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THE MEDEA
OF
EURIPIDES
TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH RHYMING VERSE
WITH EXPLANATORY NOTES BY
GILBERT MURRAY, M.A., LL.D.
SOMETIME PROFESSOR OF GREEK IN THE UNIVERSITY
OF GLASGOW; FELLOW OF NEW
COLLEGE, OXFORD
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
AMERICAN BRANCH
NEW YORK: 35 WEST 32ND STREET
1912
Copyright, 1906, by
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
AMERICAN BRANCH
INTRODUCTION
The _Medea_, in spite of its background of wonder and enchantment, is
not a romantic play but a tragedy of character and situation. It deals,
so to speak, not with the romance itself, but with the end of the
romance, a thing which is so terribly often the reverse of romantic. For
all but the very highest of romances are apt to have just one flaw
somewhere, and in the story of Jason and Medea the flaw was of a fatal
kind.
The wildness and beauty of the Argo legend run through all Greek
literature, from the mass of Corinthian lays older than our present
Iliad, which later writers vaguely associate with the name of Eumelus,
to the Fourth Pythian Ode of Pindar and the beautiful Argonautica of
Apollonius Rhodius. Our poet knows the wildness and the beauty; but it
is not these qualities that he specially seeks. He takes them almost for
granted, and pierces through them to the sheer tragedy that lies below.
Jason, son of Aeson, King of Iolcos, in Thessaly, began his life in
exile. His uncle Pelias had seized his father's kingdom, and Jason was
borne away to the mountains by night and given, wrapped in a purple
robe, to Chiron, the Centaur. When he reached manhood he came down to
Iolcos to demand, as Pindar tells us, his ancestral honour, and stood in
the market-place, a world-famous figure, one-sandalled, with his
pard-skin, his two spears and his long hair, gentle and wild and
fearless, as the Wise Beast had reared him. Pelias, cowed but loath to
yield, promised to give up the kingdom if Jason would make his way to
the unknown land of Colchis and perform a double quest. First, if I read
Pindar aright, he must fetch back the soul of his kinsman Phrixus, who
had died there far from home; and, secondly, find the fleece of the
Golden Ram which Phrixus had sacrificed. Jason undertook the quest:
gathered the most daring heroes from all parts of Hellas; built the
first ship, Argo, and set to sea. After all manner of desperate
adventures he reached the land of Aietes, king of the Colchians, and
there hope failed him. By policy, by tact, by sheer courage he did all
that man could do. But Aietes was both hostile and treacherous. The
Argonauts were surrounded, and their destruction seemed only a question
of days when, suddenly, unasked, and by the mercy of Heaven, Aietes'
daughter, Medea, an enchantress as well as a princess, fell in love with
Jason. She helped him through all his trials; slew for him her own
sleepless serpent, who guarded the fleece; deceived her father, and
secured both the fleece and the soul of Phrixus. At the last moment it
appeared that her brother, Absyrtus, was about to lay an ambush for
Jason. She invited Absyrtus to her room, stabbed him dead, and fled with
Jason over the seas. She had given up all, and expected in return a
perfect love.
And what of Jason? He could not possibly avoid taking Medea with him. He
probably rather loved her. She formed at the least a brilliant addition
to the glory of his enterprise. Not many heroes could produce a
barbarian princess ready to leave all and follow them in blind trust.
For of course, as every one knew without the telling in fifth-century
Athens, no legal marriage was possible between a Greek and a barbarian
from Colchis.
All through the voyage home, a world-wide baffled voyage by the Ister
and the Eridanus and the African Syrtes, Medea was still in her element,
and proved a constant help and counsellor to the Argonauts. When they
reached Jason's home, where Pelias was still king, things began to be
different. An ordered and law-abiding Greek state was scarcely the place
for the untamed Colchian. We only know the catastrophe. She saw with
smothered rage how Pelias hated Jason and was bent on keeping the
kingdom from him, and she determined to do her lover another act of
splendid service. Making the most of her fame as an enchantress, she
persuaded Pelias that he could, by a certain process, regain his youth.
He eagerly caught at the hope. His daughters tried the process upon him,
and Pelias died in agony. Surely Jason would be grateful now!
The real result was what it was sure to be in a civilised country. Medea
and her lover had to fly for their lives, and Jason was debarred for
ever from succeeding to the throne of Iolcos. Probably there was another
result also in Jason's mind: the conclusion that at all costs he must
somehow separate himself from this wild beast of a woman who was ruining
his life. He directed their flight to Corinth, governed at the time by a
ruler of some sort, whether "tyrant" or king, who was growing old and
had an only daughter. Creon would naturally want a son-in-law to support
and succeed him. And where in all Greece could he find one stronger or
more famous than the chief of the Argonauts? If only Medea were not
there! No doubt Jason owed her a great debt for her various services.
Still, after all, he was not married to her. And a man must not be weak
in such matters as these. Jason accepted the princess's hand, and when
Medea became violent, found it difficult to be really angry with Creon
for instantly condemning her to exile. At this point the tragedy begins.
The _Medea_ is one of the earliest of Euripides' works now preserved to
us. And those of us who have in our time glowed at all with the religion
of realism, will probably feel in it many of the qualities of youth.
Not, of course, the more normal, sensuous, romantic youth, the youth of
_Romeo and Juliet_; but another kind--crude, austere, passionate--the
youth of the poet who is also a sceptic and a devotee of truth, who so
hates the conventionally and falsely beautiful that he is apt to be
unduly ascetic towards beauty itself. When a writer really deficient in
poetry walks in this path, the result is purely disagreeable. It
produces its best results when the writer, like Euripides or Tolstoy, is
so possessed by an inward flame of poetry that it breaks out at the
great moments and consumes the cramping theory that would hold it in.
