Letter 344: I am dissuaded from writing often to you, learned as you are, by my timidity and my ignorance. But your persistent silence is different. What excuse can be offered for it?
I am discouraged from writing to you -- learned as you are -- by my timidity and my ignorance. But your persistent silence is a different matter entirely. What excuse can there be for it? If anyone reflects that you are slow to write to me, a man who lives at the very center of letters, he will conclude that you have simply forgotten me. A man who is ready at speaking is never unprepared to write. And if such a man stays silent, it is clear that he acts either from forgetfulness or from contempt.
I will, however, repay your silence with a greeting. Farewell, most honored sir. Write if you like. If you prefer, do not write.
Human translation - New Advent (NPNF / ANF series)
Latin / Greek Original
[Πρός: Βασίλειος Λιβανίῳ]
Τὸ μὴ συνεχῶς με γράφειν πρὸς τὴν σὴν παίδευσιν, πείθουσι τό τε δέος καὶ ἡ ἀμαθία· τὸ δέ σε καρτερικώτατα σιωπᾷν, τί τῆς μέμψεως ἐξαιρήσεται; εἰ δέ τις λογίσαιτο τὸ καὶ ἐν λόγοις σε βιοῦντα ὀκνεῖν ἐπιστέλλειν, καταψηφιεῖταί σου λήθην τὴν πρὸς ἡμᾶς. ᾧ γὰρ τὸ λέγειν πρόχειρον, καὶ τὸ ἐπιστέλλειν οὐκ ἀνέτοιμον. ὁ δὲ ταῦτα κεκτημένος, εἶτα σιγῶν, εὔδηλον ὡς ὑπεροψίᾳ ἢ λήθῃ τοῦτο ποιεῖ. ἐγὼ δέ σου τὴν σιωπὴν ἀμείψομαι προσρήσει. χαῖρε τοίνυν, τιμιώτατε, καὶ γράφε εἰ βούλοιο· καὶ μὴ γράφε, εἰ τοῦτό σοι προσφιλές.
Revision history
- 2026-03-20v2.1.0-import
Initial corpus import from New Advent / NPNF.
Fields: letter text, metadata, source links. Source: https://github.com/PerseusDL/canonical-greekLit/blob/master/data/tlg2040/tlg004/tlg2040.tlg004.perseus-grc2.xml
Related Letters
I am delighted at receiving what you write, but when you ask me to reply, I am in a difficulty. What could I say in answer to so Attic a tongue, except that I confess, and confess with joy, that I am a pupil of fishermen? About this page Source.
Lo and behold, yet another Cappadocian has come to you; a son of my own! Yet my present position makes all men my sons. On this ground he may be regarded as a brother of the former one, and worthy of the same attention alike from me his father, and from you his instructor — if really it is possible for these young men, who come from me, to obtai...
All who are attached to the rose, as might be expected in the case of lovers of the beautiful, are not displeased even at the thorns from out of which the flower blows. I have even heard it said about roses by some one, perhaps in jest, or, it may be, even in earnest, that nature has furnished the bloom with those delicate thorns, like stings of...
To Libanius [the greatest living Greek rhetorician, based in Antioch].
You, who have included all the art of the ancients in your own mind, are so silent, that you do not even let me get any gain in a letter. I, if the art of Dædalus had only been safe, would have made me Icarus' wings and come to you. But wax cannot be entrusted to the sun, and so, instead of Icarus' wings, I send you words to prove my affection.