Four Plays of Aeschylus Part 25

HEPHAESTUS

This arm is fast, inextricably bound.

STRENGTH

Then shackle safe the other, that he know His utmost craft is weaker far than Zeus.

HEPHAESTUS

He, but none other, can accuse mine art!

STRENGTH

Now, strong and sheer, drive thro' from breast to back The adamantine wedge's stubborn fang.

HEPHAESTUS

Alas, Prometheus! I lament thy pain.

STRENGTH

Thou, faltering and weeping sore for those Whom Zeus abhors! 'ware, lest thou rue thy tears!

HEPHAESTUS

Thou gazest on a scene that poisons sight.

STRENGTH

I gaze on one who suffers his desert.

Now between rib and shoulder shackle him- HEPHAESTUS

Do it I must-hush thy superfluous charge!

STRENGTH

Urge thee I will-ay, hound thee to the prey.

Step downward now, enring his legs amain!

HEPHAESTUS

Lo, it is done-'twas but a moment's toil.

STRENGTH

Now, strongly strike, drive in the piercing gyves- Stern is the power that oversees thy task!

HEPHAESTUS

Brutish thy form, thy speech brutality!

STRENGTH

Be gentle, an thou wilt, but blame not me For this my stubbornness and anger fell!

HEPHAESTUS

Let us go hence; his legs are firmly chained.

STRENGTH (To PROMETHEUS)

Aha! there play the insolent, and steal, For creatures of a day, the rights of G.o.ds!

O deep delusion of the powers that named thee Prometheus, the Fore-thinker! thou hast need Of others' forethought and device, whereby Thou may'st elude this handicraft of ours!

[Exeunt HEPHAESTUS, STRENGTH, and FORCE.-A pause.

PROMETHEUS

O Sky divine, O Winds of pinions swift, O fountain-heads of Rivers, and O thou, Illimitable laughter of the Sea!

O Earth, the Mighty Mother, and thou Sun, Whose orbed light surveyeth all-attest, What ills I suffer from the G.o.ds, a G.o.d!

Behold me, who must here sustain The marring agonies of pain, Wrestling with torture, doomed to bear Eternal ages, year on year!

Such and so shameful is the chain Which Heaven's new tyrant doth ordain To bind me helpless here.

Woe! for the ruthless present doom!

Woe! for the Future's teeming womb!

On what far dawn, in what dim skies, Shall star of my deliverance rise?

Truce to this utterance! to its dimmest verge I do foreknow the future, hour by hour, Nor can whatever pang may smite me now Smite with surprise. The destiny ordained I must endure to the best, for well I wot That none may challenge with Necessity.

Yet is it past my patience, to reveal, Or to conceal, these issues of my doom.

Since I to mortals brought prerogatives, Unto this durance dismal am I bound: Yea, I am he who in a fennel-stalk, By stealthy sleight, purveyed the fount of fire, The teacher, proven thus, and arch-resource Of every art that aideth mortal men.

Such was my sin: I earn its recompense, Rock-riveted, and chained in height and cold.

[A pause.

Listen! what breath of sound, what fragrance soft hath risen Upward to me? is it some G.o.dlike essence, Or being half-divine, or mortal presence?

Who to the world's end comes, unto my craggy prison?

Craves he the sight of pain, or what would he behold?

Gaze on a G.o.d in tortures manifold, Heinous to Zeus, and scorned by all Whose footsteps tread the heavenly hall, Because too deeply, from on high, I pitied man's mortality!

Hark, and again! that fluttering sound Of wings that whirr and circle round, And their light rustle thrills the air- How all things that unseen draw near Are to me Fear!

[Enter the CHORUS OF OCEANIDES, in winged cars]

CHORUS Ah, fear us not! as friends, with rivalry Of swiftly-vying wings, we came together Unto this rock and thee!

With our sea-sire we pleaded hard, until We won him to our will, And swift the wafting breezes bore us. .h.i.ther.

The heavy hammer's steely blow Thrilled to our ocean-cavern from afar, Banished soft shyness from our maiden brow, And with unsandalled feet we come, in winged car!

PROMETHEUS

Ah well-a-day! ye come, ye come From the Sea-Mother's teeming home- Children of Tethys and the sire Who around Earth rolls, gyre on gyre, His sleepless ocean-tide!

Look on me-shackled with what chain, Upon this chasm's beetling side I must my dismal watch sustain!

CHORUS

Yea, I behold, Prometheus! and my fears Draw swiftly o'er mine eyes a mist fulfilled of tears, When I behold thy frame Bound, wasting on the rock, and put to shame By adamantine chains!

The rudder and the rule of Heaven Are to strange pilots given: Zeus with new laws and strong caprice holds sway, Unkings the ancient Powers, their might constrains, And thrusts their pride away!

PROMETHEUS

Had he but hurled me, far beneath The vast and ghostly halls of Death, Down to the limitless profound Of Tartarus, in fetters bound, Fixed by his unrelenting hand!

So had no man, nor G.o.d on high, Exulted o'er mine agony- But now, a sport to wind and sky, Mocked by my foes, I stand!

CHORUS

What G.o.d can wear such ruthless heart As to delight in ill?

Who in thy sorrow bears not part?

Zeus, Zeus alone! for he, with wrathful will, Clenched and inflexible, Bears down Heaven's race-nor end shall be, till hate His soul shall satiate, Or till, by some device, some other hand Shall wrest from him his sternly-clasped command!

PROMETHEUS