The Bacchae of Euripides
Raise me thine eyes to yon blue dome of air!
AGAVE.
'Tis done. What dost thou bid me seek for there?
CADMUS.
Is it the same, or changed in thy sight?
AGAVE.
More shining than before, more heavenly bright!
CADMUS.
And that wild tremor, is it with thee still?
AGAVE (_troubled_).
I know not what thou sayest; but my will
Clears, and some change cometh, I know not how.
CADMUS.
Canst hearken then, being changed, and answer, now?
AGAVE.
I have forgotten something; else I could.
CADMUS.
What husband led thee of old from mine abode?
AGAVE.
Echion, whom men named the Child of Earth.
CADMUS.
And what child in Echion's house had birth?
AGAVE.
Pentheus, of my love and his father's bred.
CADMUS.
Thou bearest in thine arms an head--what head?
AGAVE
(_beginning to tremble, and not looking at what she carries_).
A lion's--so they all said in the chase.
CADMUS.
Turn to it now--'tis no long toil--and gaze.
AGAVE.
Ah! But what is it? What am I carrying here?
CADMUS.
Look once upon it full, till all be clear!
AGAVE.
I see . . . most deadly pain! Oh, woe is me!
CADMUS.
Wears it the likeness of a lion to thee?
AGAVE.
No; 'tis the head--O God!--of Pentheus, this!
CADMUS.
Blood-drenched ere thou wouldst know him! Aye, 'tis his.
AGAVE.
Who slew him?--How came I to hold this thing?
CADMUS.
O cruel Truth, is this thine home-coming?
AGAVE.
Answer! My heart is hanging on thy breath!
CADMUS.
'Twas thou.--Thou and thy sisters wrought his death.
AGAVE.
In what place was it? His own house, or where?
CADMUS.
Where the dogs tore Actaeon, even there.
AGAVE.
Why went he to Kithaeron? What sought he?
CADMUS.
To mock the God and thine own ecstasy.
AGAVE.
But how should we be on the hills this day?
CADMUS.
Being mad! A spirit drove all the land that way.
AGAVE.
'Tis Dionyse hath done it! Now I see.
CADMUS (_earnestly_).
Ye wronged Him! Ye denied his deity!
AGAVE (_turning from him_).
Show me the body of the son I love!
CADMUS (_leading her to the bier_).
'Tis here, my child. Hard was the quest thereof.
AGAVE.
Laid in due state?
[_As there is no answer, she lifts the veil of the bier, and sees._
Oh, if I wrought a sin,
'Twas mine! What portion had my child therein?
CADMUS.
He made him like to you, adoring not
The God; who therefore to one bane hath brought
You and this body, wrecking all our line,
And me. Aye, no man-child was ever mine;
And now this first-fruit of the flesh of thee,
Sad woman, foully here and frightfully
Lies murdered! Whom the house looked up unto,
[_Kneeling by the body._
O Child, my daughter's child! who heldest true
My castle walls; and to the folk a name
Of fear thou wast; and no man sought to shame
My grey beard, when they knew that thou wast there,
Else had they swift reward!--And now I fare
Forth in dishonour, outcast, I, the great
Cadmus, who sowed the seed-rows of this state
Of Thebes, and reaped the harvest wonderful.
O my beloved, though thy heart is dull
In death, O still beloved, and alway
Beloved! Never more, then, shalt thou lay
Thine hand to this white beard, and speak to me
Thy "Mother's Father"; ask "Who wrongeth thee?
Who stints thine honour, or with malice stirs
Thine heart? Speak, and I smite thine injurers!"
But now--woe, woe, to me and thee also,
Woe to thy mother and her sisters, woe
Alway! Oh, whoso walketh not in dread
Of Gods, let him but look on this man dead!
LEADER.
Lo, I weep with thee. 'Twas but due reward
God sent on Pentheus; but for thee . . . 'Tis hard.
AGAVE.
My father, thou canst see the change in me,
* * * * *
* * * * *
[_A page or more has here been torn out of the MS. from which all
our copies of "The Bacchae" are derived. It evidently contained a speech
of Agave (followed presumably by some words of the Chorus), and an
appearance of_ DIONYSUS _upon a cloud. He must have pronounced judgment
upon the Thebans in general, and especially upon the daughters of_
CADMUS, _have justified his own action, and declared his determination
to establish his godhead. Where the MS. begins again, we find him
addressing_ CADMUS.]
* * * * *
DIONYSUS.
* * * * *
* * * * *
And tell of Time, what gifts for thee he bears,
What griefs and wonders in the winding years.
For thou must change and be a Serpent Thing
Strange, and beside thee she whom thou didst bring
Of old to be thy bride from Heaven afar,
Harmonia, daughter of the Lord of War.
Yea, and a chariot of kine--so spake
The word of Zeus--thee and thy Queen shall take
Through many lands, Lord of a wild array
Of orient spears. And many towns shall they
Destroy beneath thee, that vast horde, until
They touch Apollo's dwelling, and fulfil
Their doom, back driven on stormy ways and steep.
Thee only and thy spouse shall Ares keep,
And save alive to the Islands of the Blest.
