Comedy, again, arose about 580 B,C with Susaricm, who traveled about through Greece, ridiculing, from a small movable stage, the follies and vices of his time. Tragedy, from its first recognition, was deemed worthy, by reason of its superior gravity and staidness, to entertain the refined inhabitants of cities; while comedy; at the outset, from its riotous fun and, jollity, was _judged more in harmony with the rustic habits of the country people: In time, comedy made its way into the city, end Epi charmus (485 B.C.), besides modeling this form of dramatic wit, after its more successful rival, tragedy, likewise introduced a number of distinguished comedians to the notice of the Athenians. Phormes, Magnes, Crates, Cratinus, Eupolis, Pherecrates, and Aristoph anes are the highest names in connection with the old Greek comedy, the last mentioned being, however, by far the greatest. Tragedy, both from its ideal character, and from the stately cothurims and long masks in the actors of it appeared, aimed at a representation of what was dignified, noble, and grand in human nature. Comedy, again, from its style of caricature, its low-heeled sock, and its grotesque masks, tried to degrade lnimanity beneath its natural level. Comedy, during the Greek period of its history, divides itself into three forms, viz.: old comedy, middle comedy, and new comedy. The old comedy is the directly opposite of tragedy; its form is essentially sportive, and a seeming aimlessness reigns throughout it. It is, in the opinion of A. von Schlegel (Lectures on Dramatic Literature), the only genuine poetic species of comedy, while the other forms of it show a tendency to decline into prose and matter of fact. In the new comedy, again, the form is rather serious than otherwise, and it is regularly tied down to the accomplishment of a certain aim. This is what is under stood by comedy at the present day. It is a mixture of tragedy and comedy proper, of earnestness and mirth. Only fragments of Menander and of Philemon, the genuinely witty poets of the new comedy, have come down to us. The middle comedy, again, which came in between the old and the new, arose after the termination of the Pelopon nesian war. The new oligarchy strictly prohibited the introduction of living persons by name on the stage; and the chorus, till then the chief instrument of vituperation, is said to have been abolished.
With 2Eschylus, Greek tragedy properly begins. He instructed his actors himself in the rehearsal of his pieces. In his dramatic compositions he aimed more at sublimity than beauty, more at the heroic than the human. Sophocles, again, who was, per haps, superior to 2Eschylus in his appreciation of human nature, strove more to depict idealized men than to paint heroic excellence. He introduced a third actor on the scene, and materially improved the mechanism of the stage. Euripides was too much of a nice speculator to attain to the highest forms of poetic expression. Instead of quietly contemplating life as Sophocles did, he seems to have been morose and peevish; but in point of moral denunciation, no dramatist surpasses him. With these three great poets, Greek tragedy may be said to close. With them it ceased to be the tragedy which Aristotle has described in his celebrated definition of it. " Tragedy," he says (Poetics, 6), "is the imitation of some action that is serious, entire, and of a proper magnitude; effecting, through pity and terror, the refinement of these and similar affec tions of the soul." In the hands of the subsequent authors this form of the D. grew lax knd effeminate, and in the 'performances of Theodectes especially, tragedy was made to give way to rhetoric. (See the works of Bfickh and Weleker on the Greek tragedians; also, 11Ifiller's Literature of Ancient Greece.) The Portions were not a great dramatic people. They borrowed, according to the common account, during a period of national Occasioned by a desolating pestilence 4.u.c. 391), their first idea of a play from the Etrurians; their effusions of spOrtive humor, their Fabuke Atellance, from the (Nelms; and the higher class of dramatic compositions from the Greeks. Philology, likewise, countenances this story;' for Merio, the Latin word for a player, is pure Etruscan. No remains of any note have come down
to us Of the comic 'writers of Roine,:eXcept Plautus and Terence. The foriaer was a poor day-laborer, the latter a Carthaginian slave. The habits of each appear in their writings. Plautus ha's a degree of rough vigor and broad jocularity; born of the hand rail] and the plow, While Terence is more refined and delicate in his wit and characteri zations. Both these Writers borrowed largely fiorn the Greeks. Of the early'period of Roman tragedy no remains exist, but it is probable that its poets were merely trans lators or imitators of Greek models. The tragedians of the Augustan age Were ambi tions of rivaling the Greeks. Unfortunately, none of these grand attempts have tome down to us, except ten bornbastical and frigid dramas, that go under the name of Seneca.
Ancient art fell with pagan Rome. In the early ages of Christianity, any one con nected with the theater was not allowed baptism. The unwise zeal Of the fathers was followed bran edict of the emperor Julian to the same effect. The two .Ap011inarii, father and son, and Gregory) of Nazianzen, attempted to introduce religions plays or mysteries, drawn from the Scriptures, to amuse the Christian people during the opera tion of Julian's law. In a short While, instead of the D. proper, there was nothing to lighten up the surrounding darknes's but such productions as the saturnalian pageants, the Feast of Fools and the Feast of the ASs.
The Italians are the first people of Europe, who, after the long sleep of the true dra matic spirit in the middle ages, strove to enkindle the ancient fire upon Roman hearths that had for long year's been cold. Early in the beginaing of the 16th c,,, the'first regular modern D. was published. It was called SOphonisba, and the writer' Was h very commonplace author,-by name Trissiuo. Shortly after, this tragedian.was followed by Ariosto, by Babbiena, and by Macchiavelli, all distinguished cultivators of the classic comedy. Towards the end of the century, Giambattista de la Porta, philosopher and comic writer, exhibited a number of pieces of a familiar, and sometimes even farcical kind, but full of happy invention and agreeable originality. The political influence of Spain was now at its height on Italian territory, and the romantic D. of the west gradually found favor in Italy. Even so early as 1529, Ricchi had attempted to over throw the classic taste in Italy, but without success. It remained for Borghini, Oddi, and M. A. Buonarroti, the nephew of the great artist, and one or two other writers, to break in upon the current taste, and to do much to introduce the romantic D. in Italy. In the 17th c„ Rinuccini, by the union of music with the romantic D., suc ceeded in establishing the melodrama. Tragedy and comedy were now entirely laid aside as antiquated, and nothing but the musiea opera was heard of from Milan to Ravenna. Maffei led the way in reforming the Italian stage. The political preponder ance of Spain had now given way to that of France, which facilitated his labors not a little. His Merope is a fine attempt to restore the tragic -D. to Italy, but as Lessing says of it, in his Dramaturgic', it is rather the production of a "learned antiquary" than of a great tragic poet. The musical D. had now to be rendered classic, and this task was undertaken by Zeno and Metastasio. The latter, who has all the attractiveness for the Italians that the classic Racine has for the French, by subtle harmony and grace in his songs, by his power of painting pathetic situations, and by his melting effeminacy of manner, charmed the hot southerners as no other poet yet had done. After Goldoni, a great comic authority in Italy, and a careful student of Macchiavelli and Moliere, except Riccoboni and Gozzi his rivals, we have few dramatists of any note till we come down to last century. The bold and passionate Alfieri inaugurated a new era in Italian tragedy. He is a follower of the classic school, and a strict observer of the Aristotelic unities. His successors have relaxed more their adherence to classic forms, and have produced some very admirable dramas. Among the most estimable of those writers are Monti, Manzoni, and Niccolini.