weep over this dead body?  Thou wert not then really the father of me, nor did she, who says she bore me, and is called my mother, bear me; but born of slavish blood I was secretly put under the breast of thy wife.  Thou showedst when thou camest to the test, who thou art; and I deem that I am not thy son.  Or else surely thou exceedest all in nothingness of soul, who being of the age thou art, and having come to the goal of life, neither hadst the will nor the courage to die for thy son; but sufferedst this stranger lady, whom alone I might justly have considered both mother and father.  And yet thou mightst have run this race for glory, hadst thou died for thy son.  But at any rate the remainder of the time thou hadst to live was short:  and I should have lived and she the rest of our days, and I should not, bereft of her, be groaning at my miseries.  And in sooth thou didst receive as many things as a happy man should receive; thou passedst the vigor of thine age indeed in sovereign sway, but I was thy son to succeed thee in this palace, so that thou wert not about to die childless and leave a desolate house for others to plunder.  Thou canst not however say of me, that I gave thee up to die, dishonoring thine old age, whereas I was particularly respectful toward thee; and for this behavior both thou, and she that bare me, have made me such return.  Wherefore you have no more time to lose[35] in getting children, who will succor thee in thine old age, and deck thee when dead, and lay out thy corse; for I will not bury thee with this mine hand; for I in sooth died, as far as in thee lay; but if, having met with, another deliverer, I view the light, I say that I am both his child, and the friendly comforter of his old age.  In vain then do old men pray to be dead, complaining of age, and the long time of life:  but if death come near, not one is willing to die, and old age is no longer burdensome to them.[36]

CHOR.  Desist, for the present calamity is sufficient; and do not, O son, provoke thy father’s mind.

PHE.  O son, whom dost thou presume thou art gibing with thy reproaches, a Lydian or a Phrygian bought with thy money?[37] Knowest thou not that I am a Thessalian, and born from a Thessalian father, truly free?  Thou art too insolent, and casting the impetuous words of youth against us, shalt not having cast them thus depart.  But I begat thee the lord of my house, and brought thee up, but I am not thy debtor to die for thee; for I received no paternal law like this, nor Grecian law, that fathers should die for their children; for for thyself thou wert born, whether unfortunate or fortunate, but what from us thou oughtest to have, thou hast.  Thou rulest indeed over many, and I will leave thee a large demesne of lands, for these I received from my father.  In what then have I injured thee?  Of what do I deprive thee?  Thou joyest to see the light, and dost think thy father does not joy?[38] Surely I count the time we must