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| Chapter XCVIII
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Chapter
XCVIII.
I do not know, moreover, how Celsus could hear of
the elephants’ (fidelity to) oaths, and of their great
devotedness to our God, and of the knowledge which they possess of
Him. For I know many wonderful things which are related of the
nature of this animal, and of its gentle disposition. But I am
not aware that any one has spoken of its observance of oaths; unless
indeed to its gentle disposition, and its observance of compacts, so to
speak, when once concluded between it and man, he give the name of
keeping its oath, which statement also in itself is false. For
although rarely, yet sometimes it has been recorded that, after their
apparent tameness, they have broken out against men in the most savage
manner, and have committed murder, and have been on that account
condemned to death, because no longer of any use. And seeing that
after this, in order to establish (as he thinks he does) that the stork
is more pious than any human being, he adduces the accounts which are
narrated regarding that creature’s display of filial
affection4065
in bringing food to
its parents for their support, we have to say in reply, that this is
done by the storks, not from a regard to what is proper, nor from
reflection, but from a natural instinct; the nature which formed them
being desirous to show an instance among the irrational animals which
might put men to shame, in the matter of exhibiting their
gratitude to their parents. And if Celsus had known how great the
difference is between acting in this way from reason, and from an
irrational natural impulse, he would not have said that storks are more
pious than human beings. But further, Celsus, as still contending
for the piety of the irrational creation, quotes the instance of the
Arabian bird the phœnix, which after many years repairs to Egypt,
and bears thither its parent, when dead and buried in a ball of myrrh,
and deposits its body in the Temple of the Sun. Now this story is
indeed recorded, and, if it be true,4066
| 4066 [See vol. i. pp.
viii., 12, this series. Observe, Origen, in Egypt, doubts
the story.] | it is possible
that it may occur in consequence of some provision of nature; divine
providence freely displaying to human beings, by the differences which
exist among living things, the variety of constitution which prevails
in the world, and which extends even to birds, and in harmony with
which He has brought into existence one creature, the only one of its
kind, in order that by it men may be led to admire, not the creature,
but Him who created it.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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