Lo, Haemon, thy last offspring, now is come,
Lamenting haply for the maiden’s doom,
Say, is he mourning o’er her young life lost,
Fiercely indignant for his bridal crossed?
Enter HAEMON.
CR. We shall know soon, better than seers could teach us.
Can it be so, my son, that thou art brought
By mad distemperature against thy sire,
On hearing of the irrevocable doom
Passed on thy promised bride? Or is thy love
Thy father’s, be his actions what they may?
HAEMON. I am thine, father, and will follow still
Thy good directions; nor would I prefer
The fairest bride to thy wise government.
CR. That, O my son! should be thy constant mind,
In all to bend thee to thy father’s will.
Therefore men pray to have around their hearths
Obedient offspring, to requite their foes
With harm, and honour whom their father loves;
But he whose issue proves unprofitable,
Begets what else but sorrow to himself
And store of laughter to his enemies?
[page 22][648-686] Make not, my son, a shipwreck of thy wit
For a woman. Thine own heart may teach thee this;—
There’s but cold comfort in a wicked wife
Yoked to the home inseparably. What wound
Can be more deadly than a harmful friend?
Then spurn her like an enemy, and send her
To wed some shadow in the world below!
For since of all the city I have found
Her only recusant, caught in the act,
I will not break my word before the State.
I will take her life. At this let her invoke
The god of kindred blood! For if at home
I foster rebels, how much more abroad?
Whoso is just in ruling his own house,
Lives rightly in the commonwealth no less:
But he that wantonly defies the law,
Or thinks to dictate to authority,
Shall have no praise from me. What power soe’er
The city hath ordained, must be obeyed
In little things and great things, right or wrong.
The man who so obeys, I have good hope
Will govern and be governed as he ought,
And in the storm of battle at my side
Will stand a faithful and a trusty comrade.
But what more fatal than the lapse of rule?
This ruins cities, this lays houses waste,
This joins with the assault of war to break
Full numbered armies into hopeless rout;
And in the unbroken host ’tis nought but rule
That keeps those many bodies from defeat,
I must be zealous to defend the law,
And not go down before a woman’s will.
Else, if I fall, ’twere best a man should strike me;
Lest one should say, ‘a woman worsted him.’
CH. Unless our sense is weakened by long time,
Thou speakest not unwisely.
HAEM. O my sire,
Sound wisdom is a God implanted seed,
Of all possessions highest in regard.
I cannot, and I would not learn to say
[page 23][687-723] That thou art wrong in this; though in another,
It may be such a word were not unmeet.
But as thy son, ’tis surely mine to scan
Men’s deeds, and words, and muttered thoughts toward thee.
Fear of thy frown restrains the citizen
In talk that would fall harshly on thine ear.
I under shadow may o’erhear, how all
Thy people mourn this maiden, and complain
That of all women least deservedly
She perishes for a most glorious deed.
‘Who, when her own true brother on the earth
Lay weltering after combat in his gore,
Left him not graveless, for the carrion few
And raw devouring field dogs to consume—
Hath she not merited a golden praise?’
Such the dark rumour spreading silently.
Now, in my valuing, with thy prosperous life,
My father, no possession can compare.
Where can be found a richer ornament
For children, than their father’s high renown?
Or where for fathers, than their children’s fame?
Nurse not one changeless humour in thy breast,
That nothing can be right but as thou sayest.
Whoe’er presumes that he alone hath sense,
Or peerless eloquence, or reach of soul,
Unwrap him, and you’ll find but emptiness.
’Tis no disgrace even to the wise to learn
And lend an ear to reason. You may see
The plant that yields where torrent waters flow
Saves every little twig, when the stout tree
Is torn away and dies. The mariner
Who will not ever slack the sheet that sways
The vessel, but still tightens, oversets,
And so, keel upward, ends his voyaging.
Relent, I pray thee, and give place to change.
If any judgement hath informed my youth,
I grant it noblest to be always wise,
But,—for omniscience is denied to man—
Tis good to hearken to admonishment.
[page 24][724-757] CH. My lord, ’twere wise, if thou wouldst learn of him
In reason; and thou, Haemon, from thy sire!
Truth lies between you.
CR. Shall our age, forsooth,
Be taught discretion by a peevish boy?
HAEM. Only in what is right. Respects of time
Must be outbalanced by the actual need.