Page:Tragedies of Seneca (1907) Miller.djvu/179

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Too prompt to work a cruel stepdame's will.
Theseus: Who ever called an act of madness crime?
Hercules: Unbridled madness often ends in crime.
Amphitr.: Now is there need of Hercules to bear
This greatest weight of woe.
Hercules: ⁠Not yet is shame 1240
So utterly extinguished in my heart,
That I can bear to see all people flee
My impious presence. Arms, my Theseus, arms!
I pray you give them quickly back to me.
If I am sane, trust weapons to my hands;
If madness still remains, O father, fly;
For I shall quickly find the road to death. 1245
Amphitr.: By holy ties of birth, and by the name
That makes us one, be it of father true,
Or foster-father; by these hoary locks
Which pious souls revere: I pray thee spare
My lonely age and my enfeebled years.
Spare thou thyself to me, the only prop 1250
Of this my falling house, the only light
That's left to cheer my woeful heart. No fruit
Of all thy toils have I as yet enjoyed;
But ever either stormy seas I've feared,
Or monsters. Every savage king who raves
In all the world, for impious altars famed, 1255
Is cause of dread to me. Thy father longs
For joy of thee, to feel and see thee near.
Hercules: Why I should longer keep my soul in life,
And linger on the earth, there is no cause;
For I have lost my all: my balanced mind, 1260
My arms, my reputation, children, wife,
The glory of my strength—my madness too.
There is no remedy for tainted souls;
But death alone can cure me of my sin.
Amphitr.: And wilt thou slay thy father?
Hercules: ⁠Lest I do,
I'll kill myself.
Amphitryon: ⁠Before thy father's face?
Hercules: Such impious sights I've taught him to behold.