IPHIGENIA. Freely to breathe alone is not to live. Say, is it life, within this holy fane, Like a poor ghost around its sepulchre To linger out my days? Or call you that A life of conscious happiness and joy, When every hour, dream'd listlessly away, Leads to those dark and melancholy days, Which the sad troop of the departed spend In self-forgetfulness on Lethe's shore? A useless life is but an early death; This, woman's lot, is eminently mine.
ARKAS. I can forgive, though I must needs deplore, The noble pride which underrates itself It robs thee of the happiness of life. And hast thou, since thy coming here, done nought? Who cheer'd the gloomy temper of the king? Who hath with gentle eloquence annull'd, From year to year, the usage of our sires, By which, a victim at Diana's shrine, Each stranger perish'd, thus from certain death Sending so oft the rescued captive home? Hath not Diana, harbouring no revenge For this suspension of her bloody rites, In richest measure heard thy gentle prayer? On joyous pinions o'er the advancing host, Doth not triumphant conquest proudly soar? And feels not every one a happier lot, Since Thoas, who so long hath guided us With wisdom and with valour, sway'd by thee, The joy of mild benignity approves, Which leads him to relax the rigid claims Of mute submission? Call thyself useless! Thou, Thou, from whose being o'er a thousand hearts, A healing balsam flows? when to a race. To whom a god consign'd thee, thou dost prove A fountain of perpetual happiness, And from this dire inhospitable shore Dost to the stranger grant a safe return?
IPHIGENIA. The little done doth vanish to the mind, Which forward sees how much remains to do.
ARKAS. Him dost thou praise, who underrates his deeds?
IPHIGENIA. Who estimates his deeds is justly blam'd.
ARKAS. We blame alike, who proudly disregard Their genuine merit, and who vainly prize Their spurious worth too highly. Trust me, priestess, And hearken to the counsel of a man With honest zeal devoted to thy service: When Thoas comes to-day to speak with thee, Lend to his purpos'd words a gracious ear.
IPHIGENIA. The well-intention'd counsel troubles me: His offer studiously I've sought to shun.
ARKAS. Thy duty and thy interest calmly weigh. Since the king lost his son, he trusts but few, Nor those as formerly. Each noble's son He views with jealous eye as his successor; He dreads a solitary, helpless age, Or rash rebellion, or untimely death. A Scythian studies not the rules of speech, And least of all the king. He who is used To act and to command, knows not the art, From far, with subtle tact, to guide discourse Through many windings to its destin'd goal. Do not embarrass him with shy reserve And studied misconception: graciously, And with submission, meet the royal wish.