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Home  »  The Bacchæ  »  Lines 400–799


Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD   Dramatis Personæ

Euripides (480 or 485–406 B.C.). The Bacchæ.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14.

Lines 400–799

Forth to the rock-seat where he dwells in wardO’er birds and wonders; rend the stone with crowAnd trident; make one wreck of high and low,And toss his hands to all the winds of air!Ha, have I found the way to sting thee, there?The rest, forth through the town! And seek amainThis girl-faced stranger, that hath wrought such baneTo all Thebes, preying on our maids and wives.Seek till ye find; and lead him here in gyves,Till he be judged and stoned and weep in bloodThe day he troubled Pentheus with his God![The guards set forth in two bodies; PENTHEUS goes into the Castle.
TEIRESIAS


Hard heart, how little dost thou know what seedThou sowest! Blind before, and now indeedMost mad!—Come, Cadmus, let us go our way,And pray for this our persecutor, prayFor this poor city, that the righteous GodMove not in anger.—Take thine ivy rodAnd help my steps, as I help thine. ’Twere ill,If two old men should fall by the roadway. Still,Come what come may, our service shall be doneTo Bacchios, the All-Father’s mystic son.O Pentheus, named of sorrow! Shall he claimFrom all thy house fulfilment of his name,Old Cadmus?—Nay, I speak not from mine art,But as I see—blind words and a blind heart![The two Old Men go off towards the Mountain.
CHORUS

Some Maidens


Thou Immaculate on high;Thou Recording Purity;Thou that stoopest, Golden Wing,Earthward, manward, pitying,Hearest thou this angry King?Hearest thou the rage and scorn’Gainst the Lord of Many Voices,Him of mortal mother born,Him in whom man’s heart rejoices,Girt with garlands and with glee,First in Heaven’s sovranty?For his kingdom, it is there,In the dancing and the prayer,In the music and the laughter,In the vanishing of care,And of all before and after;In the Gods’ high banquet, whenGleams the grape-flood, flashed to heaven;Yea, and in the feasts of menComes his crownèd slumber; thenPain is dead and hate forgiven!
Others


Loose thy lips from out the rein;Lift thy wisdom to disdain;Whatso law thou canst not see,Scorning; so the end shall beUttermost calamity!’Tis the life of quiet breath,’Tis the simple and the true,Storm nor earthquake shattereth,Nor shall aught the house undoWhere they dwell. For, far away,Hidden from the eyes of day,Watchers are there in the skies,That can see man’s life, and prizeDeeds well done by things of clay.But the world’s Wise are not wise,Claiming more than mortal may.Life is such a little thing;Lo, their present is departed,And the dreams to which they clingCome not. Mad imaginingTheirs, I ween, and empty-hearted!
Divers Maidens


Where is the Home for me?O Cyprus, set in the sea,Aphrodite’s home In the soft sea-foam,Would I could wend to thee;Where the wings of the Loves are furled,And faint the heart of the world.Aye, unto Paphos’ isle,Where the rainless meadows smileWith riches rolled From the hundred-foldMouths of the far-off Nile,Streaming beneath the wavesTo the roots of the seaward caves.But a better land is thereWhere Olympus cleaves the air,The high still dell Where the Muses dwell,Fairest of all things fair!O there is Grace, and there is the Heart’s Desire,And peace to adore thee, thou Spirit of Guiding Fire!——————A God of Heaven is he,And horn in majesty;Yet hath he mirth In the joy of the Earth,And he loveth constantlyHer who brings increase,The Feeder of Children, Peace.No grudge hath he of the great;No scorn of the mean estate;But to all that liveth His wine he giveth,Griefless, immaculate;Only on them that spurnJoy, may his anger burn.Love thou the Day and the Night;Be glad of the Dark and the Light;And avert thine eyes From the lore of the wise,That have honour in proud men’s sight.The simple nameless herd of HumanityHath deeds and faith that are truth enough for me![As the Chorus ceases, a party of the guards return, leading in the midst of them DIONYSUS, bound. The SOLDIER in command stands forth, as PENTHEUS, hearing the tramp of feet, comes out from the Castle.
SOLDIER


Our quest is finished, and thy prey, O King,Caught; for the chase was swift, and this wild thingMost tame; yet never flinched, nor thought to flee,But held both hands out unresistingly—No change, no blanching of the wine-red cheek.He waited while we came, and bade us wreakAll thy decree; yea, laughed, and made my bestEasy, till I for very shame confessedAnd said: “O stranger, not of mine own willI bind thee, but his bidding to fulfilWho sent me.”And those prisoned Maids withalWhom thou didst seize and bind within the wallOf thy great dungeon, they are fled, O King,Free in the woods, a-dance and gloryingTo Bromios. Of their own impulse fellTo earth, men say, fetter and manacle,And bars slid back untouched of mortal hand.Yea, full of many wonders to thy landIs this man come.… Howbeit, it lies with thee!
PENTHEUS


