Letter 399: Theodore Studite, Letter 399; Greek heading: Γρηγορᾷ λαϊκῷ.

Greetings, confessor of Christ! Fittingly did I long ago proclaim you a man of God. See, my humble word was not proven false, but has been shown to be lofty in you. How fares the prison? You bear chains too, as I hear, your flesh pressed hard within. The thing is wearisome; yet may you be strengthened in the Lord, contending in a holy and martyr-like manner. Ah, ah, brother, what a one you have shone forth, to how great a height you have been raised! One out of all the laity (those, I mean, under this present authority [the iconoclast regime of Emperor Leo V]) you alone have been shown forth confessing God before both men and angels. Do you see where it is that the persecutors hold you? In the palace, as a pearl, as a king over the passions, even if they do not so regard it. Do not, then, friend, be afraid, nor again dread the scourgings that are coming. May you endure them: Christ is the one who lightens the load with you, who lays hold together with you, who contends and is struck together with you. If, then, while you were being held by one of those under his hand, you had the reigning sovereign shielding you and, in your being beaten, being beaten together with you in his disposition, would you not have rejoiced to suffer, loving the world, inasmuch as by your suffering you would reap the things you longed for: riches, glories, first places? How much more, then, must this be understood here, where also it must be loved by us out of necessity, so that we may receive not these dreamlike and vain things, but the everlasting and true and unspeakable good things, having fled the eternal punishments which those who deny Christ shall undergo to be enrolled among them. From these may we be delivered, brother, praying for one another.