Against Celsus 3.74

He also accuses the teacher of seeking out the foolish. To him we would say: Whom do you call foolish? For strictly speaking every bad man is foolish. If then you call the bad foolish, when you bring men to philosophy, do you seek to bring the bad or the good? But you cannot bring the good, for they already practice philosophy; so it is the bad; and if the bad, the foolish. And you seek to bring many such people to philosophy; so you too seek the foolish. But I, even if I seek those who are called foolish in this sense, do something like a humane physician who seeks out the sick, to bring them remedies and strengthen them. But if you call foolish those who are not quick-witted but rather dull among men, I will answer you that I try to improve these too as far as possible; yet I do not wish to build up the Christian community from them. For I seek rather the quicker-witted and sharper, as able to follow the explanation of the riddles and of what is spoken with concealment in the Law, the Prophets, and the Gospels, which you have despised as containing nothing worthy of note, without testing their meaning or trying to enter into the intention of their writers.