King Oedipus

by Sophocles

translated by Lewis Campell

Sophocles. King Oedipus. Translated by Lewis Campbell. In The Oedipus Tyrannus of Sophocles, published in 1910. Now in the public domain; Lewis Campbell died in 1908. Some of the words have been modernized by James David Patterson.

Pardos

[Scene: before the Royal Palace in Boeotian Thebes.]

[Enter Oedipus, Priest of Zeus, and Suppliants.]

OEDIPUS

Children, young care of Cadmus’ ancient fold,

Why press you so to kneel beside the gate,

With wool-tufts on each suppliant olive-bough,

While o’er your city clouds of incense rise,

And mingled voice of pain and of wail?

Not choosing, O my sons, to know of this

By the ear from others, I myself have come,

Great Oedipus, of universal fame.

You, aged sir, whose look proclaims you able

To speak for these, say, what has brought you here,

What terror, what desire? Fear not but I

Will use all power to comfort you. My heart

Were hard to move, were it not stirred by you.

PRIEST

Great ruler of my country, you behold

What diverse ages hem your palace round;

Some not yet able to fly far, and some

Burdened with many years, Heaven’s ministers,

I, priest of Jove, – and these, a chosen band

From our fresh youth. Another troop, arrayed,

Like us, with fillets, crowd the marketplace.

Others are kneeling at the twofold shrines

Of Pallas and Ismenus’ prophet-fire:

Because our land, as you perceive, is tossed

Exceedingly, and cannot lift her head

From fierce engulfing by a murderous sea.

Earth’s buds are wasted, and the grazing herds

Pine, and our women have not strength to bear,

While fiery Pestilence, detested power,

Is fallen upon our city in his might,

Emptying the house of Cadmus, and dark Death

Hath full fruition of laments and groans.

We therefore and these children at your hearth,

Not likening you to the gods, are set,

But holding you of men pre-eminent

In human fortunes and affairs divine;

Who, in your coming to this Theban town,

Did free us from the tribute we had paid

To that harsh songstress, not advantaged

By aught we had to tell you, or could teach,

But by the aid of some supernal mind

‘Tis thought and said you did restore our life.

Now, then, O Oedipus of mighty fame,

We turn our suppliant faces unto you,

Together praying you to find for us

Some comfort, if you know, whether from man,

Or whispered to you by some voice of Heaven.

Experienced counsel, we have see and found,

Have ever prosperous issue. You, then, come,

Noblest of mortals, give our city rest

From trouble; come, take thought, for to this hour

All here proclaim you for your former zeal

Their savior. Let us not remember you

As having risen underneath your sway

To fair prosperity, and after fallen:

But be our restoration without fail.

Be now, as then, auspicious in your aid.

‘Tis better for the sovereign of a land

To rule a people than a wilderness.

For what avails ship, or fenced wall,

Untenented of living men within?

OEDIPUS

Alas, my children! Not unknown to me

Is the sad quest on which you come. I know

You are all suffering. Yet not one of you

Can equal his calamity to mine.

Yours is the simple grief that visits

One single bosom. But my burdened soul

Mourns for myself, my citizens, and you.

And now you rouse me not from the soft bed

Of slumber, but full many have been my tears,

Many the paths my voyaging thoughts have tried.

Yet, searching every way, only one cure

Have I found, and put to proof, by sending Creon,

Menoeceus’ son, the brother of my queen,

To learn within Apollo’s Pythian hall

What word or deed of mine may save this city.

And now as I compute the time, I am pained

To know his speed. He should be here ere now.

But when he shall arrive, base then were I

To fail in aught of all the god may show.

PRIEST

Even now these young ones tell me he draws near,

In happy time to crown your gracious word.

OEDIPUS

Apollo! may his coming be as blessed

With saving fortune as his looks are bright!

PRIEST

Sure he comes joyfully, else had he never

Worn that full garland of thick-berried bay.

OEDIPUS

We have not long to doubt. He can hear now. –

Son of Menoeceus, brother of my queen,

What answer from Apollo do you bring?

[Enter CREON, coming from Delphi.]

CREON

Good: for my message is, that even our woes,

Borne right unto their issue, shall be well.

OEDIPUS

What says the oracle? Thy words so far

Hearten me not, nor hasten me to fear.

CREON

Say, must I speak where these are standing by,

Or go within? I am ready either way.

OEDIPUS

Let it be heard by all. My heart is sore,

Not for myself, but for the souls I see.

CREON

My lips shall utter what the god has said.

Sovereign Apollo clearly bids us drive

Forth from our country an accursed thing

(For such is fostered in this land, and stains

Our clime), and not to cherish it past cure.

OEDIPUS

By what purgation of what dire mishap?

CREON

By exile, or atoning blood with blood.

This murder is the storm that shakes our state.

OEDIPUS

Of what man does he intimate the fall?

CREON

My gracious lord, before your fortunate reign,

King Laius was the leader of our land.

OEDIPUS

I know him by report. I never saw him.

CREON

The god commands us to punish home

The undetected authors of his death.

OEDIPUS

But they, where are they? Where shall now be seen

The faded impress of this ancient guilt?

CREON

He says, ‘tis in this land. And what is sought

Is found, while things uncared for fade away.

OEDIPUS

But where did Laius meet this violence?

At home, abroad, or in some foreign land?

CREON

He left us, as he said, to visit Delphi;

But nevermore returned since he set forth.

OEDIPUS

And was there none, no fellow-traveler,

To see, and to tell the tale, and help our search?

CREON

No, they were slain: save one, who fled in fear,

And only had one certain thing to tell.

OEDIPUS

What was that thing? A little door of hope

Once opened, may discover much to view.

CREON

A random troop of robbers, so ‘twas told,

Destroyed him, not with one, but many a hand.

OEDIPUS

How could the robber to such boldness rise,

Were not his crime suborned with Theban gold?

CREON

We thought of that. But Laius being dead,

No helper found us in our miseries.

OEDIPUS

What misery, when majesty was fallen,

Could hold you back from searching to the end?

CREON

A present trouble had engrossed our care.

The riddling Sphinx compelled us to attend

Her song, and not to think of things unseen.

OEDIPUS

But I will track this evil to the spring

And force it out to light. Full worthily

Does great Apollo, worthily do you

Direct this sudden effort for the dead.

And you shall see me justly your ally,

Aiding the cause of Phoebus and the land:

For I, in scattering this offence, will serve

No far-off friend, but mine own self no less:

The man who murdered Laius may choose

To make me too the victim of his rage:

So then, in shielding his affairs from wrong,

I vindicate myself. Now, children, rise

From yonder steps, and lift your suppliant boughs,

And let some other summon hither

All Cadmus’ people, and assure them, I

Will answer every need. This day shall see us

Blessed with glad fortune through God’s help, or fallen.

[OEDIPUS and CREON enter the palace.]

PRIEST

Rise then, my children. Even for this we came

Which of his own accord he promised:

Only may Phoebus, who has sent this word,

Both saving health and sure relief afford.

[PRIEST and SUPPLIANTS exit.]

First Choral Ode

[CHORUS enters.]

CHORUS

Kind voice of heaven, soft-breathing from the height

Of Pytho rich in gold to Thebes bright,

What willyou bring today?

Ah, Delian Paean, say!

My heart hangs on your word with trembling awe:

What new-given law,

Or what returning in Time’s circling round

Will you unfold? Tell us, immortal sound,

Daughter of golden Hope, we pray, we pray!

First, child of Jove, Pallas, to you appealing,

Then to sweet Artemis, your sister, kneeling,

Who guards our fair land

With blessing from her hand,

Enthroned o’er the circling mart that hears her praise,

And thou, whose rays

Pierce evils from afar, ho! come and save,

You mighty three! if e’er before you drove

The threatening fires of woe from Thebes, come today!

For ah! the griefs I bear

Are endless; all I have is out of gear,

And not a weapon near

To fray this hated pest from hearth or hall.

Earth’s blossoms blasted fall:

Nor can our women rise

From childbed after pangs and cries;

But flocking more and more

Unto the western shore,

Soul after soul is seen to wing her flight,

Swifter than quenchless flame, to the far realm of Night.

So countless deaths abound.

My city’s sons unpities lie around

O’er this plague-cumbered ground.

And wives, and matrons old, on every hand,

Along the altar-strand,

Groaning in saddest grief,

Pour supplication for relief.

Loud hymns are sounding clear;

And loud lament as near.

Then, golden daughter of the heavenly sire,

Send fair-eyed succor to subdue this fire.

And swiftly speed afar,

Windborne on backward car,

This shieldless War-god with loud onset sweeping.

