Livingstone, On the Ancient Greek Literature

Page 13

The contrast with the usual English manner may be illustrated by quoting a famous epigram—Ben Jonson's epitaph on a boy actor:

Weep with me, all you that read This little story; And know, for whom a tear you shed, Death's self is sorry.

'Twas a child that so did thrive In grace and feature, As heaven and nature seemed to strive Which owned the creature.

Years he numbered scarce thirteen When Fates turned cruel, Yet three filled zodiacs had he been The stage's jewel;

And did act (what now we moan) Old men so duly, As sooth the Parcae thought him one, He played so truly.

So, by error, to his fate They all consented; But, viewing him since, alas, too late! They have repented.

These lines—and they are not the whole of the poem—are enough to illustrate the difference between the Greek method and the English, the latter rich and profuse, following the flow of an opulent fancy, the former reticent and restrained, leaving the reader's imagination room and need to play its part. There are materials for half-a-dozen epigrams in Ben Jonson's poem. Had he been Simonides or Plato, he would have stopped after the fourth line and, in the opinion of some critics, by saving his paper he would have improved his poem.

In their theory and in their practice the Greek writers were true to this principle of Economy. Their proverbs proclaim it 'the half is greater than the whole': 'sow with the hand and not with the whole sack.' The great passages of their literature illustrate it. It is to be found no less in Thucydides' account of the siege of Syracuse and in the close of the Phaedo or the Republic than in the death of Hector or the meeting of Priam and Achilles. The Greek writers may have emotions that would seem to demand vehement and extended expression, topics to inspire a poet and tempt him to amplify them; but resisting the temptation they set the facts down quietly and pass on practically without comment. The close of the Phaedo exemplifies this restraint. Plato has just related with severe economy of detail the death of his master. His comment on the event which saddened and confounded his whole life is but this: 'Such, Echecrates, was the death of our friend, the best man, I think, that I have ever known, the wisest too and the most just.'[114]

[114] Phaedo, 118 B.

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R. W. Livingstone
On the Ancient Greek Literature

Learned Freeware

R. W. Livingstone On the Ancient Greek Literature

Learned Freeware

R. W. Livingstone
On the Ancient Greek Literature