You, however, tell me—not at length, but briefly—did you know that an
edict had forbidden this?AntigoneI knew it. How could I not? It was public.CreonAnd even so you dared overstep that law?AntigoneYes, since it was not Zeus that
published me that edict, and since not of that kind are the laws which
Justice who dwells with the gods below established among men. Nor did I
think that your decrees were of such force, that a mortal could override
the unwritten and unfailing statutes given us by the gods. For their
life is not of today or yesterday, but for all time, and no man knows
when they were first put forth. Not for fear of any man’s pride was I
about to owe a penalty to the gods for breaking these. Die I
must, that I knew well (how could I not?). That is true even without
your edicts. But if I am to die before my time, I count that a gain.
When anyone lives as I do, surrounded by evils, how can he not carry off
gain by dying? So for me to meet this doom is a grief of no account.
But if I had endured that my mother’s son should in death lie an
unburied corpse, that would have grieved me. Yet for this, I am not
grieved. And if my present actions are foolish in your sight, it may
be that it is a fool who accuses me of folly.ChorusShe shows herself the wild offspring of a wild father, and does not know
how to bend before troubles.CreonYet remember that over-hard spirits most often collapse. It is the
stiffest iron, baked to utter hardness in the fire, that you most often see
snapped and shivered. And I have witnessed horses with great spirit
disciplined by a small bit. For there is no place for pride, when one is
his neighbors’ slave. This girl was already
practiced in outrage when she overstepped the published laws. And, that
done, this now is a second outrage, that she glories in it and exults in
her deed. In truth, then, I am no man, but she is, if this victory rests with her and brings no penalty.
No! Whether she is my sister’s child, or nearer to me in blood than any
of my kin that worship Zeus at the altar of our house, she and her
sister will not escape a doom most harsh. For in truthI charge that other with an equal share
in the plotting of this burial. Call her out! I saw her inside just now,
raving, and not in control of her wits. Before the deed, the mind
frequently is convicted of stealthy crimes when conspirators are
plotting depravity in the dark. But, truly, I detest it, too, when one who has been caught in
treachery then seeks to make the crime a glory.AntigoneWhat more do you want than to capture and kill me?CreonI want nothing else. Having that, I have everything.AntigoneWhy then do you wait? In none of your maxims is there anything that pleases me—and may there never
be! Similarly to you as well my views must be displeasing. And yet, how
could I have won a nobler glory than by giving burial to my own brother?
All here would admit that they approve, if fear did not grip their tongues. But tyranny, blest
with so much else, has the power to do and say whatever it pleases.