IQO Outlines of European History (see plan, p. 173, and Fig. 94), where he finds the people are al- ready entering. Only yesterday he and his neighbors received from the state treasury the money for their admission. It is natu- ral that they should feel that the theater and all that is done there belong to the people, and not the less as the citizen looks down upon the stage and recognizes many of his friends and neighbors and their sons in the chorus for that day's performance. Sophocles A play of Sophocles is on, and his neighbor in the next seat leans over to tell the citizen how as a lad many years ago he stood on the shore of Salamis, whither his family had fled (p. 174), and as they looked down upon the destruction of the Persian fleet, this same Sophocles, a boy of sixteen, was in the crowd looking on with the rest. How deeply must the events of that tragic day have sunk into the poet's soul ! For does he not see the will of the gods in all that happens to men ? Does he not celebrate the stern decree of Zeus everywhere hanging over human life, at the same time that he uplifts his audience to adore the splendor of Zeus, however dark the destiny he lays upon men? This is the only attitude which can bring consola- tion in the tragedy of life, and the citizen feels that Sophocles is the real voice of the people, exalting the old gods in the new time. Moreover, in place of the former two, Sophocles has three actors in his plays, a change which makes them more interesting and full of action.^ Even old ^F^schylus yielded to this inno- vation once before he died. Yet too much innovation is also unwelcome to the citizen. Euripides The citizen feels this especially if it is one of the new sensa- tional plays of Euripides which is presented. Euripides (Fig. 95), a younger poet, the son of a farmer who lives over on the Island of Salamis (Fig. 86), deals with new questions; he has for some time been presenting plays at the spring competition. His new plays are all troubled with problems and mental struggle regarding the gods, and they have raised a great many questions 1 These actors were once only the leaders of the choruses at the spring feast (see p. 161). ^
