ing, in philosophy and education,—by what has been collectively characterized as "the new learning". The other four forces that have been mentioned were perhaps more outside influences working upon him, but in this last movement he took a leading part; its new spirit of free inquiry, discussion, and argument fairly bubbled up within him and overflows in every one of his extant play, even in the grotesque and humorous satyr play The Cyclops.
It was some years ago during a summer vacation at the seashore—vacation, you see, keeps running through my mind—when I had no other books at hand to study that I began the analysis and classification of Euripides' contents which I present to you this afternoon. At that time I did not quite finish all the eighteen plays and did not tabulate the 1091 fragments at all. This I have tried to do since I was asked to deliver this address. There are, however, still a number of loose odds and ends; and I also should need to revise the method and check up again the results of my notes of several years ago, before I could venture to present any detailed and accurate statistics concerning Euripides' ideas. But such specific figures would bore you anyway, and to go into every detail of his thought would take far more time than we have now at our disposal. I shall therefore simply give you some general notion of my results in their present rough approximate shape, with a few illustrative passages that are typical, and a little more detail on one or two topics in which you may be especially interested.
In the almost innumerable references of Euripides to the gods and religion we find represented every shade of opinion and feeling from simple unquestioning faith and humble acquiescence in divine providence to the sharpest criticism of the gods and their management of the world and to utter scepticism as to the existence of any divinity. At one time the old polytheism with its myths and rites is portrayed without criticism, and the ancient customs and sacred notions, such as oaths, sacrifices, blood-pollution, and the right of sanctuary and of suppliants, are unquestioningly accepted. At another time the conduct of the gods as told in old legend is attacked as immoral and disbelief is expressed in regard to improbable myths. Sometimes men and women attribute their misfortunes and mistakes to some god, but in other passages we are told that "most ills of mortals are of their own seeking". Often different gods and goddesses are represented as hostile to each other, or as animated towards human beings by feelings of revenge, offended dignity, and other unworthy motives. Again, the gods are depicted as benevolent and compassionate. "We must no longer believe in the gods," says Orestes in Electra, "If the wrong is stronger than the right". And someone in Bellerophon remarks, "I want to say to you that the gods are no gods if they do anything disgraceful". Other passages proclaim that the gods work in a mysterious and inscrutable way, that they bring to pass the unexpected, and that
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