To oarless Thracian tide,

Or ocean chambers wide,

Where Amphitrite lone her couch is keeping.

Day ruins what night spares; O you whose hand

Wields lightning, blast him with your thundering brand.

Shower from the golden string

Your arrows, Lycian King!

O Phoebe, let your fiery lances fly

Restless, as they roam

Through Xanthus’ mountain grove!

O Theban Bacchus of the lustrous eye,

With crown and torch and wavering Maenad throng

Blaze on the god disowned among the gods.

Episode 1

[OEDIPUS enters from the palace.]

OEDIPUS

Yea, you shall find, according to your prayer,

Help and relief, if you will heed my voice,

And answer the requirements of the plague.

Receive the word I give you, though a stranger

Both to the story and the deed. Not far

Could I have traced it, having naught by me

Pertaining to the matter. But today,

A citizen, though last upon the roll,

To all of you Cadmeians I speak this:

Whoever among you knows the murderer

Of Laius the son of Labdacus,

I bid him show the thing in full to me.

Himself, if he has any fear, withdrawing

The guild on his own head; he shall be vexed

No further, but go safely from the land.

Or if another from a foreign soil

Be known by any to have done this wrong,

Let him break silence. He shall have from me

Reward and lasting gratitude beside.

But if you keep it close, and one refuse

To utter this, as fearing for a friend

Or for himself, then hear my final word.

I now forbid that man, whoever he be,

Throughout this land where I hold power and sway,

To be received or spoken with, or share

In vow or sacrifice or lustral rite:

But all shall drive him from their doors, for he

Is our pollution, as the Pythian shrine

Oracular has late to me revealed.

So firm is mine alliance to the God

And your dead sovereign in this holy war.

Now on the murderer, whether he lurk

In lonely guilt, or have accomplices,

I speak this curse: Let his crushed life

Wither forlorn in hopeless misery.

And, I pray heaven, should he or they be housed

With mine own knowledge in my home, that I

May suffer what I imprecate on them.

On all of you I lay this charge, to give

Free course unto my words, for my behalf

And for the god, and for our land, that lies

A fruitless wilderness unblessed of Heaven.

Sure, had this business not been thus enjoined

By oracle divine, it were not meet

You left pollution thus uncleansed, when one,

Your noblest and your sovereign, had been slain.

Even then you should have tracked it out. And now,

Since I am vested with his power, and share

His rights in the embraces of the queen,

And we had owned beside the further tie

Of common issue, had his seed been blessed –

But Heaven was envious to him and his –

I, as contending for my own true sire,

Will do my utmost, leaving nothing untried,

To bring to light the author of the death

Of Laius the son of Labdacus,

Of Polydorus, and of Cadmus old.

And wise Agenor of the eldest time.

Lastly, to all who disobey in this,

May Heaven refuse the produce of the ground

And offspring from their wives, and may they pine

In such a plague as this, or yet more hateful.

But for the rest of you Cadmeian men,

Who love my ordinance, may righteousness,

Strong to defend, and all the gods for aye

Watch over you for blessing in your land.

CHORUS

Under the shadow of your curse, my lord,

I will speak. I slew him not, nor can I show

The slayer. Phoebus, who has given the word,

Should name the guilty.

OEDIPUS

Your demand is just,

But man may not compel the sons of Heaven.

CHORUS

I see a second course, and would suggest it.

OEDIPUS

Were it a third, hold not to speak it forth.

CHORUS

I know of one alone, who, being a king,

Sees with King Phoebus eye to eye, Teiresias.

From him, my lord, we might have certain words.

OEDIPUS

That does not count among my deeds undone.

By Creon’s counsel I have sent twice over

To fetch him, and I wonder at his delay.

CHORUS

The rumor that remains is old and dim.

OEDIPUS

What rumor? Let no tale be left unheard.

CHORUS

‘Twas said he perished by some wandering band.

OEDIPUS

But the one witness is removed from here.

CHORUS

Well, if the guilty has a taste of fear,

He will not stay when he has heard your curse.

OEDIPUS

Words will not frighten one who dares to do.

CHORUS

Yet lives there, who has power to convict him:

For hither, lo! they lead the holy seer,

Whose bosom is the only home of truth.

[TEIRESIAS enters, led by a boy.]

OEDIPUS

O you whose universal thought controls

All knowledge and all mystery, in heaven

And on earth beneath, your mind perceives,

Teiresias, though your outward eye is dark,

The plague that holds our city, whose one guide

And savior we can find in you, O king.

Phoebus (although the messenger perchance

Has told you this), upon our sending, sent

This answer back, that no release should come

From this disaster, till we sought and found

And slew the murderer of King Laius.

Or drove him exile from our land. You, then,

Withhold not any word of augury

Or other divination which you know,

But rescue Thebes, and yourself, and me,

And purge this dire pollution of the dead.

We cast ourselves on you: and beautiful

It is to use the power one has for good.

TEIRESIAS

Ah! terrible is knowledge to the man

Whom knowledge profits not. This well I knew,

But had forgotten. Else had I never come here.

OEDIPUS

Why do you come so gloomily today?

TEIRESIAS

Let me go home. Your part and mine will best

Be carried, if you will obey this word.

OEDIPUS

Rebellious and ungrateful! to deprive

The State that reared you of your utterance now.

TEIRESIAS

Your speech, I see, is crossing my intent;

And I would screen myself from the like mishap.

OEDIPUS

No, if you know, turn yourself not away:

Lo, all these suppliants are entreating you.

TEIRESIAS

Yes, for you are all blind. Never will I

Utter the sound that will reveal your evil.

OEDIPUS

What, are you privy to the business then,

And will not tell, but have a mind to be

Our traitor, and destroyer of the State?

TEIRESIAS

You press me to no purpose. I’ll not pain

Myself or you. You will get nothing from me.

OEDIPUS

O miscreant! What? Why, you would rouse, I perceive,

The passion of anger is a stone; will never

Give utterance, but in your temper prove

Still thus unsoftened and impracticable?

TEIRESIAS

My temper is your theme. Your own must dwell

Unnoticed in your bosom. You blame me?

OEDIPUS

Who could keep temper at such words as you

Have used to scorn this city?

TEIRESIAS

It will come:

Although I bury it in silence here.

OEDIPUS

Must not the king be told of what will come?

TEIRESIAS

No more for me. At this, and if you will,

Rage to the height of passionate vehemence.

OEDIPUS

Ay, and my passion shall not spare to say

All that I now perceive. I see in you

The abettor of the plot, and of the deed,

All but the handiwork. If you had eyes

Sole murderer had I declared you too.

TEIRESIAS

Is it possible? I charge you to abide

By what you have proclaimed; and from this hour

Speak not to any Theban or to me.

You are the foul polluter of this land.

OEDIPUS

O shameless front! How can you move your tongue

To such a tone, and think to escape for this?

TEIRESIAS

The might of truth is scathless. I am free.

OEDIPUS

When came the truth you speak of? Not from your art.

TEIRESIAS

From you. You urged my unwilling tongue.

OEDIPUS

Say it again, that I may know the drift.

TEIRESIAS

Was it so dark? Or do you tempt my voice?

OEDIPUS

I cannot say it was clear. Speak it again.

TEIRESIAS
I say you are the regicide you seek.

OEDIPUS

Again the word of pain! But you shall regret.

TEIRESIAS

Shall I speak something more, to feed your wrath?

OEDIPUS

All is but idleness. Say what you will.

TEIRESIAS

I tell you you are living unaware

In shameful commerce with your nearest blood,

Not seeing the abyss wherein you lie.

OEDIPUS

Think you to triumph in offending still?

TEIRESIAS

Yes, if the might of truth be anything.

OEDIPUS

It is, for other men, but not for thee,

Blind as you are in eye and ear and mind.

TEIRESIAS

O miserable reproach, which all who now

Behold you, soon shall thunder forth on you!

OEDIPUS

Nursed in unbroken night, you cannot harm

Or me, or any man who sees the day.

TEIRESIAS

No, not from me proceeds your fall; the god,

Who cares for this, is able to perform it.

OEDIPUS

Came this device from Creon or yourself?

TEIRESIAS

Not Creon, you yourself are your own bane.

OEDIPUS

O wealth and sovereign power and skill over skill

Proudly prevailing in an envied life,

What boundless jealousies environ you!

If, for this rule, which to my hand the State

Committed unsolicited and free,

Creon, my first of friends, trusted and sure,

Would undermine and hurl me from my throne,

Insinuating such a mendicant

Patcher of wiles, this crafty wizard rogue,

Blind in his art, and seeking but for gain.

