The Sibylline Oracles

The Sibylline Oracles

continued

Book III

1 Thou blessed One, loud Thunderer of the heavens, / Who holdest in their place the cherubim, / I pray thee give me now a little rest, / Since I have uttered what is all so true. For weary has my heart within me grown. / Why should my heart be quivering now again, / And my soul, lashed as with a whip, be forced / To utter forth its oracle to all? / Yet once more I will speak aloud all things Which God impels me to proclaim to men. / O men, in godlike form and image made, / Why do ye vainly wander, and not walk / The straight path, keeping ever in your mind / The immortal Maker? One God rules alone, Unutterable, dwelling in the sky, / Self-constituted, and invisible, / Though he himself alone beholds all things. / No sculptor's hand formed him, nor by man's art / Appears his image in gold or ivory;

2 But he proclaims his own eternity / As one who is, and was, and yet shall be. / For who is he, frail mortal, that with eyes / Can look on God? Or who could bear to hear / The name alone of the great God of heaven Who rules the world? He by a word all things / Created, heaven, and sea, and tireless sun, / And the full moon, and stars that shed forth light, / The mighty mother Tethys, fountains, streams, / Imperishable fire, and days and nights. This is the God who made four-lettered Adam, / The first one formed, whose name fills east and west / And south and north. The same is he who fixed / The type and form of man, and made the beasts, / And creeping things, and such as spread the wing. Ye do not reverence or worship God, / But vainly go astray and bow the knee / To serpents, and to cats make sacrifice, / And other idols, statues made of stone, / And sit before the doors of godless shrines.

3 Ye guard against the God who keeps all things, / And in the wickedness of stones delight, / Forgetful of the immortal Saviour's judgment, / Who made the heaven and earth. Woe to a race / That has delight in blood, deceitful, vile, Ungodly, double-tongued, malicious men, / Unchaste, idolatrous, designing fraud, / An evil madness raving in their breasts. / They plunder, and maintain a shameless soul; / For no rich man will with another share. But a dire evil shall to all men come, / Faith they will nowhere hold, and many wives / And widows will in secret others love / Because of gain, and they will not observe / Life's sacred bond if only they get men. But when Rome also over Egypt rules, / Having one end in view, then shall appear / The mighty kingdom of the immortal king / Set over men. A holy king shall come / Wielding the scepter over every land

4 Unto all ages of advancing time. / And then will the stern wrath of Latian men / Rome thrice expose to pitiable fate. / And all mankind shall perish in their homes, / When from the heavens a fiery cataract flows. Ah me, unhappy! When shall that day come, / And judgment of the immortal God's great king? / Now surely, O ye cities, ye are built / And all adorned with temples and race-grounds, / Markets, and images of precious stone, All that ye may come to a bitter day. / For it will come whenever there shall pass / The smell of sulphur among all mankind. / But these things severally I will tell / In as many cities as men carry vice. From the great Cæsars Beliar shall come / Hereafter, and shall stand on mountain height, / And stay the sea, and the great fiery sun, / And shining moon, and make the dead stand up, / And perform many miracles with men.

5 But nothing to perfection will he bring, / But many mortals he will lead astray, / Elect and faithful Hebrews; also men / Without law, such as never heard God's word. / But when the threatenings of the mighty God Shall draw near, and upon the earth shall come / The flaming power as in a billowy wave, / It shall burn Beliar too, and faithless men, / All, even as many as put their trust in him. / And then the world shall by a woman's hands Be governed and persuaded in all things. / And when o'er all the world a widow reigns, / And flings the gold and silver in the sea, / And brass and iron of perishable man / Flings in the flood, then all earth's elements Shall widow-like be waste and desolate. / And God who dwells on high will roll the heaven / Together, even as a scroll is rolled. / And on the noble land and on the sea / The entire multiform arch of heaven shall fall.

6 A cataract of glowing fire shall flow / Unceasing, and burn land and sea and sky; / Creation itself will he melt into one, / And take out that which tends to purity. / The luminous laughing spheres shall be no more, Nor night, nor dawn, nor many days of care, / Nor spring-time, summer, winter, autumn more. / And then shall come God's judgment, in the midst / Of a great age when all these things shall be. / O navigable waters, and all lands Wherever the sun rises and goes down, / All things shall be subjected unto him / Who comes a second time into the world; / For from the first he recognized his power. / But when the threatenings of the mighty God Had been fulfilled, which once he threatened those / Who made a tower in the Assyrian land / (And they were all one language, and resolved / To mount aloft into the starry heaven), / Straightway the Immortal added to the winds

7 A mighty force, and tempests from above / Hurled down the huge tower, and among mankind / Raised up confusion, wherefore mortals gave / Unto that city the name of Babylon. / But when the tower fell, and the tongues of men Became discordant, all the earth was filled With mortals, and divided among kings. And then appeared the generation tenth Of mortal men, from the time when the flood Came on the earlier race. And Kronos reigned, And Titan and Japetus, whom men esteemed / Fairest of Gaia and Uranus born, / And gave them also names of earth and heaven, / Because they were most excellent of men. / Into three parts divided they the earth, According to the inheritance of each, And each ruled his own portion, without strife; For they were bound by the paternal oath, And equal were their portions. But old age Came on the father, and his time was full,

8 And he died; but the sons, infringing oaths, / Contended with each other in fierce strife, / Who should hold regal honor, and bear rule / Over all mortals. Then did Kronos fight / And Titan with the rest. But Rhea, and Gaia, And garland-loving Venus, Demeter, / And Vesta, and Dione golden-haired / Brought them to friendship, and a council called / Of all the kings and brothers, and near kin, / And also others of ancestral blood, And they decided Kronos should be king, / For he was oldest and of noblest form. / But Titan placed on Kronos mighty oaths / To rear no male posterity, that he / Himself might reign when age and fate should fall On Kronos. So whenever Rhea bore, / Beside her sat the Titans, and destroyed / All the male issue; but the female lived, / And were left to the mother's nursing care. / But when at the third birth the honored Rhea

