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in this way you will also be a lover of learning. But I wish now, with God's help, to show you more accurately the matter of the chronology, so that you may know that our account is not recent nor mythical, but more ancient and truer than all the poets and writers who have written on uncertain grounds. For some, saying the world was uncreated, have plunged into the infinite, while others, affirming it was created, have said that fifteen myriads and three thousand and seventy-five years have already passed. Apollonius the Egyptian, then, relates these things. But Plato, who is thought to have been the wisest of the Greeks, into what great nonsense has he fallen! For in his works inscribed as the Republic, it is stated explicitly: "For how, if these things had remained arranged as they are now for all time, could any new thing whatever ever have been discovered? Because for ten thousand times ten thousand years they were unknown, then, to the people of that time; and it has been a thousand years, or twice as many, since some things became manifest from the time of Daedalus, and others from that of Orpheus, and others from that of Palamedes." And saying these things had happened, he indicates that ten thousand times ten thousand years passed from the flood until Daedalus. And after saying many things about cities and settlements and nations, he confesses to have said these things by conjecture. For he says: 'If, then, O stranger, some god should promise us that, if we undertake the second part of the investigation of the law, we shall hear discourses no worse or meaner than those now spoken, I for my part would go a long way.' Clearly he spoke by conjecture; and if by conjecture, then the things said by him are not true. It is necessary, therefore, to become a disciple of God's legislation, just as he himself confessed that it is otherwise impossible to learn what is accurate, unless God teaches through the law. And what of this? Did not the poets Homer and Hesiod and Orpheus say they had learned from divine providence? Furthermore, according to the writers, seers and prophets have existed, and they say that those who learned from them have written accurately. How much more, then, shall we know the truth, who learn from the holy prophets, who have contained the Holy Spirit of God? Therefore all the prophets spoke things consistent and in harmony with each other, and proclaimed in advance the things that would be in all the world. For the very outcome of the events foretold and already fulfilled can teach those who are lovers of learning, or rather lovers of truth, that the things proclaimed through them are truly true, concerning both the times and the seasons before the flood, from when the world was created until now, as the years are constituted, so as to show the nonsensical falsehood of the writers, that the things spoken by them are not true. For Plato, as we have said before, having declared that a flood had occurred, said that it had not covered the whole earth but only the plains, and that those who fled to the highest mountains were themselves saved. But others say that Deucalion and Pyrrha existed, and that they were saved in a chest, and that Deucalion, after coming out of the

