Philoctetes
Sophocles
Sophocles the plays and fragments, Part 4: The Philoctetes. Jebb, Richard Claverhouse, Sir, translator. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1898.
- A startling pity for him has come upon me—and not now for the first time, but long ago.
- Show mercy, boy, for the love of the gods, and do not give men cause to reproach you for having cheated me.
- Ah, no, what shall I do? I wish I had never left
- Scyros, so pained am I by these doings.
- You are not in and of yourself wicked, but you seem to have come to me after learning the shameless lessons of wicked masters. Now leave such behavior to others, whom it suits, and sail from here—once you have given me back my weapons.
- What shall we do, friends?
- Traitor, what are you doing? Come back here and surrender that bow to me!
- Who is that? Do I hear Odysseus?
- Yes, Odysseus, be sure of it. Here I am before your eyes.
- Ah, me, I am sold, destroyed! It was he, then, who entrapped me and robbed me of my arms.
- Yes, I and no other. I avow it.