Prophetic birds cannot foresee their own danger
We, for our part, must say a few things out of many in answer to what is before us, so as to refute his false opinion, ungrateful as it is toward the One who made him. For Celsus too, being “a man” who was “in honour,” “did not understand” (Psalm 49:20). That is why he was not even “compared” (Psalm 49:20) with the birds and the other irrational animals that he thinks prophetic. Instead, yielding them the first place, and going further than the Egyptians, who worship irrational animals as gods, he made himself subject to the irrational animals, and, as far as it lay with him, the whole human race too, as though it thought worse and less about the divine than they do.
First of all, then, let it be asked whether divination through birds and the other animals believed to be prophetic exists or does not exist. For the argument advanced on either side is not easy to despise. On the one hand, it urges us not to accept such a thing, so that the rational creature may not abandon the oracles of demons and use birds in their place. On the other hand, it presents the evidence, attested by many, that many people have been saved from the greatest dangers by trusting divination through birds.
For the present, let it be granted that augury is real, so that even so I may show those already prejudiced in its favour that, even if this is granted, man’s superiority over the irrational animals, even over the prophetic ones themselves, is great and beyond any comparison with them. We must say, then, that if there were in them some divine nature that foreknew the future, and so rich that out of its abundance it could show what is to come even to any man who wished, plainly they would have known their own affairs much sooner. And knowing their own affairs, they would have taken care not to fly up over a place where men had set snares and nets against them, or where archers, taking aim at flying creatures, were loosing arrows at them. Surely eagles too, if they foreknew the plot against their young, whether of snakes that climb up to them and destroy them or of men who take them for sport or for some other use and keeping, would not have nested where they were going to be plotted against. And, in a word, none of these animals would ever have been caught by men, if it were more divine and wiser than men.
Greek
ἡμῖν δ᾿ ὀλίγα πρὸς τὰ προκείμενα ἀπὸ πολλῶν λεκτέον, διελέγχουσι τὴν ἀχάριστον ψευδοδοξίαν πρὸς τὸν πεποιηκότα αὐτόν· „ἄνθρωπος“ γὰρ καὶ Κέλσος ὢν „ἐν τιμῇ ὢν οὐ συνῆκε,“ διὸ οὐδὲ „παρασυνεβλήθη“ τοῖς ὄρνισι καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις (ἀλόγοις) ζῴοις, οἷς νομίζει εἶναι μαντικοῖς, ἀλλ᾿ ἐκείνοις παραχωρήσας τὰ πρωτεῖα ὑπὲρ Αἰγυπτίους, τοὺς τὰ ἄλογα ζῷα ὡς θεοὺς προσκυνοῦντας, ἑαυτὸν ὑπέταξε τὸ δ᾿ ὅσον ἐπ᾿ αὐτῷ καὶ πᾶν τὸ τῶν ἀνθρώπων γένος ὡς χεῖρον καὶ ἔλαττον νοοῦν περὶ τοῦ θείου τοῖς ἀλόγοις ζῴοις. προηγουμένως μὲν οὖν ζητείσθω, πότερον ὑπάρχει ἡ δι᾿ ὀρνίθων καὶ τῶν λοιπῶν ζῴων, πεπιστευμένων εἶναι μαντικῶν, μαντικὴ ἢ μὴ ὑπάρχει. καὶ γὰρ οὐκ εὐκαταφρόνητός ἐστιν εἰς ἑκάτερα ἐπιχειρούμενος ὁ λόγος· ὅπου μὲν δυσωπῶν μὴ παραδέξασθαι τὸ τοιοῦτον, ἵνα μὴ τὸ λογικὸν ἀντὶ τῶν δαιμονίων χρηστηρίων ὄρνισι χρήσηται, καταλιπὸν ἐκεῖνα, ὅπου δὲ διὰ μαρτυρουμένης ὑπὸ πολλῶν ἐναργείας παριστὰς ὅτι πολλοὶ ἀπὸ μεγίστων διεσώθησαν κινδύνων, πεισθέντες τῇ δι᾿ ὀρνίθων μαντικῇ. ἐπὶ δὲ τοῦ παρόντος δεδόσθω ὑπαρκτὸν εἶναι τὴν οἰωνιστικὴν, ἵνα καὶ οὕτως δείξω τοῖς προκαταληφθεῖσιν ὅτι καὶ τούτου διδομένου πολλή ἐστιν ἡ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου παρὰ τὰ ἄλογα ζῷα καὶ παρ᾿ αὐτὰ τὰ μαντικὰ ὑπεροχὴ καὶ οὐδαμῶς πρὸς ἐκεῖνα συγκριτή. λεκτέον ουν ὅτι, εἴπερ τις θεία φύσις ἦν ἐν αὐτοῖς τῶν μελλόντων προγνωστικὴ καὶ ἐπὶ τοσοῦτον πλουσία, ὡς ἐκ περιουσίας καὶ τῷ βουλομένῳ τῶν ἀνθρώπων δηλοῦν τὰ ἐσόμενα, δηλονότι πολὺ πρότερον τὰ περὶ ἑαυτῶν ἐγίνωσκον· (γινώσκον) τα δὲ τὰ περὶ ἑαυτῶν ἐφυλάξατο (αν) ἀναπτῆναι κατὰ τοῦδε τοῦ τόπου, ἐφ᾿ οὗ παγίδας καὶ δίκτυα ἄνθρωποι ἔστησαν κατ᾿ αὐτῶν, ἢ τοξόται σκοπῷ χρώμενοι τοῖς ἱπταμένοις βέλη ἐπ᾿ αὐτὰ ἀπέλυον. πάντως δ᾿ ἂν καὶ προγινώσκοντες ἀετοὶ τὴν κατὰ τῶν νεοσσῶν ἐπιβουλὴν, εἴτε τῶν ἀναβαινόντων πρὸς αὐτοὺς ὄφεων καὶ διαφθειρόντων αὐτοὺς, εἴτε καί τινων ἀνθρώπων εἴτ᾿ εἰς παιδιὰν εἴτε καὶ εἰς ἄλλην τινὰ χρείαν καὶ θεραπείαν λαμβανόντων αὐτοὺς, οὐκ ἂν ἐνόσσευσαν ἔνθα ἔμελλον ἐπιβουλεύεσθαι· καὶ ἁπαξαπλῶς οὐκ ἄν ποτε τῶν ζῴων τι τούτων ἁλωτὸν ἀνθρώποις ἦν ὡς ἀνθρώπων θειότερον καὶ σοφώτερον.