It is by far the most AEschylean of his works;
the most elemental and primaeval, the most oceanic and Titanic in
conception. He deals here with no subtleties as in _Hamlet_, with no
conventions as in _Othello_: there is no question of "a divided duty" or
a problem half insoluble, a matter of country and connection, of family
or of race; we look upward and downward, and in vain, into the deepest
things of nature, into the highest things of providence; to the roots of
life, and to the stars; from the roots that no God waters to the stars
which give no man light; over a world full of death and life without
resting-place or guidance.
But in one main point it differs radically from the work and the spirit
of AEschylus. Its fatalism is of a darker and harder nature. To
Prometheus the fetters of the lord and enemy of mankind were bitter; upon
Orestes the hand of heaven was laid too heavily to bear; yet in the not
utterly infinite or everlasting distance we see beyond them the promise
of the morning on which mystery and justice shall be made one; when
righteousness and omnipotence at last shall kiss each other.
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