9 Brought forth illustrious Juno, and they saw / With wondering eyes a race of females born, / The savage Titans took themselves away. / Then when a male child Rhea brought to birth / She sent him quickly into Phrygia, There to be reared in secret, having bound / Three Cretans by an oath to do her will. / They called him Dia, for he was sent away. / Poseidon also secretly she sent; / And Pluto, third, by women's helping hand Did Rhea, coming to Dodona, bear, / Whence flows Eurotas' moistened path away, / And, with Peneius mixed, pours in the sea / Its water, and men call it Stygian. / But when the Titans heard of hidden sons Begotten by King Kronos and his wife, / Straightway assembled Titan sixty youths, / Bound Kronos and his wife Rhea in chains, / Hid them in earth, and kept them under guard. / And then the sons of mighty Kronos heard,

10 And they stirred up a great tumultuous war. / And this was the beginning of dire war / Among all mortals, for it was indeed / With men the primal origin of war. / Then God sent evil on the Titan race, And all from Titan and from Kronos sprung / Died. But as time rolled on these kingdoms rose; / Egyptian, Persian, Median, Ethiopian, / Assyrian-Babylon, and Macedon, / Egyptian yet again, then that of Rome. And then a message of the mighty God / Pressed on my heart, and bade me prophecy / On all the earth, and in the minds of kings / Those things deposit which are yet to be. / And first the only God delivered me What kingdoms of mankind shall be raised up. / And first the house of Solomon shall rule / The horsemen of Phenicia and of Asia, / And those of other islands, and the race / Of the Pamphylians, Persians, Phrygians,

11 Carians, Mysians, and Lydians famed for gold. / And then the overweening Hellenes, / Impure, another Macedonian race, / Much mixed, shall rule, and they shall bring on men / A fearful cloud of war, but the God of heaven Will utterly destroy them from below. / And then another kingdom will arise, / White, many-headed from the western sea, / Which will rule many a land, and many shake, / And afterward bring terror to all kings. Much gold and silver will she take by force / From many cities, yet in the vast earth / There will be gold and silver and elegance. / And they will sore afflict mankind, and then / To those same men will come a ruinous fall, When they attempt unrighteous insolence. / On them will be the bond of wickedness, / Male will consort with male, and they will set / Children in dens of shame. And in those days / A great affliction among men will come,

12 And vex and wound and fill all things with evil / Through shameful covetousness, and gain ill-gotten / In many lands, but most in Macedon. / And hatred shall spring up, and all deceit, / Until the seventh kingdom, which a king Of Egypt, but of Grecian birth, shall rule. / And then the nation of the mighty God / Shall be again strong, and be guides of life / To all mankind. But wherefore now should God / Lay it upon my spirit to declare What evil first, what next, what last shall be / Upon all men, and how they shall begin? / First on the Titans God will evil send, / For mighty Kronos's sons will vengeance take, / Because they bound the king and mother dear. Again will tyrants rule the Hellenes, / And they will be proud, haughty, vicious kings, / Adulterous, and altogether bad; / And no more will there be a rest from war. / The dreadful Phrygians shall perish all,

13 And Troy will meet misfortune in that day. / Evil will also to the Persians come, / And to the Assyrians, and all Egypt too, / And Libya and the Ethiopians, / Carians, Pamphylians, and on mortals all Shall evil be imposed. Why then of each / Do I speak? When the first comes to an end / Straightway the second falls upon mankind; / And yet I will the very first sound forth. / There will an evil come to pious men Who dwell by the great temple of Solomon, / And are the progeny of righteous men. / Of these I also will declare the tribe / And line of fathers, and the home of all— / Do all with skill, O mortal full of guile. There is a city on the [Asian] soil, / Ur of the Chaldees, whence has come a race / Most upright, ever of good counsel fond / And noble deeds. For they seek not with care / The circling pathway of the sun and moon,

14 Nor monstrous deeds on earth, nor the blue depth / Of sea or ocean, nor the signs of sneezing, / Nor birds of augurers, nor soothsayers, / Nor wizards, nor enchanters, nor the frauds / And silly speeches of ventriloquists, Nor studies of Chaldean astrologers, / Nor oracles they gather from the stars. / For all these things are errors, which vain men / Search day by day, and exercise their souls / In labors void of profit, and then teach Their error unto other thoughtless men. / Hence many evils have befallen men, / And turned them from good ways and righteous deeds. / But they do seek with care for righteousness / And virtue, and have not the avarice Which breeds unnumbered ills to mortal men, / Continuous war, and famine without end. / Just measure they observe in field and town; / They steal not from each other in the night, / Nor drive off herds of oxen, sheep, and goats;

15 Nor do they neighbors' landmarks take away; / Nor does the man of great wealth grieve the poor, / Nor oppress widows, but he rather aids, / Ever imparting wheat and wine and oil, / And always happy with those that have nought; And to the destitute at harvest-time / He sends a share. Thus they fulfill the word / Of the great God—a hymn enshrined in law. / For he who dwells in heaven completed earth / To be a common property for all. But when the people of twelve tribes depart / From Egypt and with joy pursue their way, / With leaders sent of God, they will proceed / In a pillar of fire by night, and one of cloud / At morning of each day as they go on; And for them God a leader will appoint, / A great man, Moses, whom a princess found / Beside a marsh, and carried off and reared / And called her son. But when anon he came / As leader of the people whom God brought Away from Egypt to the Sinai mount, / Then God delivered them the law from heaven, / And wrote upon two tables all things just, / Which he enjoined to do; and if, perchance, / One give no heed, he must unto the law

16 Make satisfaction, either at men's hands, / Or, if man's notice he escape, he shall / By ample satisfaction be destroyed. / For he who rules in heaven completed earth / To be a common property for all, And in all bosoms placed he noblest thought. / To them alone the bounteous field yields fruit, / A hundred-fold from one, and thus completes / God's measure. But to them shall also come / Misfortune, nor will they escape all plague. And even thou, forsaking thy fair shrine, / Shalt flee away when it becomes thy lot / To leave the holy ground, and thou shalt be / Carried to the Assyrians, and shalt see / Wives and young children serving hostile men. All means of life and wealth shall be destroyed, / And every land and sea be filled with thee, / And at thy customs all will take offense. / Thy land shall be all waste, and the fenced altar / And sacred temple and extended walls,

17 All to the ground shall fall, because in heart / Thou hast not kept the holy law of God; / But thou hast erred and served vain images, / And hast not feared the immortal Sire of gods / And of all men, nor willed to honor him, But thou hast honored images of men. / Therefore seven decades shall thy fruitful land / And the wonders of the temple be a waste. / And yet for thee a goodly end remains, / And highest glory from the immortal God. But wait thou, and confide in God's pure laws, / When to the light he lifts thy wearied knee. / And then will God send out of heaven a king / To judge each man in blood and light of fire. / There is a royal tribe, whose progeny Shall be unfailing, and in course of time / Will it rule, and God's temple build anew. / And all the kings of Persia will assist / With gold and brass and well-wrought iron, and God / Himself will give by night the holy dream,

18 And then the temple shall be as of old, / Now when my soul had ceased from hallowed song, / And I prayed the great Sire to be released, / Again a message of Almighty God / Rose in my heart, and he commanded me To prophesy o'er all the earth, and place / In royal minds the things which are to be. / And to my mind God gave me first to tell / What bitter woes for Babylon he planned, / Because they God's great temple had destroyed. Alas! alas! for thee, O Babylon, / And also for the Assyrians, when the clash / Of arms shall pass through all the sinful earth, / And shout of war shall ruin every land, / Even as the stroke of God, leader of hymns. For it will come as from the air above, / O Babylon, and from the holy ones / Of the high heaven it will descend on thee, / And wrath eternal shall destroy thy children. / And then wilt thou be as thou wast at first,

19 Even as things which are not, and with blood / Shalt thou be filled, as thou before didst shed / The blood of many good and righteous men, / Whose blood yet cries out to the lofty heaven. / To thee, O Egypt, a great plague shall come, Dreadful to homes, and such as thou didst hope / Might never fall on thee; for through thy midst / A sword shall pass, and separation, death, / And famine shall prevail until of kings / The seventh generation, and then cease. Woe, woe to thee, O land of Gog and Magog, / In the midst of the rivers of Ethiopia! / What pouring out of blood shalt thou receive, / And be called house of judgment among men! / And thy land of much dew shall drink black blood. Woe, woe, to thee, O Libya, and woe, woe, / O sea and land! Ye daughters of the West / How shall ye come upon a bitter day! / And ye shall come pursued by cruel strife / Dreadful and harsh; dire judgment will set in,

20 And by force ye will all to ruin come, / Because ye marred the Immortal's mighty house, / And with iron teeth ye chewed it terribly. / So shalt thou see thy land full of the dead, / By war, and every spirit of violence, Famine, and pestilence, and barbarous foes, / Thy land all desert and the city waste. / And there shall shine at evening-time a star / Which they will call a comet, baleful sign / To mortals of dire famine, sword, and death, And ruin of great leaders and chief men. / And among men great signs again shall be, / For the deep-flowing Tanais will forsake / Mæotis' marshy lake, and the deep stream / Shall flow along a fruitful furrow's mark, And the vast flood a neck of land shall check. / And there will be wide chasms and yawning pits, / And many cities with their men shall fall. / In Asia—Iassus, Cebren, Pandonia, / Colophon, Ephesus, Nice, Antioch,

21 Tanagra, Sinope, Smyrna, Myrina. / In Europe—Cyagra, Clitos, Basilis, / Meropeia, Antigone, Magnesia, / Mykene, Pantheia, and most happy Gaza, / Hierapolis and Astypalia. Know, then, Egypt's dread race is near its end, / And then unto the Alexandrians / Better the year gone by. Though Rome received / Tribute of Asia, thrice as many goods / Shall Asia back again receive from Rome, And savage insolence return to her. / Many from Asia served Italian homes, / But the Italians, twenty times as many, / Shall serve in Asia in great poverty. / O virgin, soft, rich child of Latin Rome, How oft at thy much-courted wedding-feasts, / Drunken with wine, a servant, in the world / Thou shalt not become wedded, but how oft / Will haughty mistress cut thy pretty hair, / And taking vengeance cast upon the earth The things of heaven, and from the earth again / Raise heavenward, for mortals are held fast / In miserable and unrighteous life. / And Samos shall be sand, and Delos dull, / And Rome a room, but all decrees fulfilled;

22 And Smyrna falls by no avenging word, / But by base plots and cowardice of leaders. / But calm peace into Asia's land shall go, / And Europe shall be happy—healthful air, / Full of years, strong, no winter and no hail; Bearing all things, and birds and beasts of earth. / O happiest man who at that time shall be! / Or woman, free from care, in rural bliss! / For all good order from the starry heaven / Shall come on men, and justice, and with her The sober concord which with mortal men / Surpasses all things, and affection, faith, / And friendship for the stranger. Far from them / Are lawlessness, blame, envy, folly, wrath. / And want shall flee from men, and violence, And murder, baneful strifes and bitter feuds, / And theft, and every evil, in those days. / But Macedonia shall to Asia bear / A heavy woe, and greatest suffering / Shall spring up over Europe from a birth

23 Of spurious Kronids and a race of slaves; / And she shall subjugate fenced Babylon, / And in all lands the sun looks down upon / Call herself mistress, and then come to nought / In bitter ruin, having not a law For those late born, and wandering far away. / And then shall come to Asia's happy land, / Unknown, a man with purple garment clad, / Ferocious, strange, unrighteous, fiery; / For him a thunderbolt raised into light. And Asia all shall bear an evil yoke, / And many a murder will the damp soil drink. / And he will court all the invisibles / Of Hades, whose race he wills to destroy, / And from whom his own race shall be destroyed. But there will be one root, perversely cut / From ten horns, and set by another plant; / The warlike father of the purple race / He will cut off, and be himself then taken / By sons of like mind in the chance of war;

24 And then the horn grown by his side shall rule. / And straightway unto fruitful Phrygia / Shall be a sign, when Rhea's blood-stained race, / Growing and blooming in the god-like earth / Continually from roots that know no thirst, Shall in one night be root and branch destroyed, / In a city of Neptune, shaker of the earth, / Antandrus, which thenceforward bears the name / Dorylæum, old Phrygia's much-wept town, / And therefore at that time Earth-shaker called. It will scatter the secret places of the earth / And loosen walls. And then no signs of good / But a beginning of evil will appear. / There will come on the well-known woes of war, / Among all tribes, and furnish Æneads Sprung from the native soil and kindred blood; / But he again is prey to men beloved. / O Ilion, I pity thee! For Erinnys / In Sparta shall spring forth most beautiful; / A noble shoot and famous, she bequeaths

25 Asia and Europe a far-spreading wave. / But to thee chiefly wailings, toils, and groans / She will bear and award; but thou shalt have / Undying fame among those yet to be. / And then a certain old man will appear, False writer and of doubtful native land, / And in his eyes the light will sink away. / But he will have large mind, and song immense / Of understanding, blended with two names. / Chios he will be called, and he will write Of Ilion, not truthfully indeed, / But plainly, for my verses he will seize; / For he will be first to unfold my books. / And he war's helmed heroes will adorn, / Hector of Priam, and Achilles, son Of Peleus, and the rest of warlike fame. / And with them he will make the gods to stand, / And by all arts deceive defenseless men. / And to those dying about Ilion / Shall be a glory widely spread abroad;

26 And he will celebrate their vengeful deeds. / Also to Lycia will a Locrian race / Bring many evils. And thee, Chalcedon, / When thou the passage of the narrow sea / Hast taken, an Ætolian youth will slay. And, Cyzicus, from thee the sea shall tear / Vast wealth away. And thou, Byzantium, / Shalt be in love with Asia, and receive / Sad wailings and immeasurable blood. / And Lycia's lofty mountain, riven at top With rocky chasms, shall pour a murmuring stream, / Till Patara's prophetic signs shall cease. / O Cyzicus, that dwellest by Propontis, / City of wine, around thee Rhyndacus / Shall crash his crested wave. And thou, O Rhodes, Daughter of day, shalt long be unenslaved, / And much prosperity shall yet be thine, / And on the sea thy power shall be supreme. / But later thou shalt be to greedy men / A spoil, because of beauty and of wealth,

27 And on thy neck a dreadful yoke shall come. / A Lydian earthquake shall again destroy / The things of Persia, and most horribly / Shall Europe's tribes and Asia's suffer woes. / And Sidon's cruel king and shout of war From others will show forth destruction dire / Beyond the sea to Samos. With the blood / Of fallen lights earth murmurs to the sea, / And wives together with the stately maids / Their ignominious insults will bewail, Some for the dead, some for the fallen sons. / O sign of Cyprus, phalanxes shalt thou / By earthquake overthrow, and many souls / Shall gloomy Hades all at once receive. / And Trallis, hard by Ephesus, shall fall By earthquake, and walls built by cruel men; / Boiling hot water shall rain on the earth, / Which earth weighed down shall drink—a sulphurous smell. / And Samos, in time, will royal houses build.

28 / O Italy, to thee no foreign war Shall come, but lamentable tribal blood, / Not easily subdued, and much renowned, / Wilt thou in reckless insolence destroy. / But thou thyself, beside hot ashes stretched, / As thou in thine own spirit didst foresee, Shall slay thyself. Not of the good shalt thou / The mother be, but of wild beasts the nurse. / Another man shall come from Italy, / A spoiler; then, Laodicea, thou, / Beautiful city of the Carians, By Lycus' wondrous water, creeping prone, / Shalt weep in silence for thy boastful sire. / Byzantine Thracians shall rise up on Hæmus. / To the Campanians quaking fear shall come / Because of wasting famine; Corsica Weeps her old father, and Sardinia / Shall by great storms of winter, and the strokes / Of a holy God, sink in the ocean depths— / Down in the waves with children of the sea. / Alas! alas! how many virgin maids

29 Will Hades marry, and the deep take charge / Of the unburied youths! Alas! alas! / Infants and vast wealth floating on the sea! / O happy land of Mysians, suddenly / Shall cease thy royal race. Not long, indeed, Will Carthage stand. But bitter grief shall be / To the Galatians. And to Tenedos / The last but greatest misery shall come. / And Sicyon with strong yells, and Corinth, thee / Boasting o'er all, an equal flute shall sound. Now when my soul had ceased from hallowed song, / Again a message of Almighty God / Rose in my heart, and he commanded me / To utter prophecies upon the earth. / Woe, woe, Phenician race of men and women, Also to all the cities by the sea; / No one of you shall come to the sun's light / In common light, no longer shall there be / Number and tribe, because of unjust speech / And lawless life and base which all indulged,

30 Opening a foul mouth, uttering fearful words, / False and unrighteous; and they set themselves / In opposition to the mighty God, / And opened falsely a polluted mouth. / Therefore shall they by dreadful strokes be slain In all the earth, and bitter destiny / Will God send on them, burning from the ground / Their cities and foundations manifold. / Woe, woe to thee, O Crete, burdened with pain, / On thee shall come a stroke, and terribly Shalt thou be made a ruin evermore. / And every land shall see thee black with smoke, / And fire shall never leave thee, but shall burn. / Woe, woe to thee, O Thrace, for thou shalt bend / Beneath a servile yoke; when the Galatians, Mixed with the Dardans, hurriedly destroy / Hellas, then will sore evil come on thee; / In a strange land thou'lt give and yet receive. / Woe, woe to thee, O Gog, and so with all, / One by one, Magog, Marson, and Aggon;

31 How many an evil lot shall fall to thee! / Many shall also fall on Lycia's sons, / And those of Mysia and Phrygia. / And many nations of Pamphylia / And Lydia shall fall, and Maurians, And Ethiopians and barbarous tribes, / And Cappadocians and Arabians. / How now may I, according to his lot, / Speak of each one? For unto all the nations, / As many as are dwelling on the earth, Will the Most High send forth an evil plague. / When now a very barbarous nation comes / Against the Greeks, it will slay many chiefs / Of chosen men; and many fatted sheep / And horses shall be torn, and mules and herds Of bellowing oxen, and in lawlessness / Shall they with fire the well-made houses burn. / And many shall as slaves be led by force / Into a foreign land, and children too, / And women from bed-chambers, girdled low,

32 Delicate, falling down with tender feet, / Will be seen chained and suffering all abuse / By hostile, barbarous men; nor shall they have / Helper in life, nor any help in war. / But they shall see their goods and all their wealth Enriching foes; and trembling takes their knees. / A hundred fly, but one shall slay them all, / And five shall rouse an ambush heavy-armed. / But they among themselves mixed shamefully / In fearful war and tumult will bring joy Unto the foes, but sorrow to the Greeks. / Then shall a servile yoke be on all Greece, / And all at once shall war and pestilence / With mortals yet remain. And God will make / The mighty heaven on high like brass, and drought On all the earth, which itself will be iron. / And then will men all bitterly lament / The land uncultivated and unplowed. / And he who made the heaven and earth will place / High heaped on earth a fire, and of all men

33 The third part only shall remain alive. / O Greece, why hast thou trusted mortal men / As leaders, who cannot escape from death? / And wherefore bringest thou thy foolish gifts / Unto the dead, and sacrifice to idols? Who put the wretched error in thy heart / To do these things and leave the mighty God? / Honor the All-Father's name and let it not / Escape thee. There have been a thousand years, / Yea, and five hundred more, since haughty kings Ruled o'er the Greeks, who first to mortal men / Brought evils, making many images / Of gods that perish for such as are dead, / Whence ye were taught to think on vanities. / But when the anger of the mighty God Shall come upon you, then will ye find out / The face of God the mighty; and all souls / Of men, in great distress, will lift their hands / Up to the broad heaven and begin to call / On the great King, the Helper, and to seek

34 A rescuer from the mighty wrath to come. / But come, learn this and lodge it in your hearts, / What troubles in the rolling years shall come. / When Hellas brings her sacrifice of oxen / And bellowing bulls, a whole burnt-offering Unto the temple of the mighty God, / She shall escape the hateful sound of war, / And fear and famine, and go forth again / Away from underneath a slavish yoke. / But such a race of godless men shall be Until that fatal day receives its end. / For ye shall not bring sacrifice to God / Till all things come to pass, whatever things / The one God wills to be not without end— / All shall be brought to pass; strong fate impels. Of godly men there yet shall be again / A holy race, devoted to the mind / And counsels of the Highest; they shall honor / The great God's temple with drink-offerings, / Burnt-offerings, and holy hecatombs,

35 With sacrifice of well-fed bulls, choice rams, / Firstlings of sheep, and the fat parts of lambs, / Sacredly offering whole burnt sacrifice / On the great altar. But in righteousness, / Having obtained the law of the Most High, Blest shall they dwell in cities and rich fields. / And prophets shall by the immortal One / Exalted be, and bring great joy to men. / For to them only has the great God given / His kindly counsel, and put in their hearts Faith and most noble thought. Through vain deceit / They do not hold in awe the works of men, / Of gold, and brass, and silver, and ivory, / And wood, and stone, clay forms of feeble gods, / Besmeared with chalk, with figures painted o'er— Whatever mortals with vain mind desire. / But they lift up their holy arms to heaven; / At daybreak from the couch they always cleanse / Their hands with water, and pay honors due / To God the immortal, who is ever great,

36 And then to parents. But above all men / They keep the bed of marriage undefiled, / And mix not boys with males in acts impure, / Like the Phenicians, Latins, and Egyptians, / And spacious Greece, and nations many more, Persians, Galatians, and of Asia all, / Transgressing the immortal God's pure law. / Wherefore the Immortal will inflict on men / Delusion, famine, sufferings and groans, / And war, and pestilence, and mournful woes; Because the immortal Father of all men / They did not wish to honor righteously, / But honored idols made with human hands, / Which things even men themselves will cast away / In clefts of rocks, concealing them from shame, When a young king of Egypt seventh shall rule / His own land, reckoned from the Grecian power / Which Macedonia's mighty men shall rule, / Then shall there come from Asia a great king / With eagle's fire, who with his foot and horse

37 Shall cover all the land, break down all things, / And fill all things with evil; he will cast / The Egyptian kingdom down, seize on all goods, / And ride upon the broad back of the sea. / And then before the mighty God, the King Immortal, they will bend the fair white knee / On the all-fostering earth, and all the works / Made with hands in a flame of fire shall fall; / And then great joy will God bestow on men. / For land, and trees, and countless flocks of sheep Will yield mankind the genuine fruit of wine, / And of sweet honey, and white milk, and wheat, / Which is for men the very best of all. / But thou, O mortal versed in various arts / And evil-minded, shalt not be like this; But turn back, and be reconciled to God. / Offer to God whole hecatombs of bulls / And lambs and goats, amid the circling hours. / Propitiate him, the immortal God; / Perchance he will show mercy. For himself

38 Alone is God, and other there is none. / Hold righteousness in honor, wrong no man / As by oppression, for the immortal One / Enjoins these things on miserable men. / But thou, be on thy guard against the wrath Of the great God, when to all men shall come / The height of famine, and, being overpowered, / They meet dire judgment. King shall seize on king / And wrest his land away, and nations waste / And plunder nations, and lords plunder tribes, And leaders all flee to another land, / And earth itself be changed, and barbarous rule / Ravage all Greece, and the rich land of wealth / Become exhausted, and straight into strife / Shall they because of gold and silver come In a strange land. (The love of gain will be / An evil guide for cities.) And they all / Shall be unburied, and their flesh shall be / By vultures and wild beasts of earth destroyed. / And when these things are finished, the huge earth

39 Shall all the remnants of the dead consume; / And all unsown shall it be, and unplowed, / Proclaiming woefully the abomination / Of countless men through many circling years, / And shields and javelins and all sorts of arms; Nor will the forest wood be cut for fire. / Then from the sunrise God will send a king, / Who will make all earth cease from evil war, / Killing some, others binding with strong oaths. / Nor yet will he by his own counsels do All these things, but by excellent decrees / Of God persuaded. But again the people / Of the great God with wealth will be weighed down, / With gold and silver and purple ornament, / And of good things will earth and sea be full. And then will kings begin again / To envy one another, and in heart / To cherish wicked projects. Envy brings / No good to wretched mortals. But again / Shall kings of nations rush upon the land

40 In masses, bringing doom upon themselves, / For they will purpose to destroy the shrine / Of the great God, and men most excellent. / What time they reach the land, polluted kings / Will sacrifice within the city's walls, Each having his own throne and subject tribe. / And then will God speak with a mighty voice / To all rude people of an empty mind; / And judgments from the mighty God shall come / Upon them, and they all shall be destroyed By an immortal hand. And fiery swords / Shall fall from heaven on earth, and mighty lights / Shall come down flaming in the midst of men. / And mother earth shall be tossed in those days / By an immortal hand, and fish of the sea, And all earth's beasts, and countless flocks of birds, / And all the souls of men, and all the sea / Shall shudder at the face of the Immortal, / And there shall be dismay. High mountain peaks / And huge hills he will rend, and Erebus

41 The dark and dismal will appear to all; / And misty gorges in the lofty hill / Shall be full of the dead; the rocks shall stream / With blood, and every torrent fill the plain. / And well-built walls shall all fall to the earth By hostile men, for they knew not the law, / Neither God's judgment, but with senseless soul, / All rushing to the temple, lifted spears. / God judges all by war, and sword, and fire, / And overwhelming flood; and there shall be Brimstone from heaven, and stones and grievous hail; / And death shall come upon the quadrupeds. / Then shall men come to know the immortal God / Who judges these things. Lamentation too, / And uproar shall come on the boundless earth, Because men perish, and in speechless woe / Shall all be bathed in blood, and earth herself / Shall drink the blood of them that are destroyed, / And the wild beasts will glut themselves with flesh. / All these things the eternal God himself

42 Gave me to prophesy; nor shall they be / Without complete fulfillment, for he put / Them only in the heart; for without guile / The Spirit of God continues in the world. / Again the children of the mighty God Shall all about the temple live in peace, / Delighting in those things which he shall give / Who is Creator, righteous Judge, and King. / For he alone, and standing wondrous near, / Can shelter as a wall of flaming fire From all around. And there shall be no wars / In cities or in country; not the hand / Of cruel war, but rather there shall be / With them the immortal Champion himself, / And the hand of the Holy One. And then the isles And cities all shall speak, and tell how much / The Immortal loves those men, for he with them / Shares in all conflict and delivers them. / And heaven, and sun divinely formed, and moon, / And mother earth shall tremble in those days.

43 And a sweet word shall they lead forth in hymns: / "Come, falling on the earth let us all pray / To the immortal King, great God, most high. / Let us send to the temple, since sole Lord / He is, and let us all observe the law Of God most high, who above all on earth / Is the most righteous One. For we have strayed / Far from the path of the immortal One, / And have done reverence with a senseless soul / To works of human hands, to images Carved out of wood, and of departed men." / These things souls of the faithful cry aloud: / "Come, let us with God's people, falling down / Upon our faces, gladden in our homes / With hymns God the Creator, and procure The weapons of our foes in every land / For seven lengths of the revolving years— / Even shields and helmets and all sorts of arms, / And a great store of bows and harmful arrows, / For forest wood shall not be cut for fire."

44 But, wretched Hellas, cease thy arrogance, / So willful, and entreat the immortal One, / Magnanimous, and be upon thy watch. / Send to this city the people ill-advised / Who from the Mighty's holy land have come. Do not move Camarina, for 'tis best / She be unmoved—a leopard from the lair, / An evil which thou shouldst by no means meet. / But keep away, and do not in thy heart / Hold arrogance, an overbearing soul, Ready for mighty contest. And serve God, / The mighty One, that thou mayst share with them, / Whenever this indeed shall have an end, / And on good men shall come the fatal day, / According as the mighty One ordains. For earth, all-mother, shall to mortals yield / The best fruit, boundless store of wheat, / And wine and oil. And from the heaven a drink, / Delightful of sweet honey there shall be, / And trees, and fruits of trees, and fatted sheep,

45 And oxen, and young lambs, and kids of goats. / And forth shall burst sweet fountains of white milk, / And of good things the cities shall be full, / And fat the fields, and there shall not be sword / Nor uproar on the earth, nor shall the earth Groan heavily and tremble any more. / Nor war nor drought shall longer be on earth, / Nor famine, nor the fruit-destroying hail, / But great peace shall be upon all the earth. / King will be friend to king until the end Of time, and a new law on all the earth / Will the Immortal in the starry heaven / Perfect for men, touching whatever things / Have been by miserable mortals done. / For he alone is God, no other is, And he will burn with fire man's grievous power. / But now being quick to keep my thoughts in heart, / Shun godless worship, serve the living God, / Against adultery be on thy guard, / And all uncleanness; thine own children rear,

46 And do no murder; for the immortal One / Is angry with such as commit these sins. / And then will he a kingdom for all time / Raise up for all men, and a holy law / Give to the pious to whom he has pledged To open up the land, and the wide world, / And portals of the blessed, and all joys, / And mind immortal, and eternal bliss. / And out of every land unto the house / Of the great God will they bring frankincense, And gifts, and there shall be no other house / To be inquired of by men yet to be; / But whom God gave to honor faithful men, / Him mortals shall call Son of the great God. / And all paths of the field and the rough hills, And lofty mountains, and the sea's wild waves, / Shall in those days be easy to pass over, / For all peace of the good shall come on earth. / And the sword shall God's prophets take away, / For they shall be the judges of mankind,

47 And righteous kings; for of the mighty God / This is the judgment and the sovereignty. / Be of good cheer, O maiden, and exult; / For the Eternal, who made heaven and earth, / Has given thee joy, and he will dwell in thee, And for thee shall be an immortal light. / And wolves and lambs promiscuously shall eat / Grass in the mountains, and among the kids / Shall leopards graze, and wandering bears shall lodge / Among the calves, and the carnivorous lion Shall eat straw in the manger like the ox, / And little children lead them with a band. / For tame will be on earth the beasts he made, / And with young babes will dragons fall asleep, / And no harm, for God's hand will be on them. Now tell I thee a sign exceeding clear, / That thou mayst know when of all things on earth / The end shall be. When in the starry heaven / Swords shall be seen by night toward west or east, / Straightway shall there be a dark cloud of dust,

48 Borne downward from the heaven o'er all the earth, / And the sun's brightness in the midst of heaven / Shall be eclipsed, and the moon's beams appear / And come again on earth, and there shall be / The sign of blood-drops issuing from the stones, And ye shall see a war of foot and horse / In a cloud, like a hunting of wild beasts, / Like a dark mist. This is the end of war / Which God who dwells in heaven shall bring to pass. / But all must sacrifice to the great King. These things to thee say I, who madly left / Assyria's long Babylonian walls, / And prophesied to all men of the fire, / God's fury which on Hellas should be sent, / That I might unto mortals prophesy Of mysteries divine. They say in Greece / That I am of a foreign fatherland, / Born of Erythres, shameless. Others say / I am a Sibyl and of Circe born / And father Gnostos, raving mad, and false.

49 But at the time when all things come to pass / Ye will make mention of me; no one more / Will call me mad, but God's great prophetess. / For God will show me whatsoever things / Belonged at first to my progenitors, Those things God laid down in his plans for me. / All future things God stored up in my mind, / That I might prophesy of things to come, / And things that were, and tell them unto men. / For when the world was deluged with a flood Of waters, and one man alone was left, / A man of honor, sailing on the waves / In wooden house, along with beasts and birds, / His bride was I, and from his blood I came. / To him the first things were, and the last things Were all made known; and so from mine own mouth / All these things have I truthfully declared.

Book IV

1 Hear, people of proud Asia, Europe too, / How many things by great loud-sounding mouth, / All true and of my own, I prophesy. / No oracle of false Apollo this, Whom vain men called a god, though he deceived; / But of the mighty God, whom human hands / Shaped not, like speechless idols cut in stone. / For his house is no dedicated stone / Set for a temple, wholly deaf and dumb, A great and sore dishonor to mankind; / For he, not formed by mortal hands, from earth / May not be seen, nor measured by men's eyes. / He looks on all, himself by no one seen. / His are the murky night, and day, and sun, And stars, and moon, and seas that swarm with fish, / And land, and rivers, and perennial fountains, / Creatures designed for life, and rains that serve / To bring forth fruit, and tree, and wine, and oil. / The same has moved me in my inmost soul

2 As with a whip, how many and great things / Now and hereafter shall befall mankind, / From the first generation to the eleventh, / Truly to tell. For all things he hath spoken / Who himself bringeth all things to an end. But thou, O people, hear the Sibyl's words, / Who pours from hallowed mouth a truthful strain. / Blessed of men shall they be on the earth / As many as shall love the mighty God, / Giving him praise before they eat and drink, Trusting in piety. Such, when they see / Temples and altars, copies of dumb stones / Without worth, and polluted with the blood / Of living things and sacrifice of beasts, / Reject them all; but they shall look upon One God's great glory, having not committed / Atrocious murder, nor acquired vast gain / By stealing, which things are most horrible; / Nor shameful longing for another's bed / Had they, nor vile and hateful lust of males.

3 Such mode of life and customs other men / Shall never imitate, as if they longed / For shamelessness; but children without sense / With jest and laughter ridiculing them— / Presumptuous deeds and vile—shall lie to them In as many things as they themselves shall do; / For hard to trust is the whole race of men. / But when the final judgment of the world / And mortals comes, which God himself shall bring, / Judging at once the impious and the just, The ungodly under darkness he will send, / And they shall know what wickedness they wrought; / But in a fruitful land the just shall dwell, / God giving them breath, life, and sustenance. / But all these things shall surely come to pass In the tenth generation; and what things / From the first generation shall occur / I now declare. First shall the Assyrians rule / Over all men, and wield authority / During six generations of the world,

4 From the time when, the God of heaven being wroth, / Sea covered earth and cities and all men, / A whelming flood of waters breaking in. / The Medes shall overcome them, and exult / Two generations only on the throne, At which time these events shall come to pass: / Dark night shall be at the mid-hour of day, / And from the heaven the stars and circling moon / Shall disappear, and earthquakes shake the land, / And many cities and the works of men Hurl to the dust; and then out of the deep / The islands of the sea shall peer aloft. / But when the great Euphrates overflows / With blood, then also both among the Medes / And Persians shall arise the direful noise Of battle, and the Medes, discomfited / And falling underneath the Persian spears, / Shall flee beyond the mighty Tigris' waves. / The Persian power shall be of all the world / The mightiest, and unto them shall be

