followed the victory of Apollo over Python. Some years after this, came
Susarion of Megara, the first inventor of comedy who appeared at the
head of a company of actors attacking the vices of his time. This was
562 years before Christ, and in twenty-six years after, that is 536
before Christ, appeared Thespis.

THESPIS has the credit of being the first inventor of regular tragedy.
Disgusted with the nonsensical trash exhibited on the subject of
Bacchus, and indignant, or pretending to be so, at the insult offered by
such representations to that deity, he wrote pieces of a new kind, in
which he introduced recitation, leaving Bacchus entirely out, lashing
the vices and follies of the times, and making use, for the first time,
of fiction. Though his representations were very rustic and imperfect
they still make the first great era in the history of the tragic art:
and they must be allowed to have made no slight impression upon the
public mind, when it is remembered that they called forth the opposition
of SOLON, the great lawgiver of Athens; who, on seeing the
representations of Thespis, sternly observed, that if falsehood and
fiction were tolerated on the stage they would soon find their way into
every part of the republic. To this Thespis answered, that the fiction
could not be harmful which every one knew to be fiction; that being
avowed and understood, it lost its vicious character, and that if
Solon's argument were true, the works of Homer deserved to be burned.
Solon, however, exercised his authority upon the occasion, and
interdicted Thespis not only from writing but from teaching the art of
composing tragedies at Athens. Whether Thespis was supported by the
people in contradiction to Solon, or whether he contrived to follow his
business in some other part of Attica, out of the jurisdiction of that
great man, is not known; but he certainly disregarded the interdict, and
not only wrote tragedies, but instructed others in their composition.
For Phrynicus, the tragic poet of Athens, (the first who introduced a
female character on the stage) was his disciple.

In less than half a century after Thespis had, by his ingenuity, so
improved the dramatic art as to form an era in its history, arose the
illustrious personage, whose further improvements and astonishing
poetical talents justly obtained for him the high distinction of "The
Father of Tragedy." AEschylus, in common with all the natives of Attica,
was bred to arms.