Ye are mad!—Unhand him. Howso swift he be,My toils are round him and he shall not fly.[The guards loose the arms of DIONYSUS; PENTHEUS studies him for a while in silence, then speaks jeeringly. DIONYSUS remains gentle and unafraid.Marry, a fair shape for a woman’s eye,Sir stranger! And thou seek’st no more, I ween!Long curls, withal! That shows thou ne’er hast beenA wrestler!—down both cheeks so softly tossedAnd winsome! And a white skin! It hath costThee pains, to please thy damsels with this whiteAnd red of cheeks that never face the light![DIONYSUS is silent.Speak, sirrah; tell me first thy name and race.
DIONYSUS


No glory is therein, nor yet disgrace.Thou hast heard of Tmolus, the bright hill of flowers?
PENTHEUS


Surely, the ridge that winds by Sardis towers.
DIONYSUS


Thence am I; Lydia was my fatherland.
PENTHEUS


And whence these revelations, that thy bandSpreadeth in Hellas?
DIONYSUS


Their intent and useDionysus oped to me, the Child of Zeus.
PENTHEUS (brutally)


Is there a Zeus there, that can still begetYoung Gods?
DIONYSUS


Nay, only He whose seal was setHere in thy Thebes on Semele.
PENTHEUS


What wayDescended he upon thee? In full dayOr vision of night?
DIONYSUS


Most clear he stood, and scannedMy soul, and gave his emblems to mine hand.
PENTHEUS


What like be they, these emblems?
DIONYSUS


That may noneReveal, nor know, save his Elect alone.
PENTHEUS


And what good bring they to the worshipper?
DIONYSUS


Good beyond price, but not for thee to hear.
PENTHEUS


Thou trickster? Thou wouldst prick me on the moreTo seek them out!
DIONYSUS


His mysteries abhorThe touch of sin-lovers.
PENTHEUS


And so thine eyesSaw this God plain; what guise had he?
DIONYSUS


What guiseIt liked him. ’Twas not I ordained his shape.
PENTHEUS


Aye, deftly turned again. An idle jape,And nothing answered!
DIONYSUS


Wise words being broughtTo blinded eyes will seem as things of nought.
PENTHEUS


And comest thou first to Thebes, to have thy GodEstablished?
DIONYSUS


Nay; all Barbary hath trodHis dance ere this.
PENTHEUS


A low blind folk, I ween,Beside our Hellenes!
DIONYSUS


Higher and more keenIn this thing, though their ways are not thy way.
PENTHEUS


How is thy worship held, by night or day?
DIONYSUS


Most oft by night; ’tis a majestic thing,The darkness.
PENTHEUS


Ha! with women worshipping?’Tis craft and rottenness!
DIONYSUS


By day no less,Whoso will seek may find unholiness.
PENTHEUS


Enough! Thy doom is fixed, for false pretenceCorrupting Thebes.
DIONYSUS


Not mine; but thine, for denseBlindness of heart, and for blaspheming God!
PENTHEUS


A ready knave it is, and brazen-browed,This mystery-priest!
DIONYSUS


Come, say what it shall be,My doom; what dire thing wilt thou do to me?
PENTHEUS


First, shear that delicate curl that dangles there.[He beckons to the soldiers, who approach DIONYSUS.
DIONYSUS


I have vowed it to my God; ’tis holy hair.[The soldiers cut off the tress.
PENTHEUS


Next, yield me up thy staff!
DIONYSUS


Raise thine own handTo take it. This is Dionysus’ wand.[PENTHEUS takes the staff.
PENTHEUS


Last, I will hold thee prisoned here.
DIONYSUS


My LordGod will unloose me, when I speak the word.
PENTHEUS


He may, if e’er again amid his bandsOf saints he hears thy voice!
DIONYSUS


Even now he standsClose here, and sees all that I suffer.
PENTHEUS


What?Where is he? For mine eyes discern him not.
DIONYSUS


Where I am! ’Tis thine own impurityThat veils him from thee.
PENTHEUS


The dog jeers at me!At me and Thebes! Bind him![The soldiers begin to bind him.
DIONYSUS


