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498 ignorance have now been opened by the love of gold. His age alone screens him from immediate punishment: the partner of his guilt will not escape so easily. Tiresias answers by repeating his declaration in still plainer terms; but as at the king's indignant command he is about to retire, he drops an allusion to his birth, which reminds Œdipus of a secret which he has not yet unriddled. Instead however of satisfying his curiosity, the prophet once again, in language still more distinct than before, describes his present condition and predicts his fate.

This scene completes the exposition that was begun in the preceding one. The contrast between the real blindness and wretchedness of Œdipus and his fancied wisdom and greatness can be carried no further, than when he contemptuously rejects the truth which he is seeking and has found, and makes it a ground of quarrel with a faithful friend. The Chorus, in its next song, only interprets the irony of the action, when it asks, who is the guilty wretch against whom the oracle has let loose the ministers of vengeance? Where can be his lurkingplace? It must surely be in some savage forest, in some dark cave, or rocky glen, among the haunts of wild beasts, that the miserable fugitive hides himself from his pursuers. Who can believe that he is dwelling in the heart of the city, in the royal palace! that he is seated on the throne!

It does not belong to our present purpose to dwell on the following scenes, in which the fearful mystery is gradually unfolded. The art with which the poet has contrived to sustain the interest of the spectator, by retarding the discovery, has been always deservedly admired. It has indeed been too often considered as the great excellence of this sublime poem, the real beauty of which, as we hope to shew, is of a very different kind, and infinitely more profound and heartstirring than mere ingenuity can produce. But the attentive reader who shall examine this part of the play from the point of view that has been here taken, will not fail to observe, among numberless finer touches of irony with which the dialogue is inlaid, that the poet has so constructed his plot, as always to evolve the successive steps of the disclosure out of incidents which either exhibit the delusive security of Œdipus in the