Shall prosper while thou dwellest in the land.
Then get thee forth: this not despiteously
I speak, nor as thy foe, but fearing hurt
To Thebes by reason of thy vengeance-fiends.
Oedipus.
Fate, from the first to grief thou barest me,1595
And pain, beyond all men that ever were.
Ere from my mother's womb I came to light,
Phœbus to Laïus spake me, yet unborn,
My father's murderer—ah, woe is me!
When I was born, my father, my begetter,—1600
Doomed by mine hand to die,—accounting me
From birth[1] his foe, would slay me, sent me forth,
A suckling yet, a wretched prey to beasts.
Yet was I saved. Oh had Cithæron sunk
Down to the bottomless chasms of Tartarus,1605
For that it slew me not!—but Fate gave me
To be a bondman, Polybus my lord.
So mine own father did I slay, and came,—
Ah wretch!—unto mine hapless mother's couch.
Sons I begat, my brethren, and destroyed,1610
Passing to them the curse received of Laïus.
For not so witless am I from the birth,
As to devise these things against mine eyes
And my sons' life, but by the finger of God.
Let be:—what shall I do, the fortune-crost?1615
Who shall companion me, my blind steps guide?
She who is dead? O yea, were she alive!
My sons, a goodly pair? Nay, I have none.
Am I yet young, to win me livelihood?
- ↑ Reading πεφυκέναι, vice δυσδαίμονα, "ill-starred."
