Thirty years later, Œdipus, ignorant of his birth, and being directed by the oracle to shun his native country, fled from Corinth; and it happened at the same time that his father (Laius) was on his way to consult the oracle at Delphi, for the purpose of ascertaining whether the child that had been exposed had perished or not. As father and son, strangers to each other, met in a narrow path in the mountains, a dispute arose for the right of way, and in the contest that ensued the father was slain.
Immediately after this event the goddess Juno, always hostile to Thebes, sent a monster, called the sphinx, to propound a riddle to the Thebans, and to ravage their territory until some one should solve the riddle—the purport of which was, "What animal is that which goes on four feet in the morning, on two at noon, and on three at evening?" Œdipus, the supposed son of Polybus, of Corinth, coming to Thebes, solved the riddle, by answering the sphinx that it was man, who, when an infant, creeps on all fours, in manhood goes on two feet, and when old uses a staff. The sphinx then threw herself down to the earth and perished; whereupon the Thebans, in their joy, chose Œdipus as king, and he married the widowed queen Jocasta, by whom he had two sons and two daughters. Although everything prospered with him—as he loved the Theban people, and was beloved by them in turn for his many virtues—soon the wrath of the gods fell upon the city, which was visited by a sore pestilence. Creon, brother of the queen, is now sent to consult the oracle for the cause of the evil; and it is at the point of his return that the drama opens. He brings back the response
"That guilt of blood is blasting all the state;"
that this guilt is connected with the death of Laius, and that
"Now the god clearly bids us, he being dead,
To take revenge on those who shed his blood,"
Œdipus engages earnestly in the business of unraveling the mystery connected with the death of Laius, the cause of all the Theban woes. Ignorant that he himself bears the load of guilt, he charges the Thebans to be vigilant and unremitting in their efforts,—
"And for the man who did the guilty deed,
Whether alone he lurks, or leagued with more,
I pray that he may waste his life away,
For vile deeds vilely dying; and for me,
If in my house, I knowing it, he dwells,
May every curse I spake on my head fall."
A blind and aged priest and prophet, Tire'sias, is brought before Œdipus, and, being implored to lend the aid of prophecy to "save the city from the curse" that had fallen on it, he at first refuses to exert his prophetic power.
Tiresias. Ah! Reason fails you an, but ne'er will I
Say what thou bidd'st, lest I thy troubles show.
I will not pain myself nor thee. Why, then,
All vainly question? Thou shalt never know.
But, urged and threatened by the king, he at length exclaims: