Ismene, my sister, true child of my own mother, do you know any evil out
 of all the evils bequeathed by Oedipus that Zeus will not fulfil for the
 two of us in our lifetime? There is nothing—no pain, no ruin,

no shame, nor dishonor—that I have not
 seen in your sufferings and mine. And now what is this new edict that
 they say the general has just decreed to all the city? Do you know
 anything? Have you heard? Or does it escape you that

evils from our enemies are on the march against
 our friends?

To me no word of our friends, Antigone, either bringing joy or bringing
 pain has come since we two were robbed of our two brothers who died in
 one day by a double blow.

And since
 the Argive army has fled during
 this night, I have learned nothing further, whether better fortune is
 mine, or further ruin.

I knew it well, so I was trying to bring you outside the courtyard gates
 to this end, that you alone might hear.

Hear what? It is clear that you are
 brooding on some dark news.

Why not? Has not Creon destined our brothers, the one to honored burial,
 the other to unburied shame? Eteocles, they say, with due observance of
 right and custom, he has laid in the earth

for his honor among the dead below. As for the poor
 corpse of Polyneices, however, they say that an edict has been published
 to the townsmen that no one shall bury him or mourn him, but instead
 leave him unwept, unentombed, for the birds a pleasing store

as they look to satisfy their hunger.
 Such, it is said, is the edict that the good Creon has laid down for you
 and for me—yes, for me—and it is said that he is coming here to proclaim
 it for the certain knowledge of those who do not already know. They say
 that he does not conduct this business lightly,

but whoever performs any of these rites, for him the
 fate appointed is death by public stoning among the entire city. This is
 how things stand for you, and so you will soon show your nature, whether
 you are noble-minded, or the corrupt daughter of a noble line.

Poor sister, if things have come to this, what would I

profit by loosening or tightening this knot?

Consider whether you will share the toil and the task.

What are you hazarding? What do you intend?

Will you join your hand to mine in order to lift his corpse?

You plan to bury him—when it is forbidden to the city?

Yes, he is my brother, and yours
 too, even if you wish it otherwise. I will never be convicted of
 betraying him.

Hard girl! Even when Creon has forbidden it?

No, he has no right to keep me from my own.

Ah, no! Think, sister, how our father

perished in hatred and infamy, when, because of the crimes that he
 himself detected, he smashed both his eyes with self-blinding hand; then
 his mother-wife, two names in one, with a twisted noose destroyed her
 life;

lastly, our two brothers
 in a single day, both unhappy murderers of their own flesh and blood,
 worked with mutual hands their common doom. And now we, in turn—we two
 who have been left all alone—consider how much more miserably we will be
 destroyed, if in defiance of the law

we transgress against an autocrat’s decree or his powers.
 No, we must remember, first, that ours is a woman’s nature, and
 accordingly not suited to battles against men; and next, that we are
 ruled by the more powerful, so that we must obey in these things and in
 things even more stinging.

I, therefore, will
 ask those below for pardon, since I am forced to this, and will obey
 those who have come to authority. It is foolish to do what is
 fruitless.

I would not encourage you—no, nor, even if you were willing
 later,

would I welcome you as
 my partner in this action. No, be the sort that pleases you. I will bury
 him—it would honor me to die while doing that. I shall rest with him,
 loved one with loved one, a pious criminal. For the time is
 greater

that I must serve the
 dead than the living, since in that world I will rest forever. But if
 you so choose, continue to dishonor what the gods in honor have
 established.

I do them no dishonor. But to act in violation of the
 citizens’ will—of that I am by nature incapable.

You can make that your pretext!
 Regardless, I will go now to heap a tomb over the brother I love.

Oh no, unhappy sister! I fear for you!

Do not tremble for me. Straighten out your own destiny.

Then at least disclose the deed to no one before you do it.

Conceal it, instead, in secrecy—and so,
 too, will I.

Go on! Denounce it! You will be far more hated for your silence, if you
 fail to proclaim these things to everyone.

You have a hot heart for chilling deeds.

I know that I please those whom I am most bound to please.

Yes, if you will also have the
 power. But you crave the impossible.

Why then, when my strength fails, I will have finished.

An impossible hunt should not be tried in the first place.

If you mean that, you will have my hatred, and you will be subject to
 punishment as the enemy of the dead.

But leave me and the foolish plan I have authored to suffer this
 terrible thing, for I will not suffer anything so terrible that my death
 will lack honor.

Go, then, if you so decide. And of this be sure: though
 your path is foolish, to your loved ones your love is straight and
 true. Exit Antigone on the spectators’ left. Ismene exits into
 the palace.

Shaft of the sun, fairest light of all that have dawned
 on Thebes of the seven
 gates, you have shone forth at last, eye of golden day, advancing
 over Dirce’s streams!

You have goaded with a sharper bit the
 warrior of the white shield, who came from Argos in full armor, driving him to
 headlong retreat.

He set out against our land
 because of the strife-filled claims of Polyneices, and like a screaming
 eagle he flew over into our land, covered by his snow-white
 wing,

with a mass of weapons
 and crested helmets.

He paused above our dwellings; he
 gaped around our sevenfold portals with spears thirsting for blood; but
 he left

before his jaws were ever glutted with our gore, or
 before the Fire-god’s pine-fed flame had seized our crown of towers.

So
 fierce was the crash of battle swelling about his back, a match too hard
 to win for the rival of the dragon.

For Zeus detests above all the
 boasts of a proud tongue. And when he saw them advancing in a swollen
 flood,

arrogant their clanging
 gold, he dashed with brandished fire one who was already starting to
 shout victory when he had reached our ramparts.

Staggered, he fell to the earth
 with a crash,

torch in hand, a man
 possessed by the frenzy of the mad attack, who just now was raging
 against us with the blasts of his tempestuous hate. But his threats did
 not fare as he had hoped, and to the other enemies mighty Ares dispensed
 each their own dooms with hard blows,

Ares, our mighty ally at the turning-point.

For the seven captains, stationed
 against an equal number at the seven gates, left behind their brazen
 arms in tribute to Zeus the turner of battle—all but the accursed pair
 who, born of one father and one

mother, set against each other their spears, both victorious, and who
 now share in a common death.

But since Victory whose name is
 glory has come to us, smiling in joy equal to the joy of chariot-rich
 Thebes ,

let us make for ourselves forgetfulness after
 the recent wars, and visit all the temples of the gods with night-long
 dance and song. And may Bacchus, who shakes the earth of Thebes , rule our dancing!

But look, the king of the land is
 coming here, Creon, the son of Menoeceus, our new ruler in accordance
 with the new circumstances fated by the gods. What policy is he setting
 in motion,

that he has proposed
 this special conference of elders, and summoned it by a general
 mandate?

My fellow citizens! First, the
 gods, after tossing the fate of our city on wild waves, have once more
 righted it. Second, I have ordered you through my messengers to come
 here

apart from all the rest,
 because I knew, first of all, how constant was your reverence for the
 power of the throne of Laius; how, again, you were reverent, when
 Oedipus was guiding our city; and lastly, how, when he was dead, you
 still maintained loyal thoughts towards his children.

