Against Celsus 4.88

Wishing further to show at length that not even notions about the divine are exclusive to the human race among all mortal beings, but that some of the irrational animals too have notions about God (about whom such disagreements have arisen even among the sharper-witted of human beings everywhere, Greeks and barbarians), he says: "If man is thought superior to the other animals because he has grasped notions of the divine, let those who say this know that many of the other animals will lay claim to this too; and with good reason. For what could one call more divine than to foreknow and foretell the future? Human beings learn this from the other animals, and especially from birds; and those who understand their indications are the diviners. If, then, birds, and whatever other prophetic animals there are, foreknowing from God, teach us by signs, it seems that they are by nature so much nearer to divine converse, and wiser and dearer to God. And the intelligent among human beings say that they have conversations too, evidently holier than ours, and that they themselves somehow understand what is said and show by the deed that they understand, when, having said beforehand that the birds said they would go somewhere and do this or that, they show them going there and doing what they had foretold. And nothing seems to keep oaths better than elephants, or to be more faithful to divine things, surely because they have knowledge of him." See in this how many questions debated among philosophers, not only of the Greeks but also of those among barbarians, who either discovered or learned from certain demons the facts about omens from birds and other animals, from which certain divinations are said to come to human beings, he seizes upon and sets out as agreed. For first it has been debated whether there is an art of augury, and in general divination through animals, or not. Second, among those who have accepted that there is divination through birds, the cause of the manner of divination has not been agreed upon; for some say that the movements of the animals come from certain demons or prophetic gods, to birds for different flights and different cries, and to the others for such and such movements; while others say that their souls are more divine and suited to this, which is most unconvincing.