I. In that golden Fragment, which we have left of _Platonius_, upon the three Kinds of _Greek_ Comedy, after he has told us, that when the State of _Athens_ was alter’d from a Democracy to an Oligarchy, and that the Poets grew cautious whom they libell’d in their Comedies; when the People had no longer any Desire to choose the accustom’d Officers for furnishing _Choric_ Singers, and defraying the Expence of them, _Aristophanes_ brought on a Play in which there was no _Chorus_. For, subjoins He, τῶν γὰρ ΧΟΡΕΥΤΩΝ μὴ χειροτονουμένων, καὶ τῶν ΧΟΡΗΓΩΝ οὐκ ἐχόντων τὰς τροφὰς, ὑπεξῃρέθη τῆς Κωμῳδίας τὰ χορικὰ μέλη, καὶ τῶν ὑποθέσεων ὁ τρόπος μετεβλήθη. _“The _Chorus-Singers_ being no longer chosen by Suffrage, and the _Furnishers_ of the_ Chorus _no longer having their Maintenance, the _Choric_ Songs were taken out of Comedies, and the Nature of the Argument and Fable chang’d._” But there happen to be two signal Mistakes in this short Sentence. For the _Chorus-Singers_ were never elected by Suffrage at all, but hir’d by the proper Officer who was at the Expence of the _Chorus_: and the _Furnishers_ of the _Chorus_ had never either Table, or Stipend, allowed them, towards their Charge. To what Purpose then is this Sentence, which should be a Deduction from the Premises, and yet is none, brought in? Or how comes the Reasoning to be founded upon what was not the Fact? The Mistake manifestly arises from a careless Transposition made in the Text: Let the two _Greek_ Words, which I have distinguished by _Capitals_, only change Places, and we recover what _Platonius_ meant to infer: “That the [A]_Furnishers_ of _Chorus_’s being no longer elected by Suffrage, and the [B]_Chorus-Singers_ having no Provision made for them, _Chorus_’s were abolished, and the Subjects of Comedies alter’d.” [Footnote A: Χορηγῶν.] [Footnote B: Χορευτῶν.]