p8o ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book IV. 



felves philofopliers, mention feme fafts concerning Dreams of this 

 kind, which, I think, are well vouched. Some of thefe I have al- 

 ready mentioned in the Firft Volume *, and I will now give an ac- 

 count of the mofl; extraordinary Dreamer that perhaps ever was, 

 though very little known even to Scholars ; I mean Ariltides the So- 

 phiJI, (o they called at that time Rhetoricians, who compofed and 

 pronounced orations on fubjeds of learning and philofophy : Such 

 was Dioji Chryfoftom, who lived before his time ; Maximus Tyrius, 

 who lived much about the fame time ; and Libanius and Themiftus, 

 who flourifhed in later times. They were truly, what the name So- 

 phifi imports, Philofophers as well as Orators ; for the fludy of Phi- 

 lofophy was at that time always joined witli Learning and the Stu- 

 dy of Eloquence. This Sophift was from Adrianus, a tojvn of Io- 

 nia. He flourifhed under the Antonines, the mofl learned age that 

 has been fince the days of Auguftus Caefar : and was known both to 

 Antoninus Pius, and to Marcus, and was highly efteemed by both of 

 them. He had the greateft reputation of any man of letters of his 

 age, and is mentioned with high commendations by feveral later wri- 

 ters, none of whom fpeak of him as a liar or an impoftor. Thi& 

 man, about the thirty-fecond year of his age, was feized with a vio- 

 lent difeafe, or rather a complication of difeafes : For his lungs, his 

 nerves, and his inteftines, were all affeded, and he had almoft a 

 continual fever ; fo that he was reduced to a ftate of the greateft 

 weaknefs, and was given over by all his phyficians. In this flate he 

 continued for no lefs than thirteen years, during all which time he 

 had a conftant communication with Superior Powers, both by 

 Dreams and Vifions. Of thefe he has given us a very particular ac- 

 count in fix difcourfes t> which he calls the Sacred Difcourfes^ writ- 

 ten not at all in the flyle of an Oration, though they are numbered 

 among his Orations, but in the ftyle of a plain narrative. Thefe 



Powers 



* Vol. i. p. 155. 



■f Page 273. of the Oxford Edition* 



