who would receive Oracles, to abstain one whole day from meat, and three days from wine, that the soul could not rightly prophesie unless it were free from wine, and meat; for to sober and religious minds, attending on the divine worship, the Gods are wont to give Oracles; whence Orpheus crieth out,
----- Thou spirit great of prophecy
Dost go to souls that sleep fill quietly,
And them inspire with knowledge of the Gods,
And makest them soothsay -----
Hence it was a custom amongst the ancients, that they who should receive answers, certain sacred expiations and sacrifices being first celebrated, and divine worship ended, did religiously ly down even in a consecrated chamber, or at least on the skins of the sacrifices; of which ceremony Virgil makes mention in these verses,
----- Hence they sought
Answers to doubts; when gifts the priests had brought,
Here he reposed on skins of slaughtred sheep,
And under silent night prepares to sleep.
And a little after he singeth,
----- But now
Here King Latinus Oracles to know,
They did a hundred choyce sheep sacrifice,
And on their skins, and spreding fleeces lyes -----
And the rulers of the Lacedemonians (as Cicero saith) were wont to lye down in the Temple at Pasiphae, that they might dream. The same was done in the Temple of Aesculapius, from whom true dreams were thought to be sent forth. And the Calabrians, consulting Podalyrius the son of Aesculapius, did sleep neer his Sepulchre in lambes skins; for so doing they were told in their dreams whatsoever they desired to know; for the most usuall time for dreams is the night, when the senses
