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Augustine of Hippo, The City of God
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Preface, Explaining His Design in Undertaking This Work.
Chapter 5.—Cæsar’s Statement Regarding the Universal Custom of an Enemy When Sacking a City.
Chapter 6.—That Not Even the Romans, When They Took Cities, Spared the Conquered in Their Temples.
Chapter 9.—Of the Reasons for Administering Correction to Bad and Good Together.
Chapter 10.—That the Saints Lose Nothing in Losing Temporal Goods.
Chapter 11.—Of the End of This Life, Whether It is Material that It Be Long Delayed.
Chapter 13.—Reasons for Burying the Bodies of the Saints.
Chapter 14.—Of the Captivity of the Saints, and that Divine Consolation Never Failed Them Therein.
Chapter 17.—Of Suicide Committed Through Fear of Punishment or Dishonor.
Chapter 19.—Of Lucretia, Who Put an End to Her Life Because of the Outrage Done Her.
Chapter 20.—That Christians Have No Authority for Committing Suicide in Any Circumstances Whatever.
Chapter 21.—Of the Cases in Which We May Put Men to Death Without Incurring the Guilt of Murder.
Chapter 22.—That Suicide Can Never Be Prompted by Magnanimity.
Chapter 25.—That We Should Not Endeavor By Sin to Obviate Sin.
Chapter 26.—That in Certain Peculiar Cases the Examples of the Saints are Not to Be Followed.
Chapter 27.—Whether Voluntary Death Should Be Sought in Order to Avoid Sin.
Chapter 31.—By What Steps the Passion for Governing Increased Among the Romans.
Chapter 32.—Of the Establishment of Scenic Entertainments.
Chapter 33.—That the Overthrow of Rome Has Not Corrected the Vices of the Romans.
Chapter 34.—Of God’s Clemency in Moderating the Ruin of the City.
Chapter 36.—What Subjects are to Be Handled in the Following Discourse.
Chapter 1.—Of the Limits Which Must Be Put to the Necessity of Replying to an Adversary.
Chapter 2.—Recapitulation of the Contents of the First Book.
Chapter 5.—Of the Obscenities Practiced in Honor of the Mother of the Gods.
Chapter 6.—That the Gods of the Pagans Never Inculcated Holiness of Life.
Chapter 15.—That It Was Vanity, Not Reason, Which Created Some of the Roman Gods.
Chapter 21.—Cicero’s Opinion of the Roman Republic.
Chapter 24.—Of the Deeds of Sylla, in Which the Demons Boasted that He Had Their Help.
Chapter 28.—That the Christian Religion is Health-Giving.
Chapter 29.—An Exhortation to the Romans to Renounce Paganism.
Chapter 6.—That the Gods Exacted No Penalty for the Fratricidal Act of Romulus.
Chapter 7.—Of the Destruction of Ilium by Fimbria, a Lieutenant of Marius.
Chapter 8.—Whether Rome Ought to Have Been Entrusted to the Trojan Gods.
Chapter 13.—By What Right or Agreement The Romans Obtained Their First Wives.
Chapter 15.—What Manner of Life and Death the Roman Kings Had.
Chapter 19.—Of the Calamity of the Second Punic War, Which Consumed the Strength of Both Parties.
Chapter 24.—Of the Civil Dissension Occasioned by the Sedition of the Gracchi.
Chapter 26.—Of the Various Kinds of Wars Which Followed the Building of the Temple of Concord.
Chapter 27.—Of the Civil War Between Marius and Sylla.
Chapter 28.—Of the Victory of Sylla, the Avenger of the Cruelties of Marius.
Chapter 1.—Of the Things Which Have Been Discussed in the First Book.
Chapter 2.—Of Those Things Which are Contained in Books Second and Third.
Chapter 4.—How Like Kingdoms Without Justice are to Robberies.
Chapter 5.—Of the Runaway Gladiators Whose Power Became Like that of Royal Dignity.
Chapter 11.—Concerning the Many Gods Whom the Pagan Doctors Defend as Being One and the Same Jove.
Chapter 13.—Concerning Those Who Assert that Only Rational Animals are Parts of the One God.
Chapter 15.—Whether It is Suitable for Good Men to Wish to Rule More Widely.
