as an express contempt of the religion and sanctity of an oath,
that tended to banish all sincerity and good faith from society and the
intercourse of life.

Another maxim(187) advanced by Eteocles in the tragedy called the
_Phoenicians_, and which Caesar had always in his mouth, is no less
pernicious: "If justice may be violated at all, it is when a throne is in
question; in other respects, let it be duly revered." It is highly
criminal in Eteocles, or rather in Euripides, says Cicero, to make an
exception in that very point, wherein such violation is the highest crime
that can be committed. Eteocles is a tyrant, and speaks like a tyrant, who
vindicates his unjust conduct by a false maxim; and it is not strange that
Caesar, who was a tyrant by nature, and equally unjust, should lay great
stress upon the sentiments of a prince whom he so much resembled. But what
is remarkable in Cicero, is his falling upon the poet himself, and
imputing to him as a crime the having advanced so pernicious a principle
upon the stage.

Lycurgus, the orator,(188) who lived in the time of Philip and Alexander
the Great, to reanimate the spirit of the tragic poets, caused three
statues of brass to be erected, in the name of the people, to AEschylus,
Sophocles, and Euripides; and having ordered their works to be
transcribed, he appointed them to be carefully preserved amongst the
public archives, from whence they were taken from time to time to be read;
the players not being permitted to represent them on the stage.

The reader expects, no doubt, after what has been said relating to the
three poets, who invented, improved, and carried tragedy to its
perfection, that I should point out the peculiar excellencies of their
style and character. For that I must refer to father Brumoi, who will do
it much better than it is in my power. After having laid down, as an
undoubted principle, that the epic poem, that is to say Homer, pointed out
the way for the tragic poets; and having demonstrated, by reflections
drawn from human nature, upon what principles and by what degrees this
happy imitation was conducted to its end, he goes on to describe the three
poets above mentioned, in the most lively and brilliant colours.

Tragedy took at first from AEschylus its inventor, a much more lofty style
than the _Iliad_; that is, the _magnum loqui_ mentioned by Horace. Perhaps
AEschylus, who had a full conception of the grandeur of the language of
tragedy, carri