44.
mvp-aristotle-comment-44
NOTE 44. P. 75.
6.2
IN THE WAY, NOT OF NARRATION, BUT OF ACTION.
It is surprising, that so strange a phrase as
ειδων --- δρωντων
—
formis---agentibus
—should have passed as genuine with any Greek scholar. It is still more so, that the obvious opposition of
δρωντων
to
ἀπαγγελια
, and the no less obvious absurdity of opposing narration to pity and terror, (
δι' ἀπαγγελιας, ΑΛΛΑ δ᾽ ἐλεου και φοβου
) should have escaped the notice of any commentator.—I should write the passage thus; still considering it as imperfect:—
χωρις ἐκαστου των ειδων ἐν τοις μοριοις * * * [forte ΔΙΑ] δρωντων και ου δι' ἀπαγγελιας
1
* * * * ἀλλα δι' ἐλεου και φοβου, κ. τ. αλ.
Thus the word
δρωντων
will retain its proper sense, and the active imitation of the drama, which Aristotle every where makes its characteristic distinction, as opposed to the Epic, will be, as we might expect to find it, in a formal and exact definition of Tragedy, distinctly marked.
I will just observe, farther, that this mode of expression—
δρωντων ΚΑΙ ΟΥ δι' ἀπ.
is familiar to Aristotle. Here however it may be justified by the necessity of marking clearly the distinction between Dramatic and Epic Poetry. In other instances, as,
ἑτερως και μη τον αυτον τροπον.
cap. i.
ὡς τον αυτον και μη μεταβαλλοντα.
cap. iii.
ειδως και μη ἀγνοων.
Eth. Nic. v. 8.
it seems hardly to admit of the same excuse. In the Poets we are less surprised to find it frequent.
Victorius has pointed out
Homer, Il. Z. 333.
ἐπει με κατ᾿ ἀισαν ἐνεικεσας, ἐδ᾽ ὑπερ αισαν.
—and
Sophocles:
Oed. Tyr. 58.
γνωτα, κ'ουκ ἀγνωτα μοι Προσηλθεθ' ίμειροντες.
If any man, in reading the ancients, can persuade himself to take such things for beauties, there is certainly no harm in it. The fact I take to be, that composition, even that of Poetry, was not yet so far improved and refined, as perfectly to exclude the inaccuracies and redundancies of popular and familiar speech.
45.
mvp-aristotle-comment-45
NOTE 45. P. 75.
6.2
EFFECTING, THROUGH PITY AND TERROR, THE CORRECTION AND REFINEMENT OF SUCH PASSIONS.
Δι' ἐλεου και φοβου περαινουσα την των τοιουτων παθηματων καθαρσιν.
A history of the controversies which this obscure passage has excited among critics and commentators, and an exact statement and examination of the various explanations which have been given of it, would almost fill a volume. Among these, however, the opinions, that are worth regarding, or that can, with any show of probability, be deduced from Aristotle's expression, are, I think, reducible to two.
One is, that this purgation, or moderation, of the passions, is merely the effect of having them frequently excited, and of being familiarized with the occasions of them, in Tragic fiction; just as the passions of pity and terror are actually purged, or reduced to moderation, in a surgeon, a physician, or a soldier, by their being accustomed to those terrible or piteous objects that occasion them.
The other interpretation attributes the effect to the moral lesson and example of the drama: Tragedy purges the passions by the striking pictures it sets before us of the dreadful calamities occasioned by the unrestrained indulgence of them; by giving useful warnings, and preparing us to bear the ills of life with patience.
One, or the other, or both, of these meanings, have, I think, been attributed to Aristotle by the best commentators and critics. For the first, the reader may see
Mr. Harris's Disc. on Music, Painting, &c. ch. v. note
.—
Heinf. De Trag. Const. cap. ii. p. 22, 23
. and
Castelvetro, p. 117, 118
. For the second,
Madius;—
D'Alembert in his letter to Rousseau, Melanges, tom. ii. p. 414
.—
Dryden, Obs. on the Æneid
—
Abbè Du Bos, Refl. sur la Poesie, tom. i. sect. 44, &c
. For an explanation compounded of the two,
Robortelli,
Piccolomini, and
Dacier, who, by the way, after declaring that all the explanations of former commentators
"servaient only to obscure the passage,"
and that the true sense was not to be found in any of them, proceeds to give us, as that true sense, and as his own discovery, exactly what had been said before him.