Chapter 17.—Whether, If the Highest Power Belongs to Jove, Victoria Also Ought to Be Worshipped.
Chapter 18.—With What Reason They Who Think Felicity and Fortune Goddesses Have Distinguished Them.
Chapter 27.—Concerning the Three Kinds of Gods About Which the Pontiff Scævola Has Discoursed.
Chapter 2.—On the Difference in the Health of Twins.
Chapter 5.—In What Manner the Mathematicians are Convicted of Professing a Vain Science.
Chapter 6.—Concerning Twins of Different Sexes.
Chapter 7.—Concerning the Choosing of a Day for Marriage, or for Planting, or Sowing.
Chapter 10.—Whether Our Wills are Ruled by Necessity.
Chapter 15.—Concerning the Temporal Reward Which God Granted to the Virtues of the Romans.
Chapter 19.—Concerning the Difference Between True Glory and the Desire of Domination.
Chapter 20.—That It is as Shameful for the Virtues to Serve Human Glory as Bodily Pleasure.
Chapter 22.—The Durations and Issues of War Depend on the Will of God.
Chapter 24.—What Was the Happiness of the Christian Emperors, and How Far It Was True Happiness.
Chapter 25.—Concerning the Prosperity Which God Granted to the Christian Emperor Constantine.
Chapter 26.—On the Faith and Piety of Theodosius Augustus.
Chapter 6.—Concerning the Mythic, that Is, the Fabulous, Theology, and the Civil, Against Varro.
Chapter 7.—Concerning the Likeness and Agreement of the Fabulous and Civil Theologies.
Chapter 9.—Concerning the Special Offices of the Gods.
Chapter 11.—What Seneca Thought Concerning the Jews.
Chapter 7.—Whether It is Reasonable to Separate Janus and Terminus as Two Distinct Deities.
Chapter 9.—Concerning the Power of Jupiter, and a Comparison of Jupiter with Janus.
Chapter 10.—Whether the Distinction Between Janus and Jupiter is a Proper One.
Chapter 12.—That Jupiter is Also Called Pecunia.
Chapter 14.—Concerning the Offices of Mercury and Mars.
Chapter 15.—Concerning Certain Stars Which the Pagans Have Called by the Names of Their Gods.
Chapter 17.—That Even Varro Himself Pronounced His Own Opinions Regarding the Gods Ambiguous.
Chapter 18.—A More Credible Cause of the Rise of Pagan Error.
Chapter 19.—Concerning the Interpretations Which Compose the Reason of the Worship of Saturn.
Chapter 20.—Concerning the Rites of Eleusinian Ceres.
Chapter 21.—Concerning the Shamefulness of the Rites Which are Celebrated in Honor of Liber.
Chapter 22.—Concerning Neptune, and Salacia and Venilia.
Chapter 26.—Concerning the Abomination of the Sacred Rites of the Great Mother.
Chapter 28.—That the Doctrine of Varro Concerning Theology is in No Part Consistent with Itself.
Chapter 3.—Of the Socratic Philosophy.
Chapter 6.—Concerning the Meaning of the Platonists in that Part of Philosophy Called Physical.
Chapter 8.—That the Platonists Hold the First Rank in Moral Philosophy Also.
Chapter 9.—Concerning that Philosophy Which Has Come Nearest to the Christian Faith.
Chapter 10.—That the Excellency of the Christian Religion is Above All the Science of Philosophers.
Chapter 11.—How Plato Has Been Able to Approach So Nearly to Christian Knowledge.
Chapter 16.—What Apuleius the Platonist Thought Concerning the Manners and Actions of Demons.
Chapter 19.—Of the Impiety of the Magic Art, Which is Dependent on the Assistance of Malign Spirits.
Chapter 22.—That We Must, Notwithstanding the Opinion of Apuleius, Reject the Worship of Demons.
Chapter 25.—Concerning Those Things Which May Be Common to the Holy Angels and to Men.
Chapter 26.—That All the Religion of the Pagans Has Reference to Dead Men.
Chapter 27.—Concerning the Nature of the Honor Which the Christians Pay to Their Martyrs.
Chapter 1.—The Point at Which the Discussion Has Arrived, and What Remains to Be Handled.
