Sophocles, Antigone 333–440: First stasimon: the ode on man; Antigone is brought in

Wonders are many, and none is more wonderful than man. This power spans the sea, even when it surges white before the gales of the south-wind, and makes a path under swells that threaten to engulf him. Earth, too, the eldest of the gods, the immortal, the unwearied, he wears away to his own ends, turning the soil with the offspring of horses as the plows weave to and fro year after year.

The light-hearted tribe of birds and the clans of wild beasts and the sea-brood of the deep he snares in the meshes of his twisted nets, and he leads them captive, very-skilled man. He masters by his arts the beast who dwells in the wilds and roams the hills. He tames the shaggy-maned horse, putting the yoke upon its neck, and tames the tireless mountain bull.

Speech and thought fast as the wind and the moods that give order to a city he has taught himself, and how to flee the arrows of the inhospitable frost under clear skies and the arrows of the storming rain. He has resource for everything. Lacking resource in nothing he strides towards what must come. From Death alone he shall procure no escape, but from baffling diseases he has devised flights.

Possessing resourceful skill, a subtlety beyond expectation he moves now to evil, now to good. When he honors the laws of the land and the justice of the gods to which he is bound by oath, his city prospers. But banned from his city is he who, thanks to his rashness, couples with disgrace. Never may he share my home, never think my thoughts, who does these things!

What marvel sent by the gods is this?—I am bewildered! I know her. How can I deny that this girl is Antigone? O unhappy child of your unhappy father, of Oedipus! What can this mean? What! Surely they are not bringing you captive for disobeying the King’s laws and being caught in lunacy?

Guard Here is she, the one who did the deed. We caught this one burying him. Where is Creon?

Chorus There, he is coming from the house again at our need.

Creon What is it? What has happened that makes my coming timely?

Guard My king, there is nothing that a man can rightly swear he will not do. For second thought belies one’s first intent. I could have vowed that I would not ever come here again, because of your threats by which I had just been storm-tossed. But since this joy that exceeds and oversteps my hopes can be compared in fulness to no other pleasure, I am back—though it is contrary to my sworn oath— bringing this girl who was caught giving burial honors to the dead. This time there was no casting of lots. No, this piece of luck has fallen to me, and me alone. And now, my king, as it pleases you, take her yourself, question her and convict her. But justice would see me released free and clear from this trouble.

Creon Your prisoner here—how and where did you take her?

Guard She was burying the man. You know all there is to tell.

Creon Are you clear and sure about what you are saying?

Guard I am. I saw her burying the corpse that you had forbidden to bury. Is that plain and sufficient?

Creon And how was she observed? How taken in the act?

It happened like this. When we had come to the place with those fierce threats of yours still in our ears, we swept away all the dust that covered the corpse and bared the damp body well. We then sat down on the brow of the hill to windward, fleeing the smell from him, lest it strike us. Each man was wide awake and kept his neighbor alert with torrents of threats, if any one should be careless of this task. So time passed, until the disk of the sun stood bright in mid-sky and the heat began to burn. And then suddenly a whirlwind lifted from the earth a storm of dust, a trouble in the sky, and it filled the plain, marring all the foliage of its woods. Soon the wide air was choked with it. We closed our eyes, and endured the plague from the gods. When, after a long while, this storm had passed, the girl was seen, and she wailed aloud with the sharp cry of a grieving bird, as when inside her empty nest she sees the bed stripped of its nestlings. So she, too, when she saw the corpse bare, broke into a cry of lamentation and cursed with harsh curses those who had done it. Immediately she took thirsty dust in her hands, and from a pitcher of beaten bronze held high she crowned the dead with thrice-poured libations. We rushed forward when we saw it, and at once closed upon our quarry, who was not at all dismayed. We then charged her with her past and present doings, but she made no denial of anything—at once to my joy and to my pain. For to have escaped from trouble one’s self gives the greatest joy, but it stings to lead friends to evil. Naturally, though, all such things are of less account to me than my own safety.