Letter 35: Must you really wait for a formal invitation?
Julian the Apostate→Aristoxenus philosopher|c. 357 AD|Julian the Apostate|Human translated
monasticism
To Aristoxenus the philosopher.
Must you really wait for a formal invitation? Do you never come uninvited? Let us not introduce this tiresome convention of treating friends like casual acquaintances.
Someone will raise the question: how can we be friends when we have never met? My answer: how are we friends with people who lived a thousand — or by Zeus, even two thousand — years ago? Because they were all virtuous, upright, noble in character. And we aspire to be like them, even if — speaking for myself — we completely fail. But the aspiration alone puts us in something of the same category.
Why am I going on about this? If you accept that you should come without an invitation, you will come. If you are actually waiting for one, consider this your urgent summons. Meet me at Tyana, in the name of Zeus the god of friendship, and show me a genuine Hellene [a true pagan Greek, devoted to the old gods and culture] among the Cappadocians. For I notice that some still refuse to sacrifice, and although a few are zealous, they lack the knowledge to do it properly.
To Aristoxenus, a Philosopher1
[362, June, on the way to Antioch]
Μust you then really wait for an invitation and never prefer to come uninvited? Nay, see to it that you and I do not introduce this tiresome convention
of expecting the same ceremony from our friends as from mere chance acquaintances. At this point will somebody or other raise the question how we come to be friends when we have never seen one another? I answer: How are we the friends of those who lived a thousand, or, by Zeus, even two thousand years ago? It is because they were all virtuous, of upright and noble character. And we, likewise, desire to be such as they, even though, to speak for myself, we completely fail in that aspiration. But, at any rate, this ambition does in some degree rank us in the same category as those persons. But why do I talk at length about these trifles? For if it is right that you should come without an invitation you will certainly come; if, on the other hand, you are really waiting for an invitation, herewith you have from me an urgent summons. Therefore meet me at
Tyana, in the name of Zeus the god of friendship, and show me a genuine Hellene among the Cappadocians.1 For I observe that, as yet, some refuse to sacrifice, and that, though some few are zealous, they lack knowledge.
1 This Hellenised Cappadocian is otherwise unknown.
Must you really wait for a formal invitation? Do you never come uninvited? Let us not introduce this tiresome convention of treating friends like casual acquaintances.
Someone will raise the question: how can we be friends when we have never met? My answer: how are we friends with people who lived a thousand — or by Zeus, even two thousand — years ago? Because they were all virtuous, upright, noble in character. And we aspire to be like them, even if — speaking for myself — we completely fail. But the aspiration alone puts us in something of the same category.
Why am I going on about this? If you accept that you should come without an invitation, you will come. If you are actually waiting for one, consider this your urgent summons. Meet me at Tyana, in the name of Zeus the god of friendship, and show me a genuine Hellene [a true pagan Greek, devoted to the old gods and culture] among the Cappadocians. For I notice that some still refuse to sacrifice, and although a few are zealous, they lack the knowledge to do it properly.