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Antigone
332-375
Many things cause terror and
wonder, yet nothing
is more terrifying and
wonderful than man.
This thing goes across the
gray
sea on the blasts of winter
335
storms, passing beneath
waters towering 'round him.
The Earth,
eldest of the gods,
unwithering and untiring,
this thing wears down
as his plows go back and
forth year after year
340
furrowing her with the issue
of horses.
This thing ensnares and
carries off
the tribe of light-minded
birds,
the companies of wild
beasts, and
the sea's marine life
345
with coils of woven meshes--
this keenly skilled man. He
has power
through his ways over the
beast who traverses
the mountains and haunts the
open sky.
350
The shaggy-maned horse he
tames with yoke,
and the untiring mountain
bull.
Both language and thought
swift as wind
and impulses that govern
cities,
355
he has taught himself, as
well as how
to escape the shafts of rain
while encamped beneath open
skies.
All resourceful, he
approaches no future thing
360
to come without resource.
From Hades alone
he will not contrive escape.
Refuge from baffling
diseases
he has devised.
Possessing a means of
invention,
a skillfulness beyond
expectation,
365
now toward evil he moves,
now toward good.
By integrating the laws of
the earth
and justice under oath sworn
to the gods,
he is lofty of city.
Citiless is the man with whom ignobility 370
because of his daring
dwells.
May he never reside at my
hearth
or think like me,
whoever does such things.
375
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