Epeisodion 3
Creon
Do not make commands where you are not the master.
Chorus
Let go, I tell you!
840
Creon
And I tell you: be off!
840
Chorus
Help, men of Colonus, bring help! The city, our city, is attacked by force! Come to our aid!
Antigone
I am being dragged away in misery. Strangers, strangers!
Oedipus
My child, where are you?
845
Antigone
I am led off by force.
845
Oedipus
Give me your hand, my child!
Oedipus
I am wretched, wretched! The guards exit with Antigone.
Creon
So those two staffs will never again support your path.
But since you wish to overcome your country and your friends, whose will I, though tyrant as well, am here discharging, then I wish you victory. For in time, I am sure, you will come to recognize all this, that now too as in time past, it is you who have done yourself no good, by indulging your anger despite your friends.
850
This has always been your ruin.
855
Chorus
Stop there, stranger!
Chorus
I will not let go, unless you give back the maidens.
Creon
Then you will soon give the city a more valuable prize, for I will lay hands on more than those two girls.
Chorus
What! What do you intend?
860
Creon
This man here will be my captive.
860
Creon
Straightaway it will be done.
Chorus
Indeed, unless the ruler of this realm prevents you.
Oedipus
Voice of shamelessness! Will you really lay hands on me?
Oedipus
No! May the powers of this place grant me to utter this further curse! Most evil of men, when these eyes were dark, you wrenched from me the helpless one who was my eyesight and made off with her by force. Therefore to you and to your race may the Sun, the god who sees all things,
grant in time an old age such as mine!
870
Creon
Do you see this, people of the land?
Oedipus
They see both you and me. They know that I have suffered in deeds, and my defense is mere words.
Creon
I will not check my anger. Though I am alone
