O MEN, why do ye vainly think on things
2Too lofty, as if ye immortal were?
3And ye are ruling but a little time,
4And over mortals all desire to reign,
5Not understanding that God himself hates
6The lust of rule, and most of all things hates
7Insatiate kings fearful in wickedness,
8And over them he stirs up what is dark;
9Wherefore, instead of good works and just thoughts,
10Ye all choose for your garments purple robes,
11Desiring wretched fights and homicides
12Them God imperishable who dwells in heaven
13Shall make short-lived, destroy them utterly,
14And overthrow one here, another there.
15But when there shall a bull-destroyer come
16Trusting in his own might, thick-haired and grim,
17And shall destroy all, he shall also tear
18Shepherds in pieces, and no victory
19Shall be theirs unless soon, with speed of feet
20Pursuing eagerly through wooded glens,
21Young dogs shall meet in conflict; for a dog
22Pursued the lion which destroys the shepherds.
23And then there shall be a lord confident
24In his might, and named with four syllables,
25And shown forth clearly from the number one;
26But him shall brazen Ares quickly slay
27Because of conflict with insatiate men.
28Then shall two other princely men bear rule,
29Both of the number forty; and with them
30Shall great peace be in the world and to all
31The people law and right; but them in turn
32Shall men with gleaming helmet, needing gold
33And silver, impiously put to death
34For these things, catching them by their deft plans.
35And then again a dreadful lord shall rule,
36Young, fighting hand to hand, whose name shall show
37The number seventy, life-destroying, fierce,
38Who to the army basely shall betray
39The people of Rome, slain by wickedness
40Because of wrath of kings, and he shall hurl
41Down every city and hut of the Latins.
42And Rome is no more to be seen or heard,
43Such as of late another traveler saw;
44For all these things shall in the ashes lie,
45Nor shall there be a sparing of her works;
46For hurtful he himself shall come from heaven,
47God the immortal from the sky shall send
48Lightnings and thunderbolts upon mankind;
49And some he will destroy by lightnings burned,
50And others with his mighty thunderbolts.
51And Rome's strong children and the famous Latins
52Shall then the shameless dreadful ruler slay.
53Around him dead the dust shall not lie light,
54But he shall be a sport for dogs and birds
55And wolves, for he a martial people spoiled.
56After him, numbering forty, there shall rule
57Another, famous Parthian-destroyer,
58German-destroyer, putting down dread beasts
59That kill men, which upon the ocean's streams
60And the Euphrates press continuous on.
61And then shall Rome again be as before.
62But when there comes a great wolf in thy plains,
63A ruler marching onward from the West,
64Then shall he under powerful Ares die
65Being cleft asunder by the piercing brass.
66And o'er the very mighty Romans then
67Shall there rule yet again another man
68Of great heart, from. Assyria brought to light,
69Of the first letter, and he shall himself
70By means of wars put all things under him,
71And by his armies at once power display
72And lay down laws; but him shall brazen Ares
73Quickly destroy by treacherous armies falling.
74After him three of haughty heart shall rule,
75One having the first number, one three tens,
76And the other with three hundred shall partake,
77Cruel, who gold and silver in much fire
78Shall melt in statues of gods made with hands,
79And to the armies they, equipped for war,
80Will, for the sake of victory, moneys give,
81Dividing many costly things and goods;
82And in like manner, striving eagerly
83After power, they shall barm disastrously
84The arrow-shooting Parthians of the deep
85And swift Euphrates, and the hostile Medes,
86And the soft-haired warlike Massagetæ
87And Persians also, quiver-bearing men.
88But when the king shall his own fate unloose
89Leaving unto his sons more fit for arms
90The royal scepter and entreating right,
91Then they, forgetful of their father's words
92And having their hands all prepared for war,
93Shall rush in conflict for the royal power.
94And then another lord, of the third number,
95Shall rule alone, and smitten by a sword
96Shall quickly see his fate. Then after him
97Shall many perish at each other's hands,
98Being very valiant for the royal power.
99Moreover a great-hearted one shall rule
100The very mighty Romans, an old lord,
101Of the number four, and manage all things well.
102And then upon Phœnicia shall come war
103And conflict, when there shall come nations near
104Of arrow-shooting Persians; ah, how many
105Shall before men of barbarous speech fall down!
106Sidon and Tripolis and Berytus
107The loudly-boasting shall behold each other
108Amid the blood and bodies of the dead.
109Wretched Laodicea, round thyself
110Thou shalt a great and unsuccessful war
111Stir up through the impiety of men,
112Ah, hapless Tyrians, ye shall gather in
113An evil harvest; when in the day-time
114The sun that lighteth mortals shall withdraw,
115And his disk not appear, and drops of blood
116Thick and abundant shall flow down from heaven
117Upon the earth. And then the king shall die,
118Betrayed by his companions. After him
119Shall many shameless leaders still promote
120The wicked strife and one another kill.
