Letter 22: Aeneas asks Diodorus to choose speech over silent peace.

Aeneas of GazaDiodorus the Scholasticus|c. 500 AD|Aeneas of Gaza|From Gaza, Palaestina Prima|AI-assisted
friendshiprhetoricsilence
Source label in Hercher: κβ'. Διοδώρῳ σχολαστικῷ / XXII. Diodoro scholastico. First-time modern English translation prepared from the Greek source and checked against Hercher's Latin alignment.

If war commands us to talk with each other often, while peace brings a long silence, then this war alone is better than peace. What could be more charming than often chattering playfully with a dear friend? Let us therefore dissolve either the peace or the silence. May the sun never look down on friends silent, or on orators who have stopped speaking.

AI-assisted translation - This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek below for scholarly use.

Latin / Greek Original

κβ'. Διοδώρῳ σχολαστικῷ.
Εἰ πόλεμος ἡμᾶς πρὸς ἀλλήλους πολλὰ κελεύει λαλεῖν, εἰρήνη δὲ συχνὴν ἐπάγει τὴν σιωπήν, μόνος οὗτος ὁ πόλεμος εἰρήνης κρείττων ἐστί. τί γὰρ χαριέστερον ἢ θαμὰ παιδικοῖς ἀδολεσχεῖν; λύσωμεν τοίνυν ἢ τὴν εἰρήνην ἢ τὴν σιωπήν. μὴ γὰρ τοὺς φίλους, μὴ γὰρ τοὺς ῥήτορας σιωπῶντας ὁ ἥλιος κατίδοι.

Revision history

  1. 2026-05-27v2.2.34-import

    Initial corpus import from modern aeneas gaza hercher v1.

    Fields: letter text, metadata, source links. Source: https://archive.org/download/epistolographoih00herc/epistolographoih00herc_djvu.txt

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