University of Virginia Library

SCENE THE FIRST.

Jocasta.
Joc.
Antigone returns not. Hard constraint
That here confines me! Trembling, and alone,
Am I here destined from afar to hear
The clamorous dissonance of th'unnatural strife?
The consummation am I destined here
To wait, of the abhorr'd fraternal vengeance?
Wretch that I am! Do I live yet? Yet hope?
What can I hope? I have no hope on earth:
My life is the miraculous effect
Of destiny, which wills that I should be
Involved in fratricide, then cease to breathe.
There doth remain no other trespass now,
Except this crime, to perpetrate in Thebes;
Shall not Jocasta be to this a witness?
Oh ye, of Thebes the sovereign arbiters,
Tremendous deities of realms below,
Why do ye now delay to burst asunder
“The dark, unbottom'd, infinite abyss,”
And instantly engulph us? I, perchance,
Am I not she who to my son have given
Both sons and brothers? Are not those fierce youths,
That now in battle drink each other's blood,
The fruit of horrid incest? We are yours,
Entirely yours, infernal deities! ...
Oh, pangs unuttered, and unutterable!
All the affections of a mother move me,
And yet to be a mother I abhor.
But what has happened? Suddenly the din,
The hollow din, of distant battle ceases ...
To the tremendous dissonance succeeds
A silence as tremendous ... fatal silence! ...
To me the presage of more fatal tidings!
Who knows? ... perchance the battle is suspended ...
Ah me! ... perchance the fatal strife is over ...
What should I think, alas! what hope, what fear?
For whom breathe vows? For whom ask victory?
Alas! for neither: are not both my sons?
Oh thou, whoe'er thou beest, who palms hast won,
Into my presence come not; tremble, fly;
Delinquent—fly; entirely I devote
My undivided pity to the conquered:
Confederate shades, we will descend together
To Pluto's realms, and ask for vengeance there:
Nor can I ever bear to see a son
That, o'er a brother gasping on the earth,
Has raised the standard of flagitious conquest.