Tell me, when was your divination sure?

How came it, when the minstrel hound was here,

This town had no deliverance through your word?

Her riddle was not for the passer by

To solve, but needed the diviner’s skill;

No sign whereof was manifest in you

By augury or inspiration given.

But it was left for a chance visiter,

The simple Oedipus, to end her lay:

Me, who had no intelligence from birds,

But hit upon the secret through my wit;

Whom now you study to supplant, and think

To stand as a supporter of the throne

Of lordly Creon: To your sorrow both

You and the hatcher of this scheme will drive

Pollution forth. Nought but the name of age

Protects you now from tasting of your fault.

CHORUS

As far as we may guess, the prophet’s words

And yours, O Oedipus, are spoken in anger.

That is not what we need, but to discern

How best to solve the heavenly oracle.

TEIRESIAS

Though you are sovereign here, the right of speech

Is my prerogative no less. I serve

Not you, but Apollo. He protects my life.

No need of Creon’s arm to shelter me!

Now then: my blindness is your theme: You have

Your eyes, and see not where you are in danger,

What halls you do inhabit, or with whom.

You know not where you come from. Nay, to your kin,

Buried in death and on the earth above,

Unwittingly are a most grievous foe.

And when your father’s and your mother’s curse

With fearful tread shall drive you from this land,

On both sides lashing you, your eye so clear

Seeing but darkness in that day – oh, then,

What harbor will not receive your cry,

What echo of Cithaeron will be mute,

When you perceive, what bride-song in your hall

Wafted your gallant bark with flattering gale

To anchor – where? And other store of ill

You see not, that shall equal your estate

To your true fortune and your children’s blood.

Then carp at noble Creon, and revile

My sacred utterance. No life on earth

Shall be called more miserable, than yours.

OEDIPUS

Can I endure such words from him? Begone,

Off to your ruin and with speed! Away,

And take your presence from our palace halls.

TEIRESIAS

Had you not sent for me, I would never have come.

OEDIPUS

I knew not you would utter foolishness,

Else had I never brought you to my door.

TEIRESIAS

To you I am foolish, then; but to your parents,

That gave you life, I was wise.

OEDIPUS

Hold, go not! Who?

Who gave me being?

TEIRESIAS

You shall find this day

Your origin and end.

OEDIPUS

Why will you still

Speak all in riddles and dark sentences?

TEIRESIAS

I thought you were the man to find them out.

OEDIPUS

Ay, taunt me with the gift that makes me great!

TEIRESIAS

And yet this luck has been your overthrow.

OEDIPUS

I care not, if I have preserved this city.

TEIRESIAS

Then I will go. Come, boy, and guide me forth.

OEDIPUS

Let him. For standing here you vex our eye.

But being gone, our trouble goes with you.

TEIRESIAS

Ere I depart, I will declare the word

For which I came, not daunted by your frown.

You have no power to ruin me. ‘Tis this.

The man you seek so earnestly, with threats

And proclamation loud of Laius’ blood,

Is here, a sojourner supposed from far,

But time shall prove him to the light of day

A true-born Theban: nor will such event

Bring him great joy: for, blind from having sight,

And beggared from prosperity, with staff

In stranger lands he shall feel forth his way;

Shown living with the children of his loins,

Their brother and their sire, and to the womb

That bore him, husband-son, and to his father

Murderer and joint-begetter. Now go in,

Ponder my words; and if you find them false,

Then term my prophet-gift into a senseless skill.

[OEDIPUS enters the palace.]

[TEIRESIAS is led away.]

Second Choral Ode

CHORUS

Whom has the mystic stone

Declared to have done

Horrors unnameable with blood-stained hand?

With speed of storm-swift car

‘Tis time he fled afar

With mighty footsteps hurrying from the land.

For, armed with lightning brand,

There leaps upon his track the son of Jove,

And close behind the unerring Destinies move.

Late from the snow-tipped height

This utterance sprang to light,

To hunt on every track the man unknown.

Through woodland caverns deep

And over the rocky steep

Like bull he ranges in the wilds alone,

With none to share his moan,

Shunning that prophet voice’s central sound,

Which ever lives, and haunts him, hovering round.

My heart is stirred

With strange misgiving through the augur’s word.

Nor yea nor nay

My mind will say,

But flutters betwixt hope and fear.

Seeing nor the present nor the future clear.

What strife had grown

Betwixt the son of Polybus and these

The heirs of Labdacus, was never known

Or yet to me confessed

By any certain test,

That I could bring to quench the popular praise

Of Oedipus, or with conviction strong

To vindicate a dark mysterious wrong.

Zeus and his son

Know surely all that o’er the earth is done:

But that the seer

Has wisdom cearl,

Or more endowment than the crowd,

Was never yet with evidence allowed.

A man by wit

May pass the bound another man has won;

But never ,till I see fulfillment fit,

Will I confirm the blame

They cast upon his name.

Wise he was found beneath the searching sun,

And kind to Thebes, when the Sphinx came forth

And sang. My heart shall never doubt his worth.

Episode 2

[CREON enters from the city.]

CREON

Citizens, hearing that great Oedipus,

Our sovereign, hath been launching at my head

Dire accusation, I stand here resolved

Not to endure it. In the late events

If he imagine he hath taken from me

Aught to his detriment by word or deed,

I am not careful to prolong my life

Beneath such imputation. For the harm

Of such a calumny imports not

Some single business, but of all the chief,

That I be ill-reported in the State,

And hardly thought of by my friends and you.

CHORUS

Perchance ‘twas but the sudden flash of wrath,

Not the deliberate judgment of the soul.

CREON

Who gave in evidence that the prophet spoke

False prophecies at my suggestion?

CHORUS

Such was the word, I know not how advised.

CREON

And with a steady eye, and mind not frantic,

Was this dark charge denounced on me?

CHORUS

I cannot say. To what my betters do

I am blind. But see, the King comes forth again.

[OEDIPUS enters from the palace.]

OEDIPUS

Insolent, are you here? Have you the face

To bring your boldness near my palace-roof,

Convicted of contriving against my life

And laying robber hands upon my state?

I pray thee tell, did you perceive in me

A coward or a fool, when you planned this?

Was it that I would not notice your attempt

Craftily creeping on, or, when perceived,

Not ward it off? Is it not a silly scheme,

To think to compass without troops of friends

Power, that is only won by wealth and men?

CREON

Will you be advised? Hear but as much in turn

As you have spoken, and then yourself be judge.

OEDIPUS

I know your tongue, but I am slow to learn

From you, whom I have found my grievous foe.

CREON

First on this very point, hear me declare –

OEDIPUS

I will not hear that you are not a villain.

CREON

Yours is a shallow judgment, if you think

Pride without knowledge can be any gain.

OEDIPUS

Yours is a shall judgment, if you think

You can abuse your kinsman and be free.

CREON

Right. I assent to that. But I would learn

The nature of this wrong of which you speak.

OEDIPUS

Was it or was it not by your advice

I sent to bring the seeming-reverend seer?

CREON

It was, and still I hold the counsel firm.

OEDIPUS

How long is it now, I pray, since Laius –

CREON

Performed what deed? I do not catch your drift.

OEDIPUS

Vanished in ruin by a dire defeat?

CREON

Were the time measured, it was long and old.

OEDIPUS

Well, did this prophet then profess his art?

CREON

Wise then as now, nor less in reverence.

OEDIPUS

And in that period did he mention me?

CREON

Not in my hearing.

OEDIPUS

But, I may presume,

You held an inquisition over the deed?

CREON

Yes, we inquired, of course: and could not hear.

OEDIPUS

How had this wise man then no word of this?

CREON

I speak but what I know. I cannot say.

OEDIPUS

Clear knowledge may allow you in one speech.

CREON

In what? I will not gainsay, if I know.

OEDIPUS

That, had you not been at his ear, he never

Had sought to fasten Laius’ death on me.

CREON

You know if he said this. But I in turn

Would be the questioner, and ask you this –

OEDIPUS

Ask on. No questioning can prove me guilty.

CREON

Tell me. Have you my sister for your queen?

OEDIPUS

The fact is patent, and denial vain.

CREON

And you share with her dominion of this realm?

OEDIPUS
All she desires is given her by my will.

CREON

Well, am not I third-partner with you both?

OEDIPUS

There is your villainy in breaking fealty.

CREON

Not so, if you would reason with yourself

As I now reason. First consider this:

Who would choose power accompanied with fears

Before safe slumbers with an equal sway?

