But since, as we have said, his incredible study of these concerns, procured him a greater and more perfect degree of theurgic virtue, hence he no longer remained in the contemplative order, nor contented with either of the twofold properties in divine concerns, exercised intellect and thought alone on the more excellent objects of speculation: but he was careful to obtain another kind of virtues more divine than the former, and separated from the politic mode; for he used the Chaldean assemblies and conferences, and their divine and ineffable concealments. And having comprehended these, he learned the manner of pronouncing and expressing them, with their remaining use, from Asclepigenia, the daughter of Plutarch: for she alone, at that time, preserved the knowledge of the great Orgies, and of the whole theurgic discipline, delivered to her by her father, who received it from Nestor. Besides this, our philosopher also being purified in an orderly manner in the Chaldean lustrations, was an inspector of the lucid hecatic phasmai (or visions) of which he himself makes mention in one of his commentaries. But by moving a certain hecatic sphærula[63], he very opportunely brought down showers of rain, and freed Athens from an unseasonable heat. Besides this, by certain phylacteria, or charms, he stopt an earthquake, and had thoroughly tried the energies of a divining tripod, having learned from certain verses concerning its defect. For when he was in his fortieth year, he thought in a dream, that he repeated to himself, the following verses: High above æther there with radiance bright, A pure immortal splendor wings its flight; Whose beams divine with vivid force aspire, And leap resounding from a fount of fire. And in the beginning of his forty-second year, he appeared to himself to pronounce these verses, with a loud voice: Lo! on my soul a sacred fire descends, Whose vivid pow’r the intellect extends; From whence far-beaming through dull bodies night, It soars to æther deck’d with starry light; And with soft murmurs through the azure round, The lucid regions of the gods resound. Besides, he clearly perceived that he belonged to the Mercurial series; and was persuaded from a dream that he possessed the soul of[64] Nicomachus the Pythagorean.