I charge ye, bindMe not! I having vision and ye blind!
PENTHEUS


And I, with better right, say hind the more![The soldiers obey.
DIONYSUS


Thou knowest not what end thou seekest, norWhat deed thou doest, nor what man thou art!
PENTHEUS (mocking)


Agàvê’s son, and on the father’s partEchîon’s, hight Pentheus!
DIONYSUS


So let it be,A name fore-written to calamity!
PENTHEUS


Away, and tie him where the steeds are tied;Aye, let him lie in the manger!—There abideAnd stare into the darkness!—And this routOf womankind that clusters thee about,Thy ministers of worship, are ray slaves!It may he I will sell them o’er the waves,Hither and thither; else they shall be setTo labour at my distaffs, and forgetTheir timbrel and their songs of dawning day!
DIONYSUS


I go; for that which may not be, I mayNot suffer! Yet for this thy sin, lo, HeWhom thou deniest cometh after theeFor recompense. Yea, in thy wrong to us,Thou hast cast Him into thy prison-house![DIONYSUS, without his wand, his hair shorn, and his arms tightly bound, is led off by the guards to his dungeon. PENTHEUS returns into the Palace.
CHORUS

Some Maidens


AcheIoüs’ roaming daughter,Holy Dircê, virgin water,Bathed he not of old in thee,The Babe of God, the Mystery?When from out the fire immortalTo himself his God did take him,To his own flesh, and bespake him:“Enter now life’s second portal,Motherless Mystery; lo, I breakMine own body for thy sake,Thou of the Twofold Door, and seal theeMine, O Bromios,”—thus he spake—“And to this thy land reveal thee.”
All


Still my prayer toward thee quivers,Dircê, still to thee I hie me;Why, O Blessèd among Rivers,Wilt thou fly me and deny me?By His own joy I vow,By the grape upon the bough,Thou shalt seek Him in the midnight, thou shalt loveHim, even now!
Other Maidens


Dark and of the dark impassionedIs this Pentheus’ blood; yea, fashionedOf the Dragon, and his birthFrom Echîon, child of Earth.He is no man, but a wonder;Did the Earth-Child not beget him,As a red Giant, to set himAgainst God, against the Thunder?He will hind me for his prize,Me, the Bride of Dionyse;And my priest, my friend, is takenEven now, and buried lies;In the dark he lies forsaken!
All


Lo, we race with death, we perish,Dionysus, here before thee!Dost thou mark us not, nor cherish,Who implore thee, and adore thee?Hither down Olympus’ side,Come, O Holy One defied,Be thy golden wand uplifted o’er the tyrant in his pride!
A Maiden


Oh, where art thou? In thine ownNysa, thou our help alone?O’er fierce beasts in orient landsDoth thy thronging thyrsus wave,By the high Corycian Cave,Or where stern Olympus stands;In the elm-woods and the oaken,There where Orpheus harped of old,And the trees awoke and knew him,And the wild things gathered to him,As he sang amid the brokenGlens his music manifold?Dionysus loveth thee;Blessed Land of Piêrie,He will come to thee with dancing,Come with joy and mystery;With the Maenads at his hestWinding, winding to the West;Cross the flood of swiftly glancingAxios in majesty;Cross the Lydias, the giverOf good gifts and waving green;Cross that Father-Stream of story,Through a land of steeds and gloryRolling, bravest, fairest RiverE’er of mortals seen!
A VOICE WITHIN


Io! Io!Awake, ye damsels; hear my cry,Calling my Chosen; hearken ye!
A MAIDEN


Who speaketh? Oh, what echoes thus?
ANOTHER


A Voice, a Voice, that calleth us!
THE VOICE


Be of good cheer! Lo, it is I,The Child of Zeus and Semelê.
A MAIDEN


O Master, Master, it is Thou!
ANOTHER


O Holy Voice, be with us now!
THE VOICE


Spirit of the Chained Earthquake,Hear my word; awake, awake![An Earthquake suddenly shakes the pillars of the Castle.
A MAIDEN


Ha! what is coming? Shall the hallOf Pentheus racked in ruin fall?
LEADER


Our God is in the house! Ye maids adore Him!
CHORUS


We adore Him all!
THE VOICE


Unveil the Lighning’s eye; arouseThe fire that sleeps, against this house![Fire leaps upon the Tomb of Semelê.
A MAIDEN


Ah, saw ye, marked ye there the flameFrom Semelê’s enhallowed sodAwakened? Yea, the Death that cameAblaze from heaven of old, the sameHot splendour of the shaft of God?
LEADER


