We see the man, the natural man, to the life. But as the poem goes on, we company with his intellect and soul, with the struggle of sensualism against his knowledge of a more ideal life; above all, with one, who indulging the appetites and senses of the natural man, is yet, at a moment, their master. The coarse chambers of his nature are laid bare, his sensuous pleasure in the lower forms of human life, his joy in satirising them, his contempt for the good or the ideal life if it throw the sensual man away. Then, we are made to know the power he has to rise above this--without losing it--into the higher imaginative region where, for the time, he feels the genius of Sophocles, Euripides, the moral power of Balaustion, and the beauty of the natural world. Indeed, in that last we find him in his extant plays. Few of the Greeks could write with greater exquisiteness of natural beauty than this wild poet who loved the dunghill. And Browning does not say this, but records in this _Apology_ how when Aristophanes is touched for an instant by Balaustion's reading of the _Herakles_, and seizing the psalterion sings the song of Thamuris marching to his trial with the Muses through a golden autumn morning--it is the glory and loveliness of nature that he sings. This portraiture of the poet is scattered through the whole poem. It is too minute, too full of detail to dwell on here. It has a thousand touches of life and intimacy. And it is perhaps the finest thing Browning has done in portraiture of character. But then there was a certain sympathy in Browning for Aristophanes. The natural man was never altogether put aside by Browning. Lastly, there is the fresh presentation of Balaustion, of the matured and experienced woman whom we have known as a happy girl. Euthycles and she are married, and one night, as she is sitting alone, he comes in, bringing the grave news that Euripides is dead, but had proved at the court of Archelaos of Macedonia his usefulness as counsellor to King and State, and his power still to sing-- Clashed thence _Alkaion_, maddened _Pentheus'_ up; Then music sighed itself away, one moan Iphigeneia made by Aulis' strand; With her and music died Euripides. And Athens, hearing, ceased to mock and cried "Bury Euripides in Peiraios, bring his body back." "Ah," said Balaustion, "Death alters the point of view. But our tribute is in our hearts; and more, his soul will now for ever teach and bless the world. Is not that day come? What if you and I Re-sing the song, inaugurate the fame?