Letter 330: If I were writing to introduce Hieronymus to you before you had met him, I would be asking you to befriend the man.

To Clematius. (357/58) If I were writing to you about Hieronymus before you had come to know him, instructing you who Hieronymus is, I would have been asking you to befriend the man; but as it is, since you have already made him your friend, it is open to me to say how reasonably you have done this. For in the first place [...] that which counts for much with you, Hieronymus was my fellow-student, loving and loved within our shared pursuit of letters. Next, he is so honest a man that, although he could have brought a complaint against me for having omitted the words he himself had spoken to you, he gave up finding fault and asked me to write. And when I said that the letter was pointless, since he is under another man's authority according to the division of the province, he kept naming you as his governor, even if someone should saw Palestine apart into still more pieces, and he outdid in praise even those who are reckoned to praise you most extravagantly. And he was convincing; for any appearance of flattery was absent, since Elusa had come to belong to another man. These things, then, show that it was not on a man of base character that you spent your zeal. And if it is right to admire a good orator, you have admired a noble orator: one skilled at saying what is fitting to say, skilled too at keeping silent about what is better left in silence, and one who has acquired a tongue no worse than his mind. You, then, will always remember the art of Hieronymus, and he the precision of Clematius about the voting-ballot, and he will seek out your justice, and you his oratory.

Κληματίῳ. (357/58) Εἰ μέν, πρὶν μάθῃς Ἱερώνυμον, ἐπέστελλόν σοι περὶ αὐτοῦ διδάσκων, ὅστις ἐστὶν Ἱερώνυμος, ἠξίουν ἄν σε τὸν ἄνδρα φιλεῖν· νῦν δ’ ἐπειδὴ φθάσας αὐτὸν ἐποιήσω φίλον, ὡς εἰκότως τοῦτο ἐποίησας εἰπεῖν ἔστι μοι. πρῶτον μὲν γάρ, ὃ παρὰ σοὶ μέγα, συμφοιτητὴς ἐμὸς Ἱερώνυμος φιλῶν καὶ φιλούμενος ἐν τῇ κοινωνίᾳ τῶν λόγων. ἔπειθ’ οὕτως ἐστὶ χρηστός, ὥστ’ ἔχων ἐγκαλεῖν, ὅτι δὴ παρέλιπον τοὺς ὅπερ αὐτοῦ πρὸς σὲ λόγους, ἀφεὶς αἰτιᾶσθαι γράφειν ἠξίου. λέ- γοντος δέ μου μάταιον εἶναι τὴν ἐπιστολὴν, εἶναι γὰρ αὐτὸν ὑπ’ ἄλλῳ κατὰ τὴν τομὴν τῆς ἀρχῆς, σέ τε ὠνόμαζεν ἄρ- χοντα αὑτοῦ, κἂν εἰς πλείω τις διαπρίσῃ τὴν Παλαιστίνην, καὶ τῶν πάνυ σε δοκούντων ἐπαινεῖν ἐπαινῶν ἐκράτει. καὶ ἦν πιθανός· ἀπῆν γὰρ τὸ δοκεῖν κολακεύειν τῷ τὴν Ἔλουσαν ἑτέρου γεγονέναι. ταυτὶ μὲν οὖν δείκνυσιν ὡς οὐκ εἰς φαῦλον τοὺς τρόπους ἐχρήσω σπουδῇ ῥήτορα δὲ ἀγαθὸν εἰ θαυμάζειν ἄξιον, ῥήτορα γενναῖον τεθαύμακας δεινὸν μὲν εἱπεῖν ὃ προσῆκον εἰπεῖν, δεινὸν δὲ διγάν ὃ σιγᾶν βέλτιον, γλῶτταν δὲ οὐ χείρω τοῦ νοῦ κεκτημένον. σύ τε οὖν ἀεὶ μεμνήσῃ τῆς Ἱερωνύμου τέχνης οὗτός τε τῆς Κληματίου περὶ τὴν ψῆφον ἀκριβείας, καὶ ζητήσει τὴν μὲν σὴν οὗτος δικαιο- σύνην, τὴν τοῦδε δὲ σὺ ῥητορείαν.