Let us first see what Aristotle says. He says, that Tragedy, by the means of pity and terror, effects the purgation (
καθαρσιν
) of such passions: i. e. of pity and terror and other passions of the same kind: for pity and terror seem clearly meant, by the expression, to be included in the effect.
2
And this, in my opinion, is sufficient
to overturn the second of the explanations just mentioned; for, according to that, terror and pity are not both the means and the object of the purgation, as Aristotle, I think, asserts them to be, but they are the means only of purging other passions—those passions, whatever they may be, which are supposed to produce the calamitous events exhibited to our view. Indeed, according to this idea, the object is rather the vice that arises from passion, than the passion itself which is the cause of it. But, besides this objection, I do not see any reason to think, that the moral lesson of the drama, and the effects it might have in moderating our passions through the reflections it excites in us, were at all in Aristotle's thoughts
3
.
The first of the two explanations seems far more admissible. I believe it made a part of his idea, but I doubt whether it was the whole of it. What was precisely his meaning, and the whole of his meaning, will never, I fear, be the subject of a perfect, Stoical
καταληψις
to any man. There is, however, one passage in Aristotle's works, which throws some little light upon this; enough, at least, to keep us from false interpretations, if not to lead us to the true. It is in the
seventh chapter of his eighth book De Republica
. The Abbé Batteux is the only commentator I know of, who has paid a proper attention to this passage; but as I do not perfectly agree with him, either as to the translation he has given, or the use he makes of it, I shall produce so much of the original as appears to be of any importance to our present purpose, and subjoin a translation, with some necessary remarks.
The object of Aristotle, in the chapter referred to, is, to examine what kinds of Music (i. e. of melody and rhythm,) are proper to be used in the education of youth. He mentions and approves a division, made by some philosophical writers of that time, of the different kinds of melodies, into Moral, Active, and Enthusiastic:
τα μεν ΗΘΙΚΑ, τα δε ΠΡΑΚΤΙΚΑ, τα δ' ΕΝΘΟΥΣΙΑΣΤΙΚΑ.
By the first of these we are to understand a manly, grave, and simple
melody. The sense of
πρακτικα
is less clear; but I suppose it means a more complicated and imitative sort of melody, adapted to express human actions; for, in the
49th of the Harmonic Problems [Sect. 19.]
it is said of the Hypo-Phrygian mode, that it had
ἠθος πρακτικον
, and was, on that account, used only in the dialogue and action of the drama, never in the choral part.
4
And the same epithet,
πρακτικον
, is applied, in this treatise, to the Iambic measure.
5
As to enthusiastic, it wants no explanation. Aristotle then proceeds to observe, that "Music was to be used, not for one useful purpose only, but for several," which he enumerates; and one of them is—
ΚΑΘΑΡΣΕΩΣ ἐνεκα
: with respect to which he says—
τι δε λεγομεν την καθαρσιν, νυν μεν, άπλως παλιν δε, ΕΝ ΤΟΙΣ ΠΕΡΙ ΠΟΙΗΤΙΚΗΣ, ἐρουμεν σαφεστερον
: "What I mean by
Καθαρσις
, or purgation, I shall now explain only in a short and general way; but hereafter, in the books concerning Poetry, more explicitly and clearly."—And this, I suppose, he had done, in that part of this treatise which is lost.—He then proceeds thus:
Φανερον, ότι χρηστεον μεν πασαις ταις ἁρμονιαις, ου τον αυτον δε τροπον πασαις χρηστεον· άλλα προς μεν την παιδειαν, ταις ἠθικωταταις· προς δε ἀκροασιν [f. ΚΑΘΑΡΣΙΝ], ἐτερων χειρουργουντων, και ταις πρακτικαις, και ταις ἐνθουσιαστικαις. ὁ γαρ περι ἐνιας συμβαινει παθος ψυχας ἰσχυρως, τουτο ἐν πασαις ὑπαρχει, τῳ δε ήττον διαφερει και τῳ μαλλον. οἷον, ΕΛΕΟΣ ΚΑΙ ΦΟΒΟΣ. ἐτι δ᾽ ἐνθουσιασμος· και γαρ ὑπο ταυτης της κινησεως κατακωχιμοι τινες εισιν. ἐκ δε των ἱερων μελων ὁρωμεν τουτους, όταν χρησωνται τοις ἐξοργιαζουσι την ψυχην μελεσι, καθισταμενους, ώσπερ ΙΑΤΡΕΙΑΣ τυχοντας και ΚΑΘΑΡΣΕΩΣ. ταυτο δη τουτο ἀναγκαιον πασχειν και τας ἐλεημονας, και τους φοβητικους, και τους όλως παθητικους· τους δ᾽ ἄλλους, καθ᾽ όσον ἐπιβαλλει των τοιουτων ἐκαστῳ, και πασι γιγνεσθαι ΤΙΝΑ ΚΑΘΑΡΣΙΝ, και κουφιζεσθαι μεθ' ήδονης.
