CRE.  My disposition is least of all imperious, and through feeling pity in many cases have I injured myself.  And now I see that I am doing wrong, O lady, but nevertheless thou shalt obtain thy request; but this I warn thee, if to-morrow’s light of the God of day shall behold thee and thy children within the confines of these realms, thou shalt die:  this word is spoken in truth.  But now if thou must stay, remain here yet one day, for thou wilt not do any horrid deed of which I have dread.

MEDEA, CHORUS.

CHOR.  Unhappy woman! alas wretched on account of thy griefs! whither wilt thou turn? what hospitality, or house, or country wilt thou find a refuge for these ills? how the Deity hath led thee, Medea, into a pathless tide of woes!

MED. Ill hath it been done on every side.  Who will gainsay it? but these things are not in this way, do not yet think it.  Still is there a contest for those lately married, and to those allied to them no small affliction.  For dost thou think I ever would have fawned upon this man, if I were not to gain something, or form some plan?  I would not even have addressed him.  I would not even have touched him with my hands.  But he hath arrived at such a height of folly, as that, when it was in his power to have crushed my plans, by banishing me from this land, he hath granted me to stay this day in which three of mine enemies will I put to death, the father, the bride, and my husband.  But having in my power many resources of destruction against them, I know not, my friends, which I shall first attempt.  Whether shall I consume the bridal house with fire, or force the sharpened sword through her heart having entered the chamber by stealth where the couch is spread?  But one thing is against me; if I should be caught entering the house and prosecuting my plans, by my death I shall afford laughter for my foes.  Best then is it to pursue the straight path, in which I am most skilled, to take them off by poison.  Let it be so.  And suppose them dead:  what city will receive me?  What hospitable stranger affording a land of safety and a faithful home will protect my person?  There is none.  Waiting then yet a little time, if any tower of safety shall appear to us, I will proceed to this murder in treachery and silence.  But if ill fortune that leaves me without resource force me, I myself having grasped the sword, although I should die, will kill them, and will rush to the extreme height of daring.  For never, I swear by my mistress whom I revere most of all, and have chosen for my assistant, Hecate, who dwells in the inmost recesses of my house, shall any one of them wring my heart with grief with impunity.  Bitter and mournful to them will I make these nuptials, and bitter this alliance, and my flight from this land.  But come, spare none of these sciences in which thou art skilled, Medea, deliberating and plotting.  Proceed to the deed of terror:  now is the time of resolution:  seest thou what thou art suffering?  Ill doth it become thee to incur ridicule from the race of Sisyphus, and from the nuptials of Jason, who art sprung from a noble father, and from the sun.  And thou art skilled.  Besides also we women are, by nature, to good actions of the least capacity, but the most cunning inventors of every ill.