Chapter 4.—The Opinion of the Peripatetics and Stoics About Mental Emotions.
Chapter 11.—Of the Opinion of the Platonists, that the Souls of Men Become Demons When Disembodied.
Chapter 14.—Whether Men, Though Mortal, Can Enjoy True Blessedness.
Chapter 15.—Of the Man Christ Jesus, the Mediator Between God and Men.
Chapter 19.—That Even Among Their Own Worshippers the Name “Demon” Has Never a Good Signification.
Chapter 20.—Of the Kind of Knowledge Which Puffs Up the Demons.
Chapter 21.—To What Extent the Lord Was Pleased to Make Himself Known to the Demons.
Chapter 22.—The Difference Between the Knowledge of the Holy Angels and that of the Demons.
Chapter 2.—The Opinion of Plotinus the Platonist Regarding Enlightenment from Above.
Chapter 4.—That Sacrifice is Due to the True God Only.
Chapter 6.—Of the True and Perfect Sacrifice.
Chapter 12.—Of the Miracles Wrought by the True God Through the Ministry of the Holy Angels.
Chapter 15.—Of the Ministry of the Holy Angels, by Which They Fulfill the Providence of God.
Chapter 22.—Whence the Saints Derive Power Against Demons and True Purification of Heart.
Chapter 24.—Of the One Only True Principle Which Alone Purifies and Renews Human Nature.
Chapter 27.—Of the Impiety of Porphyry, Which is Worse Than Even the Mistake of Apuleius.
Chapter 28.—How It is that Porphyry Has Been So Blind as Not to Recognize the True Wisdom—Christ.
Chapter 30.—Porphyry’s Emendations and Modifications of Platonism.
Chapter 3.—Of the Authority of the Canonical Scriptures Composed by the Divine Spirit.
Chapter 6.—That the World and Time Had Both One Beginning, and the One Did Not Anticipate the Other.
Chapter 8.—What We are to Understand of God’s Resting on the Seventh Day, After the Six Days’ Work.
Chapter 9.—What the Scriptures Teach Us to Believe Concerning the Creation of the Angels.
Chapter 15.—How We are to Understand the Words, “The Devil Sinneth from the Beginning.”
Chapter 23.—Of the Error in Which the Doctrine of Origen is Involved.
Chapter 25.—Of the Division of Philosophy into Three Parts.
Chapter 27.—Of Existence, and Knowledge of It, and the Love of Both.
Chapter 31.—Of the Seventh Day, in Which Completeness and Repose are Celebrated.
Chapter 32.—Of the Opinion that the Angels Were Created Before the World.
Chapter 1.—That the Nature of the Angels, Both Good and Bad, is One and the Same.
Chapter 5.—That in All Natures, of Every Kind and Rank, God is Glorified.
Chapter 7.—That We Ought Not to Expect to Find Any Efficient Cause of the Evil Will.
Chapter 10.—Of the Falseness of the History Which Allots Many Thousand Years to the World’s Past.
Chapter 23.—Of the Nature of the Human Soul Created in the Image of God.
Chapter 24.—Whether the Angels Can Be Said to Be the Creators of Any, Even the Least Creature.
Chapter 25.—That God Alone is the Creator of Every Kind of Creature, Whatever Its Nature or Form.
Chapter 1.—Of the Fall of the First Man, Through Which Mortality Has Been Contracted.
Chapter 6.—Of the Evil of Death in General, Considered as the Separation of Soul and Body.
Chapter 10.—Of the Life of Mortals, Which is Rather to Be Called Death Than Life.
Chapter 11.—Whether One Can Both Be Living and Dead at the Same Time.
Chapter 13.—What Was the First Punishment of the Transgression of Our First Parents.
Chapter 17.—Against Those Who Affirm that Earthly Bodies Cannot Be Made Incorruptible and Eternal.
Chapter 4.—What It is to Live According to Man, and What to Live According to God.
Chapter 6.—Of the Character of the Human Will Which Makes the Affections of the Soul Right or Wrong.
Chapter 12.—Of the Nature of Man’s First Sin.
Chapter 13.—That in Adam’s Sin an Evil Will Preceded the Evil Act.
Chapter 14.—Of the Pride in the Sin, Which Was Worse Than the Sin Itself.
