Chapter VI. That We Confirm the Testimonies Used in Our Arguments Not by Our Own Assertions, but by Our Quotations From the Greeks

Come then, let us examine what is, according to them, the character of the oracles, in order that we may learn what kind of power we must ascribe to them, and whether we withdrew from them rightly or not. Now if I were going to bring forward my own proofs of the matters to be set forth, I know well that I should not render my argument unassailable by those who are inclined to find fault. Wherefore instead of asserting anything of my own, I shall make use again of the testimonies of those who are without.

But as there are among the Greeks historians and philosophers without number, I judge the most suitable of all in reference to the subjects before us to be that very friend of the daemons, who in our generation is celebrated for his false accusations against us. For he of all the philosophers of our time seems to have been most familiar with daemons and those whom he calls gods, and to have been their advocate, and to have investigated the facts concerning them much the most accurately.

He therefore, in the book which he entitled Of the Philosophy to be derived from Oracles, made a collection of the oracles of Apollo and the other gods and good daemons, which he especially chose out of them as thinking that they would suffice both for proof of the excellence of the supposed deities, and for the encouragement of what he is pleased to call ‘Theosophy.’

From these oracles, therefore, which have been selected and thought worthy to be remembered it is fair to judge the soothsayers, and to consider what sort of power they possess. But first let us observe how at the beginning of his work the person indicated swears in the following words that he is ‘verily speaking the truth’:[1]