The Greeks were no less distinguished for comedy than for tragedy.  Both tragedy and comedy sprang from feasts in honor of Bacchus; and as the jests and frolics were found misplaced when introduced into grave scenes, a separate province of the drama was formed, and comedy arose.  At first it did not derogate from the religious purposes which were at the foundation of the Greek drama; it turned upon parodies in which the adventures of the gods were introduced by way of sport,—­as in describing the appetite of Hercules or the cowardice of Bacchus.  The comic authors entertained spectators by fantastic and gross displays, by the exhibition of buffoonery and pantomime.  But the taste of the Athenians was too severe to relish such entertainments, and comedy passed into ridicule of public men and measures and the fashions of the day.  The people loved to see their great men brought down to their own level.  Comedy, however, did not flourish until the morals of society were degenerated, and ridicule had become the most effective weapon wherewith to assail prevailing follies.  In modern times, comedy reached its culminating point when society was both the most corrupt and the most intellectual,—­as in France, when Moliere pointed his envenomed shafts against popular vices.  In Greece it flourished in the age of Socrates and the Sophists, when there was great bitterness in political parties and an irrepressible desire for novelties.  Comedy first made itself felt as a great power in Cratinus, who espoused the side of Cimon against Pericles with great bitterness and vehemence.

Many were the comic writers of that age of wickedness and genius, but all yielded precedence to Aristophanes, of whose writings only his plays have reached us.  Never were libels on persons of authority and influence uttered with such terrible license.  He attacked the gods, the politicians, the philosophers, and the poets of Athens; even private citizens did not escape from his shafts, and women were the subjects of his irony.  Socrates was made the butt of his ridicule when most revered, Cleon in the height of his power, and Euripides when he had gained the highest prizes.  Aristophanes has furnished jests for Rabelais, hints to Swift, and humor for Moliere.  In satire, in derision, in invective, and bitter scorn he has never been surpassed.  No modern capital would tolerate such unbounded license; yet no plays in their day were ever more popular, or more fully exposed follies which could not otherwise be reached.  Aristophanes is called the Father of Comedy, and his comedies are of great historical importance, although his descriptions are doubtless caricatures.  He was patriotic in his intentions, even setting up as a reformer.  His peculiar genius shines out in his “Clouds,” the greatest of his pieces, in which he attacks the Sophists.  He wrote fifty-four plays.  He was born 444 B.C., and died 380 B.C.

Thus it would appear that in the three great departments of poetry,—­the epic, the lyric, and the dramatic,—­the old Greeks were great masters, and have been the teachers of all subsequent nations and ages.