One can feel in the _Medea_ that the natural and inevitable romance of
the story is kept rigidly down. One word about Medea's ancient serpent,
two or three references to the Clashing Rocks, one startling flash of
light upon the real love of Jason's life, love for the ship Argo, these
are almost all the concessions made to us by the merciless delineator
of disaster into whose hands we are fallen. Jason is a middle-aged man,
with much glory, indeed, and some illusions; but a man entirely set upon
building up a great career, to whom love and all its works, though at
times he has found them convenient, are for the most part only
irrational and disturbing elements in a world which he can otherwise
mould to his will. And yet, most cruel touch of all, one feels this man
to be the real Jason. It is not that he has fallen from his heroic past.
It is that he was really like this always. And so with Medea. It is not
only that her beauty has begun to fade; not only that she is set in
surroundings which vaguely belittle and weaken her, making her no more a
bountiful princess, but only an ambiguous and much criticised foreigner.
Her very devotion of love for Jason, now turned to hatred, shows itself
to have been always of that somewhat rank and ugly sort to which such a
change is natural.
For concentrated dramatic quality and sheer intensity of passion few
plays ever written can vie with the _Medea_. Yet it obtained only a
third prize at its first production; and, in spite of its immense fame,
there are not many scholars who would put it among their favourite
tragedies. The comparative failure of the first production was perhaps
due chiefly to the extreme originality of the play. The Athenians in 432
B.C. had not yet learnt to understand or tolerate such work as this,
though it is likely enough that they fortified their unfavourable
opinion by the sort of criticisms which we still find attributed to
Aristotle and Dicaearchus.
At the present time it is certainly not the newness of the subject: I do
not think it is Aegeus, nor yet the dragon chariot, much less Medea's
involuntary burst of tears in the second scene with Jason, that really
produces the feeling of dissatisfaction with which many people must rise
from this great play. It is rather the general scheme on which the drama
is built. It is a scheme which occurs again and again in Euripides, a
study of oppression and revenge. Such a subject in the hands of a more
ordinary writer would probably take the form of a triumph of oppressed
virtue. But Euripides gives us nothing so sympathetic, nothing so cheap
and unreal. If oppression usually made people virtuous, the problems of
the world would be very different from what they are. Euripides seems at
times to hate the revenge of the oppressed almost as much as the
original cruelty of the oppressor; or, to put the same fact in a
different light, he seems deliberately to dwell upon the twofold evil of
cruelty, that it not only causes pain to the victim, but actually by
means of the pain makes him a worse man, so that when his turn of
triumph comes, it is no longer a triumph of justice or a thing to make
men rejoice. This is a grim lesson; taught often enough by history,
though seldom by the fables of the poets.
Seventeen years later than the _Medea_ Euripides expressed this
sentiment in a more positive way in the _Trojan Women_, where a depth of
wrong borne without revenge becomes, or seems for the moment to become,
a thing beautiful and glorious. But more plays are constructed like the
_Medea_. The _Hecuba_ begins with a noble and injured Queen, and ends
with her hideous vengeance on her enemy and his innocent sons. In the
_Orestes_ all our hearts go out to the suffering and deserted prince,
till we find at last that we have committed ourselves to the
blood-thirst of a madman. In the _Electra_, the workers of the vengeance
themselves repent.
The dramatic effect of this kind of tragedy is curious. No one can call
it undramatic or tame. Yet it is painfully unsatisfying. At the close of
the _Medea_ I actually find myself longing for a _deus ex machina_, for
some being like Artemis in the _Hippolytus_ or the good Dioscuri of the
_Electra_, to speak a word of explanation or forgiveness, or at least
leave some sound of music in our ears to drown that dreadful and
insistent clamour of hate. The truth is that in this play Medea herself
is the _dea ex machina_. The woman whom Jason and Creon intended simply
to crush has been transformed by her injuries from an individual human
being into a sort of living Curse. She is inspired with superhuman
force. Her wrongs and her hate fill all the sky. And the judgment
pronounced on Jason comes not from any disinterested or peace-making
God, but from his own victim transfigured into a devil.
From any such judgment there is an instant appeal to sane human
sympathy. Jason has suffered more than enough. But that also is the way
of the world. And the last word upon these tragic things is most often
something not to be expressed by the sentences of even the wisest
articulate judge, but only by the unspoken _lacrimae rerum_.
G. M.
MEDEA
CHARACTERS OF THE PLAY
MEDEA, _daughter of Aietes, King of Colchis_.
JASON, _chief of the Argonauts; nephew of Pelias, King of Iolcos in
Thessaly_.
CREON, _ruler of Corinth_.
AEGEUS, _King of Athens_.
NURSE _of Medea_.
TWO CHILDREN _of Jason and Medea_.
ATTENDANT _on the children_.
A MESSENGER.
CHORUS of Corinthian Women, with their LEADER.
Soldiers and Attendants.
_The scene is laid in Corinth. The play was first acted when Pythodorus
was Archon, Olympiad 87, year_ 1 (B.C. 431). _Euphorion was first,
Sophocles second, Euripides third, with Medea, Philoctetes, Dictys, and
the Harvesters, a Satyr-play._
MEDEA
_The Scene represents the front of_ MEDEA'S _House in Corinth. A road to
the right leads towards the royal castle, one on the left to the
harbour. The_ NURSE _is discovered alone_.
NURSE.
Would God no Argo e'er had winged the seas
To Colchis through the blue Symplegades:
No shaft of riven pine in Pelion's glen
Shaped that first oar-blade in the hands of men
Valiant, who won, to save King Pelias' vow,
The fleece All-golden! Never then, I trow,
Mine own princess, her spirit wounded sore
With love of Jason, to the encastled shore
Had sailed of old Iolcos: never wrought
The daughters of King Pelias, knowing not,
To spill their father's life: nor fled in fear,
Hunted for that fierce sin, to Corinth here
With Jason and her babes. This folk at need
Stood friend to her, and she in word and deed
Served alway Jason. Surely this doth bind,
Through all ill days, the hurts of humankind,
When man and woman in one music move.
