And wishing to show at greater length that even the thoughts of God
entertained by the human race are not superior to those of all other
mortal creatures, but that certain of the irrational animals are capable
of thinking about Him regarding whom opinions so discordant have existed
among the most acute of mankind—Greeks and Barbarians—he continues: “If,
because man has been able to grasp the idea of God, he is deemed
superior to the other animals, let those who hold this opinion know that
this capacity will be claimed by many of the other animals; and with
good reason: for what would any one maintain to be more divine than the
power of foreknowing and predicting future events? Men accordingly
acquire the art from the other animals, and especially from birds. And
those who listen to the indications furnished by them, become possessed
of the gift of prophecy. If, then, birds, and the other prophetic
animals, which are enabled by the gift of God to foreknow events,
instruct us by means of signs, so much the nearer do they seem to be to
the society of God, and to be endowed with greater wisdom, and to be
more beloved by Him. The more intelligent of men, moreover, say that the
animals hold meetings which are more sacred than our assemblies, and
that they know what is said at these meetings, and show that in reality
they possess this knowledge, when, having previously stated that the
birds have declared their intention of departing to some particular
place, and of doing this thing or the other, the truth of their
assertions is established by the departure of the birds to the place in
question, and by their doing what was foretold. And no race of animals
appears to be more observant of oaths than the elephants are, or to show
greater devotion to divine things; and this, I presume, solely because
they have some knowledge of God.” See here now how he at once lays hold
of, and brings forward as acknowledged facts, questions which are the
subject of dispute among those philosophers, not only among the Greeks,
but also among the Barbarians, who have either discovered or learned
from certain demons some things about birds of augury and other animals,
by which certain prophetic intimations are said to be made to men. For,
in the first place, it has been disputed whether there _is_ an art of
augury, and, in general, a method of divination by animals, or not. And,
in the second place, they who admit that there is an art of divination
by birds, are not agreed about the manner of the divination; since some
maintain that it is from certain demons or gods of divination[812] that
the animals receive their impulses to action—the birds to flights and
sounds of different kinds, and the other animals to movements of one
sort or another. Others, again, believe that their souls are more divine
in their nature, and fitted to operations of that kind, which is a most
incredible supposition.
Footnote 812:
θεῶν μαντικῶν.