The lyrical, operative character of Greek tragedies has to be borne in mind as we read passages like that which follows. They were not meant to be _read_. Uttered in a passionate recitative, accompanied by expressive action, they probably formed a very effective element in the actual representation of the tragedy. We may look on it as the only extant specimen of the kind of wailing which was characteristic of Eastern burials, and which was slowly passing away in Greece under the influence of a higher culture. The early fondness of Æschylos for a _finale_ of this nature is seen also in _The Persians_, and in a more solemn and subdued form, in the _Eumenides_. The feeling that there was something barbaric in these untoward displays of grief, showed itself alike in the legislation of Solon, and the eloquence of Pericles. Footnote 131: Here, and perhaps throughout, we must think of Antigone as addressing and looking on the corpse of Polyneikes, Ismene on that of Eteocles. Footnote 132: Perhaps “Unless some God had stood against the spear This chief did wield.” Footnote 133: The speech of the Antigone becomes the starting-point, in the hands of Sophocles, of the noblest of his tragedies. The denial of burial, it will be remembered, was looked on as not merely an indignity and outrage against the feelings of the living, but as depriving the souls of the dead of all rest and peace. As such it was the punishment of parricides and traitors. Footnote 134: The words are obscure enough, the point lying, it may be, in their ambiguity. Antigone here, as in the tragedy of Sophocles, pleads that the Gods have pardoned; they still command and love the reverence for the dead, which she is about to show. The herald catches up her words and takes them in another sense, as though all the honour he had met with from the Gods had been defeat, and death, and shame, as the reward of his sacrilege. Another rendering, however, gives— “Yes, so the Gods have done with honouring him.” Footnote 135: The words are probably a protest against the changeableness of the Athenian _demos_, as seen especially in their treatment of Aristeides. PROMETHEUS BOUND DRAMATIS PERSONÆ PROMETHEUS HERMES OKEANOS STRENGTH HEPHÆSTOS FORCE _Chorus of Ocean Nymphs_