essary,
more especially with a view to judge correctly the influence of these
comedies on the life of the Roman people, to point out the abyss which
yawned beneath all that polish and elegance. The coarsenesses and
obscenities, which Menander indeed in some measure avoided, but of
which there is no lack in the other poets, are the least part of the
evil. Features far worse are, the dreadful desolation of life in
which the only oases are lovemaking and intoxication; the fearfully
prosaic atmosphere, in which anything resembling enthusiasm is to be
found only among the sharpers whose heads have been turned by their
own swindling, and who prosecute the trade of cheating with some sort
of zeal; and above all that immoral morality, with which the pieces of
Menander in particular are garnished. Vice is chastised, virtue is
rewarded, and any peccadilloes are covered by conversion at or after
marriage. There are pieces, such as the -Trinummus- of Plautus and
several of Terence, in which all the characters down to the slaves
possess some admixture of virtue; all swarm with honest men who allow
deception on their behalf, with maidenly virtue wherever possible,
with lovers equally favoured and making love in company; moral
commonplaces and well-turned ethical maxims abound. A finale of
reconciliation such as that of the -Bacchides-, where the swindling
sons and the swindled fathers by way of a good winding up all go to
carouse together in the brothel, presents a corruption of morals
thoroughly worthy of Kotzebue.

Roman Comedy
Its Hellenism a Necessary Result of the Law

Such were the foundations, and such the elements which shaped the
growth, of Roman comedy. Originality was in its case excluded not
merely by want of aesthetic freedom, but in the first instance,
probably, by its subjection to police control. Among the considerable
number of Latin comedies of this sort which are known to us, there is
not one that did not announce itself as an imitation of a definite
Greek model; the title was only complete when the names of the Greek
piece and of its author were also given, and if, as occasionally
happened, the "novelty" of a piece was disputed, the question was
merely whether it had been previously translated. Comedy laid the
scene of its plot abroad not only frequently, but regularly and under
the pressure of necessity; and that species of art derived its special
name (-fabula palliata-) from the fact, that the scene