Since, then, these latter have fallen in one day by a
 twofold doom—each striking, each struck, both with the stain of a
 brother’s murder—I now possess all the power and the throne according to
 my kinship with the dead.

Now, it is impossible to know fully any man’s character,
 will, or judgment, until he has been proved by the test of rule and
 law-giving. For if anyone who directs the entire city does not cling to
 the best and wisest plans,

but because of some
 fear keeps his lips locked, then, in my judgment, he is and has long
 been the most cowardly traitor. And if any man thinks a friend more
 important than his fatherland, that man, I say, is of no account. Zeus,
 god who sees all things always, be my witness—

I would not be silent if I saw ruin, instead of safety,
 marching upon the citizens. Nor would I ever make a man who is hostile
 to my country a friend to myself, because I know this, that our country
 is the ship that bears us safe, and that only when

we sail her on a straight course can we make
 true friends. Such are the rules by which I strengthen this city. Akin
 to these is the edict which I have now published to the citizenry
 concerning the sons of Oedipus: Eteocles, who fell fighting

in behalf of our city and who excelled
 all in battle, they shall entomb and heap up every sacred offering that
 descends to the noblest of the dead below. But as for his brother,
 Polyneices, I mean, who on his return from exile wanted to burn to the
 ground

the city of his fathers and his race’s gods, and wanted
 to feed on kindred blood and lead the remnant into slavery—it has been
 proclaimed to the city that no one shall give him funeral honors or
 lamentation,

but all must leave him unburied and a sight of shame,
 with his body there for birds and dogs to eat. This is my will, and
 never will I allow the traitor to stand in honor before the just. But
 whoever has good will to Thebes ,

he shall
 be honored by me in death as in life.

That is your will, Creon, towards this city’s enemy and
 its friend. And the power is yours, I believe, to make use of every law
 whatsoever, both concerning the dead and all us who live.

See, then, that you be guardians
 of my commands.

Lay the weight of this task on some younger man.

That is not what I meant—the guards for the corpse are already in
 place.

Then what is this other command that you would give?

That you not give way to the breakers of my commands.

There is no one so foolish as to
 crave death.

I assure you, that is the wage for disobedience. Yet by just the hope of
 it, money has many times corrupted men.

My king, I will not say that I arrive breathless because of speed, or
 from the action of a swift foot.

For often I brought myself to a stop because of my thoughts, and
 wheeled round in my path to return. My mind was telling me many things:
 Fool, why do you go to where your arrival will mean your punishment? 
 Idiot, are you dallying again? If Creon learns it from another, must
 you not suffer for it?

So
 debating, I made my way unhurriedly, slow, and thus a short road was
 made long. At last, however, the view prevailed that I should come
 here—to you. Even if my report brings no good, still will I tell
 you,

since I come with a good
 grip on one hope, that I can suffer nothing except what is my fate.

And what is it that so disheartens you?

I want to tell you first about myself—I did not do the deed, nor did I
 see the doer,

so it would be wrong
 that I should come to any harm.

Like a bowman you aim well at your target from a distance, and all around
 you hedge yourself off well from the deed. It is clear that you have
 some unheard-of thing to tell.

That I do, for terrible news imposes great hesitation.

Then tell it, will you, and so unburdened go away?

Well, here it is. The corpse—some
 one has just given it burial and disappeared after sprinkling thirsty
 dust on the flesh and performing the other rites that piety demands.

What are you saying? What man dared do this?

I do not know. For there was no scar of a pickax to be seen
 there,

no earth thrown up by a
 mattock. The ground was hard and dry, unbroken, not rolled over by
 wheels. The doer was someone who left no trace. When the first
 day-watchman showed it to us, a discomforting amazement fell on us
 all.

The dead man was veiled
 from us—not shut within a tomb, but a light cover of dust was on him, as
 if put there by the hand of one who shunned a curse. And no sign was
 visible that any beast of prey or any dog had approached or torn him.
 Then evil words flew thick and loud among us,

guard accusing guard. It would even have come to blows
 in the end, nor was there anyone there to prevent it: every man was the
 culprit, and no one was plainly guilty, while all disclaimed knowledge
 of the act. We were ready to take red-hot iron in our hands,

to walk through fire and to swear oaths
 by the gods that we had neither done the deed, nor shared knowledge of
 the planning or the doing. At last, when our investigating got us
 nowhere, someone spoke up and made us all bend our faces

in fear towards the earth. For we did
 not know how we could argue with him, nor yet prosper, if we did what he
 said. His argument was that the deed must be reported to you and not
 hidden. This view prevailed, and so it was that

the lot doomed miserable me to win this prize. So here
 I stand, as unwelcome to you as I am unwilling, I well know. For no man
 delights in the bearer of bad news.

My king, my thoughts have long been deliberating whether this deed is
 somehow the work of gods?

Quiet, before your words truly
 fill me with rage, so that you not be found at the same time foolish as
 well as old. You say what is intolerable when you claim that the gods
 have concern for that corpse. Was it in high esteem for his
 benefactions

that they sought
 to hide him, when he had come to burn their columned shrines, their
 sacred treasures and their land, and scatter its laws to the winds? Or
 do you see the gods honoring the wicked? It cannot be. No! From the very
 first

certain men of the city
 were chafing at this edict and muttering against me, tossing their heads
 in secret, and they did not keep their necks duly under the yoke in
 submission to me. By those men, I am certain, they were led astray and
 bribed to do this deed.

Nothing so
 evil as money ever grew to be current among men. This destroys cities,
 this drives men from their homes, this trains and warps honest minds to
 set themselves to works of shame,

this teaches people to practise villainies, and to know every act of
 unholiness. But all the men who did this job for hire have made sure
 that, sooner or later, they shall suffer the punishment. Now, as Zeus
 still has my reverence, know this well—

I tell you on my oath. If you do not find the very hand
 that made this burial, and reveal him before my eyes, mere death shall
 not suffice for you, not before, hung up alive, you have made this
 outrage plain,

so that hereafter
 you may thieve with better knowledge of where your money should be
 received from, and learn that it is best not to be fond of money-making
 from any and every source. For you will find that ill-gotten gains bring
 more men to ruin than to safety.

Will you allow me to speak? Or
 shall I just turn and go?

Do you not know even now how much your voice sickens me?

Is the pain in your ears, or in your soul?

And why would you define the seat of my pain?

He who did it hurts your heart, but I, your ears.

God! How plain it is that you are
 a born babbler.

Perhaps, but never the author of this action.

Yes, and what is more, you sold your life for silver.

Ah! It is truly sad when the judge judges wrong .

Expound on judgment as you will. But, if you fail to

show me the perpetrators of these crimes, you
 will avow that money basely earned wreaks sorrows. Exit
 Creon.