Chapter 17.—Of the Nakedness of Our First Parents, Which They Saw After Their Base and Shameful Sin.
Chapter 18.—Of the Shame Which Attends All Sexual Intercourse.
Chapter 20.—Of the Foolish Beastliness of the Cynics.
Chapter 22.—Of the Conjugal Union as It Was Originally Instituted and Blessed by God.
Chapter 25.—Of True Blessedness, Which This Present Life Cannot Enjoy.
Chapter 28.—Of the Nature of the Two Cities, the Earthly and the Heavenly.
Chapter 1.—Of the Two Lines of the Human Race Which from First to Last Divide It.
Chapter 2.—Of the Children of the Flesh and the Children of the Promise.
Chapter 3.—That Sarah’s Barrenness was Made Productive by God’s Grace.
Chapter 4.—Of the Conflict and Peace of the Earthly City.
Chapter 8.—What Cain’s Reason Was for Building a City So Early in the History of the Human Race.
Chapter 9.—Of the Long Life and Greater Stature of the Antediluvians.
Chapter 11.—Of Methuselah’s Age, Which Seems to Extend Fourteen Years Beyond the Deluge.
Chapter 13.—Whether, in Computing Years, We Ought to Follow the Hebrew or the Septuagint.
Chapter 14.—That the Years in Those Ancient Times Were of the Same Length as Our Own.
Chapter 17.—Of the Two Fathers and Leaders Who Sprang from One Progenitor.
Chapter 18.—The Significance of Abel, Seth, and Enos to Christ and His Body the Church.
Chapter 19.—The Significance Of Enoch’s Translation.
Chapter 2.—What Was Prophetically Prefigured in the Sons of Noah.
Chapter 3.—Of the Generations of the Three Sons of Noah.
Chapter 4.—Of the Diversity of Languages, and of the Founding of Babylon.
Chapter 5.—Of God’s Coming Down to Confound the Languages of the Builders of the City.
Chapter 6.—What We are to Understand by God’s Speaking to the Angels.
Chapter 8.—Whether Certain Monstrous Races of Men are Derived from the Stock of Adam or Noah’s Sons.
Chapter 9.—Whether We are to Believe in the Antipodes.
Chapter 12.—Of the Era in Abraham’s Life from Which a New Period in the Holy Succession Begins.
Chapter 14.—Of the Years of Terah, Who Completed His Lifetime in Haran.
Chapter 16.—Of the Order and Nature of the Promises of God Which Were Made to Abraham.
Chapter 20.—Of the Parting of Lot and Abraham, Which They Agreed to Without Breach of Charity.
Chapter 25.—Of Sarah’s Handmaid, Hagar, Whom She Herself Wished to Be Abraham’s Concubine.
Chapter 33.—Of Rebecca, the Grand-Daughter of Nahor, Whom Isaac Took to Wife.
Chapter 34.—What is Meant by Abraham’s Marrying Keturah After Sarah’s Death.
Chapter 37.—Of the Things Mystically Prefigured in Esau and Jacob.
Chapter 39.—The Reason Why Jacob Was Also Called Israel.
Chapter 41.—Of the Blessing Which Jacob Promised in Judah His Son.
Chapter 42.—Of the Sons of Joseph, Whom Jacob Blessed, Prophetically Changing His Hands.
Chapter 1.—Of the Prophetic Age.
Chapter 14.—Of David’s Concern in the Writing of the Psalms.
Chapter 19.—Of the 69th Psalm, in Which the Obstinate Unbelief of the Jews is Declared.
Chapter 21.—Of the Kings After Solomon, Both in Judah and Israel.
Chapter 4.—Of the Times of Jacob and His Son Joseph.
Chapter 6.—Who Were Kings of Argos, and of Assyria, When Jacob Died in Egypt.
Chapter 7.—Who Were Kings When Joseph Died in Egypt.
Chapter 8.—Who Were Kings When Moses Was Born, and What Gods Began to Be Worshipped Then.
Chapter 9.—When the City of Athens Was Founded, and What Reason Varro Assigns for Its Name.
Chapter 10.—What Varro Reports About the Term Areopagus, and About Deucalion’s Flood.
Chapter 13.—What Fables Were Invented at the Time When Judges Began to Rule the Hebrews.
