Euripides, Hippolytus 848–890: Fourth episode: Theseus reads Phaedra's letter and prays for his son's death

Gone and left us hast thou, fondest wife and noblest of all women ’neath the sun’s bright eye or night’s star-lit radiance.

Poor house, what sorrows are thy portion now! My eyes are wet with streams of tears to see thy fate; but the sequel to this tragedy has long with terror filled me.

Ha! what means this letter? clasped in her dear hand it hath some strange tale to tell. Hath she, poor lady, as a last request, written her bidding as to my marriage and her children? Take heart, poor ghost; no wife henceforth shall wed thy Theseus or invade his house. Ah! how yon seal of my dead wife stamped with her golden ring affects my sight! Come, I will unfold the sealed packet and read her letter’s message to me.

Woe unto us! Here is yet another evil in the train by heaven sent. Looking to what has happened, I should count my lot in life no longer worth one’s while to gain. My master’s house, alas! is ruined, brought to naught, I say. Spare it, O Heaven, if it may be. Hearken to my prayer, for I see, as with prophetic eye, an omen boding mischief.

Theseus O horror! woe on woe! and still they come, too deep for words, too heavy to bear. Ah me!

Chorus What is it? speak, if I may share in it.

Theseus This letter loudly tells a hideous tale! where can I escape my load of woe? For I am ruined and undone, so awful are the words I find here written clear as if she cried them to me; woe is me!

Chorus Alas! thy words declare themselves the harbingers of woe.

Theseus I can no longer keep the cursed tale within the portal of my lips, cruel though its utterance be. Ah me! Hippolytus hath dared by brutal force to violate my honour, recking naught of Zeus, whose awful eye is over all. O father Poseidon, once didst thou promise to fulfil three prayers of mine ; answer one of these and slay my son, let him not escape this single day, if the prayers thou gavest me were indeed with issue fraught.