Poetics. Aristotle. Theodore Alois Buckley (Translator). London. 1857.
The Poetic of Aristotle (Theodore Alois Buckley) (OCR draft) (English) (Theodore Alois Buckley's English translation, first published in 1850 and represented from the Henry G. Bohn 1857 printing; corrected against a second OCR and aligned to the Kassel reference passage sequence.)
Provisional text from uncorrected OCR; expect errors.
Poetics
5.
mvp-aristotle-comment-530
τὸ ὅμοιον,
scil.
τὸ ἦθος ποιῆσαι, as is implied in the clause of in-terpretation,
τοῦτο γὰρ ἕτερον τοῦ χρηστὸν τὸ ἦθος καὶ ἁρμόττον ποιῆσαι. Instead of saying
ὅμοια, to correspond with
ἁρμόττοντα in 22,
Aristotle lapses into the singular
ὅμοιον, through the influence, as it would seem, of the singular in
ἀνδρεῖον μὲν τὸ ἦθος in the context. In the absence of an example in
28 sqq.
to illus-trate the neglect of this canon, the meaning of
ὅμοιον is not very clear; but a hint of it may be gathered from the language in the analogy in
1454 b 9
ὁμοίους ποιοῦντες καλλίους γράφουσιν, where
ὁμοίους (said of a portrait) means 'like the original'. This may very well be the sense of
ὅμοιον in the present passage; the literary portrait produced by the poet should be 'like the original', i. e. like what the personage in question is in history or legend (comp.
1454 b 12
). The fact of
ὅμοιος being used in a somewhat different sense in
2, 1448 a 6, 12
and
13, 1453 a 5
only shows how inattentive
Aristotle is at times to uniformity of language.
5.
mvp-aristotle-comment-531
25
ὥσπερ εἴρηται,
' in the present sense of this term (
ἁρμόττον)'.
26
110.
mvp-aristotle-comment-110
NOTE 110. P. 93.
15.5
RESEMBLANCE----A DIFFERENT THING, &C.
The words,
ώσπερ ἐιρηται, are embarrassing; for the difference here spoken of had not been mentioned before, as the expression, in its most obvious sense, implies. The only meaning I can find is this. The two requisites, the
ἁρμοττον and the
ὁμοιον, propriety, and resemblance, might easily be confounded; the
ὁμοιον being indeed only the
ἁρμοττον in another point of view. The violence and fierceness of Medea, for example, which form her historical, or traditional character, and, therefore, the likeness of the Poet's picture, may be said to be
ἁρμοττοντα, proper or suitable, with respect to the individual, though
ἀπρεπη και μη άρμοττοντα, improper and unsuitable, to the general character of the sex. And thus
Piccolomini:
"la terza conditione che assegna Aristotele à i costumi, la qual consiste in esser simile, non differisce della seconda, posta nell' esser convenevoli, in altro, se non che la conditione del con- venevole riguarda l'universale; com' à dire, che quel costume convenga ad un principe, quello ad un suddito, quello à l'uomo &c. senza considerar questa particolar persona, ò quella: et la conditione del simile riguarda il particolare; come à dire, qual costume convenga di porre in uno che habbia da rappresentar' Achille; qual in quello che habbia da representare Oreste," &c. (p. 220.)
Indeed, Aristotle would hardly have thought of admonishing the reader not to confound the two things, had he not seen that they were liable to be confounded. He would not have remarked, that they were different, had they been perfectly, and obviously, distinct. I think then, that the words,
ώσπερ ἐιρηται, must refer only to the
ἁρμοττον, and the meaning must be, that, to make the manners like, is a different thing not only from making them good, but even from making them proper, in such a way as had been said—in that sense, in which the word
ἁρμοττοντα had just been used, and explained by his instance. But if we understand the passage thus, there should be no stop after
ποιησαι
1
.