But now, the world is angry, and true love
Sick as with poison. Jason doth forsake
My mistress and his own two sons, to make
His couch in a king's chamber. He must wed:
Wed with this Creon's child, who now is head
And chief of Corinth. Wherefore sore betrayed
Medea calleth up the oath they made,
They two, and wakes the clasped hands again,
The troth surpassing speech, and cries amain
On God in heaven to mark the end, and how
Jason hath paid his debt.
All fasting now
And cold, her body yielded up to pain,
Her days a waste of weeping, she hath lain,
Since first she knew that he was false. Her eyes
Are lifted not; and all her visage lies
In the dust. If friends will speak, she hears no more
Than some dead rock or wave that beats the shore:
Only the white throat in a sudden shame
May writhe, and all alone she moans the name
Of father, and land, and home, forsook that day
For this man's sake, who casteth her away.
Not to be quite shut out from home . . . alas,
She knoweth now how rare a thing that was!
Methinks she hath a dread, not joy, to see
Her children near. 'Tis this that maketh me
Most tremble, lest she do I know not what.
Her heart is no light thing, and useth not
To brook much wrong. I know that woman, aye,
And dread her! Will she creep alone to die
Bleeding in that old room, where still is laid
Lord Jason's bed? She hath for that a blade
Made keen. Or slay the bridegroom and the king,
And win herself God knows what direr thing?
'Tis a fell spirit. Few, I ween, shall stir
Her hate unscathed, or lightly humble her.
Ha! 'Tis the children from their games again,
Rested and gay; and all their mother's pain
Forgotten! Young lives ever turn from gloom!
[_The_ CHILDREN _and their_ ATTENDANT _come in_.
ATTENDANT.
Thou ancient treasure of my lady's room,
What mak'st thou here before the gates alone,
And alway turning on thy lips some moan
Of old mischances? Will our mistress be
Content, this long time to be left by thee?
NURSE.
Grey guard of Jason's children, a good thrall
Hath his own grief, if any hurt befall
His masters. Aye, it holds one's heart! . . .
Meseems
I have strayed out so deep in evil dreams,
I longed to rest me here alone, and cry
Medea's wrongs to this still Earth and Sky.
ATTENDANT.
How? Are the tears yet running in her eyes?
NURSE.
'Twere good to be like thee! . . . Her sorrow lies
Scarce wakened yet, not half its perils wrought.
ATTENDANT.
Mad spirit! . . . if a man may speak his thought
Of masters mad.--And nothing in her ears
Hath sounded yet of her last cause for tears!
[_He moves towards the house, but the_ NURSE
_checks him_.
NURSE.
What cause, old man? . . . Nay, grudge me not one word.
ATTENDANT.
'Tis nothing. Best forget what thou hast heard.
NURSE.
Nay, housemate, by thy beard! Hold it not hid
From me. . . . I will keep silence if thou bid.
ATTENDANT.
I heard an old man talking, where he sate
At draughts in the sun, beside the fountain gate,
And never thought of me, there standing still
Beside him. And he said, 'Twas Creon's will,
Being lord of all this land, that she be sent,
And with her her two sons, to banishment.
Maybe 'tis all false. For myself, I know
No further, and I would it were not so.
NURSE.
Jason will never bear it--his own sons
Banished,--however hot his anger runs
Against their mother!
ATTENDANT.
Old love burneth low
When new love wakes, men say. He is not now
Husband nor father here, nor any kin.
NURSE.
But this is ruin! New waves breaking in
To wreck us, ere we are righted from the old!
ATTENDANT.
Well, hold thy peace. Our mistress will be told
All in good time. Speak thou no word hereof.
NURSE.
My babes! What think ye of your father's love?
God curse him not, he is my master still:
But, oh, to them that loved him, 'tis an ill
Friend. . . .
ATTENDANT.
And what man on earth is different? How?
Hast thou lived all these years, and learned but now
That every man more loveth his own head
Than other men's? He dreameth of the bed
Of this new bride, and thinks not of his sons.
NURSE.
Go: run into the house, my little ones:
All will end happily! . . . Keep them apart:
Let not their mother meet them while her heart
Is darkened. Yester night I saw a flame
Stand in her eye, as though she hated them,
And would I know not what. For sure her wrath
Will never turn nor slumber, till she hath . . .
Go: and if some must suffer, may it be
Not we who love her, but some enemy!
VOICE (_within_).
Oh shame and pain: O woe is me!
Would I could die in my misery!
[_The_ CHILDREN _and the_ ATTENDANT _go in_.
NURSE.
Ah, children, hark! She moves again
Her frozen heart, her sleeping wrath.
In, quick! And never cross her path,
Nor rouse that dark eye in its pain;
That fell sea-spirit, and the dire
Spring of a will untaught, unbowed.
Quick, now!--Methinks this weeping cloud
Hath in its heart some thunder-fire,
Slow gathering, that must flash ere long.
I know not how, for ill or well,
It turns, this uncontrollable
Tempestuous spirit, blind with wrong.
VOICE (_within_).
Have I not suffered? Doth it call
No tears? . . . Ha, ye beside the wall
Unfathered children, God hate you
As I am hated, and him, too,
That gat you, and this house and all!
NURSE.
For pity! What have they to do,
Babes, with their father's sin? Why call
Thy curse on these? . . . Ah, children, all
These days my bosom bleeds for you.
Rude are the wills of princes: yea,
Prevailing alway, seldom crossed,
On fitful winds their moods are tossed:
'Tis best men tread the equal way.
Aye, not with glory but with peace
May the long summers find me crowned:
For gentleness--her very sound
Is magic, and her usages.
All wholesome: but the fiercely great
Hath little music on his road,
And falleth, when the hand of God
Shall move, most deep and desolate.
[_During the last words the_ LEADER _of the Chorus
has entered. Other women follow her._
LEADER.
I heard a voice and a moan,
A voice of the eastern seas:
Hath she found not yet her ease?
Speak, O aged one.
For I stood afar at the gate,
And there came from within a cry,
And wailing desolate.
Ah, no more joy have I,
For the griefs this house doth see,
And the love it hath wrought in me.
NURSE.