‘Tis not my nature, no, nor any man’s

whom modest wisdom rules, to love the place

of domination rather than the power.

Now, without fear, I have my will from thee;

But were I king, I should do much unwillingly.

How then can I desire to be a king,

When I have rule and lordship, undisturbed?

Delusion has not gone so far with me

As to wish more than honor joined with gain.

Now all men count me happy, all embrace me;

Now he that needs you calls me to his side,

For on this chance his fortune wholly turns.

How should I leave this substance for that show?

No man of sense can be a criminal.

Such wild ambition has not my desires,

Nor could I bring myself to lend it aid.

If you would test me, go and ask again

If I brought Phoebus’ answer truly back.

Nay, more, if you shall find me to have planned

Aught in collusion with the seer, destroy me,

Not with one vote, but two, mine own with yours.

But do not on a mere suspicion blame

My course of your own will. To call good evil,

Or evil good, without clear cause, is sin.

And to cast off a worthy friend I call

No less a folly than to fling away

The life we love, that harbors in our breast.

The certainty of this will come with time;

For time alone can prove the righteous man.

On day suffices to proclaim the villain.

CHORUS

Prudence bids hearken to such words, my lord,

For fear one fall. Swift is not sure in thought.

OEDIPUS

When he who has designs on me is swift

In his advance, I must bethink me swiftly.

Should I wait leisurely, his secret work

Is perfected, and mine has missed success.

CREON

What would you then? To thrust me from the land?

OEDIPUS

Nay, death, not exile, is my wish for you.

CREON

When you shall show what is the grudge I bear you.

OEDIPUS

Mean you not to yield nor to obey me?

CREON

Because I see you blind.

OEDIPUS

Not to my need.

CREON

Mine must be thought of too.

OEDIPUS

You are a villain.

CREON

Suppose you are all ignorance?

OEDIPUS

My power

Must be maintained even then.

CREON

Authority

Sorts not with error.

OEDIPUS

O my citizens!

CREON

I have a part in them as well as you.

[JOCASTA enters from the palace.]

CHORUS

Cease, princes. Opportunely I behold

Jocasta coming toward you from the palace.

Her presence may attune your jarring minds.

JOCASTA

Unhappy that you are, why have you reared

Your wordy rancor amid the city’s harms?

Have you no shame, to stir up private broils

In such a time as this? Go within!

And you, too, Creon! nor enlarge your griefs

To make a mountain out of nothingness.

CREON

Sister, your husband Oedipus declares

One of two horrors he will work on me,

Banishment from my native soil, or death.

OEDIPUS

Yes, for I caught him practicing, my queen,

Against our person with malignant guile.

CREON

May comforts fail me and a withering curse

Destroy me, if I ever tried aught as this.

JOCASTA

I pray you, husband, listen to his plea;

Chiefly respecting his appeal to Heaven,

But also me, and these who stand by you.

CHORUS

Incline to our request

Your mind and will, O king!

OEDIPUS

What would you I should yield unto your prayer?

CHORUS

Respect one ever wise,

Whose oath protects him now.

OEDIPUS

Know you what thing you ask?

CHORUS

I know.

OEDIPUS

Then clearly tell.

CHORUS

Your friend, whose voice is hallowed by his oath,

Rob not of honor through a dim surmise.

OEDIPUS

In asking this, you labor for my death

Or banishment. Of this be well assured.

CHORUS

No, by the Sun I swear,

Vaunt-courier of the host of heaven.

For may I die the last of deaths,

Unblessed of God or friend,

If ever such thought were mine.

But oh! this pining land

Afflicts my hapless soul,

To think that to her past and present woe

She must ass this, that springs to her from you.

OEDIPUS

Then let him range, though I must die outright,

Or be thrust forth with violence from the land.

Not for his voice but yours, which wrings my heart;

He, wheresoever he live, shall have my hate.

CREON

You show yourself as sullen when you yield,

As unendurable in your fury’s height.

Such natures justly give themselves more pain.

OEDIPUS

Let me alone, then, and begone!

CREON

I go,

Unchanged to these, though I have found you blind.

[CREON exits to the city.]

CHORUS

Lady, why do you tarry

To lead your husband in?

JOCASTA

I will, when you have told me what has taken place.

CHORUS

Words without knowledge voiced a vague surmise;

And accusations, though unfounded, sting.

JOCASTA

Came this from both of them?

CHORUS

From both alike.

JOCASTA

And what was the dispute?

CHORUS

Enough for me,

Amply enough it seems, when the land

Is vexed already, not to wake what sleeps.

OEDIPUS

Observe where you are landed, honest friend,

Slackening my wrath, and bating my desire!

CHORUS

My prince, not once alone

I spoke it, but again.

I should be clearly mad,

Unfurnished of all sense,

To loose my clasp from you,

Who, when my land was sore distraught,

Did speed her forth anew with favoring gale.

Now, too, if you but will, be our good guide.

JOCASTA

Let not your queen be kept in ignorance

Why you have started such a power of wrath.

OEDIPUS

I’ll tell you, lady, for I honor you

More than these citizens. ‘Twas Creon there,

And his inveterate treason against me.

JOCASTA

Accuse him: so you make the quarrel clear.

OEDIPUS

He said I am the murderer of the king.

JOCASTA

Of his own knowledge, or from other’s word?

OEDIPUS

He keeps his own lips free: but has suborned

A knavish soothsayer to this wickedness.

JOCASTA

List, now, to me, and set your heart at rest

On that you speak of, while I make you see

No mortal thing is touched by prophecy.

The proofs I show of this are brief and stern.

Word came to Laius once, I will not say

From Phoebus’ self, but from his ministers,

That death should find him from his true-born son,

Who should of both of us be gendered,

And him, so rumor said, strange robbers slew

One morn, where two roads parted; but the child

Grew not three days, ere by my husband’s hand

His feet were locked, and he was cast and left

By messengers on the waste mountain world.

So Apollo neither brought upon the boy

His father’s murder, nor on Laius

The thing he greatly feared, death by his son.

Such issues came of prophesying words,

Therefore regard them not. God can himself

With ease bring forth what for his ends he needs.

OEDIPUS

How my soul’s depths are stirred on hearing you,

My queen, what wildering fancies cloud my mind!

JOCASTA

What care has given this turn to your discourse?

OEDIPUS

I though I heard you say, King Laius

Was at a crossway felled with slaughtering stroke.

JOCASTA

Such was the tale that still has currency.

OEDIPUS

Where was the scene of this unhappiness?

JOCASTA

Phocis the land is named: the parted ways

Lead from one point to Daulia and to Delphi.

OEDIPUS

What time hath passed since this affair was known?

JOCASTA

‘Twas just before you appeared with prosperous speed

and took the kingdom, that these tidings came.

OEDIPUS

What are your purposes against me, gods?

JOCASTA

Why broods your mind on such a thought, O king?

OEDIPUS

Nay, ask me not. But tell me first, what height

Had Laius, and what share of manly bloom?

JOCASTA

Tall, with a head just silvered over with gray:

In shape and bearing much resembling you.

OEDIPUS

O heavy fate! ‘Twould seem that even now

I flung myself unknowing on the curse.

JOCASTA

How?

I shudder as I gaze on you, O king.

OEDIPUS

The dread appalls me that the seer can see.

Tell one thing more to make it doubly clear.

JOCASTA

I shrink to speak, but, when you ask, I will.

OEDIPUS

Had he scant following, or, like a prince,

Full members of a richly armed train?

JOCASTA

There were but five in all: a herald one:

And Laius traveled in the only car.

OEDIPUS

Woe! Woe! ‘Tis clear as daylight. Who was he

That brought you this intelligence, my queen?

JOCASTA

A household slave, who living escaped alone.

OEDIPUS

And may it be that he is now within?

JOCASTA

No, truly. When he came from yonder scene,

And saw you on the throne with Laius dead,

He touched my hand, and made his instant prayer

That I would send him to overlook the flocks

And rural pastures, so to live as far

As might be from the very thought of Thebes.

And he obtained from me his suit. No slave

Could better merit richest boon than he.

OEDIPUS

Would he might come again immediately!

JOCASTA

Doubtless he may. But why desire it thus?

OEDIPUS

I fear me I have spoken far too much

In words that make me wish to see him come.

JOCASTA

Well, so he shall. But ‘tis my right to know

What in your state goes heavily, my king.

OEDIPUS

And you shall have it, when my thoughts have risen

To such a flight of wild expectancy.

To whom more worthy can I loose my heart

In traveling through such a perilous strait?

My father was Corinthian Polybus,

And Merope of Doris was my mother.

