Page:The poetical works of Matthew Arnold, 1897.djvu/238

200 Without friend, city, or home,—

Death, who dissevers all.

Him then I praise, who dares

To self-selected good

Prefer obedience to the primal law

Which consecrates the ties of blood; for these, indeed,

Are to the gods a care:

That touches but himself.

For every day man may be linked and loosed

With strangers; but the bond

Original, deep-inwound,

Of blood, can he not bind,

Nor, if fate binds, not bear.

But hush! Hæmon, whom Antigone,

Robbing herself of life in burying,

Against Creon's law, Polynices,

Robs of a loved bride,—pale, imploring,

Waiting her passage,

Forth from the palace hitherward comes.

HÆMON.

No, no, old men, Creon I curse not!

I weep, Thebans,

One than Creon crueller far!

For he, he, at least, by slaying her,

August laws doth mightily vindicate;

But thou, too bold, headstrong, pitiless!—

Ah me!—honorest more than thy lover,

O Antigone!

A dead, ignorant, thankless corpse.