Letter 190: While we were lamenting what has happened to Procopius and praying for his darkness to be lifted, the Cilicians --...

To Modestus. (360) While we were lamenting what has happened to Procopius and praying for his darkness to be lifted, the Cilicians -- the very people who received so many kindnesses from him -- repaid his generosity like Agamemnon [who took what was not his]. Like wolves falling on unguarded sheep, they have plundered his daughter's household as though it were Mysian booty [proverbially easy pickings]. And yet Procopius is alive. He has lost his money, but in every other respect he is the man he always was. You too are alive, and powerful, and you count Procopius among your friends, and you know how to be a friend no less than how to govern. Show those villainous Cilicians that this man is not so easy to push around. And do not wonder that I have sent a short letter about so many wrongs. The man carrying it is a rhetorician -- Procopius's own son, wronged alongside his father, with a tongue equal to the tragedy.

Μοδέστῳ. (360) Σχετλιαζόντων ἡμῶν οἴα πέπονθε Προκόπιος καὶ συν- ευχομένων λυθῆναι τὸν ζόφον Κιλίκων οἱ πολλὰ δὴ παρ’ αὐ- τοῦ χρηστὰ παθόντες ἀντ’ εὐεργεσίας Ἀγαμέμνονά φα- σιν. ὥσπερ γὰρ λύκοι προβάτοις ἐπιπεσόντες ἐρήμοις Μυσῶν λείαν τὴν τῆς θυγατρὸς αὐτοῦ πεποιήκασιν οἰκίαν. καίτοι ζῇ μὲν Προκόπιος καὶ χρημάτων ἐστέρηται, τἄλλα δέ ἐστιν ἡλίκος ἦν. ζῇς δὲ καὶ σὺ καὶ δύνασαι καὶ Προκόπιον ἔνα τῶν φίλων ἡγῇ καὶ φιλεῖν ὅλως οὐχ ἧττον ἢ ἄρχειν ἐπίστασαι. δεῖξον δὴ τοῖς πονηροῖς Κιλίκων, ὡς οὐ ῥᾴδιον τὸν ἄνδρα ἐλαύνειν. καὶ μὴ θαυμάσῃς, εἰ περὶ πολλῶν κακῶν βρα- χεῖαν ἐπιστολὴν ἔπεμψα. ῥήτωρ γάρ ἐστιν ὁ κομίζων παῖς τε ἐκείνου καὶ συνηδικημένος καὶ γλῶτταν ἔχων ἀρκοῦσαν τῇ τρα- γῳδίᾳ