“That he might bring from Erebus the dog of gloomy Pluto.”—Il., viii. 368. “And he advanced like a mountain-bred lion confident of strength.”—Od., vi. 130. “Rapidly through the city, while all his friends followed.” —Il., xxiv. 327. “Both maidens, and youths, and much-enduring old men.”—Od., xi. 38. “Mourning for him bitterly as one going forward to death.” —Il., xxiv. 328. “But Mercury and the blue-eyed Minerva conducted him.”—Od., xi. 626. “For she knew the mind of her brother, how it laboured with grief.”—Il., ii. 409.” Now, what simple-minded man, I ask, would not be led away by such verses as these to think that Homer actually framed them so with reference to the subject indicated? But he who is acquainted with the Homeric writings will recognise the verses indeed, but not the subject to which they are applied, as knowing that some of them were spoken of Ulysses, others of Hercules himself, others still of Priam, and others again of Menelaus and Agamemnon. But if he takes them and restores each of them to its proper position, he at once destroys the narrative in question. In like manner he also who retains unchangeable135 in his heart the rule of the truth which he received by means of baptism, will doubtless re- cognise the names, the expressions, and the parables taken from the Scriptures, but will by no means acknowledge the blasphemous use which these men make of them. For, though he will acknowledge the gems, he will certainly not receive the fox instead of the likeness of the king. But when he has restored every one of the expressions quoted to its proper position, and has fitted it to the body of the truth, he will lay bare, and prove to be without any foundation, the figment of these heretics. 5. But since what may prove a finishing-stroke136 to this exhibition is wanting, so that any one, on following out their farce to the end, may then at once append an argument which shall overthrow it, we have judged it well to point out, first of all, in what respects the very fathers of this fable differ among themselves, as if they were inspired by different spirits of error. For this very fact forms an a priori proof that the truth proclaimed by the Church is immoveable,137 and that the theories of these men are but a tissue of falsehoods. 135 Literally, “immoveable in himself,” the word ἀκλινῆ being used with an apparent reference to the original meaning of κανόνα, a builder’s rule. 136 The meaning of the word ἀπολύτρωσις here is not easily determined; but it is probably a scenic term equivalent to ἀπόλυσις, and may be rendered as above. 137 [The Creed, in the sublime simplicity of its fundamental articles, is established; that is, by the impossibility of framing anything to take their place.] 875 Chapter IX.—Refutation of the impious interpretations of these heretics