Letter 673: You did well to quench a great deal of nonsense with a few words—of which I was already laughing before your letter...
To Bassianus. (361)
You did well in extinguishing much nonsense with few words, nonsense at which I, for my part, was laughing even before your letter, but once it arrived, everyone laughed. And I rejoice that you are plainly glad that the one who reigns is the one who knows how to reign. For in saying that the scepter has been given to him by the son of Cronus, you reveal the excellence of the one who received it.
Take care of yourself, then, and consider both night and day how there may be a better report concerning you.
AI-assisted translation - This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed.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
Βασσιαωῷ. (361)
Καλῶς ἐποίησας ὀλίγοις γράμμασι πολλὴν φλυαρίαν
σβέσας, ἧς ἐγὼ μὲ. καὶ πρὸ τῆς ἐπιστολῆς κατεγέλων, ὡς δὲ
ἧκεν ἐκείνη, πάντες. χαίρω δὲ ὅτι δῆλος εἶ χαίρων βασι-
λεύοντος τοῦ βασιλεύειν εἰδότος. ἐν γὰρ τῷ φάναι τὸ σκῆπτρον
αὐτῷ δεδόσθαι παρὰ τοῦ παιδὸς τοῦ Κρόνου τὴν τοῦ λαβόν-
τος ἀρετὴν μηνύεις.
ἐπιμελοῦ δὴ σαυτοῦ καὶ ὅπως ἔσται
περὶ σοῦ λόγος βελτίων καὶ νύκτα καὶ ἡμέραν σκόπει.
Revision history
- 2026-05-27v2.2.34-import
Initial corpus import from modern libanius retranslated v1.
Fields: letter text, metadata, source links. Source: https://github.com/OpenGreekAndLatin/First1KGreek/blob/master/volume_xml/libanius_10.xml
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