Eteocles.
Content thee! Therefore have I filed my mind;
And words are not the stuff to dull its edge.
Chorus.
To win is all: get glory he who can:
The victory won wins God's acknowledgment.
Eteocles.
He who girds on his armour owes no love
To that wise saw.
Chorus.
And yet the greater fault—
To lay rash hands upon thy brother's life
And with those crimson juices stain thy soul—
Mislikes thee not!
Eteocles.
Sin may be thrust upon us:
Evil when Heaven sends it, who shall shun?
Chorus.
By this cold shuddering fit of fear
My heart divines a presence here,
Goddess or Ghost yclept;
Wrecker of homes, and dark adept
Of prophecy, whose vastitude of ill
This hour and all hours shall at last fulfil.
Thou Curse that from the gloom
Of nether Hell
A Sire invoked; implacable
Erinys, whom in fierce excess of wrath
Grief-maddened Œdipus did summon forth,
Thou'rt in this strife to work his children's doom.
