Lyrics Lament of Hermes - Akira the Don

Lament of Hermes

Do you know, Asclepius, that Egypt is an image of heaven?
Or to speak more exactly, in Egypt all the operations of the powers which rule
and work in heaven are present in the Earth below
In fact, it should be said that the whole cosmos dwells in this our land as in
a sanctuary
And yet, since it is fitting that wise men should have knowledge of all events
before they come to pass
You must not be left in ignorance of what I will now tell you
There will com a time when it will have been in vain that Egyptians hav honored
the Godhead with heartfelt piety and service, and all our holy worship will be
fruitless and ineffectual
For the gods will return from Earth to heaven
Egypt will be forsaken, and the land which was once the home of religion will
be left desolate
Bereft of the presence of its deities
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt, of thy religion nothing will remain but an empty tale
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt, of thy religion nothing will remain but an empty tale
Which thine own children in time to come will not believe
Nothing will be left but graven words, and only the stones will tell of thy
piety
And in that day men will be weary of life
And they will cease to think the universe worthy of reverent wonder and worship
They will no longer love this world around us
This incomparable work of God, this glorious structure which he has built,
this sum of good made up of many diverse forms, this instrument whereby the
will of God operates in that which he has made, ungrudgingly favoring man’s
welfare
This combination and accumulation of all the manifold things that call forth
the veneration, praise, and love of the beholder
Darkness will be preferred to light, and death will be thought more profitable
than life
No one will raise his eyes to heaven
The pious will be deemed insane, the impious wise
The madman will be thought a brave man, and the wicked will be esteemed as good
As for the soul, and the belief that it is immortal by nature, or may hope to
attain to immortality, as I have taught you
All this they will mock and even persuade themselves that it is false
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt, of thy religion nothing will remain but an empty tale
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt, of thy religion nothing will remain but an empty tale
No word of reverence or piety, no utterance worthy of heaven will be heard or
believed.
And so the gods will depart from mankind, a grievous thing
And only evil angels will remain, who will mingle with men, and drive the poor
wretches into all manner of reckless crime, into wars, and robberies,
and frauds, and all things hostile to the nature of the soul
Then will the earth tremble, and the sea bear no ships
Heaven will not support the stars in their orbits
All voices of the gods will be forced into silence
The fruits of the earth will rot, the soil will turn barren, and the very air
will sicken with sullen stagnation
All things will be disordered and awry
All good will disappear
But when all this has befallen, Asclepius
Then God, the creator of all things, will look on that which has come to pass,
and will stop the disorder by the counterforce of his will
Which is the good.
He will call back to the right path those who have gone
astray
He will cleanse the world of evil, washing it away with floods, burning it out
with the fiercest fire, and expelling it with war and pestilence
And thus he will bring back his world to its former aspect, so that the cosmos
will once more be deemed worthy of worship and wondering reverence, and God,
the maker and maintainer of the mighty fabric will be adored by the men of
that day with continuous songs of praise and blessing Such is the new birth of
the cosmos
It is a making again of all things good, a holy and awe-inspiring restoration
of all nature
And it is wrought
Inside the process of time
By the eternal will of the creator
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt, of thy religion nothing will remain but an empty tale
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt
Oh, Egypt, Egypt, of thy religion nothing will remain but an empty tale