There is no house! 'Tis gone. The lord
Seeketh a prouder bed: and she
Wastes in her chamber, not one word
Will hear of care or charity.
VOICE (_within_).
O Zeus, O Earth, O Light,
Will the fire not stab my brain?
What profiteth living? Oh,
Shall I not lift the slow
Yoke, and let Life go,
As a beast out in the night,
To lie, and be rid of pain?
CHORUS.
_Some Women_
A.
"O Zeus, O Earth, O Light:"
The cry of a bride forlorn
Heard ye, and wailing born
Of lost delight?
B.
Why weariest thou this day,
Wild heart, for the bed abhorred,
The cold bed in the clay?
Death cometh though no man pray,
Ungarlanded, un-adored.
Call him not thou.
C.
If another's arms be now
Where thine have been,
On his head be the sin:
Rend not thy brow!
D.
All that thou sufferest,
God seeth: Oh, not so sore
Waste nor weep for the breast
That was thine of yore.
VOICE (_within_).
Virgin of Righteousness,
Virgin of hallowed Troth,
Ye marked me when with an oath
I bound him; mark no less
That oath's end. Give me to see
Him and his bride, who sought
My grief when I wronged her not,
Broken in misery,
And all her house. . . . O God,
My mother's home, and the dim
Shore that I left for him,
And the voice of my brother's blood. . . .
NURSE.
Oh, wild words! Did ye hear her cry
To them that guard man's faith forsworn,
Themis and Zeus? . . . This wrath new-born
Shall make mad workings ere it die.
CHORUS.
_Other Women._
A.
Would she but come to seek
Our faces, that love her well,
And take to her heart the spell
Of words that speak?
B.
Alas for the heavy hate
And anger that burneth ever!
Would it but now abate,
Ah God, I love her yet.
And surely my love's endeavour
Shall fail not here.
C.
Go: from that chamber drear
Forth to the day
Lead her, and say, Oh, say
That we love her dear.
D.
Go, lest her hand be hard
On the innocent: Ah, let be!
For her grief moves hitherward,
Like an angry sea.
NURSE.
That will I: though what words of mine
Or love shall move her? Let them lie
With the old lost labours! . . . Yet her eye--
Know ye the eyes of the wild kine,
The lion flash that guards their brood?
So looks she now if any thrall
Speak comfort, or draw near at all
My mistress in her evil mood.
[_The_ NURSE _goes into the house_.
CHORUS.
_A Woman._
Alas, the bold blithe bards of old
That all for joy their music made,
For feasts and dancing manifold,
That Life might listen and be glad.
But all the darkness and the wrong,
Quick deaths and dim heart-aching things,
Would no man ease them with a song
Or music of a thousand strings?
Then song had served us in our need.
What profit, o'er the banquet's swell
That lingering cry that none may heed?
The feast hath filled them: all is well!
_Others._
I heard a song, but it comes no more.
Where the tears ran over:
A keen cry but tired, tired:
A woman's cry for her heart's desired,
For a traitor's kiss and a lost lover.
But a prayer, methinks, yet riseth sore
To God, to Faith, God's ancient daughter--
The Faith that over sundering seas
Drew her to Hellas, and the breeze
Of midnight shivered, and the door
Closed of the salt unsounded water.
[_During the last words_ MEDEA _has come
out from the house_.
MEDEA.
Women of Corinth, I am come to show
My face, lest ye despise me. For I know
Some heads stand high and fail not, even at night
Alone--far less like this, in all men's sight:
And we, who study not our wayfarings
But feel and cry--Oh we are drifting things,
And evil! For what truth is in men's eyes,
Which search no heart, but in a flash despise
A strange face, shuddering back from one that ne'er
Hath wronged them? . . . Sure, far-comers anywhere,
I know, must bow them and be gentle. Nay,
A Greek himself men praise not, who alway
Should seek his own will recking not. . . . But I--
This thing undreamed of, sudden from on high,
Hath sapped my soul: I dazzle where I stand,
The cup of all life shattered in my hand,
Longing to die--O friends! He, even he,
Whom to know well was all the world to me,
The man I loved, hath proved most evil.--Oh,
Of all things upon earth that bleed and grow,
A herb most bruised is woman. We must pay
Our store of gold, hoarded for that one day,
To buy us some man's love; and lo, they bring
A master of our flesh! There comes the sting
Of the whole shame. And then the jeopardy,
For good or ill, what shall that master be;
Reject she cannot: and if he but stays
His suit, 'tis shame on all that woman's days.
So thrown amid new laws, new places, why,
'Tis magic she must have, or prophecy--
Home never taught her that--how best to guide
Toward peace this thing that sleepeth at her side.
And she who, labouring long, shall find some way
Whereby her lord may bear with her, nor fray
His yoke too fiercely, blessed is the breath
That woman draws! Else, let her pray for death.
Her lord, if he be wearied of the face
Withindoors, gets him forth; some merrier place
Will ease his heart: but she waits on, her whole
Vision enchained on a single soul.
And then, forsooth, 'tis they that face the call
Of war, while we sit sheltered, hid from all
Peril!--False mocking! Sooner would I stand
Three times to face their battles, shield in hand,
Than bear one child.
But peace! There cannot be
Ever the same tale told of thee and me.
Thou hast this city, and thy father's home,
And joy of friends, and hope in days to come:
But I, being citiless, am cast aside
By him that wedded me, a savage bride
Won in far seas and left--no mother near,
No brother, not one kinsman anywhere
For harbour in this storm. Therefore of thee
I ask one thing. If chance yet ope to me
Some path, if even now my hand can win
Strength to requite this Jason for his sin,
Betray me not! Oh, in all things but this,
I know how full of fears a woman is,
And faint at need, and shrinking from the light
Of battle: but once spoil her of her right
In man's love, and there moves, I warn thee well,
No bloodier spirit between heaven and hell.
LEADER.
I will betray thee not. It is but just,
Thou smite him.--And that weeping in the dust
And stormy tears, how should I blame them? . . .
