Cre. [To Hæm.] How mean it shews, to fawn upon the victor!
Hæm. Had you beheld him fight, you had said otherwise.
Come, 'tis brave bearing in him, not to envy
Superior virtue.
Œdip. This indeed is conquest,
To gain a friend like you: Why were we foes?
Adr. 'Cause we were kings, and each disdained an equal.
I fought to have it in my power to do
What thou hast done, and so to use my conquest.
To shew thee, honour was my only motive,
Know this, that were my army at thy gates,
And Thebes thus waste, I would not take the gift,
Which, like a toy dropt from the hands of fortune,
Lay for the next chance-comer.
145 Œdip. [Embracing.] No more captive,
But brother of the war. 'Tis much more pleasant,
And safer, trust me, thus to meet thy love,
Than when hard gauntlets clenched our warlike hands,
And kept them from soft use.
Adr. My conqueror!
Œdip. My friend! that other name keeps enmity alive.
But longer to detain thee were a crime;
To love, and to Eurydice, go free.
Such welcome, as a ruined town can give,
Expect from me; the rest let her supply.
Adr. I go without a blush, though conquered twice,
By you, and by my princess.[Exit Adrastus.
Cre. [Aside.] Then I am conquered thrice; by Œdipus,
And her, and even by him, the slave of both.
Gods, I'm beholden to you, for making me your image;
Would I could make you mine![Exit Creon.
Enter the People with branches in their hands, holding them up, and kneeling: Two Priests before them.