Letter 660: To the same [Italicianus].

To the same man (361) This Faustinus here is the very crown of the Pisidians and of the young men around us. The things that belong to his household you could learn from others too: the distinction of his family, his splendor in the public liturgies [civic services], the fact that his ancestors have stood, and still stand, in place of a wall for the city; but what concerns him within our own sacred precincts [the schools of rhetoric] it is right that I should declare. For living among young men who slumber and who suppose that eloquence is nothing, he did not receive into his soul this opinion from the soul of others, but holding that those who have no share in education stand in no better rank than slaves, he left the theaters and the mimes and the madness for horses to others, while he himself gave his body to labors. His soul, however, he wrought to be more beautiful, being a godsend to teachers who were eager, but to such as were not eager a burden, since he reckoned the labors themselves a respite from labor. In what has been said you surely have both his temperance and the orderliness of his daily life, inasmuch as whoever has bound himself to books, that man has held himself apart from vice. If, then, either his father were still living or his grandfather were not weaker than his old age, he would, as time went on, have surpassed his own teachers as well; but as it is — for he must now preserve his own affairs — he is deprived of the greater part of his tears [i.e., he is cut off from carrying his studies further]. Yet he has strength sufficient for lawsuits, and sufficient also to make his fatherland greater. There has come to him besides the favors that proceed from fortune. For while you are governor, my companions must necessarily be borne along under fair winds, since Athena sends a profitable breeze.

Τῷ αὐτῷ (361) Καὶ Πισιδῶν ὅτιπερ κεφάλαιον Φαυστἱνος οὑτοσὶ καὶ τῆς περὶ ἡμᾶς νεότητος. τὰ μὲν οὖν οἴκοι ὄντα αὐτῷ καὶ παρ’ ἄλλων ἂν μάθοις, γένους περιφάνειαν, ἐν λειτουργίαις λαμπρότητα, τὸ ἀντὶ τείχους τῇ πόλει τοὺς τούτου γεγονέναι τε καὶ εἶναι προγόνους, τὰ δ’ ἐν τοῖς ἡμετέροις ἱεροῖς ἐγὼ φρέσαι δίκαιος. ζῶν γὰρ ἐν καθεύδουσι νέοις καὶ οἰομἐ- νοῖς οὐδὲν εἶναι τοὺς λόγους ὡς τῆς ψυχῆς ἑτέρων οὐκ ἐδέξατο τῇ ψυχῇ τήνδε τὴν δόξαν, ἀλλ’ ἡγησάμενος τοὺς παιδείας ἀμοίρους οὐκ ἐν ἀμείνονι τάξει τῶν ἀνδραπόδων εἶναι θέατρα μὲν καὶ μίμους καὶ τὴν περὶ ἵππους μανίαν ἑτέροις ἀφῆκεν, αὐτὸς δὲ τὸ μὲν σῶμα τοῖς πόνοις ἔδωκε. τὴν ψυχὴν δὲ ἀπειργάσατο καλλίω προθύμοις μὲν διδασκάλοις ἕρμαιον ὤν, οὐ τοιούτοις δὲ ἄχθος τῶν πόνων ἀνάπαυλαν αὐτοὺς νομίζων τοὺς πόνους. ἐν δὴ τοῖς εἰρημένοις ἔχεις δήπου καὶ τὴν σωφροσύνην καὶ τοῦ καθ’ ἡμέραν βίου τὸν κόσμον ὡς ὅστις αὑτὸν ἐξήρτησε βιβλίων, οὗτος αὑτὸν ἀπέ- στῆσε κακίας εἰ μὲν οὖν ἢ ὁ πατὴρ αὐτῷ περιῆν ἢ ὁ πάππος μὴ ἦν ἐλάττων τοῦ γήρως, παρῆλθεν ἂν καὶ τοὺς παιδευτὰς ἐν προιόντι τῷ χρόνῳ· νῦν δέ, δεῖ γὰρ αὐτὸν τὰ αὑτοῦ σώζειν ἤδη, δακρύων μὲν ἀποστερεῖται τοῦ πλείονος. ἔχει δὲ ῥώμην ἀρκοῦσαν μὲν δίκαις, ἀρκοῦσαν δὲ μείζω ποιῆσαι πατρίδα. προσγέγονε δὲ καὶ τὰ ἀπὸ τοῦ δαίμονος εὖ ποιοῦντα. σοῦ γὰρ ἄρχοντος ἀνάγκη τοὺς ἐμοὺς ἑταίρους ἐξ οὐρίων φέρεσθαι τῆς Ἀθηνᾶς λυσιτελοῦντα πεμπούσης ἄνεμον.