89. But you say: ‘The ambiguity of the word ὁμοούσιον troubles and offends me.’ I pray you hear me again and be not offended. I am troubled by the inadequacy of the word ὁμοιούσιον. Many deceptions come from similarity. I distrust vessels plated with gold, for I may be deceived by the metal underneath: and yet that which is seen resembles gold. I distrust anything that looks like milk, lest that which is offered to me be milk but not sheep’s milk: for cow’s milk certainly looks like it. Sheep’s milk cannot be really like sheep’s milk unless drawn from a sheep. True likeness belongs to a true natural connection. But when the true natural connection exists, the ὁμοούσιον is implied. It is a likeness according to essence when one piece of metal is like another and not plated, if milk which is of the same colour as other milk is not different in taste. Nothing can be like gold but gold, or like milk that did not belong to that species. I have often been deceived by the colour of wine: and yet by tasting the liquor have recognized that it was of another kind. I have seen meat look like other meat, but afterwards the flavour has revealed the difference to me. Yes, I fear those resemblances which are not due to a unity of nature.

89. Homaeusion non caret offendiculo. Similitudo vera.---Sed dicis: Movet me cum scandalo homoeusii ambiguitas. Iterum audi, oro, sine scandalo: et me movet homoeusii nuditas. Multa saepe fallunt, quae similia sunt. Timeo aurum bracteae, quia me fallere possit interius: et tamen auro simile est quod videtur. Timeo lactis similitudinem, ne oblatum mihi lac, non lac ovium sit: quia ei simile videatur 0541B et bubulum. Ut lac ovium lacti ovium simile sit, non potest simile esse, nisi ovis sit. Similitudo vera in veritate naturae est. Veritas autem in utroque naturae non negatur homousion. Haec est enim secundum essentiam similitudo, si massa massae 516 consimilis non fallat in bractea, si lac quod concolor est, non 0542A diversum sit in sapore. Simile auro quidquam non potest esse, nisi aurum: simile lacti, nisi sui generis sit, esse non poterit. Fefellit me frequenter color vini: et tamen gustatu, alterius generis liquorem recognovi. Vidi carnes carnibus similes: sed postea mihi naturae dissimilitudinem sapor prodidit. Has enim similitudines, quae non ex unitate naturae sint, metuo.