5. Celsus, then, did not show his dialectical skill when, comparing the human flesh of Jesus to gold, and silver, and stone, he saw it was more corruptible than they. For, to speak correctly, what is incorruptible cannot be more incorruptible than something else which is incorruptible, nor can what is corruptible be more corruptible than some other corruptible thing. But allowing that there are degrees of corruptibility, we shall still reply, that if it is possible for the matter which underlies all qualities to change its qualities, why should it be impossible for the flesh of Jesus to change its qualities, and become such as it ought to be if it is to live in the sky, and the upper realms, no longer having the qualities of fleshly |113 weakness, and whatever other qualities Celsus called "pollutions"? ----and in doing so did not speak like a philosopher. For in the proper sense pollution is the result of vice; but the nature of the body is not polluted; for as bodily nature it has no vice, which generates the pollution.