Lucius Annaeus Seneca

“ Shall he, who overcame dread Nessus' self,
By this same Nessus' blood be overcome?
Deianira: 'Tis vain to stay one who is bent on death.
It is my will at once to flee the light.
Who dies with Hercules has lived enough.
Nurse: Now by these hoary locks, as suppliant, 925
And by these breasts which suckled thee, I beg:
Abate thy wounded heart's wild threatenings,
Give o'er thy dread resolve for cruel death.
Deianira: Whoe'er persuades the wretched not to die
Is cruel. Death is sometimes punishment, 930
But oft a boon, and brings forgiveness oft. ”

“ Truly is my sire
In safety, Phaedra safe, and their two sons.
Nurse: Thou need'st not fear for them; the kingdom stands435
In prosperous estate, and all thy house
Rejoices in the blessings of the gods.
But Oh, do thou with greater kindness look
Upon thy fortune. For my heart is vexed
And anxious for thy sake; for thou thyself
With grievous sufferings dost bruise thy soul.
If fate compels it, one may be forgiven440
For wretchedness; but if, of his own will,
A man prefers to live in misery,
Brings tortures on himself, then he deserves
To lose those gifts he knows not how to use. ”

“ For joy of thee, to feel and see thee near.
Hercules: Why I should longer keep my soul in life,
And linger on the earth, there is no cause;
For I have lost my all: my balanced mind,1260
My arms, my reputation, children, wife,
The glory of my strength—my madness too.
There is no remedy for tainted souls;
But death alone can cure me of my sin.
Amphitr.: And wilt thou slay thy father?
Hercules: Lest I do,
I'll kill myself.
Amphitryon: Before thy father's face?
Hercules: Such impious sights I've taught him to behold. ”

“ Restrain, quench passion's fire, and curb thy grief.
Show now that thou art wife of Hercules.
Deianira: Shall captive Iole unto my sons
Give brothers, and a lowly slave become
The daughter-in-law of Jove? In common course
Will fire and rushing torrent never run;280
The thirsty Bear will never taste the sea—
And never shall my woes go unavenged.
Though thou didst bear the vasty heavens up,
Though all the world is debtor unto thee,
'Twill not avail thee now, for thou shalt find
A monster greater far than Hydra's rage,
An angry wife's revenge, awaiting thee. ”

“ The palace doors are now thrown open, and the prostrate, sleeping Hercules is seen. Amphitryon warns the chorus not to wake him lest they restore him to his miseries. Soon Hercules awakes, and in his right mind. He seems to himself to have had a dreadful dream. He looks in wonder at the cords which bind his arms, at the fresh-slain corpses lying near, at his own arrows scattered on the floor. He calls aloud for someone to explain these things to him. Amphitryon advances and informs him that in his madness, sent by Juno's hate, he has destroyed his wife and all his sons. ”

“ Phaedra: These slaves have seen
How, borne on speeding feet, he fled away.
Theseus: Oh, holy piety! O thou who reign'st
In heaven, and thou who rulest in the seas, 199
Whence came this base infection of our race?905
Was he of Grecian birth, or did he spring
From Scythian Taurus or some Colchian stream?
The type reverts to its ancestral stock,
And blood ignoble but repeats its source.
This is the madness of that savage race,
To scorn all lawful love, and prostitute910
At last the long-chaste body to the crowd.
Oh, loathsome race, restrained by no good laws
Which milder climes revere! ”

“ What sepulcher, O son, what tomb for thee
Is great enough? Naught save the world itself.
Then she takes up in quickened measures her funeral song of mourning in the midst of which the deified Hercules, taking shape in the air above, speaks to his mother, bidding her no longer mourn, for he has at last gained his place in heaven.
The chorus strikes a fitting final note, that the truly brave are not destined to the world below:
But when life's days are all consumed,
And comes the final hour, for them
A pathway to the gods is spread
By glory.
THE TROADES OF EURIPIDES, AND THE TROADES OF SENECA ”

“ Against these peoples let Adrastus fight,
And to thy sceptered hand deliver them.615
Consider that thy father still is king
Within this realm of Thebes. Far better, then,
Than such returns as this will exile seem.
Thou liv'st in exile through another's sin;
But thy return must be through thine alone.
With those brave troops of thine 'twere better far
To seek thee out new realms unstained by crime.620
Nay, e'en thy brother's self will be thy aid,
And fight for thee. Go, wage such warfare, then,
That, as thou fight'st, thy mother and thy sire
May pray for thy success. ”

“ Theseus [to Phaedra] : My queen, is't thus thou dost receive thy lord,
And welcome back thy husband long desired?865
Nay, put away the sword from thy right hand,
And give me heart again. Reveal to me
The cause that forces thee to flee from life.
Phaedra: Alas, great Theseus, by thy kingly power,
And by thy children's souls, by thy return,870
And by my ashes, suffer me to die.
Theseus: What cause compels thy death?
Phaedra: The fruit of death
Would perish if I let its cause be known.
Theseus: None else shall hear it save myself alone.
Phaedra: A chaste wife fears her husband most of all. ”