My life was held the noblest in esteem

Through all Achaia, till a chance appeared,

Deserving admiration, but, though strange,

Not worthy of the earnest heed I gave it.

For at a feasting once, over the wine,

One who had drunk his fill, called out to me,

“Hail, spurious foundling of your foster-sire!”

I that one day the passion at my heart

Hardly controlled, but, on the morrow morn,

Went near and proved my parents, who were fierce

In wrath at him whose lips had broached this word.

For their part I was satisfied, but still

This vexed me, for the rumor would not die.

Unknown to both my parents then I went

To Pytho, where, as touching my desire,

Phoebus repulsed me; but brake forth instead

With other oracles of misery

And horrible misfortune, how that I

Must know my mother’s shame, and manifest

A birth intolerable to human view,

And do to death the giver of my life.

I fled forth at the word, and, measuring now

Corinthia’s region by the stars alone,

Went roaming, where I never might behold

Those shameful prophecies fulfilled on me.

So faring on, I reached the spot, where you

Narrated the destruction of this king.

And, O my wife, I will hide nothing from you.

When I drew near the crossroad that you speak of,

A herald, and a man upon a car,

Like your description, there encountered me.

And he that held the reins, and he himself,

The graybeard, sought to force me from the path.

Then in mine angry mood, I sharply struck

The driver-man that turned me from the way;

Which when the elder saw, he watched for me

As I passed by, and from the vehicle

Smote full upon my head with the forked goad;

But paid no equal price, for, with a blow

From this right hand, smit by my staff, he fell

Instantly rolled from out the car supine.

I slew them every one. Now if there be

Aught of connection or relationship

Between yon stranger and King Laius,

What wretch on earth was ever so lost as I?

Whom have the Heaven’s so followed with their hate?

No house of Theban or of stranger here

Must any more receive me, none henceforth

Must speak to me, but drive me from the door!

I, I have laid this curse on mine own head!

Ay, and this arm that slew him now enfolds

His queen. O cruel stain! Am I not vile!

Polluted utterly! Yea, I must flee,

And, lost to Thebes, nevermore behold

My friends, nor tread my country, lest I meet

In marriage mine own mother, and bring low

The head that gave me life and reared me up,

My father, Polybus. Ah! right were he

Who should declare some god of cruel mood

Has sent he trouble upon my soul. You powers,

Worshipped in holiness, never may I see

That day, but perish from the sight of men,

Ere such a brand be printed on my name!

CHORUS

We share your fears, O king: yet lose not hope,

Till you have heard the man who saw the deed.

OEDIPUS

Yea, that is all I still have left of hope,

To bide the coming of the shepherd-man.

JOCASTA

What eager thought attends his presence here?

OEDIPUS

I’ll tell you. Should his speech accord with yours,

My life stands clear from this calamity.

JOCASTA

What word of mine agreed not with the scene?

OEDIPUS

You said he spoke of robbers in a band

As having slain him. Now if he shall still

Persist in the same number, I am free.

One man and many cannot be the same.

But if he tell of one lone traveler,

Then, unavoidably, this guilt is mine.

JOCASTA

So ‘twas given out by him, be sure of that,

He cannot take it back. Not only I

But all the people heard him speak it so.

And should he swerve in aught from his first tale,

He never will show the murder of the king

Rightly accordant with the oracle.

For Phoebus said expressly he should die

By him whom I brought forth. But that poor babe

Never slew his sire, but perished long before.

And for my part, for word of prophecy

I never will look this way nor that again.

OEDIPUS

Wisely resolved. But still send one to fetch

The laboring man, and be not slack in this.

JOCASTA

I will, and quickly too. Go we within,

I will do nought but what may pleasure you.

[OEDIPUS and JOCASTA go within.]

Third Choral Ode

CHORUS

Deep in my life, by fate impressed,

Let holiness of word and action rest

And sinless thought, by those Eternal Laws

Controlled, whose being Heaven alone did cause,

Nor have they drawn their birth

From mortal sires of Earth,

But tread the loftiest Ether, whence they came.

Never shall oblivion tame

Their wakeful spirit; mighty is the power

Of God in these, nor knows the enfeebling hour.

From full-blown pride the tyrant springs.

Pride, when ‘tis feasted over-much on things

Timeless and all unmeet, to topmost height

Soars madly, and then sinks to sudden night,

Midst foot-perplexing shocks

Of adamantine rocks,

Prepared for stumbling mortals by dark fate.

But to uphold the State

With help of God let men not cease to strive.

I’ll own God my protector while I live.

Who walks disdainfully with hand or tongue,

Not fearing acts of wrong,

Nor reverencing each temple’s holy shrine?

A horrid fate be yours,

For your abandoned greed,

Who seeks gain beyond your rightful meed,

Nor sparest things divine,

And in your madness touches things accurst.

Who, when such crimes have burst,

Can look for shelter from the wrathful shower?

If such a spirit be in power,

And gilded with preferment still advance,

What means my service in the sacred dance?

No more I’ll worship at earth’s central seat,

Not Abae’s altar greet,

Nor bow before Olympa’s brilliant lord,

Unless for every mind

This word fulfillment find,

The event and prophecy in clear accord.

If rightly we invoke

Your name, immortal ruler, mightiest Jove,

Let not these courses prove

Unvisited by your eternal stroke.

All heavenly sanctities are broke:

The oracles to Laius given of old

Vanish in scorn, and Phoebus’ fear is cold.

Episode 3

[JOCASTA enters from the palace.]

JOCASTA

Princes of Thebes, it came into my mind

To stand before the holy altars here

With frankincense and garlands. For the king,

Tossed with fantasy, still runs his soul

On wildest seas, nor, like a man whose thoughts

Keep measure, tries things present by the past.

Each tongue possesses him that harps on fear.

Then, since my comforts do no good at all,

To you, for you are nearest, Lycian god,

I bring my supplication with full hand,

To bid you find for us some pure release.

For seeing him, our captain, in distress,

Like shipmen, we are all amazed with dread.

[FIRST MESSENGER enters, coming from Corinth.]

FIRST MESSENGER

Can you inform me, strangers, where to find

The mansions of the sovereign Oedipus?

Or better, where he may himself be seen?

CHORUS

These are the roofs you seek, and he, our lord,

Is there within: and, stranger, you behold

The proud queen-mother of his princely race.

FIRST MESSENGER

Happy, and with the happy may she live,

High-blessed co-partner of his royal state.

JOCASTA

You, too, be blessed, kind sir! Your gracious tongue

Deserves no less. But tell me, what desire

You urge, or what intelligence you bring?

FIRST MESSENGER

Good tidings for your house and husband, queen.

JOCASTA

What are they? Who has sent you to our hall?

FIRST MESSENGER

From Corinth came I, and will quickly t ell

What sure will please you, though perchance ‘twill grieve.

JOCASTA

What news can strike us with this twofold power?

FIRST MESSENGER

‘Twas rumored that the natives of the land

Of Corinth were about to make him king.

JOCASTA

What? Is old Polybus not still in power?

FIRST MESSENGER

The power of death confines him in the grave.

JOCASTA

Hold there. How say you? Polybus is in his grave?

FIRST MESSENGER

May I die for him if I speak not true.

JOCASTA

Quick, Cloe, run and tell this to my lord.

Voices of prophecy! Where are you now?

Long time has Oedipus with trembling fear

Avoided Polybus, lest he should slay him,

Who now lies slain by fortune, not by him.

[OEDIPUS enters from the palace.]

OEDIPUS

Jocasta, my dear queen, why did you send

To bring me hither from our palace-halls?

JOCASTA

Listen to that man, and, when you hear him, judge

The ending of the dreadful prophecy.

OEDIPUS

Who is the man, and what his message here?

JOCASTA

He comes from Corinth, to announce to you

That Polybus, your father, is no more.

OEDIPUS

What, stranger? Let me hear it from your mouth.

FIRST MESSENGER

If my first duty is to make this clear,

Be without doubt that he is dead and gone.

OEDIPUS

By sickness coming over him, or by guile?

FIRST MESSENGER

Light force subdues to rest the aged frame.

OEDIPUS

It seems he died of sickness then, poor soul!

FIRST MESSENGER

By sickness and the number of his years.

OEDIPUS

Ah! my Jocasta, who again will heed

The Pythian hearth oracular, and birds

Screaming in air, blind guides! that would have given

My father’s murder to mine hand; but he

Hides underground in death, while I stand here

Harmless and weaponless: unless, perchance,

My absence killed him, so he may have died

Through me. But be that as it may, the grave,

That covers Polybus from sight, has closed

One voice of prophecy, worth noting now.