5 One generation of most prosperous rule. / But such foul deeds as men seek to avert— / Battle-cries, murders, quarrels, banishments, / Ruin of towers, and rising up of cities— / Shall take place when proud, boasting Hellas sails O'er the broad Hellespont, and carries doom / To Phrygia and to Asia. But to Egypt, / The land of many furrows and much wheat, / Shall come a blasting famine twenty years, / What time the Nile, corn-nourisher, shall hide Somewhere beneath the earth his sable wave. / To Hellas there shall come a mighty king / From Asia, with innumerable ships, / Lifting his spear on high, and he shall walk / The wet paths of the deep, and sail alone Where others tread on foot; him, fugitive / From battle, fearful Asia shall receive. / And Sicily the wretched shall a stream / Of powerful fire destroy, while Etna's flame / Breaks forth, and down into the molten stream

6 Shall Croton, great and powerful city, fall. / And strife shall be in Hellas; they shall rage / Against each other, and hurl to the dust / Numerous cities, and kill many men / Wrangling; but equal is the strife for both. But when at length the course of time shall come / To the tenth generation of mankind, / Then shall there be a slavish yoke and fear / Upon the Persians. And when Macedon / Shall boast the scepter, there shall come to Thebes A terrible destruction; and the Carians / Shall dwell in Tyre, and Tyrians be destroyed. / And sand shall hide all Samos under shore; / Delos shall be no longer visible; / And Babylon, magnificent to see, But small to fight, shall stand with vain hopes walled. / Macedonians shall dwell in Bactria, / And those of Bactria and Susa all / Shall flee away into the land of Greece. / These things shall come to pass when Pyramus,

7 Pouring his silvery eddies on the shore, / Shall reach afar unto a sacred isle. / And Sybaris shall fall, and Cyzicus, / When earthquakes shake the land, and cities perish. / To Rhodes shall come the last but greatest woe. Nor shall the Macedonians always rule; / But from the West a great Italian war / Shall blossom out, and under it the world, / Bearing a slavish yoke, shall subject be / To the Italians. Thou, O Carchedon, Thy tower shall also to the ground be hurled. / Wretched Laodicea, thee some day / Shall earthquakes damage, leveling to the dust; / But a city of broad streets shall rise again. / And also thou, O wretched Corinth, shalt Some day behold thy utter overthrow. / O Lycian Myra, who art beautiful, / Thee also some time shall the heaving land / Hurl to the dust, and falling prone to earth, / Amid the din of battle thou shalt pray

8 To flee, an alien, to another land. / Then on the godless ones of Patara, / Along with thunders and with earthquake shocks / Another shall pour out a dark sea flood. / Also for thee, Armenia, there remains A slavish fate, and then shall also come / To Solyma an evil blast of war, / From Italy, and God's great temple spoil. / But when they, trusting folly, shall forget / Piety, and foul murder consummate Around the temple, then from Italy / A mighty king, even like a star, shall flee / Unseen, unknown, beyond Euphrates' ford. / Then shall he expiate the bloody crime / Of matricide, and many other deeds Which he with wicked hands will have performed. / And many about Rome's sacred plain shall bleed, / While he escapes beyond the fatherland. / But into Syria Rome's great chief shall come / And burn with fire the temple, and with spear

9 Shall slaughter many men of Solyma, / And spoil the great broad country of the Jews. / And then, too, shall an earthquake overthrow / Both Salamis and Paphos, and dark floods / Shall wildly dash on wave-washed Cyprus' shore. But when from deep clefts of the Italian land / Fire shall come whirling into the broad heaven / And many cities burn and men destroy, / And a vast mass of heated ashes shall fill / The expanse of air, and the small drops of rain Shall fall like a red mildew out of heaven, / Then know the anger of the heavenly God, / Because they slew the blameless godly race. / And thereupon into the West shall come / The wrangle of a newly wakened war, And bearing a huge spear, Rome's fugitive / Shall cross Euphrates with many myriads. / O hapless Antioch, thee they shall call / No more a city, when thou fallest down / Through want of understanding round thy spears.

10 Then also famine and war's horrid din / Shall ruin Cyprus. Woe, wretched Cyprus, woe! / Thou shalt be hidden by the sea's broad wave, / Which by the wintry blasts is tossed on high. / But into Asia there shall come great wealth, Which Rome herself, once plundering, put away / In her luxurious homes; and twice as much / Of other things shall she to Asia give; / And then there shall be an excess of war. / And Carian cities by Mæander's wave, Which have been beautifully fenced with towers, / Shall by a bitter famine be destroyed, / When the Mæander his dark water hides. / But when from men shall perish piety, / And faith and righteousness, and they shall live In recklessness profane, and insolence / Presumptuous, and full many other sins, / And of the pious no one makes account, / But from a want of understanding all / Like children utterly destroy themselves,

11 In violence exulting, and in blood / Holding their hands, then will it be discerned / That God is mild no longer, but surcharged / With fury, and by a great conflagration / Will utterly destroy the race of men. Ah, miserable mortals, change these things, / Nor tempt the mighty God to wrath extreme; / But letting go swords, wailings, homicides, / And insolence, wash in the flowing stream / The whole body, and with hands stretched out to heaven, Seek pardon for the former deeds, and heal / Bitter impiety with piety, / And God will give repentance, not destroy. / And he will stay his wrath, if ye will all / Observe in your hearts precious piety. But if, ill-minded, ye obey me not, / But loving wickedness, receive these things / With a base hearing, over all the world / Fire shall be, and the greatest omens, swords, / And trumpets, at the rising of the sun;

12 All earth the mighty roaring sound shall hear. / The whole land he will burn, and the whole race / Of men shall perish, and he will consume / All cities, with the rivers and the seas; / These all shall be reduced to smoky dust. But when all things become an ashy pile, / God will put out the fire unspeakable / Which he once kindled, and the bones and ashes / Of men will God himself again transform, / And raise up mortals as they were before. And then will be the judgment; God himself / Will sit as judge, and judge the world again. / As many as committed impious sins / Shall Stygian Gehenna's depths conceal / 'Neath molten earth and dismal Tartarus. But the pious shall again live on the earth, / And God will give them spirit, life, and means / Of nourishment, and all shall see themselves, / Beholding the sun's sweet and cheerful light. / O happiest man, who at that time shall live!