After these assertions, he takes from the Gospel of Matthew, and perhaps
also from the other Gospels, the account of the dove alighting upon our
Saviour at His baptism by John, and desires to throw discredit upon the
statement, alleging that the narrative is a fiction. Having completely
disposed, as he imagined, of the story of our Lord’s birth from a
virgin, he does not proceed to deal in an orderly manner with the
accounts that follow it; since passion and hatred observe no order, but
angry and vindictive men slander those whom they hate, as the feeling
comes upon them, being prevented by their passion from arranging their
accusations on a careful and orderly plan. For if he had observed a
proper arrangement, he would have taken up the Gospel, and, with the
view of assailing it, would have objected to the first narrative, then
passed on to the second, and so on to the others. But now, after the
birth from a virgin, this Celsus, who professes to be acquainted with
all our history, attacks the account of the appearance of the Holy
Spirit in the form of a dove at the baptism. He then, after that, tries
to throw discredit upon the prediction that our Lord was to come into
the world. In the next place, he runs away to what immediately follows
the narrative of the birth of Jesus—the account of the star, and of the
wise men who came from the east to worship the child. And you yourself
may find, if you take the trouble, many confused statements made by
Celsus throughout his whole book; so that even in this account he may,
by those who know how to observe and require an orderly method of
arrangement, be convicted of great rashness and boasting, in having
inscribed upon his work the title of _A True Discourse_,—a thing which
is never done by a learned philosopher. For Plato says, that it is not
an indication of an intelligent man to make strong assertions respecting
those matters which are somewhat uncertain; and the celebrated
Chrysippus even, who frequently states the reasons by which he is
decided, refers us to those whom we shall find to be abler speakers than
himself. This man, however, who is wiser than those already named, and
than all the other Greeks, agreeably to his assertion of being
acquainted with everything, inscribed upon his book the words, _A True
Discourse_!