Stay:
'Tis Creon, lord of Corinth, makes his way
Hither, and bears, methinks, some word of weight.
_Enter from the right_ CREON, _the King, with armed Attendants_.
CREON.
Thou woman sullen-eyed and hot with hate
Against thy lord, Medea, I here command
That thou and thy two children from this land
Go forth to banishment. Make no delay:
Seeing ourselves, the King, are come this day
To see our charge fulfilled; nor shall again
Look homeward ere we have led thy children twain
And thee beyond our realm's last boundary.
MEDEA.
Lost! Lost!
Mine haters at the helm with sail flung free
Pursuing; and for us no beach nor shore
In the endless waters! . . . Yet, though stricken sore,
I still will ask thee, for what crime, what thing
Unlawful, wilt thou cast me out, O King?
CREON.
What crime? I fear thee, woman--little need
To cloak my reasons--lest thou work some deed
Of darkness on my child. And in that fear
Reasons enough have part. Thou comest here
A wise-woman confessed, and full of lore
In unknown ways of evil. Thou art sore
In heart, being parted from thy lover's arms.
And more, thou hast made menace . . . so the alarms
But now have reached mine ear . . . on bride and groom,
And him who gave the bride, to work thy doom
Of vengeance. Which, ere yet it be too late,
I sweep aside. I choose to earn thine hate
Of set will now, not palter with the mood
Of mercy, and hereafter weep in blood.
MEDEA.
'Tis not the first nor second time, O King,
That fame hath hurt me, and come nigh to bring
My ruin. . . . How can any man, whose eyes
Are wholesome, seek to rear his children wise
Beyond men's wont? Much helplessness in arts
Of common life, and in their townsmen's hearts
Envy deep-set . . . so much their learning brings!
Come unto fools with knowledge of new things,
They deem it vanity, not knowledge. Aye,
And men that erst for wisdom were held high,
Feel thee a thorn to fret them, privily
Held higher than they. So hath it been with me.
A wise-woman I am; and for that sin
To divers ill names men would pen me in;
A seed of strife; an eastern dreamer; one
Of brand not theirs; one hard to play upon . . .
Ah, I am not so wondrous wise!--And now,
To thee, I am terrible! What fearest thou?
What dire deed? Do I tread so proud a path--
Fear me not thou!--that I should brave the wrath
Of princes? Thou: what has thou ever done
To wrong me? Granted thine own child to one
Whom thy soul chose.--Ah, _him_ out of my heart
I hate; but thou, meseems, hast done thy part
Not ill. And for thine houses' happiness
I hold no grudge. Go: marry, and God bless
Your issues. Only suffer me to rest
Somewhere within this land. Though sore oppressed,
I will be still, knowing mine own defeat.
CREON.
Thy words be gentle: but I fear me yet
Lest even now there creep some wickedness
Deep hid within thee. And for that the less
I trust thee now than ere these words began.
A woman quick of wrath, aye, or a man,
Is easier watching than the cold and still.
Up, straight, and find thy road! Mock not my will
With words. This doom is passed beyond recall;
Nor all thy crafts shall help thee, being withal
My manifest foe, to linger at my side.
MEDEA (_suddenly throwing herself down
and clinging to_ CREON).
Oh, by thy knees! By that new-wedded bride . . .
CREON.
'Tis waste of words. Thou shalt not weaken me.
MEDEA.
Wilt hunt me? Spurn me when I kneel to thee?
CREON.
'Tis mine own house that kneels to me, not thou.
MEDEA.
Home, my lost home, how I desire thee now!
CREON.
And I mine, and my child, beyond all things.
MEDEA.
O Loves of man, what curse is on your wings!
CREON.
Blessing or curse, 'tis as their chances flow.
MEDEA.
Remember, Zeus, the cause of all this woe!
CREON.
Oh, rid me of my pains! Up, get thee gone!
MEDEA.
What would I with thy pains? I have mine own.
CREON.
Up: or, 'fore God, my soldiers here shall fling . . .
MEDEA.
Not that! Not that! . . . I do but pray, O King . . .
CREON.
Thou wilt not? I must face the harsher task?
MEDEA.
I accept mine exile. 'Tis not that I ask.
CREON.
Why then so wild? Why clinging to mine hand?
MEDEA (_rising_).
For one day only leave me in thy land
At peace, to find some counsel, ere the strain
Of exile fall, some comfort for these twain,
Mine innocents; since others take no thought,
It seems, to save the babes that they begot.
Ah! Thou wilt pity them! Thou also art
A father: thou hast somewhere still a heart
That feels. . . . I reck not of myself: 'tis they
That break me, fallen upon so dire a day.
CREON.
Mine is no tyrant's mood. Aye, many a time
Ere this my tenderness hath marred the chime
Of wisest counsels. And I know that now
I do mere folly. But so be it! Thou
Shalt have this grace . . . But this I warn thee clear,
If once the morrow's sunlight find thee here
Within my borders, thee or child of thine,
Thou diest! . . . Of this judgment not a line
Shall waver nor abate. So linger on,
If thou needs must, till the next risen sun;
No further. . . . In one day there scarce can be
Those perils wrought whose dread yet haunteth me.
[_Exit_ CREON _with his suite_.
CHORUS.
O woman, woman of sorrow,
Where wilt thou turn and flee?
What town shall be thine to-morrow,
What land of all lands that be,
What door of a strange man's home?
Yea, God hath hunted thee,
Medea, forth to the foam
Of a trackless sea.
MEDEA.
Defeat on every side; what else?--But Oh,
Not here the end is: think it not! I know
For bride and groom one battle yet untried,
And goodly pains for him that gave the bride.
Dost dream I would have grovelled to this man,
Save that I won mine end, and shaped my plan
For merry deeds? My lips had never deigned
Speak word with him: my flesh been never stained
With touching. . . . Fool, Oh, triple fool! It lay
So plain for him to kill my whole essay
By exile swift: and, lo, he sets me free
This one long day: wherein mine haters three
Shall lie here dead, the father and the bride
And husband--mine, not hers! Oh, I have tried
So many thoughts of murder to my turn,
I know not which best likes me. Shall I burn
Their house with fire? Or stealing past unseen
To Jason's bed--I have a blade made keen
For that--stab, breast to breast, that wedded pair?
