Assist, if Edipus deserve thy care!

If you received me from Jocasta's womb,
And nursed the hope of mischiefs yet to come:
If leaving Polybus, I took my way

90

To Cyrrha's temple, on that fatal day,
When by the son the trembling father died,
Where the three roads the Phocian fields divide:
If I the Sphinx's riddles durst explain,
Taught by thyself to win the promised reign:
If wretched I, by baleful furies led,
With monstrous mixture stained my mother's
bed,

95

For hell and thee begot an impious brood,
And with full lust those horrid joys renewed;
Then self-condemned to shades of endless night,
Forced from these orbs the bleeding balls of
sight:

100

Oh hear and aid the vengeance I require,
If worthy thee, and what thou mightst inspire.
My sons their old, unhappy sire despise,
Spoiled of his kingdom, and deprived of eyes;
Guideless I wander, unregarded mourn,
While these exalt their sceptres o'er my urn;
These sons, ye gods! who with flagitious pride
Insult my darkness, and my groans deride.
Art thou a father, unregarding Jove!

105

And sleeps thy thunder in the realms above? 110 Thou Fury, then some lasting curse entail, Which o'er their children's children shall pre

vail :

Place on their heads that crown distained with

gore,

Which these dire hands from my slain father

tore;

Go, and a parent's heavy curses bear;
Break all the bonds of nature, and prepare
Their kindred souls to mutual hate and war.

C

115

Give them to dare, what I might wish to see, Blind as I am, some glorious villainy!

Soon shalt thou find, if thou but arm their hands,

120

Their ready guilt preventing thy commands: Couldst thou some great, proportioned mischief frame,

They'd prove the father from whose loins they

came."

The Fury heard, while on Cocytus' brink Her snakes, untied, sulphureous waters drink; But at the summons rolled her eyes around, 126 And snatched the starting serpents from the ground.

Not half so swiftly shoots along in air,
The gliding lightning, or descending star.
Through crowds of airy shades she winged her
flight,

130

And dark dominions of the silent night;
Swift as she passed, the flitting ghosts withdrew,
And the pale spectres trembled at her view:
To the iron gates of Tænarus she flies,
There spreads her dusky pinions to the skies.
The day beheld, and sickening at the sight, 136
Veiled her fair glories in the shades of night.
Affrighted Atlas, on the distant shore,
Trembled, and shook the heavens and gods he
bore.

Now from beneath Malea's airy height

140

Aloft she sprung, and steered to Thebes her

flight;

With eager speed the well-known journey took,
Nor here regrets the hell she late forsook.
A hundred snakes her gloomy visage shade,
A hundred serpents guard her horrid head, 145
In her sunk eyeballs dreadful meteors glow;
Such rays from Phoebe's bloody circle flow,

When labouring with strong charms, she shoots from high

A fiery gleam, and reddens all the sky.

Blood stained her cheeks, and from her mouth

there came

150

Blue steaming poisons, and a length of flame.
From every blast of her contagious breath
Famine and drought proceed, and plagues, and
death.

A robe obscene was o'er her shoulders thrown,
A dress by Fates and Furies worn alone. 155
She tossed her meagre arms; her better hand
In waving circles whirled a funeral brand:
A serpent from her left was seen to rear
His flaming crest, and lash the yielding air.
But when the Fury took her stand on high,
Where vast Citharon's top salutes the sky, 161
A hiss from all the snaky tire went round;
The dreadful signal all the rocks rebound,
And through the Achaian cities send the sound.
Ete, with high Parnassus, heard the voice;
Eurotas' banks remurmured to the noise;
Again Leucothea shook at these alarms,
And pressed Palæmon closer in her arms.
Headlong from thence the glowing Fury
springs,

166

And o'er the Theban palace spreads her wings, Once more invades the guilty dome, and shrouds

171

Its bright pavilions in a veil of clouds.
Straight with the rage of all their race possessed,
Stung to the soul, the brothers start from rest,
And all their furies wake within their breast.
Their tortured minds repining Envy tears, 176
And Hate, engendered by suspicious fears;
And sacred thirst of sway; and all the ties
Of nature broke; and royal perjuries;

And impotent desire to reign alone,

180

That scorns the dull reversion of a throne; Each would the sweets of sovereign rule devour, While Discord waits upon divided power.

As stubborn steers by brawny ploughmen broke,

And joined reluctant to the galling yoke, 185 Alike disdain with servile necks to bear

The unwonted weight, or drag the crooked share,

190

But rend the reins, and bound a different way,
And all the furrows in confusion lay:
Such was the discord of the royal pair,
Whom fury drove precipitate to war.
In vain the chiefs contrived a specious way,
To govern Thebes by their alternate sway:
Unjust decree! while this enjoys the state,
That mourns in exile his unequal fate,
And the short monarch of a hasty year
Foresees with anguish his returning heir.
Thus did the league their impious arms restrain,
But scarce subsisted to the second reign.

195

199

Yet then, no proud aspiring piles were raised, No fretted roofs with polished metals blazed; No laboured columns in long order placed, No Grecian stone the pompous arches graced; No nightly bands in glittering armour wait Before the sleepless tyrant's guarded gate; 205 No chargers then were wrought in burnished gold,

Nor silver vases took the forming mould; Nor gems on bowls embossed were seen to shine,

Blaze on the brims, and sparkle in the wine. Say, wretched rivals! what provokes your rage?

210

Say, to what end your impious arms engage?

Not all bright Phoebus views in early morn,
Or when his evening beams the west adorn,
When the south glows with his meridian ray,
And the cold north receives a fainter day; 215
For crimes like these, not all those realms
suffice,

Were all those realms the guilty victor's prize!
But fortune now (the lots of empire thrown)
Decrees to proud Eteocles the crown:

What joys, oh, tyrant! swelled thy soul that

day,

220

When all were slaves thou couldst around

survey,

Pleased to behold unbounded power thy own,
And singly fill a feared and envied throne!
But the vile vulgar, ever discontent,
Their growing fears in secret murmurs vent;
Still prone to change, though still the slaves of

state,

224

And sure the monarch whom they have, to hate;

231

New lords they madly make, then tamely bear, And softly curse the tyrants whom they fear. And one of those who groan beneath the sway Of kings imposed, and grudgingly obey, (Whom envy to the great, and vulgar spite, With scandal armed, the ignoble mind's delight),

Exclaimed-"O Thebes! for thee what fates

remain,

What woes attend this inauspicious reign? 235 Must we, alas! our doubtful necks prepare, Each haughty master's yoke by turns to bear, And still to change whom changed we still must fear?

These now control a wretched people's fate, 239 These can divide, and these reverse the state: