14. If, indeed, I wished to join issue with Celsus on these lines, I might quote the words of Solomon in the Proverbs: "There be four things which be little upon the earth, but they are exceedingly wise: the ants are a people not strong, yet they provide their meat in the summer; the conies are but a feeble folk, yet make they their houses in the rocks; the locusts have no king, yet go they forth all of them by bands at one word of command; the lizard taketh hold with her hands, and though easily taken, yet is she in the strongholds of kings." But the words are not clear, and I therefore do not avail myself of them; in accordance with the title of the book (it is called "Proverbs ") I regard them as "dark sayings" and look for the meaning. For the inspired writers are wont to distinguish the many ways of conveying a deeper meaning than the literal, and one of them is the Proverb. Hence it is that even in our Gospels our Saviour is reported to have said, "These things have I spoken unto you in proverbs: the hour cometh when I shall no more speak unto you in proverbs." Now it is not the ants we see that are wiser than the wise, but the ants proverbially indicated. And we say the same of the other animals. But Celsus thinks the books of Jesus and Christians are very simple common-place productions, and he supposes that they who treat them allegorically do violence to the meaning of the writers. Let this suffice to show how futile it is for Celsus to slander us; and let it be the reputation of his argument to prove that snakes and eagles are wiser than men.