 
Nor holding pity any worth; 
And many things they have given and taken, 
And wrought and ruined many things; 
The firm land they have loosed and shaken, 
And sealed the sea with all her springs; 
They have wearied time with heavy burdens 
And vexed the lips of life with breath; 
This feeling of hostility to deity found in many passages of 
Atalanta is prevalent in much of Swinburne’s poetry. It was a 
note sounded often by Shelley, Byron and other early nineteenth 
century revolutionary spirits. Swinburne, however, seems to have 
derived this feeling also from his study of Greek. To him all 
gods seemed to be Olympian. As Mr. Woodberry says :** 
The classical immersion of his mind had made clean work of all Christian 
symbolism; it had swept it away, and in its place came, for imaginative 
purposes, the Greek forms of old divinity and myth, but less as idols of 
hope than idols of memory. 
So this feeling of hostility to deity seems not out of place in 
these classical dramas. As mentioned in discussing the chorus, 
“The Injustice of the Gods,” there are passages in some of the 
plays of Euripides that show the same spirit. In both poets the 
main criticism of deity is that man is piteous, while deity is 
pitiless. 
In Erechtheus the prominent dramatic motive is submission to 
deity. This is the motive of all the leading characters of the 
play. The king, submissive to the will of the gods, is ready at 
any sacrifice to do his duty to his city and his countrymen.” 
50 [bid., p. 285. 
51 Swinburne, p. 43. 
52 Frechtheus, p. 343. Cf. Sophocles, Antigone, ll. 450-470. 
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