PEN.  And how shall I go through the city escaping the notice of the
Cadmeans?

BAC.  We will go by deserted roads, and I will guide you.

PEN.  Every thing is better than for the Bacchae to mock me.

BAC.  We will go into the house and consider what seems best.

PEN.  We can do what we like; my part is completely prepared.  Let us go; for either I will go bearing arms, or I will be guided by your counsels.

BAC.  O women! the man is in the toils,[44] and he will come to the Bacchae, where, dying, he will pay the penalty.  Now, Bacchus, ’tis thine office, for you are not far off.  Let us punish him; but first drive him out of his wits, inspiring vain frenzy, since, being in his right mind, he will not be willing to put on a female dress, but driving him out of his senses he will put it on; and I wish him to furnish laughter to the Thebans, being led in woman’s guise through the city, after[45] his former threats, with which he was terrible.  But I will go to fit on Pentheus the dress, which, having taken, he shall die, slain by his mother’s hand.  And he shall know Bacchus, the son of Jupiter, who is in fact to men at once the most terrible, and the mildest of deities.[46]

CHOR.  Shall I move my white foot in the night-long dance, honoring Bacchus, exposing my neck to the dewy air, sporting like a fawn in the verdant delights of the mead, when it has escaped a fearful chase beyond the watch of the well-woven nets, (and the huntsman cheering hastens on the course of his hounds,) and with toil like the swift storm[47] rushes along the plain that skirts the river, exulting in the solitude apart from men, and in the thickets of the shady-foliaged wood?  What is wisdom, what is a more glorious gift from the Gods among mortals than to hold one’s hand on the heads of one’s enemies?  What is good is always pleasant; divine strength is roused with difficulty, but still is sure, and it chastises those mortals who honor folly, and do not extol the Gods in their insane mind.  But the Gods cunningly conceal the long foot[48] of time, and hunt the impious man; for it is not right to determine or plan any thing beyond the laws:  for it is a light expense to deem that that has power whatever is divine, and that what has been law for a long time has its origin in nature.  What is wisdom, what is a more noble gift from the Gods among men, than to hold one’s hand on the heads of one’s enemies? what is honorable is always pleasant.  Happy is he who has escaped from the wave of the sea, and arrived in harbor.[49] Happy, too, is he who has overcome his labors; and one surpasses another in different ways, in wealth and power.  Still are there innumerable hopes to innumerable men, some result in wealth to mortals, and some fail, but I call him happy whose life is happy day by day.

BAC.  You, who are eager to see what you ought not, and hasty to do a deed not of haste, I mean Pentheus, come forth before the house, be seen by me, having the costume of a woman, of a frantic Bacchant, as a spy upon your mother and her company!  In appearance, you are like one of the daughters of Cadmus.