THE ARGUMENT. TIRESIAS having declared that heavy judgments would fall on Creon, King of Thebes, for his treatment of Antigone, the Chorus, in the following Ode, entreat Bacchus to come either from Parnassus or Euboea to the aid of Thebes, the country of Semele his mother. SOPH. ΑNTIG. 1102. Ο THOU, by many a name adored, Son of the Thunderer! Guardian lord King of the Eleusinian vale, Where Ceres' bounties never fail,1 (1) Bacchus is frequently associated with the mysteries of Ceres. See Eurip. Ion. 1074. αἰσχύνομαι τὸν πολύϋμνον θεὸν, εἰ περὶ καλλιχόροισι παγαῖς λαμπάδα θεωρὸν εἰκάδων ὄψεται ἐννύχιος ἄϋπνος ἂν, ὅτε καὶ Διὸς ἀστερωπός ἀνεχόρευσεν αἰθὴρ, χορεύει δὲ Σελάνα καὶ πεντήκοντα κόραι Νηρέος, αἱ κατὰ πόντον ἀεννάων τε ποταμῶν τὰν χρυσοστέφανον κόραν καὶ ματέρα σεμνάν. I blush Bacchus! throned mid Thebe's walls, Mother of thy bacchanals, Where the pure Ismenus flows, Where flows Castalia's sacred stream, The smouldering fires, that nightly gleam,2 I blush lest Bacchus mark our throng; On Ceres' midnight mysteries. When the moon, beside the waters, Dances with the starry air; When speed in troops old Nereus' daughters, To tread a choral measure there; They who, deep in ocean's caves, Or amid the restless waves Of streams that roll their chafing tide, By some perennial fount supplied, Whirling oft in dances wild, The giddy torrent stem, For hallowed Ceres and her child, Queen of the golden diadem! (2) Compare Eurip. Phon. 226. ὦ λάμπουσα πέτρα πυρὸς οἴνα θ', ἃ καθαμέριον στάξεις |