Stasimon 6
[Episode]
The curse of our sons’ avenging spirit and of Justice,
Jason
that calls for blood, be on thee!
1390
Medea
What god or power divine hears thee, breaker of oaths and every law of hospitality?
Jason
Fie upon thee! cursed witch! child-murderess!
Medea
To thy house! go, bury thy wife.
Jason
I go, bereft of both my sons.
1395
Medea
Thy grief is yet to come; wait till old age is with thee too.
Jason
O my dear, dear children!
Medea
Dear to their mother, not to thee.
Jason
And yet thou didst slay them?
Medea
Yea, to vex thy heart.
Jason
One last fond kiss, ah me!
I fain would on their lips imprint.
1400
Medea
Embraces now, and fond farewells for them; but then a cold repulse!
Jason
By heaven I do adjure thee, let me touch their tender skin.
Medea
No, no! in vain this word has sped its flight.
Jason
O Zeus, dost hear how I am driven hence; dost mark the treatment I receive from this she-lion, fell murderess of her young? Yet so far as I may and can, I raise for them a dirge,
1405
and do adjureκἀπιθεάζω, Blomfield’s emendation for MSS. κἀπιθοάζω. the gods to witness how thou hast slain my sons, and wilt not suffer me to embrace or bury their dead bodies. Would I had never begotten them to see thee slay them after all!
1410
Chorus
Many a fate doth Zeus dispense, high on his Olympian throne; oft do the gods bring things to pass beyond man’s expectation; that, which we thought would be, is not fulfilled, while for the unlooked-for god finds out a way; and such hath been the issue of this matter.
1415