24. And wishing to show that the assemblies of the irrational creatures are more sacred than ours, Celsus ascribes what he relates, not to ordinary mortals, but to "intelligent" men; though in truth only the good are intelligent, for no bad man is intelligent. Well, he speaks after this fashion: "Intelligent men say that the creatures have their assemblies, obviously more sacred than ours; and that they somehow discover what is said and show that they actually have the knowledge, inasmuch as they announce beforehand that the birds said they would go |135 away and do this or that, and then show that they did go away and do what they had already foretold." In reality, no "intelligent" person tells such stories, and no wise man says that the assemblies of the irrational creatures are more sacred than those of men. If, however, for the sake of testing the statements of Celsus, we examine what they lead to, it appears, according to him, that the assemblies of the irrational creatures are more sacred than those of the venerable Pherecydes, Pythagoras, Socrates, and Plato, and the Philosophers in general, which, on the face of it, is not only unseemly, but most absurd. But if we are to believe that certain men, who have derived their information from the inarticulate cry of the birds, announce beforehand that the birds will go to some place and do this or that, we shall maintain that the information has been given to men by demons through certain signs, for the purpose of men being deceived by demons, and their understanding dragged down from heaven and from God to earth and places lower still.