Letter 79: Theodore Studite, Letter 79; Greek heading: Ἀθανασίῳ τέκνῳ.

The Lord knows those who are his, as it is written; and for this reason, my dearly longed-for child, he was not willing that you should slip past unnoticed in a hidden corner in these days, but rather that you should be displayed openly, like some pearl of piety, so that you might be glorified as fully as possible, just as in the case of certain of your more eminent brothers, and on account of your stoutness of heart. It is a grievous thing, then (for how could it not be?), that you have been separated from the most God-loving archbishop, since he has no one of equal standing with your virtue for consolation and counsel; yet God knows how to dispense [oikonomein: to manage according to the divine dispensation] what is profitable, that the proof of the virtue of both of you may be displayed. I rejoice over you, my child, and I take pride in you: you are an Athanasius [echoing the great defender of orthodoxy], but may you indeed be one in deed and in word, by the good pleasure of the God who empowers all things. Bear, my child, the imprisonment endured for Christ and with Christ. And if he is well pleased to send anything else, receive it gladly; for it is not the suffering, but the failing to endure sufferings for Christ, that is most grievous and most ruinous to those who have understanding. The Lord be with your spirit; may the prayer of our blessed father and of the holy brothers overtake you, and above all the intercession of the holy Theotokos [the God-bearer, the Virgin Mary] together with all the saints. Remember me, your sinful father.