Ulysses explains the Plan of Action to Neoptolemus, and labours to bend him to his Purpose. Lines 1-134 Neoptolemus having filched the Bow of Philoctetes, Philoctetes prays him to restore it. Lines 927-962 AESCHYLUS PROMETHEUS BOUND. Prometheus, the good Titan, has been raising mankind from the condition of primeval brutes by teaching them the arts of civilisation. At last he steals fire from heaven for their use. By this he incurs the wrath of Zeus, who, having deposed his father Chronos, has become king of the gods. As a punishment Prometheus is condemned by Zeus to be chained to a rock in the Caucasus, with an eagle always feeding on his breast. But Prometheus knows the secret of a mysterious marriage which is destined in time to take place, and by the offspring of which Zeus in his turn is to be dethroned. Strong in his consciousness of this, he defies Zeus, who by the agency of Hermes tries in vain to wrest the secret from him. The persons of the drama, besides Prometheus, are Hephaestus, better known by his Latin name of Vulcan, Might and Force personified, Hermes the messenger of Heaven, and the wandering Io. The chorus consists of sea- nymphs, who sympathise with the suffering Prometheus. This drama is a sublime enigma. Aeschylus was conservative and deeply religious. How could he write a play the hero of which is a benefactor of man struggling against the tyranny of the king of the gods, and the sequel of which found a fit and congenial composer in Shelley, whose sentiment and manner the "Prometheus Bound" wonderfully anticipates and perhaps helped to form? Again, how could the Athenians, in an age when their piety had not yet given way to scepticism, have endured such dramatic treatment of the chief of the gods? It is almost as if a Mystery Play had been presented in the Middle Ages with Satan for the hero and the First Person of the Trinity in the character of an oppressor. Perhaps the position of Zeus in the drama as a usurper may, in some degree, have softened the religious effect. * * * * * Prometheus is brought in by the Spirits of Might and Force, Hephaestus accompanying them. LINES 1-113. SCENE: _The Caucasus_. MIGHT. Unto earth's utmost boundary we have come, To Scythia's realm, th' untrodden wilderness. Hephaestus, now it is thy part to do The Almighty Father's bidding, and to bind This arch-deceiver to yon lowering cliff With bonds of everlasting adamant. Thy attribute, all-fabricating fire, He stole and gave to man. Such is the crime For which he pays the penalty to Heaven, That he may learn henceforth meekly to bear The rule of Zeus and less befriend mankind. HEPHAESTUS.