Good, but for one thing. When I am taken there,
And killed, they will laugh loud who hate me. . . .
Nay,
I love the old way best, the simple way
Of poison, where we too are strong as men.
Ah me!
And they being dead--what place shall hold me then?
What friend shall rise, with land inviolate
And trusty doors, to shelter from their hate
This flesh? . . . None anywhere! . . . A little more
I needs must wait: and, if there ope some door
Of refuge, some strong tower to shield me, good:
In craft and darkness I will hunt this blood.
Else, if mine hour be come and no hope nigh,
Then sword in hand, full-willed and sure to die,
I yet will live to slay them. I will wend
Man-like, their road of daring to the end.
So help me She who of all Gods hath been
The best to me, of all my chosen queen
And helpmate, Hecate, who dwells apart,
The flame of flame, in my fire's inmost heart:
For all their strength, they shall not stab my soul
And laugh thereafter! Dark and full of dole
Their bridal feast shall be, most dark the day
They joined their hands, and hunted me away.
Awake thee now, Medea! Whatso plot
Thou hast, or cunning, strive and falter not.
On to the peril-point! Now comes the strain
Of daring. Shall they trample thee again?
How? And with Hellas laughing o'er thy fall
While this thief's daughter weds, and weds withal
Jason? . . . A true king was thy father, yea,
And born of the ancient Sun! . . . Thou know'st the way;
And God hath made thee woman, things most vain
For help, but wondrous in the paths of pain.
[MEDEA _goes into the House_.
CHORUS.
Back streams the wave on the ever running river:
Life, life is changed and the laws of it o'ertrod.
Man shall be the slave, the affrighted, the low-liver!
Man hath forgotten God.
And woman, yea, woman, shall be terrible in story:
The tales too, meseemeth, shall be other than of yore.
For a fear there is that cometh out of Woman and a glory,
And the hard hating voices shall encompass her no more!
The old bards shall cease, and their memory that lingers
Of frail brides and faithless, shall be shrivelled as with fire.
For they loved us not, nor knew us: and our lips were dumb, our fingers
Could wake not the secret of the lyre.
Else, else, O God the Singer, I had sung amid their rages
A long tale of Man and his deeds for good and ill.
But the old World knoweth--'tis the speech of all his ages--
Man's wrong and ours: he knoweth and is still.
_Some Women._
Forth from thy father's home
Thou camest, O heart of fire,
To the Dark Blue Rocks, to the clashing foam,
To the seas of thy desire:
Till the Dark Blue Bar was crossed;
And, lo, by an alien river
Standing, thy lover lost,
Void-armed for ever,
Forth yet again, O lowest
Of landless women, a ranger
Of desolate ways, thou goest,
From the walls of the stranger.
_Others._
And the great Oath waxeth weak;
And Ruth, as a thing outstriven,
Is fled, fled, from the shores of the Greek,
Away on the winds of heaven.
Dark is the house afar,
Where an old king called thee daughter;
All that was once thy star
In stormy water,
Dark: and, lo, in the nearer
House that was sworn to love thee,
Another, queenlier, dearer,
Is throned above thee.
_Enter from the right_ JASON.
JASON.
Oft have I seen, in other days than these,
How a dark temper maketh maladies
No friend can heal. 'Twas easy to have kept
Both land and home. It needed but to accept
Unstrivingly the pleasure of our lords.
But thou, for mere delight in stormy words,
Wilt lose all! . . . Now thy speech provokes not me.
Rail on. Of all mankind let Jason be
Most evil; none shall check thee. But for these
Dark threats cast out against the majesties
Of Corinth, count as veriest gain thy path
Of exile. I myself, when princely wrath
Was hot against thee, strove with all good will
To appease the wrath, and wished to keep thee still
Beside me. But thy mouth would never stay
From vanity, blaspheming night and day
Our masters. Therefore thou shalt fly the land.
Yet, even so, I will not hold my hand
From succouring mine own people. Here am I
To help thee, woman, pondering heedfully
Thy new state. For I would not have thee flung
Provisionless away--aye, and the young
Children as well; nor lacking aught that will
Of mine can bring thee. Many a lesser ill
Hangs on the heels of exile. . . . Aye, and though
Thou hate me, dream not that my heart can know
Or fashion aught of angry will to thee.
MEDEA.
Evil, most evil! . . . since thou grantest me
That comfort, the worst weapon left me now
To smite a coward. . . . Thou comest to me, thou,
Mine enemy! (_Turning to the_ CHORUS.) Oh, say, how call ye this,
To face, and smile, the comrade whom his kiss
Betrayed? Scorn? Insult? Courage? None of these:
'Tis but of all man's inward sicknesses
The vilest, that he knoweth not of shame
Nor pity! Yet I praise him that he came . . .
To me it shall bring comfort, once to clear
My heart on thee, and thou shalt wince to hear.
I will begin with that, 'twixt me and thee,
That first befell. I saved thee. I saved thee--
Let thine own Greeks be witness, every one
That sailed on Argo--saved thee, sent alone
To yoke with yokes the bulls of fiery breath,
And sow that Acre of the Lords of Death;
And mine own ancient Serpent, who did keep
The Golden Fleece, the eyes that knew not sleep,
And shining coils, him also did I smite
Dead for thy sake, and lifted up the light
That bade thee live. Myself, uncounselled,
Stole forth from father and from home, and fled
Where dark Iolcos under Pelion lies,
With thee--Oh, single-hearted more than wise!
I murdered Pelias, yea, in agony,
By his own daughters' hands, for sake of thee;
I swept their house like War.--And hast thou then
Accepted all--O evil yet again!--
And cast me off and taken thee for bride
Another? And with children at thy side!
One could forgive a childless man. But no:
I have borne thee children . . .