121And then shall there a reverend ruler be,
122Of much skill, with a name that numbers five,
123Confiding in great armies, whom mankind
124Will fondly love because of royal power;
125And having the good name he shall thereto
126Add by good deeds. But while he reigns there shall
127'Twixt Taurus and snow-clad Amanus be
128A fearful sign. From the Cilician land
129A city new and beautiful and strong
130Shall by the deep strong rivers be destroyed.
131And in Propontis and in Phrygia
132Shall there be many earthquakes. And the king
133Of great renown shall under his own lot
134By wasting deadly sickness lose his life.
135And after him shall rule two lordly kings,
136One numbering three hundred, and one three;
137And many shall he utterly destroy
138In defense of the seven-hill city Rome,
139And for the sake of powerful sovereignty.
140And then shall evil to the senate come,
141Nor shall it from the angry king escape
142While he holds wrath against it. And a sign
143Shall then appear to all men upon earth;
144And fuller shall the rains be, snow and hail
145Shall ruin field-fruits o'er the boundless earth.
146But they shall fall in wars, slain by strong Ares
147In behalf of the war for the Italians.
148And then again another king shall rule,
149Full of devices, gathering all the army,
150And for the sake of war distributing
151Money to those with brazen breastplate clad;
152But thereupon shall Nilus, rich in corn,
153Beyond the Libyan mainland irrigate
154For two years the dark soil and fruitful land
155Of Egypt; but all things shall famine seize
156And war and robbers, murders, homicides.
157And many cities shall by warlike men
158Be thrown down headlong by the army's hands;
159And he, betrayed, shall fall by gleaming iron.
160After him one whose number is three hundred
161Shall rule the Romans, very mighty men;
162He shall stretch forth a life-destroying spear
163Against the Armenians and the Parthians,
164The Assyrians and the Persians firm in war.
165And then anew shall a creation be
166Of splendidly built Rome with gold and amber
167And silver and ivory in order raised;
168And in her many people shall abide
169From all the East and from the prosperous West;
170And the king shall make other laws for her;
171But then shall death destructive and strong fate
172In turn receive him in a boundless isle.
173And there shall rule another, of ten triads,
174A man like a wild beast, fair-haired and grim,
175Who shall be a descendant of the Greeks.
176And then a city of Molossian Phthia
177Feeding much, and Larissa shall be bent
178Down on Peneus's overhanging brows;
179And then too in horse-feeding Scythia
180Shall be an insurrection. And dire war
181Shall be hard by the waters of the lake
182Mæotis at streams by the utmost mouth
183Of the fount of watery Phasis on the mead
184Of asphodel; and there shall many fall
185By powerful warriors. Ah, how many men
186Shall Ares with strong brass receive! And then,
187Having destroyed a Scythian race, the king
188Shall die in his own lot unloosing life.
189And yet another of the number four
190Shall rule thereafter, openly made known
191A dreadful man, whom all Armenians,
192Who drink the best ice of the flowing stream
193Araxes, and the Persians of great soul
194Shall fear in wars. And between Colchians
195And very strong Pelasgi there shall be
196Wars, fights, and homicides. And those who hold
197The cities of the land of Phrygia
198And those of the Propontis, and make bare
199From out their scabbards the two-edged swords,
200Shall smite each other through sore impiousness.
201And then shall God to mortal men display
202From heaven a great sign with the rolling years,
203A bat, the portent of bad war to come.
204And then the king shall not escape stern fate,
205But die by hand, slain by the gleaming iron.
206After him, numbering fifty, there shall rule
207Again another coming out of Asia,
208A dreadful terror, fighting hand to hand;
209And he shall set war on Rome's stately walls,
210And among Colchians, and Heniochi,
211And the milk-drinking Agathyrsians
212By Euxine sea, at Thracia's sandy bay.
213And then the king shall not escape stern fate,
214And they will tear in pieces his dead corpse.
215And then, the king slain, man-ennobling Rome
216Shall be a desert, and much people perish.
217And then again one terrible and dread
218From mighty Egypt shall rule, and destroy
219Great hearted Parthians and Medes and Germans,
220And Agathyrsians of the Bosporus,
221Iernians, Britons, and Iberians
222That bear the quiver, bent Massagetæ,
223And Persians thinking themselves more than men.
224And then a famous man shall look upon
225All Hellas, acting as an enemy
226To Scythia and windy Caucasas.
227And there shall be a dread sign while he rules:
228Crowns altogether like the shining stars
229Shall from heaven in the south and north appear.
230And then shall he bequeath the royal power
231To his son whose initial letter heads
232The alphabet, when in the halls of Hades
233The manly king in his own lot shall go.
