Blind as you are in eyes, and ears, and mind!

TIRESIAS

Fool, you reproach me as not one of these

Shall not reproach you, soon!

OEDIPUS

You cannot hurt me,

Nor any other who beholds the light,

Your life being all one night.

TIRESIAS

Nor is it fated

You by my hand should fall; Apollo is

Sufficient; he will bring it all to pass.

OEDIPUS

Are these inventions Creon’s work, or yours?

TIRESIAS

Your bane is no-ways Creon, but your own self.

OEDIPUS

O riches, and dominion, and the craft

That excels craft, and makes life enviable,

How vast the grudge that is nursed up for you,

When for this sovereignty, which the state

Committed to my hands, unsought-for, free,

Creon, the trusty, the familiar friend,

With secret mines covets to oust me from it,

And has suborned a sorcerer like this,

An engine-botching crafty cogging knave,

Who has no eyes to see with, but for gain,

And was born blind in the art! Why, tell me now,

How stand your claims to prescience? How came it,

When the oracular monster was alive,

You said no word to set this people free?

And yet it was not for the first that came

To solve her riddle; sooth was needed then,

Which you could not afford; neither from birds,

Nor any inspiration; till I came,

The unlettered Oedipus, and ended her,

By sleight of wit, untaught of augury—

I whom you now seek to cast out, in hope

To stand upon the steps of Creon’s throne!

You and the framer of this plot methinks

Shall rue your purge for guilt! Dotard you seem,

Else by experience you had come to know

What thoughts these are you think!

1 SENATOR

As we conceive,

His words appear (and, Oedipus, your own,)

To have been said in anger; now not such

Our need, but rather to consider this—

How best to interpret the Gods oracle.

TIRESIAS

King as you are, we must be peers at least

In argument; I am your equal, there;

For I am Loxias’* servant, and not yours;

So never need be writ of Creon’s train.

And since you have reproached me with my blindness,

I say—you have your sight, and do not see

What evils are about you, nor with whom,

Nor in what home you are dwelling. Do you know

From whom you are? Yea, you are ignorant

That to your own you are an enemy,

Whether on earth, alive, or under it.

Soon from this land shall drive you, stalking grim,

Your mother’s and your father’s two-edged curse,

With eyes then dark, though they look proudly now.

What place on earth shall not be harbour, then,

For your lamenting? What Cithaeron-peak*

Shall not be resonant soon, when you discern

What hymen-song was that, which wafted you

On a fair voyage, to foul anchorage

Under yon roof? and multitudes besides

Of ills you know not of shall level you

Down to your self—down to your children! Go,

Trample on Creon, and on this mouth of mine;