[
p. 458. Ed. Duval.
]
6
In this passage, for
ἀκροασιν
I have no doubt that we should read
καθαρσιν
. The similitude of the words is sufficient to account for the mistake of the transcriber; and the purport of the whole passage seems to require the correction. For Aristotle is here showing, in what manner the three different kinds of melody were to be applied to the different purposes, which he had just enumerated:
προς ΜΕΝ την ΠΑΙΔΕΙΑΝ, ταις ήθικ.
προς ΔΕ την ΚΑΘΑΡΣΙΝ,—ταις πρακτικαις,
&c. The opposition is clear. And so, afterwards, a third purpose is mentioned—
προς ΑΝΑΠΑΥΣΙΝ.
[p. 459.] The words immediately following,
ἐτερων χειρουργουντων
, probably contributed to this mistake. They allude to his doctrine, in the preceding chapter, that boys should not be allowed to practice or perform, themselves, any but the simplest kind of Music, and upon the sim-
plest and easiest instruments, such as were not
δεομενα χειρουργικης ἐπιστημης.
[p. 457.] But this was not the character either of the active and enthusiastic melodies, of which he here speaks, or of the instrument used in the accompaniment of them
7
.
I shall now give what I think a fair and literal version of the passage.—
"It is manifest then, that all the different kinds of melodies are to be made use of; not all, however, for the same purpose. For education, the most moral kind should be used: for PURGATION, both the active, and the enthusiastic; performed, however, by others. For those passions, which in some minds are violent, exist, more or less, in all; such as PITY, for example, and TERROR: and, again, enthusiasm; for with this passion some men are subject to be possessed: but when the sacred melodies, intended to compose the mind after the celebration of the orgic rites, have been performed, we see those men become calm and sedate, as if they had undergone a kind of purgation, or cure. And the case must necessarily be the same with those who are particularly liable to be moved by PITY, or TERROR, or any other passion; and with other men, as far as they are under the influence of any such passion; all of them experiencing a sort of PURGATION, and PLEASURABLE RELIEF."
From this passage, though far enough, I am sensible, from being perfectly clear and explicit, two things, at least, may, I think, be confidently deduced. 1. That whatever be the meaning of the term
καθαρσις
, or purgation, here, must also be its meaning in the treatise on Poetry; since to that work Aristotle refers for a fuller explanation of it. The only difference is, that here, the term is applied to the effect of imitative Music; there, to that of imitative Poetry; of that species of it, however, which depended, we know, upon Music, for a very considerable part of
its effect. 2. It is plain, that, according to Aristotle's idea, pity was to be purged by pity, terror by terror, &c.; contrary to the second of the two explanations above mentioned. For Aristotle is here expressly speaking of the use of enthusiastic Music applied
προς καθαρσιν
; and he says, that men, agitated by enthusiasm, were purged or relieved from that enthusiasm by the
ἱερα μελη
, which were plainly enthusiastic melodies; i. e. such as imitated, or expressed, that passion, and were intended to calm the mind, which had been violently agitated and inflamed; not, as M. Batteux understands, by the sudden opposition of Doric, grave, and moral strains, [p. 280, 1.] but by pleasurable indulgence of the same passion in imitative Music:
κουφιζεσθαι μεθ᾽ ἡδονης.