Is sworn faith so low
And weak a thing? I understand it not.
Are the old gods dead? Are the old laws forgot,
And new laws made? Since not my passioning,
But thine own heart, doth cry thee for a thing
Forsworn.
[_She catches sight of her own hand which
she has thrown out to denounce him._
Poor, poor right hand of mine, whom he
Did cling to, and these knees, so cravingly,
We are unclean, thou and I; we have caught the stain
Of bad men's flesh . . . and dreamed our dreams in vain.
Thou comest to befriend me? Give me, then,
Thy counsel. 'Tis not that I dream again
For good from thee: but, questioned, thou wilt show
The viler. Say: now whither shall I go?
Back to my father? Him I did betray,
And all his land, when we two fled away.
To those poor Peliad maids? For them 'twere good
To take me in, who spilled their father's blood. . . .
Aye, so my whole life stands! There were at home
Who loved me well: to them I am become
A curse. And the first friends who sheltered me,
Whom most I should have spared, to pleasure thee
I have turned to foes. Oh, therefore hast thou laid
My crown upon me, blest of many a maid
In Hellas, now I have won what all did crave,
Thee, the world-wondered lover and the brave;
Who this day looks and sees me banished, thrown
Away with these two babes, all, all, alone . . .
Oh, merry mocking when the lamps are red:
"Where go the bridegroom's babes to beg their bread
In exile, and the woman who gave all
To save him?"
O great God, shall gold withal
Bear thy clear mark, to sift the base and fine,
And o'er man's living visage runs no sign
To show the lie within, ere all too late?
LEADER.
Dire and beyond all healing is the hate
When hearts that loved are turned to enmity.
JASON.
In speech at least, meseemeth, I must be
Not evil; but, as some old pilot goes
Furled to his sail's last edge, when danger blows
Too fiery, run before the wind and swell,
Woman, of thy loud storms.--And thus I tell
My tale. Since thou wilt build so wondrous high
Thy deeds of service in my jeopardy,
To all my crew and quest I know but one
Saviour, of Gods or mortals one alone,
The Cyprian. Oh, thou hast both brain and wit,
Yet underneath . . . nay, all the tale of it
Were graceless telling; how sheer love, a fire
Of poison-shafts, compelled thee with desire
To save me. But enough. I will not score
That count too close. 'Twas good help: and therefor
I give thee thanks, howe'er the help was wrought.
Howbeit, in my deliverance, thou hast got
Far more than given. A good Greek land hath been
Thy lasting home, not barbary. Thou hast seen
Our ordered life, and justice, and the long
Still grasp of law not changing with the strong
Man's pleasure. Then, all Hellas far and near
Hath learned thy wisdom, and in every ear
Thy fame is. Had thy days run by unseen
On that last edge of the world, where then had been
The story of great Medea? Thou and I . . .
What worth to us were treasures heaped high
In rich kings' rooms; what worth a voice of gold
More sweet than ever rang from Orpheus old,
Unless our deeds have glory?
Speak I so,
Touching the Quest I wrought, thyself did throw
The challenge down. Next for thy cavilling
Of wrath at mine alliance with a king,
Here thou shalt see I both was wise, and free
From touch of passion, and a friend to thee
Most potent, and my children . . . Nay, be still!
When first I stood in Corinth, clogged with ill
From many a desperate mischance, what bliss
Could I that day have dreamed of, like to this,
To wed with a king's daughter, I exiled
And beggared? Not--what makes thy passion wild--
From loathing of thy bed; not over-fraught
With love for this new bride; not that I sought
To upbuild mine house with offspring: 'tis enough,
What thou hast borne: I make no word thereof:
But, first and greatest, that we all might dwell
In a fair house and want not, knowing well
That poor men have no friends, but far and near
Shunning and silence. Next, I sought to rear
Our sons in nurture worthy of my race,
And, raising brethren to them, in one place
Join both my houses, and be all from now
Prince-like and happy. What more need hast thou
Of children? And for me, it serves my star
To link in strength the children that now are
With those that shall be.
Have I counselled ill?
Not thine own self would say it, couldst thou still
One hour thy jealous flesh.--'Tis ever so!
Who looks for more in women? When the flow
Of love runs plain, why, all the world is fair:
But, once there fall some ill chance anywhere
To baulk that thirst, down in swift hate are trod
Men's dearest aims and noblest. Would to God
We mortals by some other seed could raise
Our fruits, and no blind women block our ways!
Then had there been no curse to wreck mankind.
LEADER.
Lord Jason, very subtly hast thou twined
Thy speech: but yet, though all athwart thy will
I speak, this is not well thou dost, but ill,
Betraying her who loved thee and was true.
MEDEA.
Surely I have my thoughts, and not a few
Have held me strange. To me it seemeth, when
A crafty tongue is given to evil men
'Tis like to wreck, not help them. Their own brain
Tempts them with lies to dare and dare again,
Till . . . no man hath enough of subtlety.
As thou--be not so seeming-fair to me
Nor deft of speech. One word will make thee fall.
Wert thou not false, 'twas thine to tell me all,
And charge me help thy marriage path, as I
Did love thee; not befool me with a lie.
JASON.
An easy task had that been! Aye, and thou
A loving aid, who canst not, even now,
Still that loud heart that surges like the tide!
MEDEA.
That moved thee not. Thine old barbarian bride,
The dog out of the east who loved thee sore,
She grew grey-haired, she served thy pride no more.
JASON.
Now understand for once! The girl to me
Is nothing, in this web of sovranty
I hold. I do but seek to save, even yet,
Thee: and for brethren to our sons beget
Young kings, to prosper all our lives again.
MEDEA.
God shelter me from prosperous days of pain,
And wealth that maketh wounds about my heart.
JASON.
Wilt change that prayer, and choose a wiser part?
Pray not to hold true sense for pain, nor rate
Thyself unhappy, being too fortunate.
MEDEA.
Aye, mock me; thou hast where to lay thine head,
But I go naked to mine exile.
