O tomb, my bridal bower, O rock-hewn cell, My home that art to be, whither I go To meet my kin, of whom Persephone In her dark mansion holds a multitude. Last of the train and most unfortunate, I now must die before my destined hour. And yet my hope is sure that by my sire, By thee, beloved mother, and by thee, Dearest of brothers, welcomed I shall be. This hand washed every corpse and decked it out For sepulture; this hand upon each grave Libations poured; and, Polynices, now In tending thy remains I meet this doom. Yet wisdom will approve my honouring thee: Had I a mother been and lost a child, Had I been wed and had my husband died, I would not thus have braved the public ire. What is my principle, perchance you ask? My husband lost, I might have wed again, I might in time have borne a second child; But, with both sire and mother in the grave, Hope of a second brother there is none. Upon this principle I honoured thee, Dearest of brothers; but to Creon seemed A sinner and the worst of criminals. And now he hales me to the place of death. From marriage and of bridal hymn cut off, Cut off from joys of love and motherhood, And reft of friends, poor maiden as I am, I must go down into a living grave. And yet what law divine have I transgressed? How could I look for succour to the gods? Whither for comfort go, when piety Is thus requited with the pains of sin? If this is righteous in the eye of heaven, I'll own the justice of my chastisement; But if the sin be on the other side, May they but bear that which they lay on me. * * * * * _THE CATASTROPHE._ Creon, having been brought to repentance by the denunciations of the prophet Tiresias, sets out to bury the corpse of Polynices, and release Antigone from the cave of death. The issue is recounted by a messenger to the Queen Eurydice. LINES 1155-1243. MESSENGER. Ye, that by Cadmus and Amphion's shrine Do dwell, no mortal's life before its end Will be by me pronounced blessed or unblessed. Fortune is ever casting down the high, Fortune is ever lifting up the low; And none can prophesy what change may come. Creon I deemed an enviable man: He from our enemy had saved our state, And, vested with a monarch's power supreme, Ruled happy in the promise of his heir. Now all is gone, for when a man has lost The things that make life sweet, he lives in truth No more, but is an animated corpse. Have in your house what store of wealth you will, Dwell in the state of sumptuous royalty, Where joy is absent, I account the rest Less than a shadow of a wreath of smoke. CHORUS. What evil has befallen our royal house? MESSENGER. Dead are some, others guilty of their death. CHORUS. Who is the murdered, who the murderer, say. MESSENGER. Haemon is dead, unnaturally slain. CHORUS. Slain by whose hand, his father's or his own? MESSENGER. His own, stung by his sire's cruel deed. CHORUS. O seer, thy prophesy has come too true. MESSENGER.