234But when the son of this man in the land
235Of Rome shall rule, shown by the number one,
236There shall be over all the earth great peace
237Much longed for, and the Latins will love him
238As king because of his own father's worth;
239Him, eager to go both to East and West,
240The Roman people shall against his will
241Retain at home and in command of Rome,
242For among all there is a friendly heart
243Felt for their royal and illustrious lord.
244But baneful death shall snatch him out of life,
245Short-lived, abandoned to his destiny.
246But others afterwards again shall smite
247Each other, powerful warriors, carrying on
248An evil strife, not holding kingly power,
249But being tyrants. And in all the world
250Shall they bring many evil things to pass,
251But chiefly for the Romans till the time
252Of the third Dionysus, until armed
253With helmet Ares shall from Egypt come,
254Whom they shall surname Dionysus lord.
255But when the famous royal purple cloak
256A murderous lion and murderous lioness
257Shall rend, together they shall grasp the lungs
258Of the changed kingdom; then a holy king,
259Whose name has the first letter, pressing hard
260For victory, shall cast down hostile chiefs
261To be the food of dogs and birds of prey.
262Alas for thee, O city burned with fire,
263O powerful Rome! How many things must thou
264Needs suffer when all these things come to pass!
265But the great far-famed king shall afterward
266Raise thee all up again with gold and amber
267And silver and ivory, and in the world
268Thou shalt in thy possessions foremost be,
269Also in temples, market-places, wealth,
270And race-grounds; and then shalt thou be again
271A light for all, even as thou wast before.
272Ah, wretched Cecropes and Cadmeans
273And the Laconians, who are situate
274Around Peneus and Molossian stream
275Thick grown with rushes, Tricca and Dodona,
276And high-built Ithome, Pierian ridge
277Around the summit of Olympian mount,
278Ossa, Larissa, and high-gate Calydon.
279But when God shall for mortals bring to pass
280A great sign, day dark twilight round the world,
281Even then to thee, O king, the end shall come,
282Nor is it possible that thou escape
283A brother's piercing dart against thee hurled.
284And then again shall rule a life-destroyer,
285A fiery eagle from the royal race,
286Who shall of Egypt's offspring take fast hold,
287Younger, but than his brother much more strong,
288Who has for his first sign the number eighty.
289And then the whole world shall for honor's sake
290Bear in its lap the soul-distressing wrath
291Of the immortal God; and there shall come
292On mortal men, the creatures of a day,
293Famines and plagues and wars and homicides,
294And an incessant darkness o'er the earth,
295Mother of peoples, and relentless wrath
296From heaven, and disorder of the times,
297And earthquake shocks, and flaming thunderbolts,
298And stones and storms of rain and squalid drops.
299And the high summits of the Phrygian land
300Feel the shock, bases of the Scythian hills
301Feel the shock, cities tremble, and all earth
302Trembles at the cliffs of the land of Greece.
303And many cities, God being very wroth,
304Shall fall prone under burning thunderbolts
305And with bewailings, and to shun the wrath
306And make escape is not even possible.
307And then the king shall by a strong hand fall,
308Struck as if he were no one by his men.
309After him of the Latins many men
310Wearing the purple mantle on their shoulders
311Shall be again raised up, who shall by lot
312Desire to lay hold on the royal power.
313And then upon the stately walls of Rome
314Shall be three kings, two having the first number,
315And one the eponym of victory
316Bearing as no one else. They shall love Rome
317And all the world, concerned for mortal men;
318But they shall not accomplish anything;
319For God has not been gracious to the world
320Neither will he be gentle with mankind,
321Because they have done many evil things.
322Therefore to kings shall he a mean soul bring
323Still worse than that of leopards and of wolves;
324For harshly seizing them with their own hands,
325Like feeble women who are idly slain,
326Shall men in brazen breastplate utterly
327Destroy the kings together with their scepters.
328Ah, wretched lofty men of glorious Rome,
329Trusting in false oaths ye shall be destroyed.
330And then shall many masters with the spear,
331Men rushing not in order furious on,
332Take away offspring of the first-born men
333In their blood. . . . Therefore thrice
334Shall the Most High then bring on dreadful doom,
335And all men with their works shall he destroy.
336But into judgment yet again shall God
337Cause them to come that have a shameless soul,
338As many as determined evil things;
339And they themselves are fenced in, falling one
340Upon another, and given over there
341Into that condemnation of wickedness.
342. . . . . . .
343All one by one, yet a brilliant comet
344. . . . . . .
345Of much to come, of war and battle strife,
346But at the time when one about the isles
347Shall gather many oracles that speak
348To strangers of fight and of battle strife,
349And grievous harm of temples, he shall bid
350One in great haste to gather in Rome's halls
351For twelve months wheat and barley in abundance,
352And this most quickly. And in wretched plight
353The city shall be those days, and straightway
354Shall it again be prosperous not a little;
355And rest shall be when that rule is destroyed.
