Another branch of divination conquers the difficulty which distance in space opposes to our ordinary perceptions. In all such cases it is of course not our hearing or smelling which suddenly becomes miraculously powerful, but another magic power, which causes impressions on the mind like those produced by the eye and the ear. The oldest well-authenticated instance of magic hearing is probably that of Hyrcanus, the high-priest of the Jews, who while burning incense in the temple, heard a voice saying: "Now Antiochus has been slain by thy sons." The news was immediately proclaimed to the people, and some time afterward messengers came announcing that Antiochus had thus perished as he approached Samaria, which he desired to relieve from the besieging army under the sons of Hyrcanus (Josephus, "Antiq." lxiii. ch. 19). A still more striking instance is also reported by a trustworthy author (Theophylactos Simocata, l. viii. ch. 13). A man in Alexandria, Egypt, saw, as he returned home about midnight, the statues before the great temple moved aside from their seats, and heard them call out to him that the Emperor had been slain by Phocas (602). Thoroughly frightened he hastened to the authorities, reporting his adventure; he was carried before Peter, the Viceroy of Egypt, and ordered to keep silence. Nine days later, however, the official news came that the Emperor had been murdered. It is evident that the knowledge of the event came to him in some mysterious way, and for an unknown purpose; but that what he saw and heard, was purely the work of his imagination, which became the vehicle of the revelation.