Well, may the man be found! That would be best. But, whether he be caught
 or not—for fortune must decide that—I assure you that you will not see
 me come here again.

Saved just now
 beyond hope and belief, I owe the gods great thanks. Exit the
 Guard.

Wonders are many, and none is more
 wonderful than man.

This power
 spans the sea, even when it surges white before the gales of the
 south-wind, and makes a path under swells that threaten to engulf him.
 Earth, too, the eldest of the gods, the immortal, the
 unwearied,

he wears away to
 his own ends, turning the soil with the offspring of horses as the plows
 weave to and fro year after year.

The light-hearted tribe of
 birds

and the clans of wild
 beasts and the sea-brood of the deep he snares in the meshes of his
 twisted nets, and he leads them captive, very-skilled man. He masters by
 his arts

the beast who dwells in
 the wilds and roams the hills. He tames the shaggy-maned horse, putting
 the yoke upon its neck, and tames the tireless mountain bull.

Speech and thought fast as
 the

wind and the moods that
 give order to a city he has taught himself, and how to flee the arrows
 of the inhospitable frost under clear skies and the arrows of the
 storming rain.

He has resource for
 everything. Lacking resource in nothing he strides towards what must
 come. From Death alone he shall procure no escape, but from baffling
 diseases he has devised flights.

Possessing resourceful skill, a
 subtlety beyond expectation he moves now to evil, now to good. When he
 honors the laws of the land and the justice of the gods to which he is
 bound by oath,

his city prospers.
 But banned from his city is he who, thanks to his rashness, couples with
 disgrace. Never may he share my home,

never think my thoughts, who does these things!

What marvel sent by the gods is this?—I am
 bewildered! I know her. How can I deny that this girl is Antigone? O
 unhappy child

of your unhappy father, of Oedipus! What can this
 mean? What! Surely they are not bringing you captive for disobeying
 the King’s laws and being caught in lunacy?

Here is she, the one who did the deed.

We caught this one burying him. Where is Creon?

There, he is coming from the house again at our need.

What is it? What has happened that makes my coming timely?

My king, there is nothing that a man can rightly swear he
 will not do. For second thought belies one’s first intent.

I could have vowed that I would not ever come here
 again, because of your threats by which I had just been storm-tossed.
 But since this joy that exceeds and oversteps my hopes can be compared
 in fulness to no other pleasure, I am back—though it is contrary to my
 sworn oath—

bringing this girl who
 was caught giving burial honors to the dead. This time there was no
 casting of lots. No, this piece of luck has fallen to me, and me alone.
 And now, my king, as it pleases you, take her yourself, question her and
 convict her. But justice would see me

released free and clear from this trouble.

Your prisoner here—how and where did you take her?

She was burying the man. You know all there is to tell.

Are you clear and sure about what you are saying?

I am. I saw her burying the corpse that you

had forbidden to bury. Is that plain and
 sufficient?

And how was she observed? How taken in the act?

It happened like this. When we had come to the place with those fierce
 threats of yours still in our ears, we swept away all the dust that
 covered

the corpse and bared
 the damp body well. We then sat down on the brow of the hill to
 windward, fleeing the smell from him, lest it strike us. Each man was
 wide awake and kept his neighbor alert with torrents of threats, if any
 one should be careless of this task.

So time passed, until the disk of the sun stood bright
 in mid-sky and the heat began to burn. And then suddenly a whirlwind
 lifted from the earth a storm of dust, a trouble in the sky, and it
 filled the plain, marring all the foliage of its woods.

Soon the wide air was choked with it. We closed
 our eyes, and endured the plague from the gods. When, after a long
 while, this storm had passed, the girl was seen, and she wailed aloud
 with the sharp cry of a grieving bird, as when inside her
 empty

nest she sees the bed
 stripped of its nestlings. So she, too, when she saw the corpse bare,
 broke into a cry of lamentation and cursed with harsh curses those who
 had done it. Immediately she took thirsty dust in her hands,

and from a pitcher of beaten bronze held
 high she crowned the dead with thrice-poured libations. We rushed
 forward when we saw it, and at once closed upon our quarry, who was not
 at all dismayed. We then charged her with her past and present
 doings,

but she made no denial of anything—at once to my joy and
 to my pain. For to have escaped from trouble one’s self gives the
 greatest joy, but it stings to lead friends to evil. Naturally, though,
 all such things are

of less account to me than my own safety.

You, you with your face bent to the ground, do you admit, or deny that
 you did this?

I declare it and make no denial.

You can take yourself wherever you please,

free and clear of a heavy charge. Exit
 Guard.

You, however, tell me—not at length, but briefly—did you know that an
 edict had forbidden this?

I knew it. How could I not? It was public.

And even so you dared overstep that law?

Yes, since it was not Zeus that
 published me that edict, and since not of that kind are the laws which
 Justice who dwells with the gods below established among men. Nor did I
 think that your decrees were of such force, that a mortal could override
 the unwritten

and unfailing statutes given us by the gods. For their
 life is not of today or yesterday, but for all time, and no man knows
 when they were first put forth. Not for fear of any man’s pride was I
 about to owe a penalty to the gods for breaking these.

Die I
 must, that I knew well (how could I not?). That is true even without
 your edicts. But if I am to die before my time, I count that a gain.
 When anyone lives as I do, surrounded by evils, how can he not carry off
 gain by dying?

So for me to meet this doom is a grief of no account.
 But if I had endured that my mother’s son should in death lie an
 unburied corpse, that would have grieved me. Yet for this, I am not
 grieved. And if my present actions are foolish in your sight,

it may
 be that it is a fool who accuses me of folly.

She shows herself the wild offspring of a wild father, and does not know
 how to bend before troubles.

Yet remember that over-hard spirits most often collapse. It is the
 stiffest iron, baked to

utter hardness in the fire, that you most often see
 snapped and shivered. And I have witnessed horses with great spirit
 disciplined by a small bit. For there is no place for pride, when one is
 his neighbors’ slave.

This girl was already
 practiced in outrage when she overstepped the published laws. And, that
 done, this now is a second outrage, that she glories in it and exults in
 her deed. In truth, then, I am no man, but she is,

if this victory rests with her and brings no penalty.
 No! Whether she is my sister’s child, or nearer to me in blood than any
 of my kin that worship Zeus at the altar of our house, she and her
 sister will not escape a doom most harsh. For in truth

I charge that other with an equal share
 in the plotting of this burial. Call her out! I saw her inside just now,
 raving, and not in control of her wits. Before the deed, the mind
 frequently is convicted of stealthy crimes when conspirators are
 plotting depravity in the dark.

But, truly, I detest it, too, when one who has been caught in
 treachery then seeks to make the crime a glory.

What more do you want than to capture and kill me?

I want nothing else. Having that, I have everything.

Why then do you wait? In none of your maxims

is there anything that pleases me—and may there never
 be! Similarly to you as well my views must be displeasing. And yet, how
 could I have won a nobler glory than by giving burial to my own brother?
 All here would admit that they approve,

if fear did not grip their tongues. But tyranny, blest
 with so much else, has the power to do and say whatever it pleases.

