Alcestis recovered, and was restored to her husband.
Milton alludes to the story of Alcestis in his Sonnet "on his
deceased wife:"
"Methought I saw my late espoused saint
Brought to me like Alcestis from the grave,
Whom Jove's great son to her glad husband gave,
Rescued from death by force, though pale and faint."
J. R. Lowell has chosen the "Shepherd of King Admetus" for the
subject of a short poem. He makes that event the first
introduction of poetry to men.
"Men called him but a shiftless youth,
In whom no good they saw,
And yet unwittingly, in truth,
They made his careless words their law.
"And day by day more holy grew
Each spot where he had trod,
Till after-poets only knew
Their first-born brother was a god."
ANTIGONE
A large proportion both of the interesting persons and of the
exalted acts of legendary Greece belongs to the female sex.
Antigone was as bright an example of filial and sisterly fidelity
as was Alcestis of connubial devotion. She was the daughter of
Oedipus and Jocasta, who with all their descendants were the
victims of an unrelenting fate, dooming them to destruction.
OEdipus in his madness had torn out his eyes, and was driven forth
from his kingdom Thebes, dreaded and abandoned by all men, as an
object of divine vengeance.
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