Jocasta: My lords, ye look amazed to see your queen With wreaths and gifts of incense in her hands. I had a mind to visit the high shrines, For Oedipus is overwrought, alarmed With terrors manifold. He will not use His past experience, like a man of sense, To judge the present need, but lends an ear To any croaker if he augurs ill. Since then my counsels naught avail, I turn To thee, our present help in time of trouble, Apollo, Lord Lycean, and to thee My prayers and supplications here I bring. Lighten us, lord, and cleanse us from this curse! For now we all are cowed like mariners Who see their helmsman dumbstruck in the storm.
Enter Corinthian Messenger.
Messenger: My masters, tell me where the palace is Of Oedipus; or better, where’s the king.
Chorus: Here is the palace and he bides within; This is his queen the mother of his children.
Messenger: All happiness attend her and the house, Blessed is her husband and her marriage-bed.
Jocasta: My greetings to thee, stranger; thy fair words Deserve a like response. But tell me why Thou comest—what thy need or what thy news.
Messenger: Good for thy consort and the royal house.
Jocasta: What may it be? Whose messenger art thou?
Messenger: From Corinth I. The message wherewithal I stand entrusted thou shalt hear anon. ’Twill please thee surely, yet perchance offend.
Jocasta: Declare it and explain this double sense.
Messenger: The Isthmian commons have resolved to make Thy husband king—so ’twas reported there.
Jocasta: What! is not aged Polybus still king?
Messenger: No, verily; he’s dead and in his grave.
Jocasta: What! is he dead, the sire of Oedipus?
Messenger: If I speak falsely, may I die myself.
Jocasta: Quick, maiden, bear these tidings to my lord. Ye god-sent oracles, where stand ye now! This is the man whom Oedipus long shunned, In dread to prove his murderer; and now He dies in nature’s course, not by his hand.
Enter Oedipus.
Oedipus: My wife, my queen, Jocasta, why hast thou Summoned me from my palace?
Jocasta: Hear this man, And as thou hearest judge what has become Of all those awe-inspiring oracles.
Oedipus: Who is this man, and what his news for me?
Jocasta: He comes from Corinth and his message this: Thy father Polybus hath passed away.
Oedipus: What? let me have it, stranger, from thy mouth.
Messenger: If I must first make plain beyond a doubt My message, know that Polybus is dead.
Oedipus: By treachery, or by sickness visited?
Messenger: One touch will send an old man to his rest.