You alone out of all these Thebans see it that way.

They do, too, but for you they hold their tongues.

Are you not ashamed that your
 beliefs differ from theirs?

No, there is nothing shameful in respecting your own flesh and blood.

Was not he your brother too, who died in the opposite cause?

A brother by the same mother and the same father.

Why, then, do you pay a service that is disrespectful to him?

The dead man will not support you
 in that.

Yes, he will, if you honor him equally with the wicked one.

It was his brother, not his slave, who died.

But he died ravaging this land, while he fell in its defense.

Hades craves these rites, nevertheless.

But the good man craves a portion not equal to the
 evil’s.

Who knows but that these actions are pure to those below?

You do not love someone you have hated, not even after death.

It is not my nature to join in hate, but in love.

Then, go down to hell and love them

if you must. While I live, no woman will rule me.

Look, here comes Ismene from the palace, shedding the tears of a loving
 sister. A cloud over her eyes mars her red-flushed face,

and it breaks into rain on her comely
 cheek.

You who were lurking like a viper in my own house and
 secretly gulping up my life’s blood, while I was oblivious that I
 was nurturing two plagues, two revolutions against my throne—tell me
 now, will you also affirm

your share in this
 burial, or will you forswear all knowledge of it?

I performed the deed—as long as she concurs—and I share and carry the
 burden of guilt.

No, justice will not permit you to do this, since you were not willing to
 help with the deed, nor did I give you a part in it.

But now with this sea of troubles
 around you, I am not ashamed to sail in a sea of suffering at your
 side.

As to whose deed it is, Hades and the dead are witnesses. A friend in
 words is not the type of friend I love.

No, sister, do not strip me of death’s honor,

but let me die with you and make due consecration to
 the dead.

Do not share my death. Do not claim deeds to which you did not put your
 hand. My death will suffice.

And how can I cherish life, once I am deprived of you?

Ask Creon. Your concern is for him.

Why do you torture me like this,
 when it does not help you?

No, if I mock you, it is to my own pain that I do so.

Tell me, how can I help you, even now?

Save yourself. I do not grudge your escape.

Ah, misery! Will I fall short of sharing your fate?

Your choice was to live, it was
 mine to die.

At least your choice was not made without my protests.

One world approved your wisdom, another approved mine.

Nevertheless, the offense is identical for both of us.

Take heart! You live. But my life has long been

in Death’s hands so that I might serve the dead.

One of these maidens, I declare, has just revealed her foolishness; the
 other has displayed it from the moment of her birth.

Yes, Creon. Whatever amount of reason nature may have given them does not
 remain with those in dire straits, but goes astray.

Yours did, I know, when you chose
 dire actions with dire allies.

What life would there be for me alone, without her presence?

Do not speak of her presence . She lives no longer.

What? You will kill your own son’s bride?

Why not? There are other fields for him to plough.

But not fitted to him as she
 was.

I abhor an evil wife for my son.

Haemon, dearest! How your father wrongs you!

Enough! Enough of you and of your marriage!

Will you really cheat your son of this girl?

Death it is who will end these
 bridals for me.

Then it seems that it is resolved that she will die.

Resolved, yes, for you and by me. To the two Attendants. No
 more delay! Servants, take them inside! Hereafter they must be women,
 and not left at large.

For it is
 known that even the brave seek to flee, when they see Death now closing
 on their life. Exeunt Attendants, guarding Antigone and Ismene.
 Creon remains.

Blest are those whose days have
 not tasted of evil. For when a house has once been shaken by the
 gods,

no form of ruin is
 lacking, but it spreads over the bulk of the race, just as, when the
 surge is driven over the darkness of the deep by the fierce breath of
 Thracian sea-winds,

it rolls up
 the black sand from the depths, and the wind-beaten headlands that front
 the blows of the storm give out a mournful roar.

I see that the ancient sorrows of
 the house of the Labdacids

are
 heaped upon the sorrows of the dead. Each generation does not set its
 race free, but some god hurls it down and the race has no release. For
 now that dazzling ray of hope that had been spread

over the last roots in the house of
 Oedipus—that hope, in its turn, the blood-stained dust of the gods
 infernal and mindlessness in speech and frenzy at the mind cuts
 down.

Your power, great Zeus—what human
 overstepping can check it? Yours is power that neither Sleep, the
 all-ensnaring, nor the untiring months of the gods can defeat. Unaged
 through time,

you rule by your
 power and dwell thereby in the brilliant splendor of Olympus . And through the future, both
 near and distant, as through the past, shall this law prevail: nothing
 that is vast comes to the life of mortals without ruin.

See how that hope whose wanderings
 are so wide truly is a benefit to many men, but to an equal number it is
 a false lure of light-headed desires. The deception comes to one who is
 wholly unawares until he burns his foot on a hot fire.

For with wisdom did someone once reveal the
 maxim, now famous, that evil at one time or another seems good, to him
 whose mind a god leads to ruin.

But for the briefest moment such a man fares free of destruction.

But here is Haemon, the last of
 your offspring. Does he come grieving for the doom of Antigone, his
 promised bride,

and bitter for the
 deceived hope of their marriage?

We will soon know better than seers could tell us.—My son, can it be that
 after hearing the final judgment concerning your betrothed, you have
 come in rage against your father? Or do I have your loyalty, act how I
 may?

Father, I am yours, and you keep
 me upright with precepts good for me—precepts I shall follow. No
 marriage will be deemed by me more important than your good
 guidance.

Yes, my son, this is the spirit you should maintain in
 your heart—to stand behind your father’s will in all things. It is for
 this that men pray: to sire and raise in their homes children who are
 obedient, that they may requite their father’s enemy with evil and honor
 his friend, just as their father does.

But the man who begets
 unhelpful children—what would you say that he has sown except miseries
 for himself and abundant exultation for his enemies? Never, then, my
 son, banish your reason for pleasure on account of a woman,

knowing that this embrace soon becomes
 cold and brittle—an evil woman to share your bed and home. For what
 wound could strike deeper than a false friend? No, spit her out as if
 she were an enemy, let her go find a husband in Hades.

For since I caught her alone of all the city in
 open defiance, I will not make myself a liar to my city. I will kill
 her. So let her call on Zeus who protects kindred blood. If I am to
 foster my own kin to spurn order,

surely I will do the same for outsiders. For whoever shows his
 excellence in the case of his own household will be found righteous in
 his city as well. But if anyone oversteps and does violence to the laws,
 or thinks to dictate to those in power,

such a one will never win praise from me. No, whomever
 the city may appoint, that man must be obeyed in matters small and great
 and in matters just and unjust. And I would feel confident that such a
 man would be a fine ruler no less than a good and willing
 subject,

and that beneath a
 hail of spears he would stand his ground where posted, a loyal and brave
 comrade in the battle line. But there is no evil worse than
 disobedience. This destroys cities; this overturns homes; this
 breaks

the ranks of allied spears into headlong rout. But the
 lives of men who prosper upright, of these obedience has saved the
 greatest part. Therefore we must defend those who respect order, and in
 no way can we let a woman defeat us. It is better to fall from power, if
 it is fated, by a man’s hand,

than that we be called weaker than
 women.

