generous forbearance, and his counsel prevails. The part representing
the disgrace and death of Aias is more affecting to modern readers
than the remainder of the drama. But we should bear in mind that the
vindication of Aias after death, and his burial with undiminished
honours, had an absorbing interest for the Athenian and Salaminian
spectator.

Philoctetes also is rejected by man and accepted by Destiny. The
Argives in his case, as the Thebans in the case of Oedipus, are blind
to the real intentions of the Gods.

The Philoctetes, like the Oedipus at Colonos, was a work of Sophocles'
old age; and while it can hardly be said that the fire of tragic
feeling is abated in either of these plays, dramatic effect is
modified in both of them by the influence of the poet's contemplative
mood. The interest of the action in the Philoctetes is more inward and
psychological than in any other ancient drama. The change of mind in
Neoptolemus, the stubborn fixity of will in Philoctetes, contrasted
with the confiding tenderness of his nature, form the elements of a
dramatic movement at once extremely simple and wonderfully sustained.
No purer ideal of virtuous youth has been imagined than the son of
Achilles, who in this play, though sorely tempted, sets faithfulness
before ambition.

6. In the Electra, which, though much earlier than the Philoctetes, is
still a work of his mature genius, our poet appears at first sight to
be in unequal competition with Aeschylus. If the Theban trilogy of the
elder poet had remained entire, a similar impression might have been
produced by the Oedipus Tyrannus. It is best to lay such comparisons
aside, and to consider the work of Sophocles simply on its own merits.