From what has now been said it is plain that the function of a poet is this, to tell not the things that have happened, but such things as may happen, things possible as being probable or necessary. The historian and the poet differ not by writing in verse or in prose. The work of Herodotus might be put into verse, and none the less it would be history, with verse or without. No, the difference is in this, that the one tells the things that have happened; the other, such things as may happen.[27] Consistency of plot, consistency of characterization also, as Aristotle goes on to show, imply that the poet interprets. He is not merely a recorder. The acts (πράγματα) of his _personæ_ are not statistics; they are parts of the consistent presentation of a single whole. Every one of them, quite differently from the acts of real life, is seen to be significant. In thus including the significant and excluding the insignificant, the poet interprets according to his conception of the springs of action. He simplifies life according to his view of causes and motives, “according to probability or necessity.” In this the poet differs from the historian more generally. Tragedy is true to life not by rehearsing what men have done, but by revealing in significant action what men do, what they must do, being the men that the dramatist shows them to be. History records a man’s deeds, and reasons from this evidence; drama directly represents the doer doing what he should do “according to probability or necessity.” Plot, then, implies actions shaped to a unifying consistency. It imitates life: but it imitates by creative interpretation. Therefore poetry is something more philosophical and more serious than history; for poetry speaks rather in universals, history in singulars. By universal I mean what such or such a man will say or do according to probability or necessity.... It is evident from these considerations that the _poet_ must be rather a _poet_ of plots than of verses. He is a _poet_ by virtue of imitation; and what he imitates are actions. Even if he chance to _make_[28] history, none the less for that is he a _poet_; for nothing hinders some historical events from being just what they should be according to probability or possibility, and it is [only] in that aspect of them that he is their _poet_.[29] That dramatic composition is thus primarily the devising of a convincing sequence is seen conversely when the sequence is defective.