JOCASTA

Did I not tell you so, long since?

OEDIPUS

You did.

But I was drawn to error by my fear.

JOCASTA

Now cast it altogether out of mind.

OEDIPUS

Must I not fear my mother’s marriage-bed?

JOCASTA

Why should man fear? seeing his course is ruled

By fortune, and he nothing can foreknow?

‘Tis wise to live at will as best one may.

Then do not fear your mother’s nuptial.

Many a man ere now in dreams has lain

With her who bore him. He has easiest life

Who with such omens troubles not his mind.

OEDIPUS

All this would be well spoken, were not she

Alive that gave me birth. But since she lives

Though you speak well, yet have I cause for fear.

JOCASTA

Your father’s burial might enlighten you.

OEDIPUS

It does. But I am darkened by a life.

FIRST MESSENGER

What lady is the subject of your fears?

OEDIPUS

Merope, aged friend, who lived with Polybus.

FIRST MESSENGER

What touching her inclines you to fear?

OEDIPUS

A heaven-sent oracle of dreadful note.

FIRST MESSENGER

May it be told, or must no stranger know?

OEDIPUS

Surely it may. Word came from Apollo once

That I must know my mother’s shame, and shed

With these my hands mine own true father’s blood.

Wherefore long since my home has been removed

Far from Corinthia: not unhappily;

But still our parents’ eyes are sweet to see.

FIRST MESSENGER

Did fear of this make you so long in exile?

OEDIPUS

Horror of this and parricide, old friend.

FIRST MESSENGER

Since friendly was my coming, I would fain

Free you from this anxiety, my king.

OEDIPUS

Our gratitude would well reward your love.

FIRST MESSENGER

Hope of reward from you in your return

Was the chief motive of my coming hither.

OEDIPUS

Return? Not to my parents’ dwelling place.

FIRST MESSENGER

Son, ‘tis too clear, you know not what you do.

OEDIPUS

Why, aged sir? For Heaven’s sake teach me this.

FIRST MESSENGER

If for these reasons you avoid your home.

OEDIPUS

The fear torments me, Phoebus may prove true.

FIRST MESSENGER

Lest from your parents you receive a stain?

OEDIPUS

That is the life-long torture of my soul.

FIRST MESSENGER

Will you be certified your fears are groundless!

OEDIPUS

How groundless, if I am my parents’ child?

FIRST MESSENGER

Because with Polybus you have no relation.

OEDIPUS

Why? Was not he the author of my life?

FIRST MESSENGER

As much as I am, and no more than I.

OEDIPUS

How can my father be no more to me

Than who is nothing?

FIRST MESSENGER

In begetting you

Nor I nor he had any part at all.

OEDIPUS

Why then did he declare me for his son?

FIRST MESSENGER

Because he took you once as a gift from me.

OEDIPUS

Was all that love unto a foundling shown?

FIRST MESSENGER

Heirless affection so inclined his heart.

OEDIPUS

You gave me to him then? your own or bought?

FIRST MESSENGER

Found in Cithaeron’s hollowly wilderness.

OEDIPUS

What led your traveling footsteps to that ground?

FIRST MESSENGER

The flocks I tended grazed the mountain there.

OEDIPUS

A shepherd were you, and a wandering hind?

FIRST MESSENGER

Whatever else, my son, your savior then.

OEDIPUS

From what disaster that you saw me in?

FIRST MESSENGER

Your instep bears memorial of that pain.

OEDIPUS

Oh! what old evil will your words disclose?

FIRST MESSENGER

Your feet were pierced till I unfastened them.

OEDIPUS

Sad outrage in the bands of infancy!

FIRST MESSENGER

From this adventure you have taken your name.

OEDIPUS

Ah! tell me, did my father do this thing,

Or was it my mother?

FIRST MESSENGER

That I dare not say.

He knows best who gave you to my hand.

OEDIPUS

Another gave me, then? You did not find me?

FIRST MESSENGER

Another herdsman passed you on to me.

OEDIPUS

Can you describe him? Tell us what you know.

FIRST MESSENGER

He was called one of Laius’ people, sure.

OEDIPUS

Of Laius once the sovereign of this land?

FIRST MESSENGER

Yea, surely, he was the shepherd of his flock.

OEDIPUS

And is he still alive for me to see?

FIRST MESSENGER

You Thebans are most likely to know that.

OEDIPUS

Say, any one of you in presence here,

If you can tell me of the swain he speaks of,

In town or country having known of him?

The time for this discovery is full come.

CHORUS

Methinks it is no other than the peasant

Whom you did seek before to see: but this

Could best be told by Queen Jocasta there.

OEDIPUS

We lately urged that one should come, my queen.

Know you, is this of whom he speaks the same?

JOCASTA

What matter who? Regard not, nor desire

Even vainly to remember aught he says.

OEDIPUS

When I have found such tokens of my birth,

I must disclose it.

JOCASTA

As you love your life,

By Heaven I beg you, search no further here.

The sickness in my bosom is enough.

OEDIPUS

Nay, never fear. Were I proved thrice a slave

And waif of bondwomen, you still are noble.

JOCASTA

Yet hearken, I implore you: do not so.

OEDIPUS

I cannot hear you. I must know this out.

JOCASTA

With clear perception I advise the best.

OEDIPUS

This ‘best’ of yours is ever mine annoy.

JOCASTA

Wretched one, never may you know your birth.

OEDIPUS

Will some one go and bring the herdsman hither?

Leave her to revel in her lordly line.

JOCASTA

O horrible! O lost one! This alone

I speak to you, and no word more for ever.

[JOCASTA rushes into the palace.]

CHORUS

Oedipus, wherefore is Jocasta gone,

Driven madly by wild grief? I needs must fear

Lest from this silence she make sorrows spring.

OEDIPUS

Let her! Yet I will choose to know my birth

Though from an humble seed. Her woman’s pride

Is shamed, it may be, by my lowliness.

But I, while I account myself the son

Or prospering fortune, never will be disgraced.

For she is my true mother: and the months

Co-heirs with me of the same father Time

Have marked my lowness and mine exaltation.

So born, so nurtured, I can fear no change,

That I need shrink to delve this to the root.

Fourth Choral Ode

CHORUS

If I wield a prophet’s might,

Or have sense to search aright,

Cithaeron, when tonight the moon rides high,

Loud your praise shall be confessed,

How upon your rugged breast,

You, mighty mother, nursed tenderly

Great Oedipus, and gave his being room

Within your spacious home.

Yea, we will dance and sing

Your glory for your friendship to our king.

Phoebus, unto you we cry,

Be this pleasing in your eye!

Who, my child, has given you birth

Of the long-lived nymphs of earth?

Say, was she clasped by mountain-roving Faun,

Or beguiled she one sweet hour

With Apollo in her bower,

Who loves to trace the wide uncultured lawn?

Or was the ruler of Cyllene’s height

The author of your light?

Or did the Bacchic god,

Who makes the top of Helicon to nod,

Take you for a foundling care

From his playmates that are there?

Episode 4

OEDIPUS

If haply I, who never saw his face,

Thebans, may guess, I think I see the hind,

Whose coming we have longed for. Both his age,

Agreeing with the other’s wintry locks,

Chimes with my supposition, and the garb

Of his conductors is well know to me

As that of my own people. But yourself

In perfect knowledge are my better here,

Whose eyes have seen the herdsman in the past.

CHORUS

I know him well, believe me. Laius

Had no more faithful shepherd than this man.

OEDIPUS

Corinthian friend, I first appeal to you:

Was’t he you spoke of?

FIRST MESSENGER

‘Twas the man you see.

[SERVANT enters from the fields.]

OEDIPUS

Turn your eyes hither, aged friend, and tell

What I shall ask you. Were you Laius’ slave?

SERVANT

I was, not bought, but bred within the house.

OEDIPUS

What charge or occupation was your care?

SERVANT

Most of my time was spent in shepherding.

OEDIPUS

And where did you inhabit with your flock?

SERVANT

‘Twas on Cithaeron, now the neighboring tract.

OEDIPUS

And had you there acquaintance of this man?

SERVANT

Following what service? Who is he you mean?

OEDIPUS

He who stands here. Say, had you met with him?

SERVANT

I cannot bring him all at once to mind.

FIRST MESSENGER

No marvel, good my lord. But I will clearly

Wake to remembrance his long slumbering sense.

For well I know he knows of the time

When he with his two flocks and I with one

Beside him grazed Cithaeron’s pasture wide

Good six months’ space of three successive years,

From spring to spring of Arcturus; then

For the bleak winter-time I drove my charge

To their own folds, he his to Laius’ stalls.

