(Greek comedy, produced B.C. 405)

Keep silence—keep peace—and let all the profane

From our holy solemnity duly refrain;

Whose souls unenlightened by taste, are obscure;

Whose poetical notions are dark and impure;

Whose theatrical conscience

Is sullied by nonsense;

Who never were train’d by the mighty Cratinus

In mystical orgies poetic and vinous;

Who delight in buffooning and jests out of season;