To us, unless our years have stolen our wit, you seem to say what you say
 wisely.

Father, the gods implant reason in men, the highest of all things that we
 call our own.

For my part, to
 state how you are wrong to say those things is beyond my power and my
 desire, although another man, too, might have a useful thought. In any
 case, it is my natural duty to watch on your behalf all that men say, or
 do, or find to blame.

For dread of
 your glance forbids the ordinary citizen to speak such words as would
 offend your ear. But I can hear these murmurs in the dark, how the city
 moans for this girl, saying: No woman ever merited death
 less—

none ever died so
 shamefully for deeds so glorious as hers, who, when her own brother had
 fallen in bloody battle, would not leave him unburied to be devoured by
 savage dogs, or by any bird. Does she not deserve to receive golden
 honor?

Such is the rumor
 shrouded in darkness that silently spreads. For me, father, no treasure
 is more precious than your prosperity. What, indeed, is a nobler
 ornament for children than the fair fame of a thriving father, or for a
 father than that of his children?

Do not, then, bear one mood only in yourself: do not think that your
 word and no other, must be right. For if any man thinks that he alone is
 wise—that in speech or in mind he has no peer—such a soul, when laid
 open, is always found empty.

No,
 even when a man is wise, it brings him no shame to learn many things,
 and not to be too rigid. You see how the trees that stand beside the
 torrential streams created by a winter storm yield to it and save their
 branches, while the stiff and rigid perish root and all?

And in the same way the pilot who keeps
 the sheet of his sail taut and never slackens it, upsets his boat, and
 voyages thereafter with his decking underwater. Father, give way and
 allow a change from your rage. For if even from me, a younger man, a
 worthy thought may be supplied,

by
 far the best thing, I believe, would be for men to be all-wise by
 nature. Otherwise—since most often it does not turn out that way—it is
 good to learn in addition from those who advise you well.

My king, it is right, if he speaks something appropriate, that you should
 learn from him

and that you, in
 turn, Haemon, should learn from your father. On both sides there have
 been wise words.

Men of my age—are we, then, to be schooled in wisdom by men of his?

Not in anything that is not right. But if I am young, you should look to
 my conduct, not to my years.

Is it worthy conduct to honor
 disrupters?

I could not urge anyone to show respect for the wicked.

And is she not in the grasp of that disease?

All the people of this city of Thebes deny it.

Shall Thebes prescribe to me
 how I must rule?

See, there, how you have spoken so
 much like a child.

Am I to rule this land by the will of another than myself?

That is no city, which belongs to one man.

Does not the city by tradition belong to the man in power?

You would make a fine monarch in a desert.

This boy seems to be fighting on
 the side of the woman.

If you are a woman, for, to be sure, my concern is for you.

You traitor, attacking your father, accusing him!

Because I see you making a mistake and committing injustice.

Am I making a mistake when I respect my own prerogatives?

Yes. You do not respect them, when you trample on the
 gods’ honors.

Polluted creature, submitting to a woman!

You will never catch me submitting to shamelessness.

You do. Your every word, after all, pleads her case.

And yours, and mine, and that of gods below.

You can never marry her, not while
 she is still alive.

Then she will die, and in death destroy another.

What! Does your audacity run to open threats?

How is it a threat to speak against empty plans?

You will regret your unwise instructions in wisdom.

If you were not my father, I would
 have called you insane.

You woman’s slave, do not try to cajole me.

Do you want to have your say and then have done without a reply?

Is that so? By Olympus above—know this well—you will have no joy for
 taunting me over and above your censures.

Bring out that hated thing, so that with him looking on
 she may die right now in her bridegroom’s presence and at his side!

No, not at my side will she die—do not ever imagine it. Nor shall you
 ever look at me and set eyes on my face again.

Indulge in your madness now with whomever of your
 friends can endure it. Exit Haemon.

The man is gone, King Creon, in anger and haste. A young mind is fierce
 when stung.

Let him do—no!—let him plan something more immense than befits a man.
 Farewell to him! Still he will not save these two girls from death.

Then the pair of them, you really
 intend to kill them both?

Not the one who did not put her hands to the burial. You are right.

And by what mode of death do you mean to kill the other?

I will take her where the path is deserted, unvisited by men, and entomb
 her alive in a rocky vault,

setting out a ration of food, but only as much as piety requires so
 that all the city may escape defilement. And praying there to Hades, the
 only god she worships, perhaps she will obtain immunity from death, or
 else will learn, at last, even this late,

that it is fruitless labor to revere the
 dead. Exit Creon.

Love, the unconquered in battle, Love, you who descend
 upon riches, and watch the night through on a girl’s soft cheek,

you roam over
 the sea and among the homes of men in the wilds. Neither can any
 immortal escape you,

nor any man
 whose life lasts for a day. He who has known you is driven to
 madness.

You seize the minds of just men
 and drag them to injustice, to their ruin. You it is who have incited
 this conflict of men whose flesh and blood are one.

But victory belongs to radiant Desire swelling
 from the eyes of the sweet-bedded bride. Desire sits enthroned in power
 beside the mighty laws.

For in all
 this divine Aphrodite plays her irresistible game.

But now, witnessing this, I too am
 carried beyond the bounds of loyalty. The power fails me to keep back my
 streaming tears any longer, when I see Antigone making her way to the
 chamber where all are laid to rest,

now her bridal chamber.

Citizens of my fatherland, see me
 setting out on my last journey, looking at my last sunlight,

and never again. No, Hades who lays all to rest leads me
 living to Acheron ’s shore,
 though I have not had my due portion of the chant that brings the
 bride, nor has any hymn been mine

for the crowning of marriage. Instead
 the lord of Acheron will be my
 groom.

Then in glory and with praise you
 depart to that deep place of the dead, neither struck by wasting
 sickness,

nor having won the
 wages of the sword. No, guided by your own laws and still alive, unlike
 any mortal before, you will descend to Hades.

I have heard with my own ears how
 our Phrygian guest, the daughter of Tantalus, perished

in so much suffering on steep Sipylus—how, like
 clinging ivy, the sprouting stone subdued her. And the rains, as men
 tell, do not leave her melting form, nor does the snow,

but beneath her weeping lids she dampens her
 collar. Most like hers is the god-sent fate that leads me to my
 rest.

Yet she was a goddess, as you
 know, and the offspring of gods,

while we are mortals and mortal-born. Still it is a great thing for a
 woman who has died to have it said of her that she shared the lot of the
 godlike in her life, and afterwards, in death.

