To see, to endure, to hear words kindly spoken, Should I have joy in such? Out, if ye love your breath, Cast me swift unto solitude, unbroken By word or touch. Am I not charged with death, Most charged and filled to the brim With curses? And what man saith God hath so hated him? LEADER. Thy bitter will, thy hard calamity, Would I had never known nor looked on thee! OEDIPUS. [_Antistrophe._ My curse, my curse upon him, That man whom pity held in the wilderness, Who saved the feet alive from the blood-fetter And loosed the barb thereof! [Sidenote: vv. 1351-1377] That babe--what grace was done him, Had he died shelterless, He had not laid on himself this grief to bear, And all who gave him love. LEADER. I, too, O Friend, I had been happier. OEDIPUS. Found not the way to his father's blood, nor shaken The world's scorn on his mother, The child and the groom withal; But now, of murderers born, of God forsaken, Mine own sons' brother; All this, and if aught can fall Upon man more perilous And elder in sin, lo, all Is the portion of Oedipus. LEADER. How shall I hold this counsel of thy mind True? Thou wert better dead than living blind. OEDIPUS. That this deed is not well and wisely wrought Thou shalt not show me; therefore school me not. Think, with what eyes hereafter in the place Of shadows could I see my father's face, Or my poor mother's? Both of whom this hand Hath wronged too deep for man to understand. Or children--born as mine were born, to see Their shapes should bring me joy? Great God! To me [Sidenote: vv. 1378-1403]