As in the structure of the plot, so too in the portraiture of
character, the poet should always aim either at the necessary or the
probable. Thus a person of a given character should speak or act in
a given way, by the rule either of necessity or of probability; just
as this event should follow that by necessary or probable sequence. It
is therefore evident that the unraveling of the plot, no less than the
complication, must arise out of the plot itself, it must not be
brought about by the Deus ex Machina- as in the Medea, or in the
return of the Greeks in the Iliad. The Deus ex Machina should be
employed only for events external to the drama- for antecedent or
subsequent events, which lie beyond the range of human knowledge,
and which require to be reported or foretold; for to the gods we
ascribe the power of seeing all things. Within the action there must
be nothing irrational. If the irrational cannot be excluded, it should
be outside the scope of the tragedy. Such is the irrational element
the Oedipus of Sophocles.
Again, since Tragedy is an imitation of persons who are above the
common level, the example of good portrait painters should be
followed. They, while reproducing the distinctive form of the
original, make a likeness which is true to life and yet more
beautiful. So too the poet, in representing men who are irascible or
indolent, or have other defects of character, should preserve the type
and yet ennoble it. In this way Achilles is portrayed by Agathon and
Homer.
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