According to some writers the origin of beatification and
canonization in the Catholic Church is to be traced back to the
ancient pagan apotheosis. In his classic work on the subject (De
Servorum Dei Beatificatione et Beatorum Canonizatione) Benedict
XIV examines and at the very outset refutes this view. He shows
so well the substantial differences between them that no right-
thinking person need henceforth confound the two institutions or
derive one from the other. It is a matter of history who were
elevated to the honour of apotheosis, on what grounds, and by
whose authority; no less clear is the meaning that was attached
to it. Often the decree was due to the statement of a single
person (possibly bribed or enticed by promises, and with a view
to fix the fraud more securely in the minds of an already
superstitious people) that while the body of the new god was
being burned, an eagle, in the case of the emperors, or a
peacock (Juno's sacred bird), in the case of their consorts, was
seen to carry heavenward t