He said that at the moment that he lost consciousness he found himself like a sailor at the bottom of the sea; but afterwards, having recovered himself a little, he was able to breathe perfectly, and seeing only with the eyes of his soul, he looked round on all that was about him. He saw no longer the accustomed sights, but stars of prodigious magnitude, separated from each other by immense distances. They were of dazzling brightness and splendid colour. His soul, carried like a vessel on the luminous ocean, sailed along freely and smoothly, and moved everywhere with rapidity. Passing over in silence a large number of the sights that met his eye, he stated that the souls of the dead, taking the form of bubbles of fire, rise through the air, which opens a passage above them; at last the bubbles, breaking without noise, let out the souls in a human form and of a smaller size, and moving in different ways. Some, rising with astonishing lightness, mounted in a straight line; others, running round like a whipping-top, went up and down by turns with a confused and irregular motion, making small advance by long and painful efforts. Among this number he saw one of his parents, whom he recognised with difficulty, as she had died in his infancy; but she approached him, and said, "Good day, Thespesius." Surprised to hear himself called by this name, he told her that he was called Arideus, and not Thespesius. "That was once your name," she replied, "but in future you will bear that of Thespesius, for you are not dead, only the intelligent part of your soul has come here by the particular will of the gods; your other faculties are still united to your body, which keeps them like an anchor. The proof I will give you is that the souls of the dead do not cast any shadow, and they cannot move their eyes."