These melodies were, probably, such as those of
Olympus, which had been mentioned just before [cap. 5.] and of which Aristotle says, that they,
Ὁμολογουμενως ΠΟΙΕΙ ΤΑΣ ΨΥΧΑΣ ΕΝΘΟΥΣΙΑΣΤΙΚΑΣ.
Indeed, from the manner, in which the Music of Olympus is spoken of by
Plato, and
Plutarch, there is great reason to suppose, that these "sacred melodies" were no other, than the very melodies of that musician
8
.
With respect to this
καθαρσις
itself, Aristotle by no means gives us in this passage, nor, indeed, professes to give us, a full and satisfactory explanation of it. Some light, however, he has flung upon it by the expressions,
ἰατρεια
, and
κουφιζεσθαι μεθ᾽ ἡδονης
, which he uses as synonymous to
καθαρσις
: "Purgation, cure, pleasurable relief." The Abbé Batteux understands Aristotle to mean no more by this, than that the passions of terror or pity, which, when excited by real objects, are simply painful, or, at least, have a predominant mixture of pain, are, by imitation, and the consciousness of fiction, purged or purified from this alloy of the disagreeable and painful,
and converted, on the whole, into an emotion of delight. His meaning may be clearer in his own words. Aristotle, he says, had established it as a principle—
"Que les objets désagréables plaisent quand ils sont imités, même lorsqu'ils le font dans la plus grande verité. En appliquant ce principe à la Tragedie, il s'ensuit, que c'est l'imitation qui est la cause du plaisir qu'elle produit, et non la nature des objets imités, puisque ces objets sont par eux-mêmes désagréables. C'est donc l'imitation qui ôte à la terreur et à la pitié l'accessoire désagréable qu'elles ont dans la realité: c'est l'imitation qui opere la purgation Tragique, en mettant les malheurs imités à la place des malheurs réels, et en séparant par ce moyen ce que la pitié et la terreur ont d'agréable, comme emotions, d'avec ce qu'elles ont de désagréable, quand elles font jointes à l'idée de malheurs réels."
9
This account, which is exactly
Fontenelle's solution of the pleasure arising from Tragic emotion
10
, is liable to a difficulty not easily, I think, surmounted. It confines Aristotle's meaning to the present pleasure of the emotion; it supposes all the purgation to consist merely in rendering the feeling of the passion pleasurable; not in any good effect which the habit of such emotion may produce, in correcting, refining, or moderating, such passions, when excited by real objects. Now, though it must be confessed, that Aristotle has not, in that short and professedly imperfect explanation given of the
καθαρσις
in the passage adduced, said any thing directly pointing to such effect, yet, I think, the whole turn and cast of his expression is such, as leads one naturally to conclude, that it was his meaning. The phrase,
κουφιζεσθαι μεθ' ήδονης
, does indeed appear to express the present effect only; but I can scarce conceive, that he would have
used such a word as
καθαρσις
, and still less,
ΙΑΤΡΕΙΑ
, without a view to something beyond the pleasurable relief or vent of the moment; especially, in a chapter, where he is professedly enumerating and examining the uses of music
11
. Farther, the words,
ἐλεημονας, φοβητικους, παθητικους
, confirm this idea; being all words expressive of habitual excess, requiring correction and moderation
12
.
But, what still more strongly opposes the Abbé Batteux's idea, is, that Aristotle is here, as Heinsius and others have well observed, evidently combating the doctrine of
Plato, whose great objection to Tragedy, was, that it feeds and inflames the passions
13
. It could be no answer to this, to allege, that the feeling of passion excited by Tragic imitation is pleasurable; for this is so far from being called in question by Plato, that it is the very foundation of his objection. The pleasure afforded by such Poetry is allowed by him in its utmost extent
14
. "Let its advocates," he says, "undertake to show us that it is not merely pleasurable, but USEFUL also, and we will lend a favourable ear to their apology; for we shall surely be gainers by the conviction."
