XVIII. Demetrius told us that, among the islands near Britain, many were deserted and lay scattered (Sporades), some of them bearing the names of daemons and demigods. He himself, by the Emperor’s command, made a voyage of inquiry and observation to the nearest of the deserted islands, which had a few inhabitants, all sacred persons and never molested by the Britons. Just after his arrival, there was a great confusion in the atmosphere, many portents from the sky with gusts of wind and fiery blasts. When these calmed [Sidenote: F] down, the islanders said that ‘one of the mightier ones has ceased to be.’ For as a lamp when lighted, so they explained, has no unpleasant effect, but when extinguished is disagreeable to many people, so it is with great souls: their kindling into life is easy and free from pain; their extinction and death often breed winds and tempests, ‘such as you see now’, and infect the air with pestilence and sickness. They added that there is one island in particular where Cronus is a prisoner, being guarded in his sleep by Briareus; for sleep has been devised to be a chain to bind him, and there are many daemons about him as satellites and attendants.[160] XIX. Cleombrotus spoke next: ‘I have stories of the same [Sidenote: 420] kind which I might tell; but it is enough for our hypothesis that there is nothing which actually contradicts it or makes such things impossible. Yet we know’, he continued, ‘that the Stoics not only hold the view which I am advancing with [Sidenote: B] reference to daemons, but also recognize one out of the great multitude of Gods who is eternal and immortal; the others, they think, have come into being, and will perish. From the flouts and laughter of the Epicureans, which they venture to employ against Providence also, calling it a mere myth, we have nothing to fear. We maintain that their “Infinity” is a myth; so many worlds, not one of which is governed by divine reason, all produced spontaneously, and so subsisting. If it be permissible to laugh in speaking of Philosophy, we may laugh at the dumb, blind, soulless images which they shepherd during countless cycles of years, to reappear and anon return in all directions, some issuing from bodies still living, some [Sidenote: C] from those long ago burned or rotted. Thus they drag into physiology cyphers and shadows; yet if one asserts that daemons exist not in physical nature only, but as matter of theory, able to remain in being for long periods of time, they show irritation.’