Note 46 — Chapter XV · THE FRAGMENTS OF ÆSCHYLUS, SOPHOCLES, AND EURIPIDES.
Reading edition
Dire is the violence of ocean waves, And dire the blast of rivers and hot fire, And dire is want, and dire are countless things; But nothing is so dire and dread as woman. No painting could express her dreadfulness, No words describe it. If a god made woman, And fashioned her, he was for men the artist Of woes unnumbered, and their deadly foe.
Incert. Fab., 880.