Is this the truth, or do I stray from fact?

SERVANT

The time is far remote. But all is true.

FIRST MESSENGER

Well, do you remember having given me then

A child, that I might foster him for mine?

SERVANT

What means this question? Let me know your drift.

FIRST MESSENGER

Friend, yonder is the infant whom we knew.

SERVANT

Confusion seize you, and your evil tongue!

OEDIPUS

Check not his speech, I pray you, for your words

Call more than his for chastisement, old sir.

SERVANT

What, mighty sovereign, is mine error here?

OEDIPUS

Not answering about the child he asks of.

SERVANT

He knows not what he says. His end is vain.

OEDIPUS

You will not speak to please us, but the lash

Will make you speak.

SERVANT

By all that’s merciful,

Scourge not this aged frame!

OEDIPUS

Pinion him straight!

SERVANT

Unhappy! wherefore? what is’t you would know?

OEDIPUS

Gave you the child he asks of to this man?

SERVANT

I gave it him. Would I had died that hour!

OEDIPUS

Speak rightly, or your wish will soon come true.

SERVANT

My ruin comes sooner, if I speak.

OEDIPUS

You mean to keep us in suspense, I see.

SERVANT

Not I. I said long since, “I gave the child.”

OEDIPUS

Whence? Was it your own, or from another’s home?

SERVANT

‘Twas not mine own, another gave it me.

OEDIPUS

What Theban gave it from what house in Thebes?

SERVANT

O, I implore you, master, ask no more!

OEIDPUS

You perish, if I have to ask again.

SERVANT

The child was of the stock of Laius.

OEDIPUS

Slave-born, or rightly of the royal line?

SERVANT

My lips will hardly speak the awful truth.

OEDIPUS

My ears refuse to hear, yet hear they must.

SERVANT

He was given out for Laius’ son: but she,

Your queen, within the palace, best can tell.

OEDIPUS

How? Did she give it to you?

SERVANT

My lord, she did.

OEDIPUS

With what commission?

SERVANT

I was to destroy him.

OEDIPUS

And could a mother’s heart be steeled to this?

SERVANT

By fear of evil prophecies.

OEDIPUS

What were they?

SERVANT

‘Twas said the child should be his father’s death.

OEDIPUS

What then possessed you to give up the child

To this old man?

SERVANT

Pity, my sovereign lord!

Supposing he would take him far away

Unto the land where he was from. But he

Preserved him to great sorrow. For if you

Are whom he gives you out, be well assured

You bear a heavy doom.

OEDIPUS

O horrible!

Horrible! All is know, as sunlight clear!

O may I nevermore behold the day,

Since proved accursed, in my parentage,

In those I live with, and in those I slew.

[OEDIPUS rushes into the palace.]

Fifth Choral Ode

CHORUS

O tribes of living men,

How nothing worth I count you while you stand!

For who of all the train

Draws more of happiness into his hand

Than to seem bright, and, seeming, fade in gloom?

O Oedipus, in your all-hapless doom

Too clearly ‘tis expressed

Nought in mortality is blessed.

You, that with peerless might did hit

The center, and destroy by wit

The taloned songstress, as a tower

Saving my land from death’s dark power,

And winning for yourself the name

Of Thebes’ king, and noblest fame

And fullness of triumphal bliss.

But now whose story is more mournful?

Who so in life’s vicissitude

Has fellowship with fortune rude,

Checkless calamity and boundless pain?

O Oedipus renowned,

Who in one haven found

Room both for son and sire

To haunt with nuptial fire,

Ah! how could you so long remain

The furrower of your father’s field,

Borne patiently and unrevealed?

Crimes from yourself concealed

All-searching Time has opened to the day,

And shown you with clear ray,

Long while in hideous bond, spouse, father, child.

O Laius’ fatal son,

Would I had never known you!

My heart cries loud for you

In tones of agony,

And frenzied exclamation wild.

For, to speak truth, you did renew my life,

And gave my eye sweet respite after strife.

Episode 5

[SECOND MESSENGER enters from palace.]

SECOND MESSENGER

O you whom Thebes still has chosen in chief

To honor, what a spectacle of woe

Awaits your eyes, your ears; what piercing grief

Your hearts must suffer, if as kinsmen should

You still regard the house of Laius!

Not Phasis, nor the Danube’s rolling flood

Can ever wash away the stains, and purge

This mansion of the horror that it hides.

And more it soon shall give to light, not now

Unconsciously determined. Of all ill,

Self-chosen sorrows are the worst to bear.

CHORUS

What have you new to add? The weight of grief

From what we know burdens the heart enough.

SECOND MESSENGER

Soon spoken and soon heard is the chief sum.

Jocasta’s royal head is sunk in death.

CHORUS

The hapless queen! What was the fatal cause?

SECOND MESSENGER

Her own determination. Those who saw

Felt more of pain that ever can be told.

Yet to the summit of my memory’s power

The wretched lady’s passion you shall hear.

When she had passed in her rash mood within

The vestibule, straight to the bridal bed

She rushes, tearing with both hands her hair.

Then having entered, pulling fast the door,

She called aloud on Laius, long dead,

With living memory of that far-off joy,

From which he died, and left the mother-queen

To breed a hideous offspring for his son.

And loudly over the bed she mourned, where she,

All hapless, had brought forth a twofold brood,

Husband from husband, children from a child.

We could not know the moment of her death,

Which followed soon, for Oedipus with cries

Burst in, and would not let us see her end,

But drew all eyes as he careered the hall,

Demanding arms, and where to find his wife, –

No, not his wife, but fatal mother-croft,

Cropped doubly with himself and his own seed.

And in his rage some demon pointed him

The way, – for ‘twas no man of us at hand.

And with a fearful shout, as following

Some leader, he assailed the folding doors.

Then hollering inwards from the mortised bolts

The yielding boards, he breaks into the room;

Where high suspended we beheld the queen,

In twisted cordage violently swung.

And he with terrible outcry when he saw,

Poor king! undid the hanging noose. But when

She lay upon the ground, ‘twas terrible

To see what followed. For he tore away

The brooch-pins that had fastened her attire,

And, lifting, smote his eyeballs to the root,

Saying, Henceforth they should not see the evil

Suffered or done by him in the past time,

But evermore in darkness now should scan

The feature he ought never to have seen,

And not-discern the souls he longed to know.

Chanting this strain, not once but oftentimes

He dashed the points into his eyes; and soon

The bleeding pupils moistened all his beard,

Nor stinted the dark flood, but all at once

The ruddy hail poured forth with plenteous shower.

Thus from two springs, from man and wife together,

Burst the joint evil that is now overflowing.

And the old happiness in that past day

Was truly happy, but the present hour

Has groaning, death, disaster, shame, all ill

Without exemption, that has ever been named.

CHORUS

And finds the sufferer now some pause of woe?

SECOND MESSENGER

He cries to open the portal and display

To all the men of Thebes him who slew

His father, who unto his mother did

What I dare not repeat, and fain would fling

His person from the land, nor calmly bide

The shock of his own curse in his own hall.

His case craves comfort and some guiding hand:

For such a load of misery who can bear?

Yourself shall judge: for, lo, the palace-gate

Is opening, and you will quickly see

A hateful sight, yet one you needs must pity.

[OEDIPUS enters from the palace.]

CHORUS

O horror of the world!

Too great for mortal eye!

Terrible beyond all my life has know!

What madness, O poor head!

Assailed thee? Who in heaven

Has leaped against your hapless lot

With boundings out of measure fierce and huge?

Ah! wretched one, I cannot look on you:

No, though I long to search, to ask, to learn.

Your aspect is too horrible. I cannot!

OEDIPUS

Oh! miserable am I.

Where am I borne? Ah woe!

Where do these accents flow,

Tossed waveringly?

O Genius! Whither has your fury soared?

CHORUS

To a pitch too dread for speech, by sight abhorred.

OEDIPUS

O cloud of dark, on me

Sent loweringly!

Hideous, unutterable,

Invisible!

Too surely wafted on.

Ah me! Again I moan.

These piercing wounds with agonizing smart

Sharpen the pang of memory at mine heart.

CHORUS

No marvel, if in this assault of woe

Your miseries with redoubled fullness flow.

OEDIPUS

Friend of the years that were,

O constant kind!

Still do you tend the blind,

Unwearied in your care!

Ah! ‘tis you voice, I know you by that tone;

Dark though I be, you do not lurk unknown.

CHORUS

Agent of horror! whence did you have the force

To waste those orbs? what power impelled your course?

