Page:Tragedies of Seneca (1907) Miller.djvu/157

Rh Thy pardon, O Apollo, do I crave, If aught unlawful thou dost see in me; For by another's will have I revealed The hidden things of earth. Thou lord of heaven, And sire, behind thy flaming thunderbolt Conceal thy face; and thou who rul'st the seas By second lot, seek thou their lowest depths. Whoever from on high beholds the earth, And would not by strange sights be vision-stained, To heaven look and so these portents shun. Two only may behold this horrid sight: The one who brought and she who ordered it. To work my punishment and fated toils The earth was not enough. Through Juno's hate Have I seen regions unapproachable, Unknown to Phoebus' rays; yea, I have seen Those gloomy spaces which the nether pole Has yielded to the dusky Jove's domain. And had the regions of the final lot Been pleasing, there could I myself have reigned. That seething chaos of eternal night, And, what is worse than night, the gloomy gods, And fates I conquered; and in scorn of death I have come back again. What else remains? I've seen and shown the lower world to men. If aught beyond is left to do, command. Why dost thou for so long allow these hands, O Juno, to remain in idleness? What conquest still dost thou command? But why Do soldiers hold the temple walls in siege, And fear of arms beset their sacred doors? [Enter Amphitryon.] Amphitr.: Now do my fervent hopes deceive my sight, Or is this he, the tamer of the world, The pride of Greece, from that sad, silent land Returned? Is this my son? My agéd limbs Give way through utter joy. O son, of Thebes The sure though long-delayed preserver thou! And do I hold thee sent to earth again,