Thus speaketh Dionysus, Son confessed
Of no man but of Zeus!--Ah, had ye seen
Truth in the hour ye would not, all had been
Well with ye, and the Child of God your friend!
AGAVE.
Dionysus, we beseech thee! We have sinned!
DIONYSUS.
Too late! When there was time, ye knew me not!
AGAVE.
We have confessed. Yet is thine hand too hot.
DIONYSUS.
Ye mocked me, being God; this is your wage.
AGAVE.
Should God be like a proud man in his rage?
DIONYSUS.
'Tis as my sire, Zeus, willed it long ago.
AGAVE (_turning from him almost with disdain_).
Old Man, the word is spoken; we must go.
DIONYSUS.
And seeing ye must, what is it that ye wait?
CADMUS.
Child, we are come into a deadly strait,
All; thou, poor sufferer, and thy sisters twain,
And my sad self. Far off to barbarous men,
A grey-haired wanderer, I must take my road.
And then the oracle, the doom of God,
That I must lead a raging horde far-flown
To prey on Hellas; lead my spouse, mine own
Harmonia, Ares' child, discorporate
And haunting forms, dragon and dragon-mate.
Against the tombs and altar-stones of Greece,
Lance upon lance behind us; and not cease
From toils, like other men, nor dream, nor past
The foam of Acheron find my peace at last.
AGAVE.
Father! And I must wander far from thee!
CADMUS.
O Child, why wilt thou reach thine arms to me,
As yearns the milk-white swan, when old swans die?
AGAVE.
Where shall I turn me else? No home have I.
CADMUS.
I know not; I can help thee not.
AGAVE.
Farewell, O home, O ancient tower!
Lo, I am outcast from my bower,
And leave ye for a worser lot.
CADMUS.
Go forth, go forth to misery,
The way Actaeon's father went!
AGAVE.
Father, for thee my tears are spent.
CADMUS.
Nay, Child, 'tis I must weep for thee;
For thee and for thy sisters twain!
AGAVE.
On all this house, in bitter wise,
Our Lord and Master, Dionyse,
Hath poured the utter dregs of pain!
DIONYSUS.
In bitter wise, for bitter was the shame
Ye did me, when Thebes honoured not my name.
AGAVE.
Then lead me where my sisters be;
Together let our tears be shed,
Our ways be wandered; where no red
Kithaeron waits to gaze on me;
Nor I gaze back; no thyrsus stem,
Nor song, nor memory in the air.
Oh, other Bacchanals be there,
Not I, not I, to dream of them!
[AGAVE _with her group of attendants goes out on the side away from
the Mountain_. DIONYSUS _rises upon the Cloud and disappears_.
CHORUS.
There be many shapes of mystery.
And many things God makes to be,
Past hope or fear.
And the end men looked for cometh not,
And a path is there where no man thought.
So hath it fallen here. [_Exeunt._
NOTES ON THE BACCHAE
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
The _Bacchae_, being from one point of view a religious drama, a kind of
"mystery play," is full of allusions both to the myth and to the
religion of Dionysus.
1. The Myth, as implied by Euripides. Semele, daughter of Cadmus, being
loved by Zeus, asked her divine lover to appear to her once in his full
glory; he came, a blaze of miraculous lightning, in the ecstasy of which
Semele died, giving premature birth to a son. Zeus, to save this child's
life and make him truly God as well as Man, tore open his own flesh and
therein fostered the child till in due time, by a miraculous and
mysterious Second Birth, the child of Semele came to full life as God.
2. The Religion of Dionysus is hard to formulate or even describe, both
because of its composite origins and because of its condition of
constant vitality, fluctuation, and development.
(_a_) The first datum, apparently, is the introduction from Thrace of
the characteristic God of the wild northern mountains, a God of
Intoxication, of Inspiration, a giver of superhuman or immortal life.
His worship is superposed upon that of divers old Tree or Vegetation
Gods, already worshipped in Greece. He becomes specially the God of the
Vine. Originally a god of the common folk, despised and unauthorised, he
is eventually so strong as to be adopted into the Olympian hierarchy as
the "youngest" of the Gods, son of Zeus. His "Olympian" name, so to
speak, is Dionysus, but in his worship he is addressed by numbers of
names, more or less mystic and secret--Bromios, Bacchios or Baccheus,
Iacchos, Eleuthercus, Zagreus, Sabazios, &c. Some of these may be the
names of old spirits whom he has displaced; some are his own Thracian
names. Bromos and Sabaja, for instance, seem to have been Thracian names
for two kinds of intoxicating drink. Bacchos means a "wand." Together
with his many names, he has many shapes, especially appearing as a Bull
and a Serpent.
(_b_) This religion, very primitive and barbarous, but possessing a
strong hold over the emotions of the common people, was seized upon and
transfigured by the great wave of religious reform, known under the name
of Orphism, which swept over Greece and South Italy in the sixth century
B.C., and influenced the teachings of such philosophers as Pythagoras,
Aristeas, Empedocles, and the many writers on purification and the world
after death. Orphism may very possibly represent an ancient Cretan
religion in clash or fusion with one from Thrace. At any rate, it was
grafted straight upon the Dionysus-worship, and, without rationalising,
spiritualised and reformed it. Ascetic, mystical, ritualistic, and