Chapter 14.—Of the Theological Poets.
Chapter 17.—What Varro Says of the Incredible Transformations of Men.
Chapter 19.—That Æneas Came into Italy When Abdon the Judge Ruled Over the Hebrews.
Chapter 28.—Of the Things Pertaining to the Gospel of Christ Which Hosea and Amos Prohesied.
Chapter 29.—What Things are Predicted by Isaiah Concerning Christ and the Church.
Chapter 30.—What Micah, Jonah, and Joel Prophesied in Accordance with the New Testament.
Chapter 32.—Of the Prophecy that is Contained in the Prayer and Song of Habakkuk.
Chapter 34.—Of the Prophecy of Daniel and Ezekiel, Other Two of the Greater Prophets.
Chapter 35.—Of the Prophecy of the Three Prophets, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi.
Chapter 36.—About Esdras and the Books of the Maccabees.
Chapter 39.—About the Hebrew Written Characters Which that Language Always Possessed.
Chapter 51.—That the Catholic Faith May Be Confirmed Even by the Dissensions of the Heretics.
Chapter 53.—Of the Hidden Time of the Final Persecution.
Chapter 6.—Of the Error of Human Judgments When the Truth is Hidden.
Chapter 10.—The Reward Prepared for the Saints After They Have Endured the Trial of This Life.
Chapter 16.—Of Equitable Rule.
Chapter 17.—What Produces Peace, and What Discord, Between the Heavenly and Earthly Cities.
Chapter 19.—Of the Dress and Habits of the Christian People.
Chapter 20.—That the Saints are in This Life Blessed in Hope.
Chapter 23.—Porphyry’s Account of the Responses Given by the Oracles of the gods Concerning Christ.
Chapter 25.—That Where There is No True Religion There are No True Virtues.
Chapter 28.—The End of the Wicked.
Chapter 6.—What is the First Resurrection, and What the Second.
Chapter 8.—Of the Binding and Loosing of the Devil.
Chapter 15.—Who the Dead are Who are Given Up to Judgment by the Sea, and by Death and Hell.
Chapter 16.—Of the New Heaven and the New Earth.
Chapter 17.—Of the Endless Glory of the Church.
Chapter 18.—What the Apostle Peter Predicted Regarding the Last Judgment.
Chapter 22.—What is Meant by the Good Going Out to See the Punishment of the Wicked.
Chapter 2.—Whether It is Possible for Bodies to Last for Ever in Burning Fire.
Chapter 3.—Whether Bodily Suffering Necessarily Terminates in the Destruction of the Flesh.
Chapter 4.—Examples from Nature Proving that Bodies May Remain Unconsumed and Alive in Fire.
Chapter 7.—That the Ultimate Reason for Believing Miracles is the Omnipotence of the Creator.
Chapter 9.—Of Hell, and the Nature of Eternal Punishments.
Chapter 14.—Of the Temporary Punishments of This Life to Which the Human Condition is Subject.
Chapter 16.—The Laws of Grace, Which Extend to All the Epochs of the Life of the Regenerate.
Chapter 17.—Of Those Who Fancy that No Men Shall Be Punished Eternally.
Chapter 1.—Of the Creation of Angels and Men.
Chapter 2.—Of the Eternal and Unchangeable Will of God.
Chapter 7.—That the World’s Belief in Christ is the Result of Divine Power, Not of Human Persuasion.
Chapter 14.—Whether Infants Shall Rise in that Body Which They Would Have Had Had They Grown Up.
Chapter 15.—Whether the Bodies of All the Dead Shall Rise the Same Size as the Lord’s Body.
Chapter 16.—What is Meant by the Conforming of the Saints to the Image of The Son of God.
Chapter 17.—Whether the Bodies of Women Shall Retain Their Own Sex in the Resurrection.
Chapter 21.—Of the New Spiritual Body into Which the Flesh of the Saints Shall Be Transformed.
Chapter 29.—Of the Beatific Vision.
Chapter 30.—Of the Eternal Felicity of the City of God, and of the Perpetual Sabbath.