OEDIPUS

Apollo’s was the power, Apollo wrought my woe:

But mine, and no man’s else, the hand that struck the blow.

Why, friends, should I have sight,

When nought could meet my vision with delight?

CHORUS

Ay, you speak truly there!

OEDIPUS

What could I see, what hear,

That ever again could move

My heart with love, or sweetly soothe mine ear?

Friends, with what speed you may

Lead me from hence away,

Me, the accursed thing,

Ruined and ruining.

Ay, and over all on Earth by Heaven abhorred.

CHORUS

Not least unhappy for your depth of heart!

Would I had never known you who you are!

OEDIPUS

Perish, who amidst the wild from cruel fettering band

Took me and saved from death, vain kindness, idly planned!

Had I but perished then,

Nor I, nor those I loved, had known this pain.

CHORUS

I join you in that prayer.

OEDIPUS

Then I had never been shown

My father’s slayer, nor know

My mother’s bridal in the face of men.

Now, heaven-abandoned,

Of crime and horror bred,

I have shared a father’s bed.

What woe ranks highest in ill? my life has found that word.

CHORUS

I know not how to call you wise in this,

Better be out of life than blindly live.

OEDIPUS

That this last act has not been for the best

Censure me not, nor counsel me again.

For how, if I had eyes, could I have looked

In Hades on my father’s countenance,

Or my all-hapless mother, when, toward both,

Crimes worse than capital are on my head?

Ah! but my children were a sight of joy,

Offspring of such a union! were they so?

Never, to eyes of mine! nor town, nor tower,

Nor holy fanes of the gods, which I myself,

O misery, have sundered from myself,

I, dowered with fairest life of Theban men,

Proclaiming to drive off from every door

Whom Heaven had marked for impious and impure,

Nay worse, of Laius born! And was I then,

By mine own process branded thus, to look

On Theban faces with unaltered mien?

Nay verily; but had there been a way

To stop the hearing fountain through the ear,

I had not faltered, but had closed and barred

Each gate of this poor body; deaf and blind!

So thought might sweetly dwell at rest from harm.

Cithaeron! Why did you take me to your breast,

Not slaying me then and there? So had I not

Told to the world the horror of my birth.

O foster-home of Corinth and her king,

How bright the life you cherished, filming over

What foulness far beneath! For I am vile,

And vile have been my parents. So ‘tis proved.

O crossroads in the covert of the glen,

O thicket in the gorge where three ways met,

Bedewed by these my hands with mine own blood.

From whence I sprang – have you forgotten me?

Or doth some memory haunt you of the deeds

I did before you, and then came and wrought

Fresh horrors here? O doubly cursed womb!

That gendered me, and then again sent forth

New offsets from the seed so gendered:

Mazing the world with dire confusion

Of father, brother, son, bride, mother, wife,

Murder of parents, and all shames that re.

But for that in respect of hideous deeds

Silence is commendable, I beg you now

To hurl me forth at once from human view.

Slay me outright, or fling me far to sea,

Where you may never look on me again.

Come, lend your hand unto my misery.

Comply, and fear not, for my strain of woe

Is incommunicable to all but me.

CHORUS

With timely presence to fulfil your word

With act and counsel, Creon comes, who now

Is regent over our city in your place.

[CREON enters from the palace.]

OEDIPUS

Alas, what shall I say to him? What plea

Will hold for my defense? My wickedness

Toward him in all the past is clearly seen.

CREON

I come not, Oedipus, to mock your woes,

Or to reproach you for your evils past.

But you, if all respect of mortal eye

Be dead, let awe of the universal flame

Of life’s great nourisher, our lord the Sun,

Forbid your holding thus unveiled to view

This huge abomination, which nor Earth

Nor sacred Element, nor light of Heaven

Can once endure. Convey him in with speed.

Religion bids that kindred eyes and ears

Alone should witness kindred crimes and woe.

OEDIPUS

By Heaven, since you have wrenched me from my fear,

So nobly meeting my unworthiness,

I pray you hear me for your own behalf.

CREON

What boon do you desire so earnestly?

OEDIPUS

Fling me with utmost swiftness from the land,

Where I may never speak with mortal more.

CREON

Doubt not I would have done so, but the god

Must first be questioned for our guidance here.

OEDIPUS

Sure unequivocal was his behest,

The parricide, the impious, should be slain.

CREON

So it was spoken: but, in such a time,

We needs must be advised more perfectly.

OEDIPUS

And will you ask him for a wretch like me?

CREON

Yes. For even you, I think, will now believe.

OEDIPUS

Not only so. But I will charge you too,

With urgent exhortation, to perform

The funeral rite for her who lies within –

She is your kinswoman – however you will.

But never let this city of my sires

Claim me for living habitant, but there

Leave me to range the mountains, where my nurse

Cithaeron, echoes with my name, Cithaeron,

Which both my parents destined for my grave.

So my true murderers will be my death.

Yet one thing I can tell. Mine end will come

Not by disease nor human casualty.

I had not lived when at the point to die,

But for some terrible doom. Then let my fate

Run out its full career. But for my children

You, Creon, shall provide. As for my sons,

I pray you burden not yourself with them.

They never will lack subsistence – they are men.

But my poor maidens, hapless and forlorn,

Who never had a meal apart from mine,

But ever shared my table, yea, for them

Take heedful care; and grant me, if but one,

Yea, I beseech you, with these hands to feel,

You noble heart! the forms I love so well,

And weep with them our common misery.

Oh, if my arms were round them, when I could see.

[ANTIGONE and ISMENE enter with attendants.]

What? Am I fooled once more, or do I hear

My dear ones weeping? And has Creon sent,

Pitying my sorrows, mine own children to me

That most I love? Can this be truth I utter?

CREON

Yea. I have done it. For I knew the joy

You still have felt in this, your comfort now.

OEDIPUS

Fair be your fortune, then, and, for this speed,

God guard you better than he watched over me.

Where are you, O my children? Come, draw near

To these my hands of brother blood with you,

Hands that have thus provided for your gaze

The once bright luster of your father’s eyes,

Of mine, who, ignorant and unaware,

Became your father at that fount of life,

My children, where I quickened! Oh! for you

I weep, not seeing you, when I take thought

Of all the bitter passages of fate

That yet await you among men. For where

Can you find fellowship, what civic throng,

What feast, can you resort to, but instead

Of seeing aught, you will come weeping home?

And when you reach the marriageable bloom,

My daughters, who will be the man to cast

His lot with the unfortunate, and take

All those reproaches on his name, which fall

So heavily on my parents and on you?

What evil is not here? Your father slew

His father, and then sowed the mother-field,

Where he himself was sown, and got you from

The source of his own birth. Such taunts will fly.

And who will marry you? No man, my daughters;

But you must wither childless and unwed.

Son of Menoeceus, who alone are left

As father to them both: for we, their parents,

Who gave them birth, are utterly undone:

Suffer them not, being your kinswomen,

To wander desolate and poor, nor make

Their lot perforce the counterpart of mine.

But have compassion on their youth, thus left

Forlorn of all protection save from you.

Noble one, seal this promise with your hand.

For you, my children, were you of an age

To ponder speech, I would have counseled you

Full carefully. Now I would have your pray

To dwell where ‘tis convenient, that your life

May find more blessing than your father knew.

CREON

You have had enough of weeping. Close yourself in

your chamber walls.

OEDIPUS

I must yield, though sore against me.

CREON

Yes, for strong occasion calls.

OEDIPUS

Do you know on what terms I yield it?

CREON

Tell me, let me hear and know.

OEDIPUS

That you send me from the country.

CREON

God alone can let you go.

OEDIPUS

But the gods long since abhor me.

CREON

This the sooner you will gain.

OEDIPUS

Then consent.

CREON

‘Tis not my desire to venture promises in vain.

OEDIPUS

Lead me now within the palace.

CREON

Come, but let your children be.

OEDIPUS

Tear them not from my embrace!

CREON

Think not all things are for you.

Even the gods you once obtained have not held your life in fee.

[CREON and OEDIPUS, with ANTGONE and

ISMENE, enter the palace.]

Exidos

CHORUS

You who dwell in Thebes our city, fix on Oedipus your eyes,

Who resolved the dark enigma, noblest liver and most wise.

Glorious, like a sun he mounted, envied of the popular throng;

Now he sinks in seas of anguish, quenched among the stormy waves.

Therefore I await the final hour, to ancient wisdom known,

Ere I call one mortal happy. Never shall that thought be shown,

Till he end his earthly being, scathless of a sigh or groan.

[CHORUS exits into the city.]