Euripides' HELEN Complete

Translated by E. Coleridge.

Euripides Bilingual Anthology  Studies  Euripides in Print

90 pages - You are on Page 41

Messenger: It shall be done, O king. Now I see how worthless are the
seers' tricks, how full of falsehood; nor is there after all aught
trustworthy in the blaze of sacrifice or in the cry of feathered fowls;
'tis folly, the very notion that birds can help mankind. Calchas never
by word or sign showed the host the truth, when he saw his friends
dying on behalf of a phantom, nor yet did Helenus; but the city was
stormed in vain. Perhaps thou wilt say, 'twas not heaven's will that
they should do so. Then why do we employ these prophets? Better were
it to sacrifice to the gods, and crave a blessing, leaving prophecy
alone; for this was but devised as a bait to catch livelihood, and
no man grows rich by divination if he is idle. No! sound judgment
and discernment are the best of seers. (The Messenger departs.)

Leader: My views about seers agree exactly with this old man's: whoso
hath the gods upon his side will have the best seer in his house.

Helen: Good! so far all is well. But how camest thou, poor husband,
safe from Troy? though 'tis no gain to know, yet friends feel a longing
to learn all that their friends have suffered.

Menelaus: That one short sentence of thine contains a host of questions.
Why should I tell thee of our losses in the Aegean, or of the beacon
Nauplius lighted on Euboea? or of my visits to Crete and the cities
of Libya, or of the peaks of Perseus? For I should never satisfy thee
with the tale, and by telling thee should add to my own pain, though
I suffered enough at the time; and so would my grief be doubled.

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