Page:A History of Ancient Greek Literature.djvu/295

Thebes a 'Bacchos'—an incarnation, it would seem, of the god himself—preaching the new worship. The daughters of Cadmus refuse to accept his spirit; he exerts it upon them in strength amounting to madness, and they range the hills glorifying him. The old Cadmus and the prophet Teiresias recognise him at once as God; the unearthly joy fills them, and they feel themselves young again. The king Pentheus is the great obstacle. He takes his stand on reason and order: he will not recognise the 'mad' divinity. But Pentheus is the wrong man for such a protest; possibly he had himself once been mad—at least that seems to be the meaning of l. 359, and is natural in a Bacchic legend—and he acts not calmly, but with fury. He insults and imprisons the god, who bears all gently and fearlessly, with the magic of latent power. The prison walls fall, and Dionysus comes straight to the king to convince him again. Miracles have been done by the Mænads on Cithæron, and Dionysus is ready to show more; will Pentheus wait and see? Pentheus refuses, and threatens the 'Bacchos' with death; the god changes his tone (l. 810). In a scene of weird power and audacity, he slowly controls—one would fain say 'hypnotises'—Pentheus: makes him consent to don the dress of a Mænad, to carry the thyrsus, to perform all the acts of worship. The doomed man is led forth to Cithæron to watch from ambush the secret worship of the Bacchanals, and is torn to pieces by them. The mad daughters of Cadmus enter. Agavê bearing in triumph her son's head, which she takes for a lion's head, and singing a joy-song which seems like the very essence of Dionysiac madness expressed in music. The story is well known how this play was acted at the Parthian