[Re-enter Apollo from the inner shrine.
APOLLO
Out! I command you. Out from this my home—
Haste, tarry not! Out from the mystic shrine,
Lest thy lot be to take into thy breast
The winged bright dart that from my golden string
Speeds hissing as a snake,—lest, pierced and thrilled
With agony, thou shouldst spew forth again
Black frothy heart’s-blood, drawn from mortal men,
Belching the gory clots sucked forth from wounds.
These be no halls where such as you can prowl—
Go where men lay on men the doom of blood,
Heads lopped from necks, eyes from their spheres plucked out,
Hacked flesh, the flower of youthful seed crushed out,
Feet hewn away, and hands, and death beneath
The smiting stone, low moans and piteous
Of men impaled—Hark, hear ye for what feast
Ye hanker ever, and the loathing gods
Do spit upon your craving? Lo, your shape
Is all too fitted to your greed; the cave
Where lurks some lion, lapping gore, were home
More meet for you. Avaunt from sacred shrines,
Nor bring pollution by your touch on all
That nears you. Hence! and roam unshepherded—
No god there is to tend such herd as you.
CHORUS
O king Apollo, in our turn hear us.
Thou hast’not only part in these ill things,
But art chief cause and doer of the same.
APOLLO
How? stretch thy speech to tell this, and have done.
CHORUS
Thine oracle bade this man slay his mother.
APOLLO
I bade him quit his sire’s death,—wherefore not?
CHORUS
Then didst thou aid and guard red-handed crime.
APOLLO
Yea, and I bade him to this temple flee.
CHORUS
And yet forsooth dost chide us following him!
APOLLO
Ay—not for you it is, to near this fane.