TIRESIAS.
I will be gone. Boy, lead me to my home.
OEDIPUS.
Yea, let him lead thee; thy intrusion here
Troubles us; thy departure were relief.
TIRESIAS.
I go, but first will my deliverance make
Maugre thy frown, which can do me no harm.
I tell thee that the man whom thou dost seek
With proclamations and with threat'nings dire,
The man who murdered Laius, is here;
In name a foreigner, a native born
In fact, as will to his small joy appear.
For he who now has sight will go forth blind,
He who is rich will go forth penniless,
Groping his way to dwell in a strange land;
Brother of his own offspring he has been,
As all the world shall know, husband of her
That brought him forth, with incest stained, and stained
With parricide. Get thee into thy house,
There think upon my words, and if I lie
Say I have lost the gift of prophecy.
* * * * *
DISCOVERY.
A messenger from Corinth announces to Oedipus the death of his reputed father, Polybus, king of Corinth, and incidentally reveals to him in part the history of his birth. Jocasta, the queen of Oedipus and his real mother, is on the scene when the messenger arrives; upon her the fatal secret dawns at once.