Page:Oedipus, King of Thebes (Murray 1911).djvu/87

vv. 1176–1192

The babe must slay his father; so

’Twas written.

Why didst thou, then, let him go

With this old man?

O King, my heart did bleed.

I thought the man would save him, past all need

Of fear, to his own distant home. And he

Did save him, to great evil. Verily

If thou art he whom this man telleth of,

Know, to affliction thou art born.

Enough!

All will come true. Thou Light, never again

May I behold thee, I in the eyes of men

Made naked, how from sin my being grew,

In sin I wedded and in sin I slew!

[''He rushes into the Palace. The is led away by the thralls''.

Nothingness, nothingness,

Ye Children of Man, and less

I count you, waking or dreaming!

And none among mortals, none,

Seeking to live, hath won

More than to seem, and to cease

Again from his seeming.