Sophocles, Philoctetes
Robert Torrance, Ed.

Philoctetes
Child, in your father's and your mother's name,
470by everything you value most, I beg you,
do not abandon me to live alone
with all these many hardships you yourself
have seen, and others you have only heard of.
Give me a passing thought: I know this burden
475is great, and will perhaps offend you, yet
bear with it; for the truly noble man
will hate a shameful act, and prize a good one.
If you forsake me, only shame is yours,
but if you take me safely home to Oeta,
480my son, a rich reward of fame awaits you.
Come: I will trouble you for just one day;
make the endeavor - place me where you will,
down in the hold, or in the prow, the stern,
wherever I will be least in the way.
485Consent - by the god of suppliants, child, I pray,
listen: I fall upon my knees, though I
am weak and lame and wretched: do not leave me
forlorn, and far from human footsteps, here.
Save me, and take me to your home, or else
490farther, to prince Chalcodon's land, Euboea:
then we will not have far to go to Oeta,
the Trachinian hills and the fair-flowing river
Spercheius, and you may take me to my father -
though I have been afraid long since that he
495has passed away: for I have often sent
prayers with my visitors, and summoned him
to come for me and take me home again.
But either he is dead, or else, more likely,
my messengers neglected what I asked them,
500and, in their haste, sailed on their homeward way.
But now I have found in you both messenger
and escort: have compassion, and preserve me!
The life of man is full of dread and danger;
its happiness is fleeting; and the man
505who dwells apart from grief must watch that danger,
and when he lives at ease must be most careful
lest suddenly his life slip by in ruin.