The Bacchae of Euripides

by Euripides

Where then shall I stand, where tread The dance and toss this bowed and hoary head? O friend, in thee is wisdom; guide my grey And eld-worn steps, eld-worn Teiresias.—Nay; I am not weak.

Good words, my son, come easily, when he That speaks is wise, and speaks but for the right. Else come they never! Swift are thine, and bright As though with thought, yet have no thought at all.

Pain is dead and hate forgiven!

Streaming beneath the waves To the roots of the seaward caves.

Wise words being brought To blinded eyes will seem as things of nought.

Child of a savage shore; For the chains of my prison are broken, and the dread where I cowered of yore!

'Twixt earth and sky a pillar of high flame. And silence took the air, and no leaf stirred In all the forest dell. Thou hadst not heard In that vast silence any wild thing's cry. And up they sprang; but with bewildered eye, Agaze and listening, scarce yet hearing true. Then came the Voice again. And when they knew

With groans that faded into sobbing breath, Dim shrieks, and joy, and triumph-cries of death. And here was borne a severed arm, and there A hunter's booted foot; white bones lay bare

Alas, if ever ye can know again The truth of what ye did, what pain of pain That truth shall bring! Or were it best to wait Darkened for evermore, and deem your state Not misery, though ye know no happiness?