DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.71556#0332
288 LIFE OF MICHAEL ANGELO.
Pagan antiquity ascribed to these female hiero-
phants a prophetic spirit, and the delivery of oracles
respecting the fates and revolutions of kingdoms.
Plato speaks of one, Julian of four, and Varro of
ten, and his authority has been chiefly followed by
subsequent writers. The story of the Sibylline vo-
lumes purchased by Tarquin, and of their having
subsequently perished in a fire, and the still earlier
existence ascribed by Virgil to the Cumaean Sibyl,
are facts familiar to scholars. That popular super-
stition continued, after the diffusion of Christianity,
to cherish the fable of their prophetic power, is
attested by St. Augustin and by Lactantius*, the
latter of whom quotes from a Greek document
various alleged predictions respecting the humilia-
tion and resurrection of Christ, closely accordant
with the facts of his history. To the Erythrean
Sibyl, in particular, St. Augustin ascribes similar
predictions, mingled with figurative allusions to
the glories of his spiritual kingdom, and the great
crisis of the universal judgment. These, and other
passages, formed the staple of a work which ap-
peared, it is supposed, in the second century, under
the title of the Sibylline Oracles, and is most justly
classed among the numerous forgeries of that pe-
riod. They are made up, like some remarkable
passages in the Pollio of Virgil, from the prophetic
Scriptures, and from the literal facts of the evan-
* St. Augustin de Civitate Dei, lib. vii. 107. ; Lactantius, edit.
Spark. Oxon. 1684, lib. i. p. 23, and lib. iv. p. 371.
Pagan antiquity ascribed to these female hiero-
phants a prophetic spirit, and the delivery of oracles
respecting the fates and revolutions of kingdoms.
Plato speaks of one, Julian of four, and Varro of
ten, and his authority has been chiefly followed by
subsequent writers. The story of the Sibylline vo-
lumes purchased by Tarquin, and of their having
subsequently perished in a fire, and the still earlier
existence ascribed by Virgil to the Cumaean Sibyl,
are facts familiar to scholars. That popular super-
stition continued, after the diffusion of Christianity,
to cherish the fable of their prophetic power, is
attested by St. Augustin and by Lactantius*, the
latter of whom quotes from a Greek document
various alleged predictions respecting the humilia-
tion and resurrection of Christ, closely accordant
with the facts of his history. To the Erythrean
Sibyl, in particular, St. Augustin ascribes similar
predictions, mingled with figurative allusions to
the glories of his spiritual kingdom, and the great
crisis of the universal judgment. These, and other
passages, formed the staple of a work which ap-
peared, it is supposed, in the second century, under
the title of the Sibylline Oracles, and is most justly
classed among the numerous forgeries of that pe-
riod. They are made up, like some remarkable
passages in the Pollio of Virgil, from the prophetic
Scriptures, and from the literal facts of the evan-
* St. Augustin de Civitate Dei, lib. vii. 107. ; Lactantius, edit.
Spark. Oxon. 1684, lib. i. p. 23, and lib. iv. p. 371.