Oh, cast ye, cast ye, to the earth! The LordCometh against this house! Oh, cast ye down,Ye trembling damsels; He, our own adored,God’s Child bath come, and all is overthrown![The Maidens cast themselves upon the ground, their eyes earthward. DIONYSUS, alone and unbound, enters from the Castle.
DIONYSUS


Ye Damsels of the Morning Hills, why lie ye thus dismayed?Ye marked him, then, our Master, and the mighty hand he laidOn tower and rock, shaking the house of Pentheus?—But arise,And cast the trembling from your flesh and lift untroubled eyes.
LEADER


O Light in Darkness, is it thou? O Priest, is this thy face?My heart leaps out to greet thee from the deep of loneliness.
DIONYSUS


Fell ye so quick despairing, when beneath the Gate I passed?Should the gates of Pentheus quell me, or his darkness make me fast?
LEADER


Oh, what was left if thou wert gone? What could I but despair?How hast thou ’scaped the man of sin? Who freed thee from the snare?
DIONYSUS


I had no pain nor peril; ’twas mine own hand set me free.
LEADER


Thine arms were gyvèd!
DIONYSUS


Nay, no gyve, no touch, was laid on me!’Twas there I mocked him, in his gyves, and gave him dreams for food.For when he laid me down, behold, before the stall there stoodA Bull of Offering. And this King, he bit his lips, and straightFell on and bound it, hoof and limb, with gasping wrath and sweatAnd I sat watching!—Then a Voice; and lo, our Lord was come,And the house shook, and a great flame stood o’er his mother’s tomb.And Pentheus hied this way and that, and called his thralls amainFor water, lest his roof-tree burn; and all toiled, all in vain.Then deemed a-sudden I was gone; and left his fire, and spedBack to the prison portals, and his lifted sword shone red.But there, methinks, the God had wrought—I speak but as I guess—Some dream-shape in mine image; for he smote at emptiness,Stabbed in the air, and strove in wrath, as though ’twere me he slew.Then ’mid his dreams God smote him yet again! He overthrewAll that high house. And there in wreck for ever more it lies,That the day of this my bondage may he sore in Pentheus’ eyes!And now his sword is fallen, and he lies outworn and wanWho dared to rise against his God in wrath, being but man.And I uprose and left him, and in all peace took my pathForce to my Chosen, recking light of Pentheus and his wrath.But soft, methinks a footstep sounds even now within the hall;’Tis he; how think ye he will stand, and what words speak withal?I will endure him gently, though lie come in fury hot.For still are the ways of Wisdom, and her temper trembleth not!
Enter PENTHEUS in fury


PENTHEUS


It is too much! This Eastern knave bath slippedHis prison, whom I held but now, hard grippedIn bondage.—Ha! ’Tis he!—What, sirrah, howShow’st thou before my portals?[He advances furiously upon him.
DIONYSUS


And set a quiet carriage to thy rage.
PENTHEUS


How comest thou here? How didst thou break thy cage?Speak!
DIONYSUS


Said I not, or didst thou mark not me,There was One living that should set me free?
PENTHEUS


Who? Ever wilder are these tales of thine.
DIONYSUS


He who first made for man the clustered vine.
PENTHEUS


I scorn him and his vines.
DIONYSUS


For Dionyse’Tis well; for in thy scorn his glory lies.
PENTHEUS (to his guard)


Go swift to all the towers, and bar withalEach gate!
DIONYSUS


What, cannot God o’erleap a wall?
PENTHEUS


Oh, wit thou hast, save where thou needest it!
DIONYSUS


Whereso it most imports, there is my wit!—Nay, peace! Abide till he who hasteth fromThe mountain side with news for thee, be come.We will not fly, but wait on thy command.[Enter suddenly and in haste a Messenger from the Mountain.
MESSENGER


Great Pentheus, Lord of all this Theban land,I come from high Kithaeron, where the froreSnow spangles gleam and cease not evermore.…
PENTHEUS


And what of import may thy coming bring?
MESSENGER

I have seen the Wild White Women there, O King,Whose fleet limbs darted arrow-like but nowFrom Thebes away, and come to tell thee howThey work strange deeds and passing marvel. YetI first would learn thy pleasure. Shall I setMy whole tale forth, or veil the stranger part?Yea, Lord, I fear the swiftness of thy heart,Thine edged wrath and more than royal soul.Thy tale shall nothing scathe thee.—Tell the whole.
PENTHEUS

It skills not to be wroth with honesty.Nay, if thy news of them be dark, ’tis heShall pay it, who bewitched and led them on.

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