Lactantius

“ But Lactantius, who uses the Sibyls so freely, should not have omitted to show what Sibylline oracles God drew forth from “the princes of this world” also, by the illumination of the pharos which he established in Sion, “to be a light to lighten the Gentiles” until the great Epiphany should rise upon them in “the dayspring from on high.”
I extract from a paradoxical but most entertaining author, whom I have often quoted, certain extracts from Philo, which I translate from his note in the Soirées. ”

“ According to the Sibylline books, King Messiah was not only to come, but He was to be specifically sent of God. He is supermundane, a King and a Judge [19] of superhuman glory and splendour. And, indeed, that a superhuman kingdom, such as the Sibylline oracles paint, should have a superhuman king, seems only a natural and necessary inference....If, as certain modern critics contend, the book of Daniel is not authentic, [20] but dates from Maccabean times, ...it may well be asked to what king the Sibylline oracles point, for they certainly date from that period ”

“ The Fathers all cite them, when it must have exposed them to scorn and overwhelming refutation had their quotations not been found in the Sibylline books of their adversaries. The influence of the Jewish religion upon the Gentiles under the Babylonian and Medo-Persian monarchies must have been considerable, but after Alexander’s time it was vastly increased. Many versions of select prophets were doubtless produced in Greek before the authorized Septuagint. These were soon embedded in the Sibyls’ books ”

“ St. Paul (Acts xvii. 28) quotes a heathen oracle very much as does our author. [12] Now, in view of the boldness with which the early Christians follow the example of the Apostle in quoting the Orphica and Sibyllina, I cannot imagine that these citations were not honestly believed by them to be oracles of a certain sort, by which God permitted the heathen to be enlightened. [13] Observe our author’s moderate but most pregnant remark about such inspiration (on p. 170, supra, note 8) , “almost with a divine voice;” ”

“ Who Phlegon was; his work lost; extracts from it by Julius Africanus and Eusebius; their works, containing these extracts, lost; all we know is from versions and later writers; collation of extracts as given by the Armenian version of the Chronicon of Eusebius, St. Jerome’s Latin version, the Chronographia of Syncellus, and the Chronicon Paschale ”