of
M. Nostradamus
to his Prophecies.
To Caesar Nostradamus my son
Long life and happiness.
1. Your late arrival, César Nostradamus, my son, has caused me to spend a great deal of time in continual nightly watches so that after my death you might be left a memorial of your father, revealing in writing that which the Divine Spirit has made known to me, through the revolutions of the stars, to the common benefit of mankind.
2. Since it has pleased the immortal God that you should have appeared on this earth but recently, and your years cannot yet be said to be coupled, your weak understanding is incapable of absorbing that which I must needs record of the future. Furthermore, it is impossible to leave you in writing that which would be obliterated by the wear and tear of time. Indeed, the hereditary gift of prophecy will go to the grave with me.
3. Events of human origin are uncertain, but all is regulated and governed by the incalculable power of God, inspiring us not through drunken fury, nor by frantic movement, but through the influences of the stars. Only those divinely inspired can predict particular things in a prophetic spirit.
4, For a long time I have been making many predictions, far in advance, of events since come to pass, naming the particular locality. I acknowledge all to have been accomplished through divine power and inspiration. Predicted events, both happy and sad, have come to pass throughout the world with increasing promptness. However, because of the possibility of harm, both for the present and most of the future, I became willing to keep silent and refrain from putting them into writing.
5. For kingdoms, sects and religions will make changes so complete, truly diametrically opposite, that if I came to reveal what will happen in the future, the great ones of the above kingdoms, sects, religions and faiths
