Letter 715: The law requires of doctors only one public service: the practice of their art.
To the same man. (362)
The law requires of physicians one public service, namely that which arises from their craft; but Philo is being dragged toward serving on the council by the inhabitants of Rhosus, though he has long since raised many men up from their illnesses.
If, then, they are unaware that Philo is a physician, let them learn it and desist; but if, knowing it, they apply force, then perhaps Philo is weak, yet the law is strong.
AI-assisted translation - This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek below for scholarly use.
Latin / Greek Original
Τῷ αὐτῶ. (362)
Ὁ νόμος τοὺς ἰατροὺς μίαν ἀπαιτεῖ λειτουργίαν τὴν ἀπὸ
τῆς τέχνης, Φίλων δὲ πρὸς τὸ βουλεύειν ὑπὸ τῶν Ῥωσὸν
οἰκούντων ἕλκεται πάλαι πολλοὺς ἐκ νοσημάτων ἀναστήσας.
εἰ μὲν οὖν ἀγνοοῦσιν ὡς ἰατρὸς ὁ Φίλων, μαθόντες παυ-
έσθωσαν· εἰ δὲ εἰδότες βιάζονται, Φίλων μὲν ἴσως ἀσθενής,
ἰσχυρὸς δὲ ὁ νόμος.
Revision history
- 2026-05-27v2.2.34-import
Initial corpus import from modern libanius retranslated v1.
Fields: letter text, metadata, source links. Source: https://github.com/OpenGreekAndLatin/First1KGreek/blob/master/volume_xml/libanius_10.xml
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