JASON.
Tread
Thine own path! Thou hast made it all to be.
MEDEA.
How? By seducing and forsaking thee?
JASON.
By those vile curses on the royal halls
Let loose. . . .
MEDEA.
On thy house also, as chance falls,
I am a living curse.
JASON.
Oh, peace! Enough
Of these vain wars: I will no more thereof.
If thou wilt take from all that I possess
Aid for these babes and thine own helplessness
Of exile, speak thy bidding. Here I stand
Full-willed to succour thee with stintless hand,
And send my signet to old friends that dwell
On foreign shores, who will entreat thee well.
Refuse, and thou shalt do a deed most vain.
But cast thy rage away, and thou shalt gain
Much, and lose little for thine anger's sake.
MEDEA.
I will not seek thy friends. I will not take
Thy givings. Give them not. Fruits of a stem
Unholy bring no blessing after them.
JASON.
Now God in heaven be witness, all my heart
Is willing, in all ways, to do its part
For thee and for thy babes. But nothing good
Can please thee. In sheer savageness of mood
Thou drivest from thee every friend. Wherefore
I warrant thee, thy pains shall be the more.
[_He goes slowly away._
MEDEA.
Go: thou art weary for the new delight
Thou wooest, so long tarrying out of sight
Of her sweet chamber. Go, fulfil thy pride,
O bridegroom! For it may be, such a bride
Shall wait thee,--yea, God heareth me in this--
As thine own heart shall sicken ere it kiss.
* * * * *
CHORUS.
Alas, the Love that falleth like a flood,
Strong-winged and transitory:
Why praise ye him? What beareth he of good
To man, or glory?
Yet Love there is that moves in gentleness,
Heart-filling, sweetest of all powers that bless.
Loose not on me, O Holder of man's heart,
Thy golden quiver,
Nor steep in poison of desire the dart
That heals not ever.
The pent hate of the word that cavilleth,
The strife that hath no fill,
Where once was fondness; and the mad heart's breath
For strange love panting still:
O Cyprian, cast me not on these; but sift,
Keen-eyed, of love the good and evil gift.
Make Innocence my friend, God's fairest star,
Yea, and abate not
The rare sweet beat of bosoms without war,
That love, and hate not.
_Others._
Home of my heart, land of my own,
Cast me not, nay, for pity,
Out on my ways, helpless, alone,
Where the feet fail in the mire and stone,
A woman without a city.
Ah, not that! Better the end:
The green grave cover me rather,
If a break must come in the days I know,
And the skies be changed and the earth below;
For the weariest road that man may wend
Is forth from the home of his father.
Lo, we have seen: 'tis not a song
Sung, nor learned of another.
For whom hast thou in thy direst wrong
For comfort? Never a city strong
To hide thee, never a brother.
Ah, but the man--cursed be he,
Cursed beyond recover,
Who openeth, shattering, seal by seal,
A friend's clean heart, then turns his heel,
Deaf unto love: never in me
Friend shall he know nor lover.
[_While_ MEDEA _is waiting downcast, seated upon her
door-step, there passes from the left a traveller
with followers. As he catches sight of_ MEDEA
_he stops_.
AEGEUS.
Have joy, Medea! 'Tis the homeliest
Word that old friends can greet with, and the best.
MEDEA (_looking up, surprised_).
Oh, joy on thee, too, Aegeus, gentle king
Of Athens!--But whence com'st thou journeying?
AEGEUS.
From Delphi now and the old encaverned stair. . . .
MEDEA.
Where Earth's heart speaks in song? What mad'st thou there?
AEGEUS.
Prayed heaven for children--the same search alway.
MEDEA.
Children? Ah God! Art childless to this day?
AEGEUS.
So God hath willed. Childless and desolate.
MEDEA.
What word did Phoebus speak, to change thy fate?
AEGEUS.
Riddles, too hard for mortal man to read.
MEDEA.
Which I may hear?
AEGEUS.
Assuredly: they need
A rarer wit.
MEDEA.
How said he?
AEGEUS.
Not to spill
Life's wine, nor seek for more. . . .
MEDEA.
Until?
AEGEUS.
Until
I tread the hearth-stone of my sires of yore.
MEDEA.
And what should bring thee here, by Creon's shore?
AEGEUS.
One Pittheus know'st thou, high lord of Trozen?
MEDEA.
Aye, Pelops' son, a man most pure of sin.
AEGEUS.
Him I would ask, touching Apollo's will.
MEDEA.
Much use in God's ways hath he, and much skill.
AEGEUS.
And, long years back he was my battle-friend,
The truest e'er man had.
MEDEA.
Well, may God send
Good hap to thee, and grant all thy desire.
AEGEUS.
But thou . . . ? Thy frame is wasted, and the fire
Dead in thine eyes.
MEDEA.
Aegeus, my husband is
The falsest man in the world.
AEGEUS.
What word is this?
Say clearly what thus makes thy visage dim?
MEDEA.
He is false to me, who never injured him.
AEGEUS.
What hath he done? Show all, that I may see.
MEDEA.
Ta'en him a wife; a wife, set over me
To rule his house.
AEGEUS.
He hath not dared to do,
Jason, a thing so shameful?
MEDEA.
Aye, 'tis true:
And those he loved of yore have no place now.
AEGEUS.
Some passion sweepeth him? Or is it thou
He turns from?
MEDEA.
Passion, passion to betray
His dearest!
AEGEUS.
Shame be his, so fallen away
From honour!
MEDEA.
Passion to be near a throne,
A king's heir!
AEGEUS.
How, who gives the bride? Say on.
MEDEA.
Creon, who o'er all Corinth standeth chief.
AEGEUS.
Woman, thou hast indeed much cause for grief.
MEDEA.
'Tis ruin.--And they have cast me out as well.
AEGEUS.
Who? 'Tis a new wrong this, and terrible.
MEDEA.
Creon the king, from every land and shore. . . .
AEGEUS.
And Jason suffers him? Oh, 'tis too sore!
MEDEA.