THE BACCHAE
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Euripides and Murray, Gilbert
Dionysus.
Good beyond price, but not for thee to hear.
Pentheus.
Thou trickster! Thou wouldst prick me on the more To seek them out!
Dionysus.
His mysteries abhor The touch of sin-lovers.
Pentheus.
And so thine eyes Saw this God plain; what guise had he?
Dionysus.
What guise It liked him. 'Twas not I ordained his shape.
Pentheus.
Aye, deftly turned again. An idle jape, And nothing answered!
Dionysus.
Wise words being brought To blinded eyes will seem as things of nought.
Pentheus.
And comest thou first to Thebes, to have thy God Established?
Dionysus.
Nay; all Barbary hath trod His dance ere this.
Pentheus.
A low blind folk, I ween, Beside our Hellenes!
Dionysus.
Higher and more keen In this thing, though their ways are not thy way.
Pentheus.
How is thy worship held, by night or day?
Dionysus.
Most oft by night; 'tis a majestic thing, The darkness.
Pentheus.
Ha! with women worshipping? 'Tis craft and rottenness!
Dionysus.
By day no less, Whoso will seek may find unholiness.
Pentheus.
Enough! Thy doom is fixed, for false pretence Corrupting Thebes.
Dionysus.
Not mine; but thine, for dense Blindness of heart, and for blaspheming God!
Pentheus.
A ready knave it is, and brazen-browed, This mystery-priest!
Dionysus.
Come, say what it shall be, My doom; what dire thing wilt thou do to me?
Pentheus.
First, shear that delicate curl that dangles there.