Chorus This day the deity, it seems, will mass on Jason, as he well deserves, a heavy load of evils. Woe is thee, daughter of Creon! We pity thy sad fate, gone as thou art to Hades’ halls as the price of thy marriage with Jason.
Medea My friends, I am resolved upon the deed; at once will I slay my children and then leave this land, without delaying long enough to hand them over to some more savage hand to butcher. Needs must they die in any case; and since they must, I will slay them—I, the mother that bare them. O heart of mine, steel thyself! Why do I hesitate to do the awful deed that must be done? Come, take the sword, thou wretched hand of mine! Take it, and advance to the post whence starts thy life of sorrow! Away with cowardice! Give not one thought to thy babes, how dear they are or how thou art their mother This one brief day forget thy children dear, and after that lament; for though thou wilt slay them yet they were thy darlings still, and am a lady of sorrows.
Chorus
O earth, O sun whose beam illumines all, look, look upon this lost woman, ere she stretch forth, her murderous hand upon her sons for blood; for lo! these are scions of thy own golden seed, and the blood of gods is in danger of being shed by man. O light, from Zeus proceeding, stay her, hold her hand, forth from the house chase this fell bloody fiend by demons led.
Chorus Vainly wasted were the throes thy children cost thee; vainly hast thou born, it seems, sweet babes, O thou who hast left behind thee that passage through the blue Symplegades, that strangers justly hate. Ah! hapless one, why doth fierce anger thy soul assail? Why in its place is fell murder growing up? For grievous unto mortal men are pollutions that come of kindred blood poured on the earth, woes to suit each crime hurled from heaven on the murderer’s house.
Sons Ah!
Chorus Didst hear, didst hear the children’s cry? O lady, born to sorrow, victim of an evil fate!
1st Son Ah, me; what can I do? Whither fly to escape my mother’s blows?
2nd Son I know not, sweet brother mine; we are undone.
Chorus Shall I enter the house? For the children’s sake I am resolved to ward off the murder.
1st Son Yea, by heaven I adjure you; help, your aid is needed.
2nd Son Even now the toils of the sword are closing round us.
Chorus O hapless mother, surely thou hast a heart of stone or steel to slay the offspring of thy womb by such a murderous doom.
Chorus
Of all the wives of yore I know but one who laid her hand upon her children dear, even Ino, whom the gods did madden in the day that the wife of Zeus drove her wandering from her home. But she, poor sufferer, flung herself into the sea because of the foul murder of her children, leaping o’er the wave-beat cliff, and in her death was she united to her children twain. Can there be any deed of horror left to follow this? Woe for the wooing of women fraught with disaster! What sorrows hast thou caused for men ere now!
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