Letter 53: (Gregory put a collection of Basil's letters with his own, and gave them the first place. Nicobulus seems to have been surprised at this, and asked the reason. Gregory explains as follows.) I have always preferred the Great Basil to myself, though he was of the contrary opinion; and so I do now, not less for truth's sake than for friendship's.

Gregory of NazianzusUnknown|c. 386 AD|Gregory of Nazianzus|Human translated
friendship
Travel & mobility; Personal friendship

I have always ranked the great Basil above myself, though he held the opposite opinion. I still do — not less for truth's sake than for friendship's.

That is why I've given his letters the first place and my own the second. I hope we two will always be remembered together. And I wanted to offer others an example of humility and willingness to yield.

Human translation - New Advent (NPNF / ANF series)

Latin / Greek Original

Original text not yet available in this corpus.

This letter still needs a Latin or Greek source-text backfill. The source link, when available, is preserved so the text can be checked and added later.

View source

Revision history

  1. 2026-03-20v2.1.0-import

    Initial corpus import from New Advent / NPNF.

    Fields: letter text, metadata, source links. Source: https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3103c.htm

Related Letters