But, why does Aristotle mention at all, a difference so very obvious as that between resemblance, and goodness, of manners?— These two requisites could not easily be confounded, any more than likeness and beauty in a portrait. There was more danger of a reader's thinking the
ὁμοιον too different from the
χρησον, and, as a general precept, incompatible with it. And so indeed he seems to have apprehended himself, by what he presently after says about the
μιμησις βελτιονων, and his rule, that the Poet, in imitation of the painter, should exhibit his characters as much better than they were, or are supposed to have been, as is consistent with the preservation of the likeness
2
.
15.5.
mvp-aristotle-comment-54
15.5
THE FOURTH IS CONSISTENCY.
BY consistency is meant keeping the character uniform with itself in every respect. Without this it is impoffible for the manners to excel in the other qualities; for a character can never be faid to have poetical go odness, or general propriety of manners, or individual likeness, if these qualities are not uniformly kept up. Horace seems to conceive this admonition chiefly necessary to those poets who draw original characters from their own imagination. [M] • Should you adventuring novelty, engage • Some bold original to walk the stage, • Preserve it well, continued as begun • True to itself in every scene, and one.' COLMAN'S HOR. EP. Tο PIS. 186. Indeed though this rule is equally essential to all characters, original ones will be most liable to offend against it. As there the poet will have nothing to guide him but his own genius, and besides he will be [M] Si quid inexpertum scenæ committis, & audes Perfonam formare novam; fervetur ad imum Qualis ab incepto processerit et fibi conftet.. Uu2 EP. AD PIS. 125. more.
more tempted to take liberties with what he esteems particularly his property, as being the creature of his own invention. He also will efteem himself to be, and indeed actually will be, less liable to detection. The example that Ariftotle gives of failure in this point is the character of Iphigenia in the Iphigenia in Aulis of Euripides, of which more will be faid in the next note. Modern instances of the breach of this rule will be amply furnished by our best poets, serious and comic, epic and dramatic. [N] The character of Hamlet cannot certainly be allowed to be uniform throughout. Befides the neglect or forgetfulness of the poet in making Hamlet, who is only supposed to affect madness, appear often really mad, (an error carefully and effectually guarded against in [o] Edgar,) there are many improprieties which I shall not enlarge upon as they are fufficiently obvious. [N] I have been informed that by order of Mrs. Garrick the tragedy of Hamlet was thrown into Garrick's grave. I think though he was undoubtedly great in that character he was equally fo in many of Shakespear's characters, and superior in Lear. The comic characters I presume were thought too light for so solemn an occafion. If by burying that tragedy with Garrick it was meant to infer that it was loft to the stage with him, a complete edition of Shakespear might, with the utmost propriety, have been interred with that inimitable actor: for what Cardinal Bembó has said of Nature on the tomb of Raffael, may be faid of Shakefpear on the tomb of Garrick. one. [o] When one of the persons assumes a character different from his own it is the business of the actor to mark the distinction, and make the real character appear through the feigned Johnfon has observed, that Garrick did not play Archer in the Beaux Stratagem ' well. The gentleman should break out through the footman, which was not the cafe as ' he did it.' BOSWELL'S LIFE OF JOHNSON, Vol. 11. p. 62. Romeo
POETIC OF ARISTOTLE. Romeo also surely acts contrary to the general tendency of his character when after the fall of [P] Paris, on being requested by his dying rival to lay his body by Juliet, he answers coolly, and rather lightly, • In faith I will.' And on recognizing his face he considers him as an object of pity, and feems really concerned for him though his rival, and the occafion of Juliet's death. Valentine's offer of resigning Sylvia to Protheus is a striking instance of the same impropriety in our great dramatic poet; if that play [Q], which I greatly doubt, is really a production of Shakespear. Farquhar has added to this impropriety when he makes Aimwell say to Archer in the Beaux Stratagem, • Take the ten thousand or the Lady;' and in Archer's brutal answer to Dorinda, when the expresses her surprize at the offer. [P] The author of the REMARKS makes a curious observation on these lines spoken