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y without interest, if we were not moved for a moment by her indignation at the rejection of her offer; and we see her at length consigned to Maximinus with as little emotion as is shown by themselves.
The introduction of a good and evil spirit disguised in human shapes was not to be expected in a work aspiring to the reputation of a regular tragedy: still, whatever be their departure from propriety, it must be remembered that such representations had a most solemn origin, and that the business in which the spirits are engaged has a substantial conformity with the opinions of the early ages in which the plot is laid. The opposition of the demons to the progress of the faith, and the reasoning and raillery which Dorothea expresses, under the influence of Angelo, against the pagan gods, are to be found in Justin, Tatian, Arnobius, and others. The separate agency of the spirits, and the consequence of their personal encounter, are also described in a characteristic manner.
Apart from Angelo, Harpax seems to advance in his malignant work. When the daughters of Theophilus express their zeal for paganism, he "grows fat to see his labours prosper;" yet he cannot look forward to the defeat of those labours in their approaching conversion, though on some occasions we find he could "see a thousand leagues" in his master's service. And this agrees with the doctrine, that when some signal triumph of the faith was at hand, the evil spirits were abridged of their usual powers. Again, when Harpax expects to meet Angelo, he thus expresses the dread of his presence, and the effect which it afterwards produced on him:
The tragedy is too full of horrors; but this is a fault of which our ancestors were very tolerant.
DRAMATIS PERSONAE.
SCENE, Caesarea.
THE VIRGIN-MARTYR.
GIFFORD.
Being come in person, shall, I hope, hear from you Music more pleasing.
Welcome, oh, thrice welcome, Daughters, both of my body and my mind! Let me embrace in you my bliss, my comfort; And, Dorothea, now more welcome too, Than if you never had fallen off! I am ravish'd With the excess of joy:--speak, happy daughters, The blest event.
A pretty one; but let such horror follow The next I feed with torments, that when Rome Shall hear it, her foundation at the sound May feel an earthquake. How now? Ha, ha, ha, ha!
Herodotus relates this tale, and Justin repeats it. Massinger may have taken it from Purchas's Pilgrims, a book that formed the delight of our ancestors; and in which it is said, that the Boiards of Noviorogod reduced their slaves, who had seized the town, by the whip, just as the Scythians are said to have done theirs.
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