Letter 119: The people who say I've fallen far from real eloquence are actually agreeing with me and disagreeing with you.

The people who say I've fallen far from real eloquence are actually agreeing with me and disagreeing with you. I've never considered myself a great orator. You, on the other hand, have never stopped calling me one. Now, if you are divinely inspired -- and the gods themselves confirm this -- and these people fight against your judgment, well, consider who they might be. I'm amazed at them: they think fortune made me bloom long ago and old age has now snuffed me out, while they themselves, having risen from utter obscurity to strut around, never consider that they too owe their position to fortune -- fortune that will fly away from them soon enough. None of this can actually sting me. If it did hurt, I'd have a source of consolation: mouths like these have attacked many men better than me -- you, your teacher, his teacher, and even the one before that. So you, as the most respected of philosophers, should pray to Justice to change their ways. And I, as the clumsiest of ignoramuses, ask the same goddess to keep them exactly as they are.

**To Eustathius** (359/60) Those who say I stand at the greatest remove from eloquence are saying the same thing I say, yet they contradict you. For I have never considered myself a rhetorician, but you have never ceased calling me one. Now if you are divinely inspired, and the gods themselves affirm it, yet these people fight against your judgment — consider who they must be. I marvel at them: they suppose that I once flourished by fortune and have now been extinguished by old age, yet they themselves, surging up out of deep obscurity just now, do not think they owe their success to a fortune that will fly away from them before long. None of this has the power to sting me. But if I were in pain, I would have a source from which to draw consolation — for such mouths have attacked many who are better than I: you, and your teacher, and his teacher, and his teacher before him. So then, you, as the most esteemed of philosophers, pray to Justice to change their ways. But I, as the most boorish of ignorant men, ask that same goddess to keep them just as they are.

Εὐσταθίῳ. (359/60) Οἱ λέγοντές με πλεῖστον ἀφεστάναι λόγων ἐμοὶ μὲν ταὐτὰ φθέγγονται σοὶ δὲ ἀντιλέγουσιν. ἐγὼ μὲν γὰρ οὐδεπώποτε ἐμαυτὸν ἡγησάμην ῥητορικόν, σὺ δ’ οὐδεπώποτέ με ἐπαύσω τοῦτο καλῶν. εἰ δὴ σὺ μὲν θεῖος καὶ τοῦτό φασιν οἱ θεοί, μάχονται δ’ ἐκεῖνοι τῇ ψήφῳ τῇ σῇ, τίνες ἂν εἶεν, σκόπει θαυμάζω δὲ αὐτῶν εἰ ἐμὲ μὲν ἡγοῦνται τύχη μὲν ἠνθηκέναι πάλαι, γήρᾳ δὲ ἀπεσβηκέναι νῦν, αὐτοὶ δὲ ἐξ ἀφανείας πολ- λῆς νυνὶ σοβοῦντες οὔτι οἴονται τύχῃ κεχρῆσθαι τῇ μικρὸν ὕστερον ἀποπτησομένῃ. ἐμὲ μὲν οὖν τούτων οὐδὲν δύνα- ται δάκνειν, εἰ δὲ ἤλγουν, εἶχον ἄν. ὅθεν ἂν παραμυθίαν ἀγάγοιμι· πολλοῖς γὰρ ἐμοῦ βελτίοσι τὰ τοιαῦτα ἐπέθετο στό- ματα, σοὶ καὶ τῷ σῷ διδασκάλῳ καὶ τῷ ’κείνου καὶ ἔτι γε τῷ ’κείνου. σὺ μὲν οὖν ὡς ἂν φιλοσόφων ὁ δοκιμώτατος εὔχου τῇ Δίκῃ μεταβαλεῖν αὐτοῖς τὸν τρόπον, ἐγὼ δὲ ὡς ἄν τις τῶν ἀμαθῶν ὁ σκαιότατος αἰτῶ τὴν αὐτὴν θεὸν <ἐν> ἴσοις αὐτοὺς διατηρῆσαι τρόποις.