Athena: Which wouldst thou, to seem righteous, or to be?
Leader: What meanst thou there? Speak out thy subtlety.
Athena: Let no bare oath the deeper right subdue.
Leader: Try thou the cause, then, and give judgement true.
Athena: Ye trust me this whole issue to decide?
Leader: Who would not trust thee? True thou art and tried.
Athena: Turning to Orestes.
Strange man, and what in turn hast thou to advance? Thy land and lineage, and thy long mischance Show first, then make thine answer to their laws. If truly in the justice of thy cause Trusting, thou clingest here in need so dire To mine own shape, hard by my deathless fire, In fearful prayer, as lost Ixion prayed, Make to all these thine answer unafraid.
Orestes: Most high Athena, let me from the last Of these thy questionings one fear outcast. Pollution is not in me, nor with hand Blood-reeking cleave I to thine altar-strand; In sign whereof, behold, I have cast away That silence which the man of blood alway Observeth, till some hand, that hath the power To cleanse the sins of man, new blood shall shower Of swine upon him, drowning the old stain.
I have been cleansed again and yet again In others’ dwellings, both by blood that fell And running rivers that have washed me well. Be that care then forgot. My name and birth Are quickly told. I am sprung of Argive earth; My father’s name was known upon thy lips, Agamemnon, marshal of a thousand ships, With whom thou madest Troy, that city of pride, No more a city. He returning died,
Not kingly. ’Twas my mother black of heart Met him and murdered, snaring him with art Of spangled webs. … Alas, that robe of wrath, That cried to heaven the blood-stain of the bath! Then came long exile; then, returning, I Struck dead my mother. Nought will I deny; So, for my sire belovèd, death met death.
And Loxias in these doings meriteth His portion, who foretold strange agonies To spur me if I left unsmitten these That slew him. … Take me thou, and judge if ill I wrought or righteously. I will be still And praise thy judgement, whatsoe’er betide.
Athena: This is a mystery graver to decide Than mortal dreameth. Nor for me ’twere good To sift the passionate punishments of blood. Since thou hast cast thee on my altar stair Perfect by suffering, from thy stains that were Made clean and harmless, suppliant at my knee, I, in my City’s name, must pity thee And chide not. Yet these too, I may not slight: They have their portion in the Orb of Right
Eternal. If they are baffled of their will, The wrath of undone Justice shall distil Through all the air a poison; yea, a pall Intolerable about the land shall fall And groaning sickness. Doubtful thus it lies: To cast them out or keep them in mine eyes Were equal peril, and I must ponder sore. Yet, seeing fate lays this matter at my door, Myself not judging, I will judges find
In mine own City, who will make no blind Oath-challenge to pursuer and pursued, But follow this new rule, by me indued As law for ever. Proofs and witnesses Call ye on either side, and set to these Your oaths. Such oath helps Justice in her need.
I will go choose the noblest of the breed Of Athens, and here bring them to decide This bloody judgement even as truth is tried, And then, their oath accomplished, to depart, Right done, and no transgression in their heart. Exit Athena. The Shrine is closed, Orestes remaining inside at the foot of the Image.
Other Furies: —This day there is a new Order born. If this long coil of judging and of strife Shall uplift the mother-murderer to life, Shall the World not mark it, and in scorn Go forth to do evil with a smile? Yea, for parents hereafter there is guile That waiteth, and great anguish; by a knife In a child’s hand their bosom shall be torn.
—No wrath shall be stirred by any deed, No doom from the Dark Watchers any more. Lo, to all death I cast wide the door! And men, while they whisper of the need Of their neighbour, shall pray tremblingly within For some rest and diminishing of sin. They will praise the old medicine that of yore Brought comfort, and marvel as they bleed.
—Vainly will they make their moan? Vainly cry in sore despite, “Help, ye Watchers on your throne, Help, O Right!” Many a father so shall cry, Many a mother, new in pain; Their vain sobbing floateth by: “The great House is fallen again! Law shall die!”
—Times there be when Fear is good, And the Watcher in the breast Needs must reign in masterhood. Aye, ’tis best Through much straitening to be wise. Who that hath no fear at all In the sunlight of his eyes, Man or City, but shall fall From Right somewise?
—The life that walketh without rule, The life that is a tyrant’s fool, Thou shalt not praise. O’er all man’s striving variously God looketh, but, where’er it be, Gives to the Mean his victory. And therefore know I and confess, The doomèd child of Godlessness Is Pride of Man, and Pride’s excess; Only from health of heart shall spring What men desire, what poets sing, Stormless days.
—Whate’er befall, the Throne of Right Fear thou, and let no lucre bright Seen suddenly, To spurn that Altar make thee blind; For chastisement is hid behind, And the End waiteth, and shall bind. Wherefore I charge thee, through all stress Thy mother and thy father bless: Herein, O Man, lies holiness. And next, of all within thy fold, The stranger and the friendless hold In sanctity.
—He that is righteous uncompelled and free His life’s way taketh Not without happiness; and utterly Cast to destruction shall he never be. But he who laugheth and is bold in sin, From every port great gain he gathers in, Rejoicing; but methinks shall cast away All, with much haste and trembling, on the day When sails are stript by the edge of wind and sea And yard-arm breaketh.
He yearns, he strives, amid the whirling sea, But none shall hear; And loud his Daemon laughs, saying “This is he Who vaunted him these things should never be!” Who now is weeping, weak in the endless foam, And sees the foreland where beyond is home, But shall not pass it: on the rocks of Right Wrecked is his life’s long glory; and the night Falls, and there lives from all his agony No word nor tear.
The scene is now set with seats for the Council of the Areopagus. Enter Athena, the Judges, a Herald, a crowd of Citizens, the Furies, Orestes.