R R R TRREE IE=—, - —

16 THE CRIME OF PROMETHEUS

animal men, recognizing them as suitable instruments for
his words, and he gave in exchange his intoxication.

The god, being most like to the beast in respect to his
innocence and fulness, showed himself first to the goat-man.
Silenus, god-drunk, informed, made fertile by the god’s
word, became filled with his harmony like a pipe with wind,
and began singing the lyrics of longing and pure joy which the
chorus intones as it portends, heralds, and revels in the com-
ing of the god.

The choral lyric was a magical incantation used by Silenus
and his troop to command the presence of Dionysus the twice
born, induce him to share his vine of life, and become re-
born through him. Their song was thus a deliberate imitation
of the god’s creative act, and their longing; their drunken-
ness, and the travail of their lyric were a ferment in which
he grew. Then these animal-men, Dionysus’ first priests, made
mock of their own native fertility and offered it as a goat-sac-
rifice upon his altar so that they might exchange 1t for his
livingness. The chorus thus mesmerized themselves by him,
and the god, in turn, liking the flavor of their offering, ap-
proving the wholeness and soundness of the animal, enjoying
its t aste, accepted and partook of their sacrifice and there-
by bound himself to- be present in it, to be partaken of by
his celebrants. In their mimicry, in the ecstasy and triumph
of their lyric, he read, his own parable.

The chorus, who remained throughout the Greek drama
essentially priests and priestesses of Dionysus, at whose altar
they ministered, officiated at this public festival and were
assigned the task of producing on the stage a sacrificial spec-
tacle worthy of the god. The choral song must enchant him,
persuade him, conjure him from his human concealment,
and force him to speak. The song was a travail, the tra-
vail of his birth. The chorus became spelibound by him.
Like mediums, they then summoned forth on the stage the
vision of the god-man, bade him reveal his doings and act
out his drama.