babes; I guarded them
E'en as the apple of mine eye,
And now--

MEDEA. They have repaid thy love
As thanklessness doth e'er repay!

GORA. Chide not the babes! They're innocent!

MEDEA. How, innocent? And flee their mother
Innocent? They are Jason's babes,
Like him in form, in heart, and in
My bitter hate! If I could hold them here,
Their life or death depending on my hand,
E'en on this hand I reach out, so, and one
Swift stroke sufficed to slay them, bring to naught
All that they were, or are, or e'er can be,--
Look! they should be no more!

GORA. O, woe to thee,
Cruel mother, who canst hate those little babes
Thyself didst bear!

MEDEA. What hopes have they, what hopes?
If here they tarry with their sire,
That sire so base and infamous,
What shall their lot be then?
The children of this latest bed
Will scorn them, do despite to them
And to their mother, that wild thing
From distant Colchis' strand!
Their lot will be to serve as slaves;
Or else their anger, gnawing deep
And ever deeper at their hearts,
Will make them bitter, hard,
Until they grow to hate themselves.
For, if misfortune often is begot
By crime, more often far are wicked deeds
The offspring of misfortune!--What have they
To live for, then? I would my sire
Had slain me long, long years agone
When I was small, and had not yet
Drunk deep of woe, as now I do--
Thought heavy thoughts, as now!

GORA. Thou tremblest! What dost think to do?

MEDEA. That I must forth, is sure; what else
May chance ere that, I cannot see.
My heart leaps up, when I recall
The foul injustice I have borne,
And glows with fierce revenge! No deed
So dread or awful but I would
Put hand to it!--
He loves these babes,
Forsooth, because he sees in them
His own self mirrored back again,
Himself--his idol!--Nay, he ne'er
Shall have them, shall not!--Nor will I