Chapter 23.—Of the Erythræan Sibyl, Who is Known to Have Sung Many Things About Christ More Plainly Than the Other Sibyls.1119 The Sibylline Oracles are a collection of prophecies and religious teachings in Greek hexameter under the assumed authority and inspiration of a Sibyl, i.e., a female prophet. They are partly of heathen, partly of Jewish-Christian origin. They were used by the fathers against the heathen as genuine prophecies without critical discrimination, and they appear also in the famous Dies iræ alongside with David as witnesses of the future judgment (“teste David cum Sibylla.”) They were edited by Alexander, Paris, 2d. ed. 1869, and by Friedlieb (in Greek and German), Leipzig, 1852. Comp. Ewald: Ueber Entstehung, Inhalt und Werth der sibyll. Bücher, 1858, and Schürer, Geschichte der jüd. Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu (Leipzig, 1885), ii. § 33, pp. 700 sqq., Engl. transl. (Hist. of the Jews in the times of Jesus. Edinburgh and New York, 1886), vol. iii. 271 sqq.—P.S.]
Some say the Erythræan sibyl prophesied at this time. Now Varro declares there were many sibyls, and not merely one. This sibyl of Erythræ certainly wrote some things concerning Christ which are quite manifest, and we first read them in the Latin tongue in verses of bad Latin, and unrhythmical, through the unskillfulness, as we afterwards learned, of some interpreter unknown to me. For Flaccianus, a very famous man, who was also a proconsul, a man of most ready eloquence and much learning, when we were speaking about Christ, produced a Greek manuscript, saying that it was the prophecies of the Erythræan sibyl, in which he pointed out a certain passage which had the initial letters of the lines so arranged that these words could be read in them: ᾽Ιησοῦς Χριστος Θεοῦ υιὸς σωτηρ, which means, “Jesus Christ the Son of God, the Saviour.” And these verses, of which the initial letters yield that meaning, contain what follows as translated by some one into Latin in good rhythm:
Ι Judgment shall moisten the earth with the sweat of its standard,
Η Ever enduring, behold the King shall come through the ages,
Σ Sent to be here in the flesh, and Judge at the last of the world.
Ο O God, the believing and faithless alike shall behold Thee
Υ Uplifted with saints, when at last the ages are ended.
Σ Seated before Him are souls in the flesh for His judgment.
Χ Hid in thick vapors, the while desolate lieth the earth.
Ρ Rejected by men are the idols and long hidden treasures;
Ε Earth is consumed by the fire, and it searcheth the ocean and heaven;
Ι Issuing forth, it destroyeth the terrible portals of hell.
Σ Saints in their body and soul freedom and light shall inherit;
Τ Those who are guilty shall burn in fire and brimstone for ever.
Ο Occult actions revealing, each one shall publish his secrets;
Σ Secrets of every man’s heart God shall reveal in the light.
Θ Then shall be weeping and wailing, yea, and gnashing of teeth;
Ε Eclipsed is the sun, and silenced the stars in their chorus.
Ο Over and gone is the splendor of moonlight, melted the heaven,
Υ Uplifted by Him are the valleys, and cast down the mountains.
Υ Utterly gone among men are distinctions of lofty and lowly.
Ι Into the plains rush the hills, the skies and oceans are mingled.
Ο Oh, what an end of all things! earth broken in pieces shall perish;
Σ . . . . Swelling together at once shall the waters and flames flow in rivers.
Σ Sounding the archangel’s trumpet shall peal down from heaven,
Ω Over the wicked who groan in their guilt and their manifold sorrows.
Τ Trembling, the earth shall be opened, revealing chaos and hell.
Η Every king before God shall stand in that day to be judged.
Ρ Rivers of fire and brimstone shall fall from the heavens.
In these Latin verses the meaning of the Greek is correctly given, although not in the exact order of the lines as connected with the initial letters; for in three of them, the fifth, eighteenth, and nineteenth, where the Greek letter Υ occurs, Latin words could not be found beginning with the corresponding letter, and yielding a suitable meaning. So that, if we note down together the initial letters of all the lines in our Latin translation except those three in which we retain the letter Υ in the proper place, they will express in five Greek words this meaning, “Jesus Christ the Son of God, the Saviour.” And the verses are twenty-seven, which is the cube of three. For three times three are nine; and nine itself, if tripled, so as to rise from the superficial square to the cube, comes to twenty-seven. But if you join the initial letters of these five Greek words, ᾽Ιησοῦς Χριστος Θεοῦ υἰὸς σωτήρ, which mean, “Jesus Christ the Son of God, the Saviour,” they will make the word ἰχδὺς, that is, “fish,” in which word Christ is mystically understood, because He was able to live, that is, to exist, without sin in the abyss of this mortality as in the depth of waters.1120 [Hence the fish was a favorite symbol of the ancient Christians. See Schaff, Church Hist. (revised ed.), vol. ii. 279 sq.—P.S.]
