Aeschylus, Eumenides 490–565: Second stasimon: the Furies on law, fear and justice

Here is the overturning of new laws, if the wrongful cause of this matricide is to triumph. Now his deed will accustom all men to recklessness; many sorrowful wounds, given in truth by children, wait for parents in the future time.

For the wrath of us, the Furies who keep watch on mortals, will not come stealthily upon such deeds—I will let loose death in every form. And as he anticipates his neighbor’s evils, one man will ask of another when hardship is to end or to decrease; and the poor wretch offers the vain consolation of uncertain remedies.

Do not let anyone who is struck by misfortune make an appeal and cry aloud this word, Justice! Thrones of the Furies! Perhaps some father, or mother, in new sorrow, may cry out these words piteously, now that the house of Justice is falling.

There is a time when fear is good and ought to remain seated as a guardian of the heart. It is profitable to learn wisdom under strain. But who, if he did not train his heart in fear, either city or mortal, would still revere justice in the same way?

Do not approve of a lawless life or one subject to a tyrant. The god grants power to moderation in every form, but he oversees other matters in different ways. I have a timely word of advice: arrogance is truly the child of impiety, but from health of soul comes happiness, dear to all, much prayed for.

And as for the whole matter, I say to you: respect the altar of Justice and do not, looking to profit, dishonor it by spurning with godless foot; for punishment will come upon you. The appointed fulfilment remains. Therefore, let a man rightly put first in honor the reverence owed to his parents, and have regard for attentions paid to guests welcomed in his house.

Whoever is just willingly and without compulsion will not lack happiness; he will never be utterly destroyed. But I say that the man who boldly transgresses, amassing a great heap unjustly—by force, in time, he will strike his sail, when trouble seizes him as the yardarm is splintered.

He calls on those who hear nothing and he struggles in the midst of the whirling waters. The god laughs at the hot-headed man, seeing him, who boasted that this would never happen, exhausted by distress without remedy and unable to surmount the cresting wave. He wrecks the happiness of his earlier life on the reef of Justice, and he perishes unwept, unseen.