The scholiast says that “Æschylus won the prize in the archonship of Menon, with _Phineus_, _Persæ_, _Glaucus of Potniæ_ and _Prometheus_”.[217] This tetralogy seems (to judge from the titles and the fragments) to have been a collection of plays which had no relation of subject-matter. Interesting to the historian as the only extant tragedy dealing with a contemporary subject, the _Persæ_ also wins the highest admiration as a piece of literature not unworthy of its theme. The muscular and majestic diction of the speeches, the noble sweep of the lyrics, the colossal dignity of the characters, the picturesqueness and vigour which make the story of Salamis one of the greatest passages even in Æschylus—these are characteristics of the poet which the _Supplices_ presents only in germ. But the noblest feature of the whole is the manner in which Æschylus has faced his chief obstacle. To dramatize the heroic spirit and overwhelming success of Athens in the presence of Athenians—was this an easy task? Nothing could be more cloying at the moment, more thin and unsatisfying to the after-reflection. Æschylus rises clear above all this. First, he places the scene not in Athens, but before the gates of the palace at Susa; that dignity which elsewhere in Greek tragedy is secured by remoteness in time, is here obtained by remoteness in space.[218] The whole incident is held at arm’s length that it may be viewed with soberness, and as a whole in perspective. Next, it has often been observed that on the one hand he chronicles a host of Asiatic nobles while on the other not a single Greek—not even Themistocles—is named. Both these facts spring from the same source. Æschylus, it cannot be repeated too often, was a deeply religious man. When he takes it in hand to dramatize an event of recent history his instinct impels him, just as infallibly as if he were writing of Heracles or Prometheus, to describe occurrences not in the language of politics or of tactics, but of theology. Athens has been but the instrument of Heaven; Persia has fallen, not through the brawn of oarsmen or the skill of captains, but through the blasphemous infatuation of her prince and the wrath of God following thereupon. O God, thy arm was here; And not to us, but to thy arm alone, Ascribe we all! When, without stratagem, But in plain shock and even play of battle, Was ever known so great and little loss On one part and on th’ other? Take it, God, For it is none but thine![219]