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Anonymous translation from the Greek
MOST glorious of all the Undying, many-named, girt round with awe! | |
| Jove, author of Nature, applying to all things the rudder of law— | |
| Hail! Hail! for it justly rejoices the races whose life is a span | |
| To lift unto thee their voices—the Author and Framer of man. | |
| For we are thy sons; thou didst give us the symbols of speech at our birth, | 5 |
| Alone of the things that live, and mortal move upon earth. | |
| Wherefore thou shalt find me extolling and ever singing thy praise; | |
| Since thee the great Universe, rolling on its path round the world, obeys:— | |
| Obeys thee, wherever thou guidest, and gladly is bound in thy bands, | |
| So great is the power thou confidest, with strong, invincible hands, | 10 |
| To thy mighty ministering servant, the bolt of the thunder, that flies, | |
| Two-edged like a sword, and fervent, that is living and never dies. | |
| All nature, in fear and dismay, doth quake in the path of its stroke, | |
| What time thou preparest the way for the one Word thy lips have spoke, | |
| Which blends with lights smaller and greater, which pervadeth and thrilleth all things, | 15 |
| So great is thy power and thy nature—in the Universe Highest of Kings! | |
| On earth, of all deeds that are done, O God! there is none without thee; | |
| In the holy ether not one, nor one on the face of the sea, | |
| Save the deeds that evil men, driven by their own blind folly, have planned; | |
| But things that have grown uneven are made even again by thy hand; | 20 |
| And things unseemly grow seemly, the unfriendly are friendly to thee; | |
| For no good and evil supremely thou hast blended in one by decree. | |
| For all thy decree is one ever—a Word that endureth for aye, | |
| Which mortals, rebellious, endeavor to flee from and shun to obey— | |
| Ill-fated, that, worn with proneness for the lordship of goodly things, | 25 |
| Neither hear nor behold, in its oneness, the law that divinity brings; | |
| Which men with reason obeying, might attain unto glorious life, | |
| No longer aimlessly straying in the paths of ignoble strife. | |
| There are men with a zeal unblest, that are wearied with following of fame, | |
| And men with a baser quest, that are turned to lucre and shame. | 30 |
| There are men too that pamper and pleasure the flesh with delicate stings: | |
| All these desire beyond measure to be other than all these things. | |
| Great Jove, all-giver, dark-clouded, great Lord of the thunderbolt’s breath! | |
| Deliver the men that are shrouded in ignorance dismal as death. | |
| O Father! dispel from their souls the darkness, and grant them the light | 35 |
| Of reason, thy stay, when the whole wide world thou rulest with might, | |
| That we, being honored, may honor thy name with the music of hymns, | |
| Extolling the deeds of the Donor, unceasing, as rightly beseems | |
| Mankind; for no worthier trust is awarded to God or to man | |
| Than forever to glory with justice in the law that endures and is One. | 40 |
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