by the prince. • And I for winking at your difcords too ' Have loft a brace of kinsmen.' His kinsmen he says are Mercutio and envolio, and therefore proposes to refstore a line which mentions the death of the latter. This ought to be a good lesson to commentators, as it shews how they are able sometimes to fee what is invisible, and to shut their eyes againft what stares them in the face. Mercutio and Paris are obviously the prince's relations. Romeo on first seeing the face of Paris, calls him Mercutio's kinsman. And in the dramatis perfonæ, which is arranged rather according to political than poetical rank, the first character mentioned is Escalus, prince of Verona: the second Paris, kinsman to the prince. [Q] If the hand of Shakespear is to be traced in any part of the Two Gentlemen of Verona, I think it is in the characters of Launce and Speed, which much resemble Lancelot in the Merchant of Venice. In
In the fong supposed to be written by Lovemore for the widow Belmour in the WAY TO KEEP HIM, and which is supposed to give his own sentiments, there is a strong instance not only of inconfiftency but abfolutely of oppofition in this line. Turn the chief of your care from your face to your mind.' Now the only cause of Lovemore's indifference to his wife is her having done this very thing; and the whole tenor of the drama is to enforce the contrary conduct, and shew a woman that the ought, after marriage, to facrifice to the graces as well as to the virtues. There is a fimilar neglect in that excellent comedy the School for Scandal, when Charles Surface says to Sir Oliver on his being difcovered, Believe me when I tell you, (and upon my foul I would not say it if it was not so,) if I do not feel mortified at the exposure of my • follies; it is because I feel at this moment the warmest satisfaction at seeing you my liberal benefactor.' This is quite inconsistent with the character of Charles, and would have exactly suited Joseph in the fame situation, as it conveys a premeditated sentiment, and is besides obvioufly an untruth. I will now produce three instances from works of narrative imitation, and those justly in the highest class of estimation. To begin with Don Quixote. In the part first published by Cervantes, and his subsequent addition in consequence of a fpurious attempt by another hand, he has two distinct characters. • In the first part it is true he is not drawn as an abfolute maniac, when he is not discoursing of knight errantry, ▲ but all his conversation is tinged with fingularity; and the pertinent • things
POETIC OF ARISTOTLE. ، things he says are incoherently arranged, and themselves out of place; as for instance, his long speech to the goatherds about the golden age : • but in the second part he is made a man of found judgment and elegant literature when the immediate subject of his madness is not • touched upon [R].' My next instance is from a work which is of undoubted excellence indeed, leaving every work of the same nature far behind. I mean the character of Allworthy in Tom Jones. He has always appeared to me a striking instance of a character at oppofition with himself, though more perhaps in general with that which the author tells you in his own person he is, than with his own conduct in those parts where the author suffers him to act from himself. The author is at great pains to inform us frequently that he is, though no scholar, a man of sense and difcernment, with a benevolence almost angelic; and to press this more forcibly on our minds, he has given him a name strongly expressive of his moral goodness, though all his other characters have common names [s]. But how is he really drawn? He is the dupe of every infinuating rafcal he meets; and a dupe not of the most amiable kind, fince he is always led to acts of justice and severity. The consequence of his pliability is oftener the punishment of the innocent than the acquittal of the guilty; and in such punishment he is severe and implacable. As in the cafe of Jones himself, his fupposed father and mother, and black George. He fuffers his adopted fon and his foundling to be ill treated by an imperious pedagogue, whose [R] See Andrews's Anecdotes, p. 31. Article Books. [s] See Note III. Ch. Ix. whole
