lust for battle fill your soul and
carry you away. Reject this evil passion while it is still young.
ETEOCLES
[689] Since God
hastens the deed so urgently, let the whole race of Laius, hated by Phoebus, be
swept on the wind to Cocytus’ destined flood!
CHORUS
[692] A savage
desire eats away at you, drives you to murder, blood-sacrifice proscribed by
divine law, whose only fruit is bitterness.
ETEOCLES
[695] True,
my own beloved father’s hateful, ruinous curse hovers before my dry, unweeping
eyes, and informs me of benefit preceding subsequent death.
CHORUS
[698] No, do not
let yourself be driven to it. You will not be called a coward if you retain
life nobly. Will not the avenging Erinys in her dark aegis leave your house,
when the gods receive sacrifice from your hands?
ETEOCLES
[702] The gods,
it seems, have already banished us from their care, yet they admire the grace
we offer them when we perish. So then, why should we cringe and shy away from
deadly fate?
CHORUS
[705] It is
only at this moment that death stands close by you, for the divine spirit may
change its purpose even after a long time and come on a gentler wind. But now
it still seethes.
ETEOCLES
[709] Yes, the
curses of Oedipus have made it seethe in fury. Too true were the phantoms in my
sleeping visions, predicting the division of our father’s wealth!
CHORUS
[712] Obey us
women, although you do not like to.
ETEOCLES
[713] Recommend
something that can be accomplished; your request need not be lengthy.
CHORUS
[714] Do not
yourself take the road to the seventh gate!
ETEOCLES
[715] Let
me assure you, you will not blunt my sharpened purpose with words.
CHORUS
[716] And yet
any victory, even a cowardly one, is nonetheless held in honor by God.
ETEOCLES
[717] A soldier
must not embrace that maxim.
CHORUS
[718] But are
you willing to harvest the blood of your own brother?
ETEOCLES
[719] When it is
the gods who give you evils, you cannot flee them.
[ Exit. ]
CHORUS
[720] I
shudder in terror at the goddess who lays ruin to homes, a goddess unlike other
divinities, who is an unerring omen of evil to come. I shudder that the Erinys
invoked by the father’s prayer will fulfil the over-wrathful curses that
Oedipus spoke in madness. This strife that will destroy his sons drives the
Erinys to fulfillment.
[727] A stranger distributes
their inheritance, a Chalybian immigrant from Scythia, a bitter divider of
wealth, savage-hearted iron that apportions land for them to dwell in, as much
as they can occupy in death when they have lost their share in these wide
plains.
[734] But when both
have died, each killing the other in mutual slaughter, and the earth’s
dust has swallowed the black streams of their blood, who could offer sacrifice
that might make purification? Who could cleanse them of their pollution? O, the
new troubles of this house mixed with its evils of before!
[742] Indeed I speak
of the ancient transgression, now swift in its retribution. It remains even
into the third generation, ever since Laius — in defiance of Apollo who, at his
Pythian oracle at the earth’s center, said three times that the king would save
his city if he died without offspring — ever since he, overcome by the
thoughtlessness of his longing, fathered his own death, the parricide Oedipus,
who sowed his mother’s sacred field, where he was nurtured, and endured a
bloody crop. Madness united the frenzied bridal pair.
[758] Now it is as if
a sea of evils pushes its swell onward. As one wave sinks, the sea raises up
another, triple-crested, which crashes around the city’s stern. In between
a narrow defense stretches — no wider than a wall. I fear that the city will be
overthrown along with its kings.
[766] For the
compensation is heavy when curses uttered long ago are fulfilled, and once the
deadly curse has come into existence, it does not pass away. When the fortune
of seafaring merchants has grown too great, it must be thrown overboard.
[772] For
carry you away. Reject this evil passion while it is still young.
ETEOCLES
[689] Since God
hastens the deed so urgently, let the whole race of Laius, hated by Phoebus, be
swept on the wind to Cocytus’ destined flood!
CHORUS
[692] A savage
desire eats away at you, drives you to murder, blood-sacrifice proscribed by
divine law, whose only fruit is bitterness.
ETEOCLES
[695] True,
my own beloved father’s hateful, ruinous curse hovers before my dry, unweeping
eyes, and informs me of benefit preceding subsequent death.
CHORUS
[698] No, do not
let yourself be driven to it. You will not be called a coward if you retain
life nobly. Will not the avenging Erinys in her dark aegis leave your house,
when the gods receive sacrifice from your hands?
ETEOCLES
[702] The gods,
it seems, have already banished us from their care, yet they admire the grace
we offer them when we perish. So then, why should we cringe and shy away from
deadly fate?
CHORUS
[705] It is
only at this moment that death stands close by you, for the divine spirit may
change its purpose even after a long time and come on a gentler wind. But now
it still seethes.
ETEOCLES
[709] Yes, the
curses of Oedipus have made it seethe in fury. Too true were the phantoms in my
sleeping visions, predicting the division of our father’s wealth!
CHORUS
[712] Obey us
women, although you do not like to.
ETEOCLES
[713] Recommend
something that can be accomplished; your request need not be lengthy.
CHORUS
[714] Do not
yourself take the road to the seventh gate!
ETEOCLES
[715] Let
me assure you, you will not blunt my sharpened purpose with words.
CHORUS
[716] And yet
any victory, even a cowardly one, is nonetheless held in honor by God.
ETEOCLES
[717] A soldier
must not embrace that maxim.
CHORUS
[718] But are
you willing to harvest the blood of your own brother?
ETEOCLES
[719] When it is
the gods who give you evils, you cannot flee them.
[ Exit. ]
CHORUS
[720] I
shudder in terror at the goddess who lays ruin to homes, a goddess unlike other
divinities, who is an unerring omen of evil to come. I shudder that the Erinys
invoked by the father’s prayer will fulfil the over-wrathful curses that
Oedipus spoke in madness. This strife that will destroy his sons drives the
Erinys to fulfillment.
[727] A stranger distributes
their inheritance, a Chalybian immigrant from Scythia, a bitter divider of
wealth, savage-hearted iron that apportions land for them to dwell in, as much
as they can occupy in death when they have lost their share in these wide
plains.
[734] But when both
have died, each killing the other in mutual slaughter, and the earth’s
dust has swallowed the black streams of their blood, who could offer sacrifice
that might make purification? Who could cleanse them of their pollution? O, the
new troubles of this house mixed with its evils of before!
[742] Indeed I speak
of the ancient transgression, now swift in its retribution. It remains even
into the third generation, ever since Laius — in defiance of Apollo who, at his
Pythian oracle at the earth’s center, said three times that the king would save
his city if he died without offspring — ever since he, overcome by the
thoughtlessness of his longing, fathered his own death, the parricide Oedipus,
who sowed his mother’s sacred field, where he was nurtured, and endured a
bloody crop. Madness united the frenzied bridal pair.
[758] Now it is as if
a sea of evils pushes its swell onward. As one wave sinks, the sea raises up
another, triple-crested, which crashes around the city’s stern. In between
a narrow defense stretches — no wider than a wall. I fear that the city will be
overthrown along with its kings.
[766] For the
compensation is heavy when curses uttered long ago are fulfilled, and once the
deadly curse has come into existence, it does not pass away. When the fortune
of seafaring merchants has grown too great, it must be thrown overboard.
[772] For
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