oice of Euripides has interposed between the Athenians and their
doom.[51] When AEgos Potamos had been fought, and Athens was in Spartan
hands, Euthykles flung the "choric flower" of the "Electra" in the face
of the foe, and

"... because Greeks are Greeks, though Sparte's brood,
And hearts are hearts, though in Lusandros' breast,
And poetry is power,...." (p. 253.)

the city itself was spared. But when tragedy ceased, comedy was allowed
its work, and it danced away the Piraean bulwarks, which were demolished,
by Lysander's command, to the sound of the flute.

And now Euthykles and Balaustion are nearing Rhodes. Their master lies
buried in the land to which they have bidden farewell; but the winds and
waves of their island home bear witness to his immortality: for theirs
seems the voice of nature, re-echoing the cry, "There are no gods, no
gods!" his prophetic, if unconscious, tribute to the One God, "who
saves" him.

Balaustion has no genuine historic personality. She is simply what Mr.
Browning's purpose required: a large-souled woman, who could be supposed
to echo his appreciation of these two opposite forms of genius, and
express his judgments upon them. But the Euripides she depicts is
entirely constructed from his works; while her portrait of Aristophanes
shows him not only as his works reflect, but as contemporary criticism
represented him; he is one of the most vivid of Mr. Browning's
characters. The two transcripts from Euripides seem enough to prove that
that poet was far more human than Aristophanes professed to think; but
the belief of Aristophanes in the practical asceticism of his rival was
in some degree justified by popular opinion, if not in itself just; and
we can understand his feeling at once rebuked and irritated by a
contempt for the natural life which carried with it so much religious
and social change. Aristophanes was a believer in the value of
conservative ideas, though not himself a slave to them. He was also a
great poet, though often very false to his poetic self. Such a man might
easily fancy that one like Euripides was untrue to the poetry, because
untrue to the joyousness of existence; and that he shook even the
foundations of morality by reasoning away the religious conceptions
which were bound up with natural joys. The impression we receive from
Aristophanes' Apology is that he is defending something which he
believes to be true, though