Page:Tragedies of Sophocles (Plumptre 1878).djvu/543

Rh (Where Thrakian storm-winds rave,

And floods of darkness from the depths emerge,)

Rolls the black sand from out the lowest deep,

And shores re-echoing wail, as rough blasts o'er them sweep.

Woes upon woes fast falling on the race

Of Labdacos that faileth still I see,

Nor can one age for that which comes win grace,

But still some God hurls all to misery;

All power to heal is fled;

For her, the one faint light,

That o'er the last root spread,

And in the house of Œdipus was bright,

Now doth the blood-stained scythe of Gods below

Cut down, man s frenzied word and dread Erinnys' woe.

What pride of man, Ο Zeus, in check can hold

Thy power divine,

Which nor sleep seizeth that makes all things old,

Nor the long months of God in endless line?

Thou grow'st not old with time,

But ruling in thy might,

For ever dwellest in thy home sublime,

Olympos, glittering in its sheen of light:

And through the years' long tale,

The far time or the near,

As through the past, this law shall still prevail:—

Nought comes to life of man without or woe or fear.

For unto many men come hopes that rove,

Bringing vain joy,