Ah, you mock me! In the name of our fathers’ gods,

why do you not
 wait to abuse me until after I have gone, and not to my face, O my city,
 and you, her wealthy citizens? Ah, spring of Dirce, and you holy ground
 of Thebes whose chariots are
 many,

you, at least, will bear
 me witness how unwept by loved ones, and by what laws I go to the
 rock-closed prison of my unheard-of tomb! Ah, misery!

I have no home among men or with the shades, no
 home with the living or with the dead.

You have rushed headlong to the
 far limits of daring, and against the high throne of Justice

you have fallen, my daughter, fallen
 heavily. But in this ordeal you are paying for some paternal crime.

You have touched on my most bitter
 thought

and moved my ever-renewed pity for my father and for the
 entire doom ordained for us, the famed house of Labdacus. Oh, the
 horrors of our mother’s bed! Oh, the slumbers of the wretched mother
 at the side

of her own son, my own father! What manner of parents
 gave me my miserable being! It is to them that I go like this, accursed
 and unwed, to share their home.

Ah, my brother, the marriage you made was doomed, and by dying you
 killed me still alive!

Your pious action shows a certain
 reverence, but an offence against power can no way be tolerated by him
 who has power in his keeping.

Your
 self-willed disposition is what has destroyed you.

Unwept, unfriended, without
 marriage-song, I am led in misery on this journey that cannot be put
 off. No longer is it permitted me, unhappy girl,

to look up at this sacred eye of the burning
 sun. But for my fate no tear is shed, no friend moans in sorrow.

Do you not know that dirges and
 wailing before death would never be given up, if it were allowed to make
 them freely?

Take her away—now!
 And when you have enshrouded her, as I proclaimed, in her covered tomb,
 leave her alone, deserted—let her decide whether she wishes to die or to
 live entombed in such a home. It makes no difference, since our hands
 are clean so far as regards this girl.

But no matter what, she will be stripped of her home
 here above.

Tomb, bridal-chamber, deep-dug eternal prison where I go to find my own,
 whom in the greatest numbers destruction has seized and Persephone has
 welcomed among the dead!

Last of
 them all and in by far the most shameful circumstances, I will descend,
 even before the fated term of my life is spent. But I cherish strong
 hopes that I will arrive welcome to my father, and pleasant to you,
 Mother, and welcome, dear brother, to you.

For, when each of you died, with my own hands I washed
 and dressed you and poured drink-offerings at your graves. But now,
 Polyneices, it is for tending your corpse that I win such reward as
 this. And yet I honored you rightly, as the wise understand.

Never, if I had been a mother of children, or if a
 husband had been rotting after death, would I have taken that burden
 upon myself in violation of the citizens’ will. For the sake of what
 law, you ask, do I say that? A husband lost, another might have been
 found,

and if
 bereft of a child, there could be a second from some other man. But when
 father and mother are hidden in Hades, no brother could ever bloom for
 me again. Such was the law whereby I held you first in honor, but for
 that Creon judged me guilty of wrongdoing

and of dreadful outrage, dear brother! And now he leads
 me thus in his hands’ strong grasp, when I have enjoyed no marriage bed
 or bridal song and have not received any portion of marriage or the
 nurture of children. But deserted by friends,

in misery I go living to the hollow graves of the
 dead. What law of the gods have I transgressed? Why should I look to
 the gods anymore? What ally should I call out to, when by my reverence I
 have earned a name for irreverence?

Well, then, if these events please the gods, once I have suffered my
 doom I will come to know my guilt. But if the guilt lies with my judges,
 I could wish for them no greater evils than they inflict unjustly on
 me.

Still the same tempest of the soul

grips this girl with the same fierce gusts.

Then because of this her guards will have reason to lament their
 slowness.

Ah, no! That command verges close on death.

I cannot console you with any hope
 that your doom is not to be fulfilled in that way.

O city of my fathers, land of Thebes , and you gods, our ancestors! I am led away now;
 there is no more delay!

Look at me, you who are Thebes ’ lords—look at the only remaining daughter
 of the house of your kings. See what I suffer, and at whose hands,
 because I revered reverence! Antigone is led away by the
 guards.

So too endured Danae in her beauty
 to change

the light of the sky for
 brass-bound walls, and in that chamber, both burial and bridal, she was
 held in strict confinement. And yet was she of esteemed lineage, my
 daughter,

and guarded a
 deposit of the seed of Zeus that had fallen in a golden rain. But
 dreadful is the mysterious power of fate—there is no deliverance from it
 by wealth or by war, by towered city, or dark, sea-beaten ships.

And Dryas’s son, the Edonian king swift to rage, was
 tamed in recompense for his frenzied insults, when, by the will of
 Dionysus, he was shut in a rocky prison. There the fierce and
 swelling force of his madness trickled away.

That man came to know the god whom in his
 frenzy he had provoked with mockeries. For he had sought to quell the
 god-inspired women and the Bacchanalian fire,

and he angered the Muses who love the flute.

And by the waters of the Dark
 Rocks, the waters of the twofold sea, are the shores of Bosporus and the Thracian city
 Salmydessus,

where Ares,
 neighbor of that city, saw the accursed, blinding wound inflicted on the
 two sons of Phineus by his savage wife. It was a wound that brought
 darkness to the hollows, making them crave vengeance

for the eyes she crushed with her bloody hands
 and with her shuttle for a dagger.

Wasting away in their misery, they
 bewailed their miserable suffering

and their birth from their mother stripped of her
 marriage. But she traced her descent from the ancient line of the
 Erechtheids, and in far-distant caves she was raised amidst her
 father’s gusts. She was the child of Boreas,

running swift as
 horses over the steep hills, a daughter of gods. Yet she, too, was
 assailed by the long-lived Fates, my child.

Princes of Thebes , we have come on a shared journey, two scouting
 the way by the eyes of one.

For this is the method of travel for the blind, using a
 guide.

What is it, old Teiresias? What is your news?

I will tell you. You, obey the seer.

It was not my habit before, at any rate, to stand apart
 from your will.

Therefore you captained this city on an upright course.

I have felt and can attest your benefits.

Realize that once more now you are poised on fortune’s
 razor-edge.

What do you mean? I shudder to hear you!

You will understand, when you hear the signs revealed by my
 art. As I took my place on my old seat of augury

where all birds regularly gather for me, I heard an
 unintelligible voice among them: they were screaming in dire frenzy that
 made their language foreign to me. I realized that they were ripping
 each other with their talons, murderously—the rush of their wings did
 not lack meaning.

Quickly, in fear, I tried burnt-sacrifice on a
 duly-kindled altar, but from my offerings Hephaestus did not blaze.
 Instead juice that had sweated from the thigh-flesh trickled out onto
 the embers and smoked and sputtered;

the gall was scattered high up in the air; and the
 streaming thighs lay bared of the fat that had been wrapped around them.
 Such was the failure of the rites that yielded no sign, as I learned
 from this boy. For he is my guide, as I am guide to others.

