But the heroes of these stories have their everlasting existence in special abodes under the surface of the earth, in subterranean chambers[7\3]--not in the common meeting place of the departed; they each have their own peculiar domain far from the House of Aïdoneus. Such isolation of individuals below the earth does not agree with Homeric ideas; though it almost seems as if a dim echo of these stories of seers like Amphiaraos and Amphilochos, translated alive and with consciousness undestroyed, could be discerned in what the Homeric Nekyia says of Teiresias the Theban seer, in whom alone of all the shadows Persephone had allowed consciousness and intelligence (the essential vital powers) to remain undiminished.[8\3] But even he is fast bound in Erebos, the general home of the dead, and cut off from all connexion with the upper world, as is demanded by the Homeric view of the world. Amphiaraos and Trophonios, on the other hand, are released from Hades; not having suffered death they have not entered the world of the strengthless dead. They are also translated out of this life (besides out of Hades). But this "subterranean translation" is in its nature and in the origin of the belief in it quite distinct from that "translation to Islands of the Blest" of which we spoke in the last chapter. Those Heroes dwelling alone or in company on holy islands far out over the sea are far removed from human life and beyond the reach of prayers and desires. No influence upon the things of this world is attributed to them, and consequently no cult is offered to them: there never existed a cult of the dwellers in Elysium _as such_. They glimmer in the distance like visions of the poet's fancy from which no one anticipates active interference with the world of reality. It is quite different with these dwellers in the caves. They are actually alive under the surface of the earth; not far away in the inaccessible, spectral world of Hades, but here in the midst of Greece. Questions and prayers {92} can reach down to them, and they can send up aid to those who call to them. To them, accordingly, as powerful and effectual Spirits a _cult_ is paid.