Letter 184: Nothing from you is small, precisely because it comes from you.

To Demetrius. (360) But nothing that comes from you is small, since it comes from you. And these things that have arrived are even great, at least to one who judges their greatness by the pleasure they bring. And it is plain that long ago your country, being a part of the empire, used to feast the Persian with such dainties. But if this land had belonged to the Greeks, and those things to the Persian, and then he had tasted of these, it seems to me he would have made war to win your country rather than to march on Athens for the sake of its figs. But let them be, if you wish, small by their own nature; for their greatness comes to them from the one who sends them, and they are not small because of their nature so much as great because of him. And that I am of this mind, I too have sent you two of my own discourses, by no means fine ones, yet ones that will not seem bad to you: such is friendship.

Δημητρίῳ. (360) Ἀλλ’ οὐδὲν τῶν παρὰ σοῦ μικρόν, ἐπεὶ καὶ παρὰ σοῦ. ταυτὶ δὲ τὰ ἥκοντα καὶ μεγάλα τῷ γε τὸ μέγεθος κρίνοντι τῇ ἡδονῇ. καὶ δῆλον ὡς πάλαι τὸν Πέρσην εἱστία τούτοις ἡ ὑμε- τέρα μέρος οὖσα τῆς ἀρχῆς. εἰ δέ γε ἥδε μὲν ἦν τῶν Ἑλλή- νων, τοῦ Περσοῦ δὲ ἐκεῖνα, ἔπειτ’ ἐκεῖνος ἐγεύσατο τούτων. δοκεῖ ἄν μοι στρατεῦσαι ἐπὶ κτήσει τῆς ὑμετέρας μᾶλλον ἢ ἐπ’ Ἀθήνας ὑπὲρ τῶν σύκων. ἀλλ’ ἔστω γε, εἰ βούλει, τῇ φύσει μικρά, τὸ γὰρ μέγεθος αὐτοῖς ἀπὸ τοῦ πέμποντος, καὶ οὐ δι’ ἐκείνην μικρὰ μᾶλλον διὰ τοῦτον μεγάλα. ὅτι δὲ οὕτω φρονῶ, πέπομφά σοι καὶ αὐτὸς δύο λόγω τῶν ἐμῶν, καλὼ μὲν ἥκιστα, σοὶ δὲ οὐ δόξοντε κακώ· τοιοῦτον ἡ φιλία.