—sola insuperabile Fatum
Nata, movere paras? intres licet ipsa sororum
Tecta trium; cernes illic molimine vasto
Ex aere, & solido rerum tabularia ferro:
Quae neque concursum Coeli, neque fulminis iram,
Nec metuunt ullas tuta atque aeterna ruinas.
Invenies illic incisa Adamante perenni
Fata tui Generis, legi ipse, animoque notavi,
Et referam: ne sis etiamnum ignara futuri.
Hic sua complevit; (pro quo Cytherea laboras,)
Tempora, perfectis quos Terrae debuit, annis, &c.
Jupiter you see is only Library-Keeper, or Custos Rotulorum to the Fates: For he offers his Daughter a Cast of his Office, to give her a Sight of their Decrees; which the inferiour Gods were not permitted to read without his leave. This agrees with what I have said already in the Preface; that they not having seen the Records, might believe they were his own Hand-writing; and consequently at his disposing either to blott out, or alter, as he saw convenient. And of this Opinion was Juno in those words, tua qui potes orsa reflectas. Now the abode of those Destinies being in Hell, we cannot wonder why the Swearing by Styx, was an inviolable Oath amongst the Gods of Heaven, and that Jupiter himself should fear to be accus'd of Forgery by the Fates, if he alter'd any thing in their Decrees. Chaos, Night, and Erebus, being the most Antient of the Deities, and instituting those fundamental Laws, by which he was afterwards to govern. Hesiod gives
