SOURCE: "The Comedies of Terence," in The Edinburgh Review, Vol. CLV, No. CCCXVIII, April, 1882, pp. 364-81.

In the following excerpt, the anonymous reviewer points out that, although Terence suffered from a lack of recognition because his plays did not satisfy popular audiences in his time, he remains "a well of Latin undefiled."

Terence at the outset of his career had had a hard, uphill battle to fight and many great difficulties to overcome. The average class of spectator in a Roman theatre was very much the same as that of an ordinary modern crowd—such, for instance, as the collection of the great Unwashed which visits the Crystal Palace on a Bank Holiday. There was certainly a sprinkling of nobility; but, there being no charge for admission, the vast majority belonged to the lower orders. Plautus, with his genuine fun and broad jokes, too often, at least in...