the prize of magical incantations, namely divination and
prophecy. And this miracle in the case of boys is confirmed not only
by vulgar opinion but by the authority of learned men. I remember
reading various relations of the kind in the philosopher Varro, a
writer of the highest learning and erudition, but there was the
following story in particular. Inquiry was being made at Tralles by
means of magic into the probable issue of the Mithridatic war, and a
boy who was gazing at an image of Mercury reflected in a bowl of water
foretold the future in a hundred and sixty lines of verse. He records
also that Fabius, having lost five hundred denarii, came to consult
Nigidius; the latter by means of incantations inspired certain boys so
that they were able to indicate to him where a pot containing a
certain portion of the money had been hidden in the ground, and how
the remainder had been dispersed, one denarius having found its way
into the possession of Marcus Cato the philosopher. This coin Cato
acknowledged he had received from a certain lackey as a contribution
to the treasury of Apollo.

43. I have read this and the like concerning boys and art-magic in
several authors, but I am in doubt whether to admit the truth of such
stories or no, although I believe Plato when he asserts that there are
certain divine powers holding a position and possessing a character
midway between gods and men, and that all divination and the miracles
of magicians are controlled by them. Moreover it is my own personal
opinion that the human soul, especially when it is young and
unsophisticated, may by the allurement of music or the soothing
influence of sweet smells be lulled into slumber and banished into
oblivion of its surroundings so that, as all consciousness of the body
fades from the memory, it returns and is reduced to its primal nature,
which is in truth immortal and divine; and thus, as it were in a kind
of slumber, it may predict the future. But howsoever these things may
be, if any faith is to be put in them, the prophetic boy must, as far
as I can understand, be fair and unblemished in body, shrewd of wit
and ready of speech, so that a worthy and fair shrine may be provided
for the divine indwelling power--if indeed such a power does enter
into the boy's body--or that the boy's mind when wakened may quickly
apply itself to its inherent powers of divination, find them ready to
its use and reproduce their promptings undulled and unimpa