“ He must strengthen his power by union with some princely house—he will marry Megara! Should she refuse, he will give to utter ruin all the house of Hercules.
Meeting her at the moment, he attempts with specious arguments to persuade her to his plan. But Megara repulses his monstrous proposition with indignant scorn. Lycus attempts to defend his slaughter of her father and brother as done through the exigency of war, and pleads with her to put away her wrath; but all in vain, and in the end he bids his attendants heap high a funeral pyre on which to burn the woman and all her brood. ”

“ Of Phoebus' self to king Aeëtes as a proof
Of fatherhood; a gleaming circlet, too, all wrought
With threads of gold, the yellow gold bespangled o'er
With gems, a fitting crown to deck a princess' head.
These treasures let Medea's children bear as gifts575
To Jason's bride. But first infuse them with the power
Of magic, and invoke the aid of Hecate;
The woe-producing sacrifices then prepare,
And let the sacred flames through all our courts resound.
Chorus: No force of flame or raging gale,
Or whizzing bolt so fearful is,580
As when a wife, by her lord betrayed,
Burns hot with hate. ”

“ My godhead too, if first I seize and slay530
With sword relentless all who bear me hate,
And on a worthy offspring found my house.
Seneca: But she will fill thy house with noble sons,
That heaven-born glory of the Claudian stock,
Who by the will of fate was wed to thee,
As Juno to her brother Jove was given.535
Nero: A child of hers would stain my noble line,
For she herself was of a harlot born;
And more—her heart was never linked to me.
Seneca: In tender years is faith not manifest,
When love, by shame o'ercome, conceals its fires. ”

“ Deianira: What magic herbs does distant Pontus yield,465
Or Pindus 'neath the rocks of Thessaly,
Where I may find a charm to bend his will?
Though Luna leave the stars and fall to earth,
Obedient to thy magic; though the crops
In winter ripen; though the hurtling bolt
Stand still at thy command; though all the laws470
Of nature be reversed, and stars shine out
Upon the noonday skies—he would not yield.
Nurse: But Love has conquered e'en the heavenly gods.
Deianira: Perhaps by one alone he will himself
Be conquered, and give spoils of war to him,
And so become Alcides' latest task. ”

“ Thee, sprung from regal stock to be our guide,320
In fear of civil strife our Thebes invokes,
And prays that thou wouldst save thy father's house
From the flaming torch of war. No mere threats, these;
For ever nearer does destruction come.
One brother claims his share of royal power,
His turn to rule according to the bond,
And now is rousing all the tribes of Greece325
To bloody war. Against the walls of Thebes
Seven camps have set them down. Haste to our aid,
And war and crime prohibit equally.
Oedipus: Do I seem one to stay the hand of crime,
And teach it to refrain from kindred blood? ”

“ Suppose thou canst escape the world of men;
Still must thou face the thunderbolts of Jove,
The father of Alcides. Even now
His threat'ning torches gleam athwart the sky,325
And all the heavens tremble with the shock.
Nay, death itself, wherein thou hop'st to find
A place of safe retreat—fear that as well;
For there Alcides' uncle reigns supreme.
Turn where thou wilt, O wretched woman; there
Shalt thou behold thy husband's kindred gods.330
Deianira: A fearful crime it is, I do confess;
But Oh, my passion bids me do it still.
Nurse: Thou'lt die.
Deianira: But as the wife of Hercules
I'll die ”

“ I may anticipate my falling throne,
Nor be myself the last of all to die,
The sole surviving remnant of my realm.
O gods of heaven, too hard! O heavy fate! 75
Is death to be denied to me alone,
So easy for all else? Come, fly the land
Thy baleful touch has tainted. Leave thou here
The grief, the death, the pestilential air,
Which with thyself thou bring'st. Go speed thy flight
To any land, e'en to thy parents' realm. 80
Jocasta [who has entered in time to hear her husband's last words] : What boots it, husband, to augment thy woes
With lamentations? ”

“ Ye heard, indeed, my prayers, O gods of heaven,
And Hercules is safe returned—for her!295
O grief, that no revenge can satisfy,
Seek out some dreadful means of punishment,
By man unthought of and unspeakable.
Teach Juno's self how slight her hatred is.
She knows not how to rage. O Hercules,
For me didst thou thy mighty battles wage;
For me did Acheloüs dye his waves300
With his own blood in mortal strife with thee,
When now a writhing serpent he became,
Now to a threatening bull he turned himself,
And thou a thousand beasts didst overcome
In one sole enemy. ”

