The Male Characteristics Of Euripides by
Professor E M Blaiklock MA
SONS OF ERECHTHEUS
Continuing from page 57
And so, too, her own bear record: Ever of old she chooseth this our land,
To help the helpless ones in justice' cause.
So hath she borne for friends unnumbered toils.
Now see I this new struggle looming nigh.
(Heracl. 176-178, 329-332. Way)
Such an attitude is based on truest piety:
God's suppliants, stranger, must we reverence,
And not with hands of violence tear them hence,
From this place where the Holy Presence is:
The majesty of Justice shall not suffer this.
.....………..,……………………….
Zeus champions me; I tread fear down:
Zeus' favour is my right, my crown.
.……………………………………….
In justice, my land, thy path lieth:
This thy crown yield to none,
That thou fearest the Gods: who denieth,
Into madness hath run.
Lo, what sign is revealed for a token, How the pride of wrong-doers is broken
Evermore, how to-day hath God spoken,
How the voice of Omnipotence crieth
In the deeds he hath done!'
(Heracl. 101-104; 766, 767; 901-909.. Way)
Athens is, in short,
throughout the play, held forth as the Education of Hellas, the embodiment of a higher wisdom and a higher piety. Demophon might have been Euripides himself, or Pericles, simplified to form a mouthpiece for the best political ideals of the age. He stands in contrast with the crude Argive herald so contemptuous of finer scruples, he stands in contrast with Alcmena, so bloodthirsty in her barbarian notions of vengeance and retaliation. Does he also stand in contrast with old lolaus, who allows a maiden to pass to useless death?
It is possible that this suggestion explains the puzzling episode of Macaria's sacrifice. Demophon returns with the oracle.
He is afraid, but certain of one thing, that he, no Agamemnon, will slay no daughter of his; and of another, that he, no tyrant, will force no free Athenian to like crime. His rule is based on justice given, justice won. Euripides could hardly make it more clear, without the downright language that it was his wont in such matters to avoid, that the oracle was doing its best to prevent the performance of an act of mercy, by demanding as a prerequisite an act which offended the moral sense of an enlightened Athenian:
How? do the Gods forbid that Athens help The stranger, though she yearn with eager will?
The veiled criticism is bold. Macaria goes to her death, for it is not the Athenian's part or duty to interfere with the scruples of other peoples, but she is not heard of again. No section of the plot pivots on her noble sacrifice. She passes, a wasted life.
This, surely, is what Euripides means.
Euripides was no destructive critic, no irreverent and militant cynic. Compton Mackenzie suggests that Pericles
*a profound believer in the divine truth behind the confused phantasmagoria of myth and an aspirant after a cen-tralised authority that would guide Athens to the fulfilment of her destiny, which was to become the source of political, divine and human wisdom in Hellas? Some such conception infuses the Heracleidae. There were those who found echoes in Demophon's words of a speech they had heard in the Outer Cerameicus, the lovely burial ground just beyond the Dipylon Gate, beside the Sacred Way to Eleusis.
Addendum:
"Way's translation of the choric passage is as usual a trifle too rich. The lines have all the simplicity and sincerity of a Hebrew psalm:
O land,
thy path is in justice.
O never abandon thy fear of the Lord.
Who denieth it in thee close rideth to madness, when these signs are showing.
For behold God revealeth clear tokens. He taketh away evermore the high mind of the wicked.