Page:The Tragedies of Aeschylus - tr. Potter - 1812.pdf/69

Rh Grateful, the gall, the liver streak'd with veins,

The limbs involv'd in fat, and the long chine

Plac'd on the blazing altar; from the smoke

And mounting flame to mark th' unerring omen.

These arts I taught. And all the secret treasures

Deep buried in the bowels of the earth;

Brass, iron, silver, gold, their use to man,

Let the vain tongue make what high vaunts it may,

Are my inventions all; and, in a word,

Prometheus taught each useful art to man.

Let not thy love to man o'erleap the bounds

Of reason, nor neglect thy wretched state:

So my fond hope suggests thou shalt be free

From these base chains, nor less in pow'r than Jove.

Not thus, it is not in the Fates that thus

These things should end: crush'd with a thousand wrongs,

A thousand woes, I shall escape these chains.

Necessity is stronger far than art.

Who then is ruler of necessity?,

The triple Fates and unforgetting furies.

Must Jove then yield to their superior pow'r?

He no way shall escape his destin'd fate.

What, but eternal empire, in his fate?

Thou may'st not know this now: forbear t' inquire.

Is it of moment what thou keep'st thus close?

No more of this discourse; it is not time

Now to disclose that which requires the seal

Of strictest secresy; by guarding which

I shall escape the misery of these chains.


 * Never, never may my soul


 * Jove's all-ruling pow'r defy;


 * Never feel his harsh control,


 * Sovreign ruler of the sky.