the phallic songs, which still survive as institutions in many of our
cities. And its advance after that was little by little, through their
improving on whatever they had before them at each stage. It was in
fact only after a long series of changes that the movement of Tragedy
stopped on its attaining to its natural form. (1) The number of actors
was first increased to two by Aeschylus, who curtailed the business of
the Chorus, and made the dialogue, or spoken portion, take the leading
part in the play. (2) A third actor and scenery were due to Sophocles.
(3) Tragedy acquired also its magnitude. Discarding short stories and
a ludicrous diction, through its passing out of its satyric stage, it
assumed, though only at a late point in its progress, a tone of
dignity; and its metre changed then from trochaic to iambic. The
reason for their original use of the trochaic tetrameter was that
their poetry was satyric and more connected with dancing than it now
is. As soon, however, as a spoken part came in, nature herself found
the appropriate metre. The iambic, we know, is the most speakable of
metres, as is shown by the fact that we very often fall into it in
conversation, whereas we rarely talk hexameters, and only when we
depart from the speaking tone of voice. (4) Another change was a
plurality of episodes or acts. As for the remaining matters, the
superadded embellishments and the account of their introduction, these
must be taken as said, as it would probably be a long piece of work to
go through the details.




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