15
Now Aristotle, if I understand him rightly, undertakes this apology, and points out the utility required. And no one, I think, can reasonably doubt, that such was his intention, who has attended to the following passage of Plato:—
ἀπολαυειν ἀναγκη ἀπο των ἀλλοτριων εις τα οικεια· ΘΡΕΨΑΝΤΑ γαρ ἐν ἐκεινοις ΙΣΧΥΡΟΝ ΤΟ ΕΛΕΕΙΝΟΝ, ου ραδιον ἐν τοις ΑΥΤΟΥ ΠΑΘΕΣΙ ΚΑΤΕΧΕΙΝ
16
. For, to this objection, there cannot well be a more direct and pointed answer, than Aristotle's assertion, as usually understood—that the habit of indulging the emotions of pity, or terror, in the fictitious representations of Tragedy, tends, on the contrary, to moderate and refine those passions, when they occur in real life.
But though the Abbé Batteux's idea of this purgation appears to me by no means to be the whole, it must, I think, be admitted as a part, and an essential part, of Aristotle's meaning. For the effect depends, not merely, as some commentators seem to suppose
17
, on the having our passions frequently and habitually excited, but, on the having them so excited by fictitious representation. Pity and terror frequently excited by such objects and such events in real life, as the imitations of the Tragic scene set before us, would rather tend to produce apathy than moderation. Nature would struggle against such violent and painful agitation, and the heart would become callous in its own defence. We must be insensible, that we might not be wretched. It is far otherwise with fictitious passion. There, the emotion, though often violent in spite of the consciousness of fiction, is always, more or less, delightful. We indulge it, as one of the first of pleasures; and the effect of that indulgence, frequently repeated, is perhaps, that, while it moderates real passion by the frequency of similar impressions, it, at the same time, cherishes such sympathetic emotions, in their proper and useful degree, by the delicious feelings which never fail to accompany the indulgence of them in imitative representation.
The passions of savages, or of men in the first rude stages of civilization, are ferocious and painful. They pity, or they fear, either violently, or not at all. With them, there is hardly any medium between ungovernable agitation, and absolute insensibility.—Suppose such a people to have access, like the Athenians, to theatrical representations, and to have their passions kept in frequent and pleasurable exercise by fictitious distress; the consequence, I think, would be, that, by degrees, they would come to have more feeling, and less perturbation. Instead of sympathetic emotions rarely excited, painfully felt, and soon extinguished, they would gradually acquire a calm, lasting, and useful habit of general tenderness and sensibility. In polished society, where the passions are accustomed to be indulged in fiction, either in the theatre, or by reading, and the pain is converted, on the whole, into one strong and delightful feeling, by the charms of imitation, Poetry, Music, aided by the indistinct consciousness of fiction—these passions, even when excited by real objects, seem to retain, (at least, in cases where we are not too closely touched,) some tincture of the same pleasurable emotion, which attended them, when raised by works of imagination; they are more moderately and agreeably felt, more easily governed, and more gentle and polished in their expressions.
Such appears to me, on the whole, to be the most probable explanation of Aristotle's meaning: I must, at least, confess it to be the only reasonable meaning, that I am able to discover. How far it is true, and founded on solid observation, is another question, which I willingly submit to the philosophical and thinking part of my readers.
I cannot omit to observe, that the short explanation given by
MILTON, in the introduction to his
Samson Agonistes
, appears to coincide exactly, as far as it goes, with my idea of the passage.—"Tragedy, as it was anciently composed, hath been ever held the gravest, moraleft, and most profitable of all other Poems: therefore said by Aristotle to be of power, by raising pity, and fear or terror, to purge the mind of those and such like passions; that is, to temper and reduce them to just measure, with a kind of delight, stirred up by reading or seeing those passions well imitated." One thing should be added. Aristotle's assertion must be considered relatively to his own times, and nation. He speaks of the effects of Tragedy on the people of Athens, who, as reading was then no popular occupation, had scarce any opportunity of indulging fictitious emotion, but at the Theatre, and who, we know, were there accustomed to indulge it perpetually. With us, the case is widely different. The doctrine, therefore, of Aristotle, that "Tragedy purges the passions," translated, if I may so speak, into modern truth, would perhaps amount only to this—that the habitual exercise of the passions by works of imagination in general, of the serious and pathetic kind, (such as Tragedies, Novels, &c.) has a tendency to soften and refine those passions, when excited by real objects in common life.
