Editing Civics (section)

==== Aeschyslus ====
In the [[Aristophanes]] comedy ''[[The Frogs]]'', the character of the playwright [[Aeschylus]] scolds fellow tragedian Euripides for writing scenes pernicious to proper ideals of citizenship:{{blockquote|<poem>What crimes is he not guilty of?
Did he not put up on display
pimps and women giving birth
in holy shrines and having sex
with their own brothers, and then claim
that living is no life? So now,
because of him our city here
is crammed with bureaucratic types
and stupid democratic apes
who always cheat our people.
Nobody carries on the torch—
no one's trained in that these days.</poem>}}

During his diatribe, he emphasises the importance of poetry to civic education: {{blockquote|<poem>Small children have a teacher helping them,
for young men there's the poets—we've got
a solemn duty to say useful things.<ref>[[Aristophanes]]. [http://johnstoniatexts.x10host.com/aristophanes/frogshtml.html ''The Frogs''], Lines 1260–1300. Translated by [[Ian C. Johnston]]. [http://johnstoniatexts.x10host.com/ johnstoniatexts].</ref></poem>}}

Similarly, [[Plutarch]] would later speak of the power of the poet [[Thales]] to, in the words of the English poet [[John Milton]], 'prepare and mollify the Spartan surliness with his smooth songs and odes, the better to plant among them law and civility'.<ref>Plutarch. [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/674/674-h/674-h.htm#2H_4_0004 ''Parallel Lives'', ''Lycurgus'']. "Amongst the persons there the most renowned for their learning all their wisdom in state matters was one Thales, whom Lycurgus, by importunities and assurances of friendship, persuaded to go over to Lacedaemon; where, though by his outward appearance and his own profession he seemed to be no other than a lyric poet, in reality he performed the part of one of the ablest lawgivers in the world.  The very songs which he composed were exhortations to obedience and concord, and the very measure and cadence of the verse, conveying impressions of order and tranquility, had so great an influence on the minds of the listeners, that they were insensibly softened and civilized, insomuch that they renounced their private feuds and animosities, and were reunited in a common admiration of virtue.  So that it may truly be said that Thales prepared the way for the discipline introduced by Lycurgus."</ref><ref>[[John Milton]]. [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/608/608-h/608-h.htm ''Areopagitica'']. That other leading city of Greece, Lacedaemon, considering that Lycurgus their lawgiver was so addicted to elegant learning, as to have been the first that brought out of Ionia the scattered works of Homer, and sent the poet Thales from Crete to prepare and mollify the Spartan surliness with his smooth songs and odes, the better to plant among them law and civility, it is to be wondered how museless and unbookish they were, minding nought but the feats of war.[[Project Gutenberg]].</ref> Plutarch also spoke of the deep influence of [[Homer]]'s 'lessons of state' on [[Lycurgus of Sparta|Lycurgus]], framer of the Spartan constitution.<ref>Plutarch. [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/674/674-h/674-h.htm#2H_4_0004 ''Parallel Lives'', ''Lycurgus'']. "Here he had the first sight of Homer's works, in the hands, we may suppose, of the posterity of Creophylus; and, having observed that the few loose expressions and actions of ill example which are to be found in his poems were much outweighed by serious lessons of state and rules of morality, he set himself eagerly to transcribe and digest them into order, as thinking they would be of good use in his own country."</ref>