Sophocles Antigone 612

Creon

We will soon know better than seers could tell us.—My son, can it be that after hearing the final judgment concerning your betrothed, you have come in rage against your father? Or do I have your loyalty, act how I may?

Haemon

Father, I am yours, and you keep me upright with precepts good for me—precepts I shall follow. No marriage will be deemed by me more important than your good guidance.

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Creon

Yes, my son, this is the spirit you should maintain in your heart—to stand behind your father’s will in all things. It is for this that men pray: to sire and raise in their homes children who are obedient, that they may requite their father’s enemy with evil and honor his friend, just as their father does.

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But the man who begets unhelpful children—what would you say that he has sown except miseries for himself and abundant exultation for his enemies? Never, then, my son, banish your reason for pleasure on account of a woman,

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knowing that this embrace soon becomes cold and brittle—an evil woman to share your bed and home. For what wound could strike deeper than a false friend? No, spit her out as if she were an enemy, let her go find a husband in Hades.

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For since I caught her alone of all the city in open defiance, I will not make myself a liar to my city. I will kill her. So let her call on Zeus who protects kindred blood. If I am to foster my own kin to spurn order,

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surely I will do the same for outsiders. For whoever shows his excellence in the case of his own household will be found righteous in his city as well. But if anyone oversteps and does violence to the laws, or thinks to dictate to those in power,

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such a one will never win praise from me. No, whomever the city may appoint, that man must be obeyed in matters small and great and in matters just and unjust. And I would feel confident that such a man would be a fine ruler no less than a good and willing subject,

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and that beneath a hail of spears he would stand his ground where posted, a loyal and brave comrade in the battle line. But there is no evil worse than disobedience. This destroys cities; this overturns homes; this breaks

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the ranks of allied spears into headlong rout. But the lives of men who prosper upright, of these obedience has saved the greatest part. Therefore we must defend those who respect order, and in no way can we let a woman defeat us. It is better to fall from power, if it is fated, by a man’s hand,

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than that we be called weaker than women.

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Chorus

To us, unless our years have stolen our wit, you seem to say what you say wisely.

Haemon

Father, the gods implant reason in men, the highest of all things that we call our own.

For my part, to state how you are wrong to say those things is beyond my power and my desire, although another man, too, might have a useful thought. In any case, it is my natural duty to watch on your behalf all that men say, or do, or find to blame.

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For dread of your glance forbids the ordinary citizen to speak such words as would offend your ear. But I can hear these murmurs in the dark, how the city moans for this girl, saying: No woman ever merited death less—

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none ever died so shamefully for deeds so glorious as hers, who, when her own brother had fallen in bloody battle, would not leave him unburied to be devoured by savage dogs, or by any bird. Does she not deserve to receive golden honor?

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Such is the rumor shrouded in darkness that silently spreads. For me, father, no treasure is more precious than your prosperity. What, indeed, is a nobler ornament for children than the fair fame of a thriving father, or for a father than that of his children?

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Do not, then, bear one mood only in yourself: do not think that your word and no other, must be right. For if any man thinks that he alone is wise—that in speech or in mind he has no peer—such a soul, when laid open, is always found empty.

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No, even when a man is wise, it brings him no shame to learn many things, and not to be too rigid. You see how the trees that stand beside the torrential streams created by a winter storm yield to it and save their branches, while the stiff and rigid perish root and all?

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And in the same way the pilot who keeps the sheet of his sail taut and never slackens it, upsets his boat, and voyages thereafter with his decking underwater. Father, give way and allow a change from your rage. For if even from me, a younger man, a worthy thought may be supplied,

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by far the best thing, I believe, would be for men to be all-wise by nature. Otherwise—since most often it does not turn out that way—it is good to learn in addition from those who advise you well.

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Chorus

My king, it is right, if he speaks something appropriate, that you should learn from him

and that you, in turn, Haemon, should learn from your father. On both sides there have been wise words.

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Creon

Men of my age—are we, then, to be schooled in wisdom by men of his?

Haemon

Not in anything that is not right. But if I am young, you should look to my conduct, not to my years.

Creon

Is it worthy conduct to honor disrupters?

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Haemon

I could not urge anyone to show respect for the wicked.

Creon

And is she not in the grasp of that disease?

Haemon

All the people of this city of Thebes deny it.

Creon

Shall Thebes prescribe to me how I must rule?

Haemon

See, there, how you have spoken so much like a child.

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Creon

Am I to rule this land by the will of another than myself?

Haemon

That is no city, which belongs to one man.

Creon

Does not the city by tradition belong to the man in power?

Haemon

You would make a fine monarch in a desert.

Creon

This boy seems to be fighting on the side of the woman.

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Haemon

If you are a woman, for, to be sure, my concern is for you.

Creon

You traitor, attacking your father, accusing him!

Haemon

Because I see you making a mistake and committing injustice.

Creon

Am I making a mistake when I respect my own prerogatives?

Haemon

Yes. You do not respect them, when you trample on the gods’ honors.

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Creon

Polluted creature, submitting to a woman!

Haemon

You will never catch me submitting to shamelessness.

Creon

You do. Your every word, after all, pleads her case.

Haemon

And yours, and mine, and that of gods below.

Creon

You can never marry her, not while she is still alive.

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Haemon

Then she will die, and in death destroy another.

Creon

What! Does your audacity run to open threats?

Haemon

How is it a threat to speak against empty plans?

Creon

You will regret your unwise instructions in wisdom.

Haemon

If you were not my father, I would have called you insane.

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Creon

You woman’s slave, do not try to cajole me.

Haemon

Do you want to have your say and then have done without a reply?

Creon

Is that so? By Olympus above—know this well—you will have no joy for taunting me over and above your censures.

Bring out that hated thing, so that with him looking on she may die right now in her bridegroom’s presence and at his side!

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Haemon

No, not at my side will she die—do not ever imagine it. Nor shall you ever look at me and set eyes on my face again.

Indulge in your madness now with whomever of your friends can endure it. Exit Haemon.

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Chorus

The man is gone, King Creon, in anger and haste. A young mind is fierce when stung.

Creon

Let him do—no!—let him plan something more immense than befits a man. Farewell to him! Still he will not save these two girls from death.

Chorus

Then the pair of them, you really intend to kill them both?

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Creon

Not the one who did not put her hands to the burial. You are right.

Chorus

And by what mode of death do you mean to kill the other?

Creon

I will take her where the path is deserted, unvisited by men, and entomb her alive in a rocky vault,

setting out a ration of food, but only as much as piety requires so that all the city may escape defilement. And praying there to Hades, the only god she worships, perhaps she will obtain immunity from death, or else will learn, at last, even this late,

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that it is fruitless labor to revere the dead. Exit Creon.

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