Letter 1641: God's judgment is certain, and no amount of cleverness or delay can avoid it.

To Athanasios. I have considered it both impious and unmanly to pay court to those who do not live well but are clothed in power, while despising those adorned with virtue if they happen to be private men, and to praise the former while tearing down the latter. Do not be surprised, then, that I set the just before the advantageous, and the fitting before gain, and virtue before power. For if I did not do this, I would have seemed to have overlooked Eutonios, who is being plotted against, and to have fawned upon Eusebios, who plays the tyrant. For the whole clergy makes war on Eusebios, the one willingly, the other even at the signal of the man in power. Of this war I, for my part, know no charge whatever [to justify it]. They say-and I hear it from those who say it-that he [Eutonios] is a renowned nursling of virtue; but the man who gave the signal for this war, even if many who hate and revile him flatter him, I, since he is an enemy of virtue and a fellow worker with the devil who sows the tares against the souls of men, cannot so much as look upon-not even if he should threaten me with ten thousand deaths.

Καὶ ἀσεβὲς εἶναι καὶ ἄνανδρον γενόμικα τοὺς μὴ εὖ βιοῦντας μέν, δυναστείαν δὲ περιβεβλημένους περιέπειν· τῶν δὲ ἀρετῇ κεκοσμημένων, εἰ ἰδιωτεύοιεν, καταφρονεῖν· κἀκείνους ἐπαινεῖν, τούτους δὲ διασύρειν. Μὴ τοίνυν θαύμαζε, εἰ τὸ δίκαιον πρὸ τοῦ συμφέροντος τίθεμαι, καὶ τὸ πρέπον πρὸ τοῦ κέρδους, καὶ τὴν ἀρετὴν πρὸ τῆς δυναστείας. Εἰ γὰρ μή τοῦτ’ ἐποίουν, ἔδοξα ἂν Εὐτόνιον μέν, ὅτι ἐπιδουλεύεται, παρεωρακέναι, Εὐσέβιον δέ, ὅτι τυραννεῖ τεθεραπευκέναι. Εὐσέβιῳ γὰρ πολεμεῖ μὲν ἅπας ὁ κλῆρος, ὅ’μὲν ἑκών, ὁ δὲ καὶ πρὸς τὸ τοῦ κρατοῦντος σύνθημα· Ἔγκλημα δὲ τοῦ πολέμου τούτου, ἐγὼ μὲν οὐκ οἶδα οὐδέν. Φασὶ δὲ λεγόντων ἀκούειν, ὅτι ἀρετῆς ἐστι θρέμμα περίβλεπτον· τὸν δὲ τὸ σύνθημα τοῦ πολέμου δόντα εἰ καὶ πολλοὶ μισοῦντες καὶ κακηγοροῦντες κολακεύουσιν, ἐγὼ ἀτε ἐχθρὸν τῆς ἀρετῆς, καὶ τῷ διαβόλῳ συμπράττοντα τῷ κατὰ τῶν ἀνθρωπίνων ψυχῶν σπείροντι τὰ ζιζάνια, οὐδ’ ἰδεῖν δύναμαι, οὐδ’ ἂν μυρίους ἀπειλήσῃ θανάτους.