And it is your will that is the source of the sickness
 now afflicting the city. For the altars of our city and our hearths have
 one and all been tainted by the birds and dogs with the carrion taken
 from the sadly fallen son of Oedipus. And so the gods no more accept
 prayer and sacrifice at our hands,

or the burning of thigh-meat, nor does any bird sound
 out clear signs in its shrill cries, for they have tasted the fatness of
 a slain man’s blood. Think, therefore, on these things, my son. All men
 are liable to err.

But when an error is made, that man is no longer unwise
 or unblessed who heals the evil into which he has fallen and does not
 remain stubborn. Self-will, we know, invites the charge of foolishness.
 Concede the claim of the dead. Do not kick at the fallen.

What prowess is it to kill the dead all over again? I
 have considered for your good, and what I advise is good. The sweetest
 thing is to learn from a good advisor when his advice is to your
 profit.

Old man, you all shoot your arrows at me, like archers at
 their mark, and I am not safe

even from the plottings of the seer’s divine art, but
 by their tribe I have long been bought and sold and made their
 merchandise. Turn your profits, make your deals for the white gold of
 Sardis and the gold of
 India , if it pleases you,
 but you shall not cover that man with a grave,

not even if the eagles of Zeus wish to snatch and carry
 him to be devoured at the god’s throne. No, not even then, for fear of
 that defilement will I permit his burial, since I know with certainty
 that no mortal has the power to defile the gods.

But even the exceedingly clever, old Teiresias, falls
 with a shameful fall, when they couch shameful thoughts in fine phrasing
 for profit’s sake.

Alas! Does any man know, does any consider—

What is this? What universal truth are you announcing?

—by how much the most precious of our possessions is
 the power to reason wisely?

By as much, I think, as senselessness is the greatest
 affliction.

Yet you came into being full of that disease.

I have no desire to trade insults with the seer.

Yet that is what you do in saying that I prophesy
 falsely.

Yes, for the prophet-clan was ever fond of money.

And the race sprung from tyrants loves shameful gain.

Do you know that you ramble so about your king?

I am aware, since through me you have saved this city.

You are a wise seer, but fond of doing injustice.

You will stir me to utter the dire secret in my
 soul.

Out with it! But only if it is not for gain that you speak
 it.

Indeed, I think I speak without mention of gain—where you
 are concerned.

Be certain that you will not trade in my will.

Then know, yes, know it well! You will not live through
 many more

courses of the sun’s swift chariot, before you will
 give in return one sprung from your own loins, a corpse in requital for
 corpses. For you have thrust below one of those of the upper air and
 irreverently lodged a living soul in the grave,

while you detain in this world that which belongs to
 the infernal gods, a corpse unburied, unmourned, unholy. In the dead you
 have no part, nor do the gods above, but in this you do them violence.
 For these crimes the avenging destroyers,

the Furies of Hades and of the gods, lie in ambush for
 you, waiting to seize you in these same sufferings. And look closely if
 I tell you this with a silvered palm. A time not long to be delayed will
 reveal in your house wailing over men and over women.

All the cities are stirred up in hostility, whose
 mangled corpses the dogs, or the wild beasts or some winged bird buried,
 carrying an unholy stench to the city that held each man’s hearth.
 There, now, are arrows for your heart, since you provoke me,

launched at you, archer-like, in my anger. They fly
 true—you cannot run from their burning sting. Boy, lead me home, so that
 he may launch his rage against younger men, and learn to keep a quieter
 tongue

and a better mind within his breast than he now
 bears. Exit Teiresias.

The man is gone, my king, leaving dire prophecies behind.
 And for all the time that I have had this hair on my head, now white,
 once dark, I know that he has never been a false prophet to our
 city.

I, too, know it well, and my mind is troubled. To yield
 is terrible, but, to resist, to strike my pride with ruin—this, too,
 inspires terror.

The moment, Creon, requires that you reason wisely.

What should I do, then? Speak, and I will obey.

Go and free the girl from her hollowed chamber. Then
 raise a tomb for the unburied dead.

And you recommend this? You think that I should yield?

Yes, my king, and with all possible speed. For harms sent
 from the gods swiftly cut short the follies of men.

Ah, it is a struggle, but I depart from my heart’s
 resolve and obey. We must not wage vain wars with necessity.

Go, do these things and do not leave their performance to
 others.

Right away I will go. Go, go, my servants, each and all of
 you! Take axes in your hands,

and hurry to that place there in view! But since my
 judgment has taken this turn, I will be there to set her free, as I
 myself confined her. I am held by the fear that it is best to keep the
 established laws to life’s very end.

God of many names, glory of the
 Cadmeian bride and offspring of loud-thundering Zeus, you who watch over
 far-famed Italy and
 reign

in the valleys of
 Eleusinian Deo where all find welcome! O Bacchus, denizen of Thebes , the mother-city of your
 Bacchants, dweller by the wet stream of Ismenus on the soil

of the sowing of the savage dragon’s teeth!

The smoky glare of torches sees
 you above the cliffs of the twin peaks, where the Corycian nymphs move
 inspired by your godhead,

and Castalia’s stream sees you, too. The ivy-mantled
 slopes of Nysa ’s hills and
 the shore green with many-clustered vines send you, when accompanied
 by the cries of your divine words,

you visit the
 avenues of Thebes .

Thebes of all cities you hold foremost in honor,
 together with your lightning-struck mother.

And now when the whole city is held subject to a
 violent plague, come, we ask, with purifying feet over steep Parnassus ,

or over the groaning straits!

O Leader of the chorus of the
 stars whose breath is fire, overseer of the chants in the night, son
 begotten of Zeus,

appear, my
 king, with your attendant Thyiads, who in night-long frenzy dance and
 sing you as Iacchus the Giver!

Neighbors of the house of Cadmus and of Amphion, there
 is no station of human life that I would ever praise or blame as being
 settled. Fortune sets upright and Fortune sinks the lucky and unlucky
 from day to day,

and no one can prophesy to men concerning the order
 that has just been established. For Creon, as I saw it, was once blest:
 he had saved this land of Cadmus from its enemies; and having won sole
 and total dominion in the land, he guided it on a straight course and
 flourished in his noble crop of children.

And now all this has been lost. When a man has
 forfeited his pleasures, I do not reckon his existence as life, but
 consider him just a breathing corpse. Heap up riches in your house, if
 you wish! Live with a tyrant’s pomp! But if there is no joy

along with all of that, I would not pay even the shadow
 of smoke for all the rest, compared with joy.

What is this new grief for our princes that you have come
 to report?

They are dead, and the living are guilty of the deaths.

Who is the murderer? Who the murdered? Tell us.

Haemon is dead—his blood was shed by no strange
 hand.

Was it his father’s, or his own ?

He did it by his own, enraged with his father for the
 murder.

Ah, prophet, how true, then, you have proved your word!

Knowing that these things are so, you must consider the
 rest.

Wait, I see the unhappy Eurydice, Creon’s wife, nearby.
 She comes from the house either knowing of her son, or merely by
 chance.