“ Phaedra: Then I'll no rival fear.
Nurse: Thy husband comes.
Phaedra: With him Pirithoüs!
Nurse: Thy sire!245
Phaedra: To Ariadne he was kind.
Nurse: O child, by these white locks of age, I pray,
This care-filled heart, these breasts that suckled thee,
Put off this rage; to thine own rescue come.
The greater part of life is will to live.
Phaedra: Shame has not wholly fled my noble soul.250
I yield: let love, which will not be controlled,
Be conquered. Nor shalt thou, fair fame, be stained.
This way alone is left, sole hope of woe:
Theseus I'll follow, and by death shun sin. ”

“ What dost thou, sluggish, wait
Till Phrygian rivals wrest thy power away?
Or do thy virgin daughters stay thy hand,195
Or yet Orestes, image of his sire?
Nay, 'tis for these thy children thou must act,
Lest greater ills befall them; for, behold,
A mad stepmother soon shall call them hers.
Through thine own heart, if so thou must, prepare
To drive the sword, and so slay two in one.200
Let thy blood flow with his; in slaying, die.
For death is sweet if with a foeman shared.
Nurse: My queen, restrain thyself, check thy wild wrath,
And think how great thy task. ”

“ Arise, O wretched queen, stand firm in soul,
And gird thy fainting spirit up.
[Hecuba falls fainting.]
Behold,
By what a slender thread her feeble life
Is held to earth. How slight the barrier now
That doth remove our Hecuba from joy.
But no, she breathes, alas! she lives again,
For from the wretched, death is first to flee.
Hecuba [reviving] : Still dost thou live, Achilles, for our bane?955
Dost still prolong the bitter strife? O Paris,
Thine arrow should have dealt a deadlier wound.
For see, the very ashes and the tomb
Of that insatiate chieftain still do thirst
For Trojan blood. ”

“ First, Juno's inveterate hate, which attacked him in his very cradle, pursues him still, relentlessly; but, most and worst of all, he has incurred such odium because of the murder of his wife and children, that he will be henceforth an outcast on the earth. No land will give him refuge now. Why should he live? Let him die; and let Juno's cup of happiness be full.
Theseus reminds him that no man escapes unscathed by fate. Nay, even the gods themselves have done unlawful things, and yet live on and do not feel the obloquy their deeds should cause. ”

“ The ocean-fearing bears revolve, and tumbling streams
Flow downward to the sea; my grief shall never cease405
To seek revenge, and shall forever grow. What rage
Of savage beast can equal mine? What Scylla famed? 95
What sea-engulfing pool? What burning Aetna placed
On impious Titan's heaving breast? No torrent stream,410
Nor storm-tossed sea, nor breath of flame fanned by the gale,
Can check or equal my wild storm of rage. My will
Is set on limitless revenge!
Will Jason say415
He feared the power of Creon and Acastus' threats?
True love is proof against the fear of man. ”

“ Let fly thy dart (so by a woman's hand
I may be slain) , thine anger soothed at last,
Thy thirst for vengeance sated. Why dost thou
Still nurse thy wrath? Why further seek revenge?1320
Behold Alcides suppliant to thee,
Which no wild beast, no land has ever seen.
But now, O Juno, when I need thy wrath,
Is now thine anger cooled, thy hate forgot?
Thou giv'st me life when 'tis for death I pray.
O lands, and countless cities of the earth,1325
Is there no one among you all to bring
A blazing torch for mighty Hercules?
Will no one give me arms? Why take away
My weapons from my hands? ”

“ The Greeks and Trojans supplicate the skies.
Now Pyrrhus envies great Achilles' fate;
Ulysses, Ajax'; Menelaüs, Hector's;
And Priam seems to Agamemnon blest:
Yea all who perished on the plains of Troy,
Whose lot it was to die by human hand,
Are counted blest of heaven, secure in fame,515
For they rest safely in the land they won.
"Shall winds and waves engulf in common fate
The faint of heart who nothing noble dare,
And those brave souls who quit themselves like men?
Must we for naught resign ourselves to death? ”

“ Atreus: Then I refuse my share of power as well.
Thyestes: Nay then, I yield. The name of king I'll wear,
But laws and arms—and I, are thine to sway.
Atreus [placing the crown on his brother's head] : I'll place this crown upon thy reverend head,
And pay the destined victims to the gods.545
Chorus: The sight is past belief. Behold,
This Atreus, fierce and bold of soul,
By every cruel passion swayed,
When first he saw his brother's face
Was held in dumb amaze.
No force is greater than the power
Of Nature's ties of love. ”

“ From sin; for sometimes faith itself is sin.
Deianira: Lest someone hear my secret, look about;
In all directions turn thy watchful gaze.
Nurse: Behold, the place is free from curious eyes.
Deianira: Deep hidden, far within this royal pile,485
There is a cave that guards my secret well.
Neither the rising sun can reach the spot
With its fresh beams; nor can its latest rays,
When Titan leads the weary day to rest,
And plunges 'neath the ruddy ocean's waves.
There lies a charm that can restore to me490
The love of Hercules. I'll tell thee all. ”