Where the herdsman imputes the Corinthian’s efforts to ignorance, the Corinthian is not ignorant about the fact that Oidipous was the baby he once received from the herdsman. He is ignorant of the fact that Oidipous killed his father and married his mother. That the Theban is able to recognize the Corinthian’s ignorance about these matters proves that he himself does know them. The information he possesses is identical to that which the Oracle gave Oidipous when he consulted it. And yet, where Oidipous fled in terror from Delphi, he is now insistent upon interrogating the herdsman, and where his present interrogation of the herdsman can only plunge him into misery, had he been similarly assiduous in his interrogation of the Oracle, the information could have been of benefit to him, for then the god was instructing him, not (as Oidipous’s discrepant accounts have made clear to the audience) simply foretelling his future. If the god was instructing Oidipous to kill his father, then any pollution resulting from the deed would become the god’s responsibility, just as it was when Apollo instructed Orestes to kill his mother. [Gm] Orestes’ interrogation of the god through the prophet netted him detailed instructions that provided for him to cleanse himself of his mother’s blood. Just so, it can be supposed that had Oidipous not left Delphi in a panic but stopped to ask further questions, he might have been given a way to manage the burden of his father’s murder. Asking more questions about the union with his mother, he might have been informed that the god did not mean for him to marry her but to be reunited with her. In that case, there would have been no incest, and the next generation would never have been born. Apollo must have been warning Oidipous, as he once warned Laios, that improper intercourse would have terrible consequences. From this the audience can infer that a complete and thorough interrogation will ameliorate what at first blush sounds to be intolerable, and that the timing of such an interrogation is crucial, for at some point a threshold is crossed beyond which catastrophe can no longer be averted. [Mipd] [Mw]