But this sibyl, whether she is the Erythræan, or, as some rather believe, the Cumæan, in her whole poem, of which this is a very small portion, not only has nothing that can relate to the worship of the false or feigned gods, but rather speaks against them and their worshippers in such a way that we might even think she ought to be reckoned among those who belong to the city of God. Lactantius also inserted in his work the prophecies about Christ of a certain sibyl, he does not say which. But I have thought fit to combine in a single extract, which may seem long, what he has set down in many short quotations. She says, “Afterward He shall come into the injurious hands of the unbelieving, and they will give God buffets with profane hands, and with impure mouth will spit out envenomed spittle; but He will with simplicity yield His holy back to stripes. And He will hold His peace when struck with the fist, that no one may find out what word, or whence, He comes to speak to hell; and He shall be crowned with a crown of thorns. And they gave Him gall for meat, and vinegar for His thirst: they will spread this table of inhospitality. For thou thyself, being foolish, hast not understood thy God, deluding the minds of mortals, but hast both crowned Him with thorns and mingled for Him bitter gall. But the veil of the temple shall be rent; and at midday it shall be darker than night for three hours. And He shall die the death, taking sleep for three days; and then returning from hell, He first shall come to the light, the beginning of the resurrection being shown to the recalled.” Lactantius made use of these sibylline testimonies, introducing them bit by bit in the course of his discussion as the things he intended to prove seemed to require, and we have set them down in one connected series, uninterrupted by comment, only taking care to mark them by capitals, if only the transcribers do not neglect to preserve them hereafter. Some writers, indeed, say that the Erythræan sibyl was not in the time of Romulus, but of the Trojan war.
CAPUT XXIII. De Sibylla Erythraea, quae inter alias Sibyllas cognoscitur de Christo evidentia multa cecinisse.
1. Eodem tempore nonnulli Sibyllam Erythraeam vaticinatam ferunt. Sibyllas autem Varro prodidit plures fuisse, non unam . Haec sane Erythraea Sibylla quaedam de Christo manifesta conscripsit: quod etiam nos prius in latina lingua versibus male latinis et non stantibus legimus, per nescio cujus interpretis imperitiam, sicut post cognovimus. Nam vir clarissimus Flaccianus, qui etiam proconsul fuit, homo facillimae facundiae, multaeque doctrinae, cum de Christo colloqueremur, graecum nobis codicem protulit, carmina esse dicens Sibyllae Erythraeae, ubi ostendit quodam loco in capitibus versuum ordinem litterarum ita se habentem, ut haec in eo verba legerentur, Ἰησοῦς Χρειστὸς Θεοῦ Υἱὸς Σωτὴρ: quod est latine, Jesus Christus Dei Filius Salvator. Hi autem versus quorum primae litterae istum sensum, quem diximus, reddunt, sicut eos quidam latinis et stantibus versibus est interpretatus, hoc continent: ΙJudicii signum tellus sudore madescet. ΗE coelo Rex adveniet per saecla futurus: ΣScilicet in carne praesens ut judicet orbem. ΟUnde Deum cernent incredulus atque fidelis [5] ΥCelsum cum sanctis, aevi jam termino in ipso. ΣSic animae cum carne aderunt, quas judicat ipse: ΧCum jacet incultus densis in vepribus orbis. ΡRejicient simulacra viri, cunctam quoque gazam: ΕExuret terras ignis, pontumque polumque [10] ΙInquirens, tetri portas effringet Averni ΣSanctorum sed enim cunctae lux libera carni ΤTradetur, sontes aeterna flamma cremabit. ΟOccultos actus retegens, tunc quisque