، whole character and conversation is a fatire on christianity, and to have their principles corrupted by a hypocritical infidel. The third instance is not so striking, but is I think to be found in a character, whose fingularity as well as general uniformity with itself is universally and defervedly admired, and was a particular favorite with its author on this very account. I mean [T] Sir Roger de Coverly in the Spectator. But is his conduct throughout the work consonant with the original delineation of his character? Or can his fingularities, however amiable and however entertaining, be at all faid to [u]' proceed from • his good sense, and be contradictions to the manners of the world, only as he thinks the world is in the wrong?' There are many comedies whose catastrophe depends entirely on this want of uniformity of manners. I mean those in which the event of the fable turns on an entire and radical change of character in one of the principal persons. Where, as Mr. Harris observes, with as much humour as justice, • The old gentleman of the drama, after having • fretted and stormed through the first four acts, towards the conclufion • of the fifth is unaccountably appeased. At the fame time the diffipated 6. coquette, and the diffolute fine gentleman whose vices cannot be occa- • fional but must clearly be habitual, are in the space of half a scene [T] The character of Sir Roger did not, it feems, fuit the delicacy of Shenstone. In his Essays on Men, Manners, and Things, where he chuses to draw what he calls a character, and a most infipid one it is, and make him talk common-place nonfsense among the tombs at Westminster, he concludes by saying he ' sometimes boafted that he was a distant relation of • Sir Roger de Coverly. If he was, ' I am afraid his lady mother played false, for there is not the most distant family likeness.. [u] Spectator, No. II.. miracu-
POETIC OF ARISTOTLE. ' miraculously reformed, and grow at once as completely good as if they ' had never been otherwife.' Some instances may however be produced in which a sudden and yet lasting reformation may not be improbable, as in Lady Townly. We may conceive a young woman of good natural disposition, but led into habits of diffipation by company and fashion, to be really convinced of her error by one striking incident: but we can never believe that any thing can cure the brutal fufpicion of Strictland [x]. [x] No two passions can be more different than jealousy and suspicion. The one is the offspring of brutality, and may be unconnected with love; the other is the certain proof of a most violent and unreasonable passion. Hoadley in the Suspicious Husband has once, and I believe once only, confounded these characters when he makes Strictland say he cannot bear that even a woman should partake in his wife's love. This is jealousy though pushed to excess. Mrs. Brooks in Emily Montague makes Colonel Rivers express the violence of his passion in these words: ' I would engross, I would employ, I would absorb every faculty • of that lovely mind.' Othello reasons, if I may use the expreffion, in the same manner, when he says, • I'd rather be a toad, • And feed upon the vapor of a dungeon, • Than keep a corner in the thing I love • For other's uses.' X x NOTE
3.
mvp-aristotle-comment-103
Ritter, cap. 15 § 3
τρίτον δὲ τὸ ὅμοιον-ὥσπερ εἴρηται: in his neque vola neque vestigium est ingenii Aristotelii. tertium quod poeta in moribus depingendis observare debeat, esse simile (
τὸ ὅμοιον), idque aliud esse quam bonos mores et aptos fingere, ut dictum. quae est illa comparatio, qua "simile" et "bonos aptosque mores" componuntur? quae definitio, qua "simile" aliud esse quam "bonos aptosque mores fingere" declaratur? quid tandem isto
ὥσπερ εἴρηται faciemus? num interpolator haec inseruit? fortasse ita est: sed uncis tamen illa includere nolui, quoniam epitomator bonam quandam Aristotelis sententiam male reddidisse videtur, et sententiam quidem ipsam quae subsequitur (§. 6),
χρὴ δὲ καὶ ἐν τοῖς ἤθεσιν ἀεὶ ζητεῖν ἢ τὸ ἀναγκαῖον ἢ τὸ εἰκός. qui haec sive inseruit sive brevioribus et minus aptis verbis reddidit, sua ne ipse quidem videtur intellexisse. nam exemplis continuo sequentibus non quattuor sed tria tantummodo morum vitia notantur, ut statim videbimus. iam non mirabimur hunc locum ab interpretibus varie acceptum esse. Victorius similes mores eos intelligit qui non abhorreant a moribus eius aetatis, unde homines in scenam producuntur, h. e. congruentes cum historia sive vera sive fabulosa. sed quis eiusmodi mores simpliciter
ὁμοίους appellaverit? nec vero omnes omnium tragoediarum personae ex historia repetuntur, neque mores cuiusvis temporis ubique a poeta religiose observandi sunt ac reddendi, immo nonnulla in moribus immutare ille et ad consilium suum accommodare debet. conf. c. 14, 5. Hermannus
τὸ ὅμοιον cum explicat
οἷα ἂν γένοιτο, ego ei ita consentio, ut haec fere dicere voluisse epitomatorem statuam, h. e. sententiam ipsius Aristotelis hanc fuisse, sed ab homine parum diligente corruptam et obscuratam esse.