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. It has come into my head, citizens of Thebes, to visit every altar of the gods, a wreath in my hand and a dish of incense. For all manner of alarms trouble the soul of Oedipus, who instead of weighing new oracles by old, like a man of sense, is at the mercy of every mouth that speaks terror. Seeing that my words are nothing to him, I cry to you, Lysian Apollo, whose altar is the first I meet: I come, a suppliant, bearing symbols of prayer; O make us clean, for now we are all afraid, seeing him afraid, even as they who see the helmsman afraid.

. May I learn from you, strangers, where is the home of King Oedipus? Or better still, tell me where he himself is, if you know.

. This is his house, and he himself, stranger, is within it, and this lady is the mother of his children.

. Then I call a blessing upon her, seeing what man she has married.

. May god reward those words with a like blessing, stranger. But what have you come to seek or to tell?

. Good news for your house, lady, and for your husband.