loquetur ΣSecreta, atque Deus reserabit pectora luci. [15] ΘTunc erit et luctus, stridebunt dentibus omnes. ΕEripitur solis jubar, et chorus interit astris. ΟVolvetur coelum, lunaris splendor obibit. ΥDejiciet colles, valles extollet ab imo. ΥNon erit in rebus hominum sublime vel altum. [20] ΙJam aequantur campis montes, et caerula ponti ΟOmnia cessabunt, tellus confracta peribit. ΣSic pariter fontes torrentur, fluminaque igni. ΣSed tuba tum sonitum tristem demittet ab alto ΩOrbe, gemens facinus miserum variosque labores: [25] ΤTartareumque chaos monstrabit terra dehiscens. ΗEt coram hic Domino reges sistentur ad unum ΡRecidet e coelis ignisque et sulphuris amnis.In his latinis versibus de graeco utcumque translatis, ibi non potuit ille sensus occurrere, qui fit cum litterae, quae sunt in eorum capitibus, connectuntur, ubi 0580 Υ littera in graeco posita est; quia non potuerunt verba latina inveniri, quae ab eadem littera inciperent, et sententiae convenirent. Hi autem sunt versus tres, quintus et octavus decimus et nonus decimus. Denique si litteras quae sunt in capitibus omnium versuum connectentes, horum trium quae scriptae sunt non legamus, sed pro eis Υ litteram, tanquam in eisdem locis ipsa sit posita, recordemur, exprimitur in quinque verbis, Jesus Christus Dei Filius Salvator; sed cum graece hoc dicitur, non latine. Et sunt versus viginti et septem, qui numerus quadratum ternarium solidum reddit. Tria enim ter ducta fiunt novem: et ipsa novem si ter ducantur, ut ex lato in altum figura consurgat, ad viginti septem perveniunt. Horum autem graecorum quinque verborum, quae sunt, Ἰησους Χρειστὸς Θεοῦ Υἱὸς Σωτερ, quod est latine, Jesus Christus Dei Filius Salvator, si primas litteras jungas, erit Ἰχθύς, id est Piscis, in quo nomine mystice intelligitur Christus, eo quod in hujus mortalitatis abysso velut in aquarum profunditate vivus, hoc est sine peccato, esse potuerit.
2. Haec autem Sybilla sive Erythraea, sive, ut quidam magis credunt, Cumaea, ita nihil habet in toto carmine suo, cujus exigua ista particula est, quod ad deorum falsorum sive factorum cultum pertineat; quin imo ita etiam contra eos et contra cultores eorum loquitur, ut in eorum numero deputanda videatur, qui pertinent ad civitatem Dei. Inserit etiam Lactantius operi suo quaedam de Christo vaticinia Sibyllae, quamvis non exprimat cujus. Sed quae ipse singillatim posuit, ego arbitratus sum conjuncta esse ponenda, tanquam unum sit prolixum, quae ille plura commemoravit et brevia. In manus iniquas, inquit, infidelium postea veniet: dabunt autem Deo alapas manibus incestis, et impurato ore exspuent venenatos sputus: dabit vero ad verbera simpliciter sanctum dorsum . Et colaphos accipiens tacebit, ne quis agnoscat, quod verbum, vel unde venit ut inferis loquatur, et corona spinea coronetur . Ad cibum autem fel, et ad sitim acetum dederunt: inhospitalitatis hanc monstrabunt mensam . Ipsa enim incipiens tuum Deum non intellexisti, ludentem mortalium mentibus; sed spinis coronasti, et horridum fel miscuisti . Templi vero 0581velum scindetur: et medio die nox erit tenebrosa nimis in tribus horis . Et morte morietur tribus diebus somno suscepto: et tunc ab inferis regressus ad lucemveniet primus, resurrectionis principio revocatis ostenso . Ista Lactantius carptim per intervalla disputationis suae, sicut ea poscere videbantur, quae probare intenderat, adhibuit testimonia Sibyllina, quae nos nihil interponentes, sed in unam seriem connexa ponentes, solis capitibus, si tamen scriptores deinceps ea servare non negligant, distinguenda curavimus. Nonnulli sane Erythraeam Sibyllam, non Romuli, sed belli Trojani tempore fuisse scripserunt.