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τοῦ δεῦρο οὕτως καὶ φιλομαθὴς ἔσῃ. Θέλω δέ σοι καὶ τὰ τῶν χρόνων θεοῦ παρέχοντος νῦν ἀκρι- βέστερον ἐπιδεῖξαι, ἵνα ἐπιγνῷς ὅτι οὐ πρόσφατος οὐδὲ μυθώδης ἐστὶν ὁ καθ' ἡμᾶς λόγος, ἀλλ' ἀρχαιότερος καὶ ἀληθέστερος ἁπάντων ποιητῶν καὶ συγγραφέων, τῶν ἐπ' ἀδήλῳ συγγραψάντων. οἱ μὲν γὰρ τὸν κόσμον ἀγένητον εἰπόντες εἰς τὸ ἀπέραντον ἐχώρησαν, ἕτεροι δὲ γενητὸν φήσαντες εἶπον ὡς ἤδη μυριάδας ἐτῶν πεντε- καίδεκα ἐληλυθέναι καὶ τρισχίλια ἑβδομήκοντα πέντε ἔτη. ταῦτα μὲν οὖν Ἀπολλώνιος ὁ Aἰγύπτιος ἱστορεῖ. Πλάτων δέ, ὁ δοκῶν Ἑλλήνων σοφώτερος γεγενῆσθαι, εἰς πόσην φλυαρίαν ἐχώρησεν! ἐν γὰρ ταῖς Πολιτείαις αὐτοῦ ἐπιγραφομέναις ·ητῶς κεῖται· "Πῶς γὰρ ἄν, εἴ γε ἔμενε τάδε οὕτως πάντα χρόνον ὡς νῦν διακοσμεῖται, καινὸν ἀνευρίσκετό ποτε ὁτιοῦν τοῦτο; ὅτι μὲν μυριάκις μυρία ἔτη διελάνθανεν ἄρα τοὺς τότε· χίλια δ' ἀφ' οὗ γέγονεν ἢ δὶς τοσαῦτα ἔτη· τὰ μὲν ἀπὸ ∆αιδάλου καταφανῆ γέγονεν, τὰ δὲ ἀπὸ Ὀρφέως, τὰ δὲ ἀπὸ Παλαμήδους." καὶ ταῦτα εἰπὼν γεγενῆσθαι, τὰ μὲν μυριάκις μυρία ἔτη ἀπὸ κατακλυσμοῦ ἕως ∆αιδάλου δηλοῖ. καὶ πολλὰ φήσας περὶ πολέων καὶ κατοικισμῶν καὶ ἐθνῶν, ὁμολογεῖ εἰκασμῷ ταῦτα εἰρηκέναι. λέγει γάρ· Ἕἰ γοῦν, ὦ ξένε, τις ἡμῖν ὑπόσχηται θεὸς ὡς, ἂν ἐπιχειρήσωμεν τὸ β τῇ τῆς νομοθεσίας σκέψει, τῶν νῦν εἰρημένων λόγων οὐ χείρους οὐδ' ἐλάττους ἀκουσό- μεθα, μακρὰν ἂν ἔλθοιμι ἔγωγε." δηλονότι εἰκασμῷ ἔφη· εἰ δὲ εἰκασμῷ, οὐκ ἄρα ἀληθῆ ἐστιν τὰ ὑπ' αὐτοῦ εἰρημένα. ∆εῖ οὖν μᾶλλον μαθητὴν γενέσθαι τῆς νομοθεσίας τοῦ θεοῦ, καθὼς καὶ αὐτὸς ὡμολόγηκεν ἄλλως μὴ δύνασθαι τὸ ἀκριβὲς μαθεῖν, ἐὰν μὴ ὁ θεὸς διδάξῃ διὰ τοῦ νόμου. τί δέ; οὐχὶ καὶ οἱ ποιηταὶ Ὅμηρος καὶ Ἡσίοδος καὶ Ὀρφεὺς ἔφασαν ἑαυτοὺς ἀπὸ θείας προνοίας μεμαθηκέναι; ἔτι μὴν μάντεις καὶ προγνώστας γεγενῆσθαι κατὰ τοὺς συγγραφεῖς, καὶ τοὺς παρ' αὐτῶν μαθόντας ἀκριβῶς συγγεγραφέναι φασίν. πόσῳ οὖν μᾶλλον ἡμεῖς τὰ ἀληθῆ εἰσόμεθα οἱ μανθάνοντες ἀπὸ τῶν ἁγίων προφητῶν, τῶν χωρησάν- των τὸ ἅγιον πνεῦμα τοῦ θεοῦ; διὸ σύμφωνα καὶ φίλα ἀλλήλοις οἱ πάντες προφῆται εἶπον, καὶ προεκήρυξαν τὰ μέλλοντα ἔσεσθαι παντὶ τῷ κόσμῳ. τοὺς γὰρ φιλομαθεῖς μᾶλλον δὲ φιλαληθεῖς δύναται αὐτὴ ἡ ἔκβασις τῶν προαναπεφωνημένων πραγμάτων καὶ ἤδη ἀπηρτισμένων ἐκδιδάσκειν ὄντως ἀληθῆ εἶναι τὰ δι' αὐτῶν κεκηρυγμένα περί τε χρόνων καὶ καιρῶν τῶν πρὸ κατακλυσμοῦ, ἀφ' οὗ ἔκτισται ὁ κόσμος ἕως τοῦ δεῦρο, ὡς συνέστηκε τὰ ἔτη, εἰς τὸ ἐπιδεῖξαι τὴν φλυαρίαν τοῦ ψεύδους τῶν συγγραφέων, ὅτι οὐκ ἀληθῆ ἐστιν τὰ δι' αὐτῶν ηθέντα. Πλάτων γάρ, ὡς προειρήκαμεν, δηλώσας κατακλυσμὸν γεγενῆ- σθαι, ἔφη μὴ πάσης τῆς γῆς ἀλλὰ τῶν πεδίων μόνον γεγενῆσθαι, καὶ τοὺς διαφυγόντας ἐπὶ τοῖς ὑψηλοτάτοις ὄρεσιν αὐτοὺς διασεσῶσθαι. ἕτεροι δὲ λέγουσι γεγονέναι ∆ευκαλίωνα καὶ Πύρραν, καὶ τούτους ἐν λάρνακι διασεσῶσθαι καὶ τὸν ∆ευκαλίωνα μετὰ τὸ ἐλθεῖν ἐκ τῆς