Martyr Acts 1

He introduces two characters, Meliboeus and Tityrus. Tityrus, you reclining beneath the covering of a spreading beech, glad with some sweetness beyond the wont, fortunate old man! Here, among the familiar streams and the sacred springs, you prepare to speak verses drawn out and to sing with divine song, shepherd, guardian of a beautiful flock, more beautiful yourself. No uncertain things do I sing: the predictions of the prophets of old. Or could anything be greater for us than such a gift? O Meliboeus, a god has made these leisures for us. For he shall always be a god to me, and king of men, the almighty Father, to whom belongs the highest power over all things; whoever would know him, let him breathe in divine love. I speak no unknown things, which lie scattered through the whole world.

Of their own joy the unshorn mountains hurl voices to the stars, the very crags now hurl songs, the very thickets resound; for that God goes through all lands and tracts of the sea and the deep heaven do not doubt—for you see true things—who by a fixed covenant rules with eternal sway and tempers his wrath. Did he not do so, black night would brood over seas and lands. Happy is he who has been able to know the causes of things! For—for I will confess it—from what prince our race is sprung, Stimicon had heard: he praised our songs to us. Be happy! For that you go through the deep under greater auspices, clear faith proclaims, in return for those your praises. Receive and give a pledge: nor is the song ignoble. A greater god is at work and sends us back to greater tasks.

The one who by delaying restored the state to us, he the keeper of works, the discoverer of men and things, without whom the mind begins nothing lofty, himself ponders what things are, what have been, what soon are drawn on to come. For by these signs and following these examples, men have said that souls are a part of the divine mind and draughts drawn from the ether, because their genius is from God. Although the boundary of a narrow span and earthly limbs and dying members dull them, yet the immortal race remains: do not seek to be taught. Fiery is their vigor and heavenly their origin; and when cold death has parted the soul from the limbs, all these, when they have rolled the wheel through a thousand years, God, numbering the times, calls forth in a great throng. They render themselves back, just as many faces, and the lands gape open.

But to recall one's step and escape to the upper airs, this is the work of virtue: to attempt the hidden lands, to a starry seat and to mount up into the high heaven. Tityrus, is it then to be thought that any souls go hence to heaven and again return to sluggish bodies? Are we called from one fate to another? Am I immortal? Joys assail my breast, if only what you recount could come to pass as a fact. Do not doubt: nothing that is held by the law of fate—believe God, for you see true things, since a parent can do it. As little as you would suppose, wisdom is greater than fate. Indeed I believe, nor is the faith vain; who, mad, would deny such things? And I, both conquered and willing, give myself up: foolishly I used to compare great things with small;

nor does my opinion now, once changed, give way from its place. One thing I beg: that you teach the way, and open the sacred portals, and by following what I may be able to surpass such great labors. I will indeed tell, nor will I hold you in suspense, my son, by what manner you may flee and bear each labor. "Dare, stranger, to despise riches: this is the first way of salvation. Untainted faith and a mind conscious to itself of right bear worthy rewards. Relying on piety, they found a way through the fire: that is the sure rest from labors. Gardens, breathing with saffron flowers, invite you, and the seats of the fortunate groves; and blessed shall the abodes ever be of those whose mind has the better judgment: for these there shall be a place in the city, the glory of a divine countryside.

For those who alone brooded over riches once found, who put off the expiations they had committed until a late death, all who dared a monstrous wickedness and gained what they dared, are pressed by punishments. How they would wish, in the high ether, to have come into all things and beneath the upper airs of heaven!" What gifts, what gifts shall I render you in return for such a song? It is not in our power: we will lift your name to the stars, Tityrus. The shadows are dispersed and light restored to my mind. These things come forth not by human resources, not by any guiding art: you will be able to know what virtue it may be. If you do not shrink back, I will go on, repeating from the first origin. Nay, come, and tell us, stranger, from the very first origin; I accept and gladly acknowledge it, as the words of a parent. Receive: the deed is of ancient faith, but the fame is everlasting.

Now I will begin to sing, since we have both met together on our mountains: the valleys carry the strains back to the stars. "The great order of the ages is born anew from the start; a greater work I set in motion: the praises and deeds of the Father. For neither were there fires of the stars, nor was the pole bright with the starry ether, and dark night held sway. Then the almighty Father, the world now uncovered by light, moved aside the dark air and dispelled the shadows. In the beginning he made heaven and the lands, and the setting sun, and the shining globe of the moon, and the flowing plains; for the journey of night he gave numbers and names to the stars: whence the race of men and of cattle and of flying life, and the monsters that the sea bears beneath its marble surface.

And he now divides the round world midway between light and shadows, and made the year equal in its four diverse seasons. Nor did he suffer his realms to grow numb with heavy sloth: he stirred the fields with cares, sharpening mortal hearts, that by practice men might hammer out, through their experience, the various arts. Here he composed a race untaught and scattered over the high mountains, and gave it law, and held it under his sway. Hence he taught that a people, far and wide a king and proud in its age, should come to ruin; afterward a mighty issue, victor over the peoples of the Dawn and over the Red Shore. Then by their sustenance they recall their strength, the heavenly gifts, until little by little a worse and faded age, and the madness of war and the love of having, came on, forgetful of their kingdoms and seized by base desire. Then various plagues mock them: an evil error swept away Egypt and the strength of the East;

monstrous things are seen, and prodigies of every kind of god, and the barker Anubis. What do the shrines avail, and the images of those who lack light? Such aid the time does not need, nor those defenders; when, the years rolling on, your day shall have refuted your words, you shall pay the penalty for what you have committed. Nay, rather let us all call to witness eternal peace and the altar of the deity? This altar shall guard all. These things done, the Father ponders within himself another matter—by which he gave eternal life, by which the condition of death was taken away—and at last he had pity from heaven on high. Ancient piety regards the labors of men, about to set a limit to destructions; responses faithful enough were given: clear faith, the secret things of the Father.

He himself bears these commands through the swift airs of heaven, an interpreter, that the warning and the breathing one should be present in his words; and late the terrifying prophets sang the omens; for they sang that he would be illustrious in words and deeds. O by what name shall I call you, virgin? To whom the almighty granted a mind and spirit from an ethereal seed, from the upper shores."