_Attend, great King of_ Thrace, _and learn thy Doom; Thy stately City soon thou must depart, And thy defenceless Sheep shall follow thee; The Savage Lion’s irresistless Power Shall plunder thee, and ravage all thy Stores. Thou from thy princely Grandeur soon shalt fall; The Dogs which now in State stand round thy Throne Shall rouze the sleepy Wolf, bold to assert His Liberty, nor drag thy servile Chain._ Bithynia’s _Realm shall then become a Prey To fierce devouring Wolves, and_ Jove’s _Decree Transfer thy Empire hence to fair_ Byzantium. _Happy, thrice happy Monarch would’st thou be, Could’st thou repel with Force the rav’nous Wolf, Thus timely warn’d by me: For I am forc’d To speak, and tell the Will of Heav’n to Man. Wide Desolation now attends thee_, Thrace; _A heavy Vengeance waits; long hast thou try’d, And daringly provok’d the Neighbouring States; And now a Cloud of Woe hangs o’re thy Head, Which daily swelling to a larger Size, Shall burst in Blood, and ruine all about thee_. This Oracle or Prophecy, says _Zosimus_, truly fore-tells, tho’ in an Ænigmatical Manner, all the Calamities which would befall the _Bythinians_, by Reason of an excessive Tribute which had been demanded of them, and presignifies also their speedy Subjection to the Empire of _Constantinople_. And tho’ this did not happen till a long Time after, yet let no Man from thence infer, that the Time of the Accomplishment of the Prediction was expired before it came to pass. For all Time is but for a Moment with God, who is eternal. _This Interpretation of the Oracle_, says the Historian, _I observed to be true, by comparing the Event of Things with the Words of the Prophecy_; and adds, _that if any other Interpretation seems more agreeable, any one is at his own Liberty to follow it_. And to confirm the more this Explication of it, he tells us, how _Constantine_ the _Great_ and his Sons, oppress’d not only _Bithynia_, but the whole World with severe Exactions, so that whole Cities, unable to pay the Levies, remained desolate. The learned _Tzetzes_ before-mentioned, explains this Oracle in another Manner, and says, that it was delivered by _Phaenno_. _This Sybil_, says he, _was long ago famous for her Oracles, and foretold same Things many Ages since, which were accomplished but a little before the Times we live in; as the Conquest of_ Persia _over the Empire, the Slavery and Subjection of the Emperor to them, his Dethronement by his People and Nobles, the Wars of the_ Scythians _with the Eastern Empire, by whom she seems to mean the_ Turks. Thus far _Zosimus_. This Oracle, tho’ it be very antient, yet, amidst the present Ruins of _Constantinople_, it never appeared so manifest as now.