People of Thebes ,
 I heard your words as I was on my way to the gates to address divine
 Pallas with my prayers.

At one and the same time I was loosening the bolts of
 the gate to open it, and the sound of a blow to our house struck my ear.
 In terror I sank back into the arms of my handmaids, and my senses fled.

But repeat what your news was, for I shall hear it with
 ears that are no strangers to sorrow.

Dear mistress, I will tell what I witnessed and leave no
 word of the truth unspoken. For what good would it do that should I
 soothe you with words in which I must later be found false?

The truth is always best. I attended your husband as
 his guide to the furthest part of the plain, where unpitied the body of
 Polyneices, torn by dogs, still lay. After we had prayed to the goddess
 of the roads

and to Pluto to restrain their anger in mercy, we
 washed him with pure washing, and with freshly-plucked boughs we burned
 what remains there were. Lastly we heaped a high-mounded tomb of his
 native earth. Afterwards we turned away to enter the maiden’s
 stoney-bedded

bridal chamber, the caverned mansion of Hades’ bride.
 From a distance, one of us servants heard a voice of loud wailing near
 that bride’s unwept bed and came to tell our master Creon. And as the
 King moved closer and closer, obscure signs rising from a bitter cry
 surrounded him—

he groaned and said in bitter lament, Ah, misery, am I now the prophet of evil? Am I going on the path
 most lined with grief of all that I have walked before? My son’s
 voice greets me. Go, my servants,

hurry closer, and when
 you have reached the tomb, enter the opening where the stones of the
 mound have been torn away, up to the cell’s very mouth. See if it is
 Haemon’s voice that I recognize, or if I am cheated by the
 gods.

This search, at our desperate master’s word,

we went to make, and in the furthest part of the tomb
 we saw her hanging by the neck, fastened by a halter of fine linen
 threads, while he was embracing her with arms thrown around her waist,
 bewailing the loss of his bride to the spirits below, as well as his
 father’s deeds, and his grief-filled marriage.

But his father, when he saw him, cried aloud with a
 dreadful cry and went in and called to him with a voice of wailing: Ah, unhappy boy, what have you done! What plan have
 you seized on? By what misfortune have you lost your reason?

Come out, my son, I pray
 you, I beg you! But the boy glared at him with savage eyes, spat
 in his face, and without a word in response drew his twin-edged sword.
 As his father rushed out in flight, he missed his aim. Then the
 ill-fated boy was enraged with himself

and straightway stretched himself over his sword and
 drove it, half its length, into his side. Still conscious, he clasped
 the maiden in his faint embrace, and, as he gasped, he shot onto her
 pale cheek a swift stream of oozing blood.

Corpse enfolding corpse he lay, having won his marriage
 rites, poor boy, not here, but in Hades’ palace, and having shown to
 mankind by how much the failure to reason wisely is the most severe of
 all afflictions assigned to man. Eurydice departs into the
 house.

What would you infer from this? The lady

has turned back and gone without a word, either for
 good or for evil.

I, too, am startled. Still I am nourished by the hope that
 at the grave news of her son she thinks it unworthy to make her laments
 before the city, but in the shelter of her home will set her handmaids
 to mourn the house’s grief.

For she is not unhabituated to discretion, that she
 should err.

I do not know. But to me, in any case, a silence too strict
 seems to promise trouble just as much as a fruitless abundance of
 weeping.

I will find out whether she is not, in fact, hiding some
 repressed plan in the darkness of her passionate heart.

I will go in, since you are right—in an excess of
 silence, too, there may be trouble. Exit Messenger.

Look, here is the King himself approaching, his hands
 grasping a monument plainly signing that his—if we may say it—and no
 one else’s,

was the madness of this error.

Ah, the blunders of an unthinking
 mind, blunders of rigidity, yielding death! Oh, you witnesses of the
 killers and the killed, both of one family!

What misery arises from my reasonings! Haemon, you have
 died after a young life, youngest and last of my sons! O God! You have
 departed not by your foolishness, but by my own!

Ah, how late you seem to see the
 right!

God, I have mastered the bitter lesson! But then, then, I think, some god
 struck me on my head with a crushing weight, and drove me into savage
 paths,

—ah!—and overthrew my
 joy to be trampled on! Ah, the labors men must toil through!

My master, you have come, I
 think, like one whose hands are not empty, but who has a ready store:
 first, you carry that burden visible in your arms;

second, you will soon look upon further
 sufferings inside your house.

What worse suffering is still to follow upon these sufferings?

Your wife is dead, true mother of that corpse, poor lady, by wounds newly
 cut.

O harbor of Hades, hard to
 purify!

Why, why do you ruin
 me? Herald of evil, of grief, what word do you say? Ah, you have done in
 a dead man anew! What are you saying, boy? What is this you report to
 me

God no!—what new slaughter, my wife’s doom, is heaped
 upon this ruin?

The sight is at hand. It is no longer hidden inside.

Ah, misery!

There I see a new, a
 second evil! What destiny, ah, what, can still await me? I have just now
 taken my son in my arms, and now I see another corpse before
 me!

Oh, tormented mother! Oh,
 my son!

By the altar, with a
 sharp-whetted sword, she struck until her eyes went slack and dark.
 Before that she bewailed the noble fate of Megareus who died earlier,
 and then the fate of this boy, and also, with her last breath,

she called down evil fortune upon you,
 the slayer of her sons.

Ah, no! I tremble with fear. Why
 does no one strike me full on my chest with a two-edged sword?

I am miserable—ah—and bathed in
 miserable anguish!

Yes, because you were accused of responsibility for both
 this son’s death, and the other’s, by her whose corpse you see.

What was the manner of the violent deed by which she departed?

Her own hand struck her to the heart upon learning her
 son’s sharply-lamented fate.

Ah this guilt can never be
 fastened onto any other mortal so as to remove my own! It was I, yes, I,
 who killed you, I the wretch.

I
 admit the truth. Lead me away, my servants, lead me from here with all
 haste, who am no more than a dead man!

The course you recommend is to
 your gain, if there can be gain amidst evil. What is briefest is best,
 when trouble lies at your feet.

Let it come, let it appear, that
 fairest of fates for me, that brings my final day,

the fate supreme! Oh, let it come, so that I may never
 see tomorrow’s light!

These things are in the future.
 We must see to present affairs.

Fulfillment of these things rests in the hands where it should
 rest.

All that I crave was summed in that prayer.

Then pray no more; for mortals have no release from destined
 misfortune.

Lead me away, I beg you, a rash,
 useless man.

I have murdered you,
 son, unwittingly, and you, too, my wife—the misery! I do not know which
 way I should look, or where I should seek support. All is

amiss that is in my hands, and, again,
 a crushing fate has leapt upon my head.

Wisdom is provided as the chief
 part of happiness, and our dealings with the gods must be in no way
 unholy. The great words of arrogant men have to make repayment with
 great blows, and in old age teach wisdom.