_OEdip._ Cruel Adrastus! wilt thou, Haemon, too? Are these the obligations of my friends? O worse than worst of my most barbarous foes! Dear, dear Adrastus, look with half an eye On my unheard of woes, and judge thyself, If it be fit that such a wretch should live! O, by these melting eyes, unused to weep, With all the low submissions of a slave, I do conjure thee, give my horrors way! Talk not of life, for that will make me rave: As well thou may'st advise a tortured wretch, All mangled o'er from head to foot with wounds, And his bones broke, to wait a better day. _Adr._ My lord, you ask me things impossible; And I with justice should be thought your foe, To leave you in this tempest of your soul. _Tir._ Though banished Thebes, in Corinth you may reign; The infernal powers themselves exact no more: Calm then your rage, and once more seek the gods. _OEdip._ I'll have no more to do with gods, nor men; Hence, from my arms, avaunt. Enjoy thy mother! What, violate, with bestial appetite, The sacred veils that wrapt thee yet unborn! This is not to be borne! Hence; off, I say! For they, who let my vengeance, make themselves Accomplices in my most horrid guilt. _Adr._ Let it be so; we'll fence heav'n's fury from you, And suffer all together. This, perhaps, When ruin comes, may help to break your fall. _OEdip._ O that, as oft I have at Athens seen The stage arise, and the big clouds descend; So now, in very deed I might behold The pond'rous earth, and all yon marble roof Meet, like the hand of Jove, and crush mankind! For all the elements, and all the powers Celestial, nay, terrestrial, and infernal, Conspire the wreck of out-cast OEdipus! Fall darkness then, and everlasting night Shadow the globe; may the sun never dawn; The silver moon be blotted from her orb; And for an universal rout of nature Through all the inmost chambers of the sky, May there not be a glimpse, one starry spark, But gods meet gods, and jostle in the dark; That jars may rise, and wrath divine be hurled, Which may to atoms shake the solid world! [_Exeunt._ ACT V.--SCENE I. _Enter_ CREON, ALCANDER, _and_ PYRACMON. _Creon._ Thebes is at length my own; and all my wishes, Which sure were great as royalty e'er formed, Fortune and my auspicious stars have crowned. O diadem, thou centre of ambition, Where all its different lines are reconciled, As if thou wert the burning glass of glory! _Pyr._ Might I be counsellor, I would intreat you To cool a little, sir; find out Eurydice; And, with the resolution of a man Marked out for greatness, give the fatal choice Of death or marriage. _Alc._ Survey cursed OEdipus, As one who, though unfortunate, beloved, Thought innocent, and therefore much lamented By all the Thebans: you must mark him dead, Since nothing but his death, not banishment, Can give assurance to your doubtful reign.