Ion (375-404)

for it would be the height of folly in us, were we to try and make the gods against their will declare reluctant truths either by sacrifice of sheep at their altars, or by omens from birds. For those answers we strive to extort from heaven, lady, are goods that bring no blessing on our getting;

but what they freely offer, thereby we profit.

Many are the chances that befall the many tribes of men, and diverse are their forms. But scarce one happy scene canst thou find in all the life of man.

Ah! Phoebus, here as there, art thou unjust

to that absent sufferer, whose cause I now am pleading. Thou didst not preserve thy child, as in duty bound, nor wilt thou, for all thy prophetic skill, answer his mother’s questioning, that, if he be no more, a mound may be raised o’er him, or, if he live, he may some day be restored to his mother’s eyes.

In vain is this the home of oracles if the god prevents me from learning what I wish to ask. But lo! I see my noble lord, Xuthus, nigh at hand, returning 278 from the lair of Trophonius; say nothing,

sir, to my husband of what I have told thee, lest I incur reproach for troubling about secrets, and the matter take a different turn to that which I sought to give it. For women stand towards men in a difficult position, and the virtuous from being mingled with the wicked amongst us are hated;

such is our unhappy destiny.

First to the god all hail! for he must receive the first-fruits of my salutation, and next all hail to thee, my wife! Has my delay in arriving caused thee alarm?

By no means; but thou art come at an anxious time.