CHAPTER XXV. Having therefore solved the problem pertaining to the essence, let us in the next place consider the order of the sublunary Gods, and the meaning of the subsequent words of Plato. For let them be Gods, and let them be called dæmons for the cause above assigned, where must we arrange them? Must it be, as we have before said, under the moon, or prior to the celestial[130] Gods? For this may appear to be proper for these two reasons; one indeed, because Plato indicates that he ascends to a greater order, by saying that it exceeds our ability to speak concerning them, having already spoken concerning the celestial Gods; but the other, because he follows in what he says, those who have delivered to us Theogonies. For they prior to the world and the demiurgus, delivered these generations of Gods proceeding from Heaven and Earth. In answer to this query however, we must say, that he produces them after the celestial Gods, and through this from Heaven and Earth. For on this account he said that Earth was the most ancient of the Gods within the Heaven, because from this and Heaven, he was about to produce the other Gods which the heavens contain. This we demonstrate from the demiurgus addressing his speech to these Gods, and to all the rest, as being produced by him within the universe. Why, however, Plato says that he follows the Theogony, and why he shall omit to speak concerning the sublunary deities, we must refer to his having no clear indications of the subsistence of these from the phænomena, as he had of the celestial divinities, from the order of their periods, which is adapted to the government of Gods. It exceeds the province therefore of physiology to speak of beings, concerning whom natural effects afford us no stable belief. Hence Plato says, as a physiologist, that it surpasses his ability to speak of these.