356And then the last race of the Latin kings
357Shall be, and after it again shall grow
358Dominion, children and the children's race
359Shall be unshaken; for it shall be known,
360Since of a surety God himself is king.
361There is a land dear, nourisher of men,
362Situate in a plain, and round it Nile
363Marks off the boundary and separates
364All Libya and Ethiopia.
365And Syrians short-lived, one from one place,
366Another from another, from that land
367Shall snatch away all movable effects;
368A great and careful lord shall be their king,
369Training up youth and sending off for men,
370And planning something fearful about those
371Most fearful, above all he shall send forth
372A powerful helper of all Italy
373The lofty-minded. And when he shall come
374Unto the dark sea of Assyria
375He shall despoil Phœnicians in their homes,
376And fastening evil war and battle dire
377Shall be one lord of the two lords of earth.
378And now will I for Alexandrians sing
379Their grievous end; alas, barbarians
380Shall possess sacred Egypt, land unharmed,
381Unshaken, when wrath from the gods shall come.
382. . . . . . .
383. . . making winter summer,
384Then shall the oracles be all fulfilled.
385But when three youths in the Olympian games
386Shall conquer, and thou shalt bid them that know
387The oracles that call on God to cleanse
388First by the blood of sucking quadruped,
389Thrice therefore shall the Most High then bring on
390A fearful lot, and be shall over all
391Brandish the mournful long spear; then much blood
392Barbarian shall be poured out in the dust
393When the city shall be plundered utterly
394By inhospitable strangers. Happy he
395Who is dead, also happy any one
396Who is without a child; for he who once
397Was leader surnamed for them that are free,
398Far-famed in song, no longer in his mind
399Revolving earlier plans, shall place their neck
400Under a servile yoke; such slavery,
401Cause of much weeping, shall a lord impose.
402And then straightway an army of Sicilians
403Ill-fated shall come, carrying dismay,
404When a barbarian nation shall again
405Come suddenly; and the fruit, when it grows,
406They from the field shall sever. Upon them
407Shall God the lofty Thunderer bestow
408Evil instead of good; continually
409Shall stranger pluck from stranger hateful gold.
410But now when all shall look upon the blood
411Of the flesh-eating lion and there comes
412Upon the body a murderous lioness,
413Down from his head will be the scepter cast
414Away from him. And as in friendly feast
415In Egypt when the people all partake,
416They perform valiant deeds, and one restrains
417Another, and among them there is much
418Shouting aloud; so also shall there be
419Upon mankind the fear of furious strife,
420And many shall be utterly destroyed
421And others kill each other by hard fights.
422And then one, covered with dark scales shall come;
423Two others shall come acting in concert
424With one another, and with them a third
425A great ram from Cyrene, whom before
426spoke of as a fugitive in war
427Beside the streams of Nile; but in no wise
428An unsuccessful way do all complete.
429And then the lengths of the revolving years
430Shall be exceeding quiet; yet again
431Thereafter shall a second war for them
432In Egypt be stirred up, and there shall be
433A battle on the sea, but victory
434Shall not be theirs. Ah, wretched ones, there shall
435A conquest of the famous city be,
436And it shall be a spoil of war not long.
437And then men having common boundaries
438Of much land shall flee wretched, and shall lead
439Their wretched parents. And they shall again
440Having great victory light on a land,
441And shall destroy the Jews, men staunch in war,
442Wasting by wars far as the hoary deep,
443On both sides, fighting in the foremost ranks
444For father-land and parents. And a race
445Of trophy-bearing men shall for the dead
446Be reckoned. Ah, how many men shall swim
447About the waves! For on the sandy beach
448Many shall lie; and heads of golden hair
449Shall fall beneath Egyptian winged fowls.
450And then for the Arabians mortal blood
451Shall go in quest. But when wolves shall with dogs
452Pledge in a sea-girt island solemn oaths,
453Then shall there be the raising of a tower,
454And the city that suffered very many things
455Men shall inhabit. For deceitful gold
456Shall no more be nor silver, nor acquiring
457Of the earth, nor much-laboring servitude;
458But one fast friendship and one mode of life
459With cheerful soul; and all things shall be common
460And equal light among the means of life.
461And wickedness shall sink down from the earth
462Into the vast sea. And then near at hand
463Is come the harvest-time of mortal men.
464There is imposed a strong necessity
465That these things be fulfilled. And at that time
466There shall not any other traveler say,
467In this conjecturing, that the race of men
468Though perishable shall ever cease to be.
469And then a holy nation shall prevail
470And hold the sovereignty of all the earth
471Unto all ages with their mighty sons.