First of all, they discover in a few lines from Virgil a direct prophecy of the birth of Christ. Yet it is impossible to detect in this prophecy any feature of the present age. It is in the famous fourth Eclogue in which, half a century before our era, Pollio is made to ask the Muses of Sicily to sing to him about greater events.
The last era of Cumæan song is now arrived and the grand series of ages [that series which recurs again and again in the course of our mundane revolution] begins afresh. Now the Virgin Astræa returns, and the reign of Saturn recommences. [pg 347]Now a new progeny descends from the celestial realms. Do thou, chaste Lucina, smile propitious to the infant Boy who will bring to a close the present Age of Iron,[635] and introduce throughout the whole world the Age of Gold.... He shall share the life of Gods and shall see heroes mingled in society with Gods, himself be seen by them and all the peaceful world.... Then shall the herds no longer dread the huge lion, the serpent also shall die: and the poison's deceptive plant shall perish. Come then, dear child of the Gods, great descendant of Jupiter!... The time is near. See, the world is shaken with its globe saluting thee: the earth, the regions of the sea, and the heavens sublime.[636]
It is in these few lines, called the “Sibylline prophecy about the coming of Christ,” that his followers now see a direct foretelling of the event. Now who will presume to maintain that either at the birth of Jesus or since the establishment of the so-called Christian religion, any portion of the above-quoted sentences can be shown as prophetic? Has the “last age”—the Age of Iron, or Kali Yuga—closed since then? Quite the reverse, since it is shown to be in full sway just now, not only because the Hindus use the name, but by universal personal experience. Where is that “new race that has descended from the celestial realms”? Was it the race that emerged from Paganism into Christianity? Or is it our present race, with nations ever red-hot for fight, jealous and envious, ready to pounce upon each other, showing mutual hatred that would put to blush cats and dogs, ever lying and deceiving one another? Is it this age of ours that is the promised “Golden Age”—in which neither the venom of the serpent nor of any plant is any longer lethal, and in which we are all secure under the mild sway of God-chosen sovereigns? The wildest fancy of an opium-eater could hardly suggest a more inappropriate description, if it is to be applied to our age or to any age since the year one of our era. What of the mutual slaughter of sects, of Christians by Pagans, and of Pagans and Heretics by Christians; the horrors of the Middle Ages and of the Inquisition; Napoleon, and since his day, an “armed peace” at best—at the worst, torrents of blood, shed for supremacy over acres of land, and a handful of heathen: millions of soldiers under arms, ready for battle; a diplomatic body playing at Cains and Judases; and instead of the “mild sway of a divine sovereign” the universal, though unrecognised, sway of Cæsarism, of “might” in lieu of “right,” and the breeding therefrom of anarchists, socialists, pétroleuses, and destroyers of every description?
The Sibylline prophecy and Virgil's inspirational poetry remain unfulfilled in every point, as we see.
The fields are yellow with soft ears of corn;
but so they were before our era:
The blushing grapes shall hang from the rude brambles, and dewy honey shall [or may] distil from the rugged oak;
but they have not thus done, so far. We must look for another interpretation. What is it? The Sibylline Prophetess spoke, as thousands of other Prophets and Seers have spoken, though even the few such records that have survived are rejected by Christian and infidel, and their interpretations are only allowed and accepted among the Initiated. The Sibyl alluded to cycles in general and to the great cycle especially. Let us remember how the Purânas corroborate the above, among others the Vishnu Purâna:
When the practices taught by the Vedas, and the Institutes of Law shall have nearly ceased, and the close of the Kali Yuga [the “Iron Age” of Virgil] shall be nigh, an aspect of that divine Being who exists of his own spiritual nature in the character of Brahmâ and even is the beginning and the end [Alpha and Omega], ... shall descend upon earth: he will be born in the family of Vishnuyashas, an eminent Brâhman of Shamballah ... endowed with the eight superhuman powers. By his irresistible might he will destroy ... all whose minds are devoted to iniquity. He will then reëstablish righteousness upon earth; and the minds of those who live at the end of the [Kali] Age shall be awakened, and shall be as pellucid as crystal.[637] The men who are thus changed by virtue of that peculiar time shall be as the seeds of human beings [the Shistha, the survivors of the future cataclysm], and shall give birth to a race who shall follow the laws of the Krita [or Satya] Yuga [the age of purity, or the “Golden Age”]. For it is said: “When the sun and moon and Tishya [asterisms] and the planet Jupiter are in one mansion the Krita Age [the Golden] shall return.”[638]
The astronomical cycles of the Hindus—those taught publicly—have been sufficiently well understood, but the esoteric meaning thereof, in its application to transcendental subjects connected with them, has ever remained a dead-letter. The number of cycles was enormous; it ranged from the Mahâ Yuga cycle of 4,320,000 years down to the small septenary and quinquennial cycles, the latter being composed of the five years called respectively the [pg 349] Samvatsara, Parivatsara, Idvatsara, Anuvatsara, and Vatsara, each having secret attributes or qualities attached to them. Vriddhagarga gives these in a treatise, now the property of a Trans-Himâlayan Matham (or temple); and describes the relation between this quinquennial and the Brihaspati cycle, based on the conjunction of the Sun and Moon every sixtieth year: a cycle as mysterious—for national events in general and those of the Âryan Hindu nation especially—as it is important.