Letter 734: Back when we were enjoying that blessed life in Nicomedia -- rich not in wealth but in leisure for our studies --...

To Celsus. (362) When at Nicomedia we were enjoying that happiness of ours, being not richer than others but rather having leisure for letters, Pompeianus governed the Bithynians, that excellent and just man, who was nowhere annoyed by poverty, who honored those discourses that were genuine and refuted those that were not such. And surely you do not forget how he made a comedy of the man from Athens, the one resplendent in fine garments, hurling him in against his will, the man whose weakness he was about to expose. From those times, then, I enrolled the man as a benefactor, and there is nothing so difficult that he could enjoin upon me which, by failing to do it, I would not consider myself to be acting unjustly. But the present matter is indeed very easy; for he bids me through a letter to entreat you to take care of certain women, two of them, one named Philopatra, and the other Hermogeneia. And I did not ask on what sort of matters they have need of assistance, so that I might write or not according to the nature of the affairs, but having persuaded myself of this one thing, that Pompeianus would not defend women against the laws, I give the letter at once. And you, by what you do, gladden that man, who has often presided over contests as judge for me

Κέλσῳ. (362) Ὅτ᾿ ἐν Νικομηδείᾳ τῆς εὐδαιμονίας ἐκείνης ἀπηλαύομεν οὐ πλουτοῦντες μᾶλλον ἑτέρων, ἀλλὰ σχολὴν ἄγοντες εἰς λόγους, Βιθυνῶν ἦρχε Πομπηιανὸς ὁ χρηστός, ὁ δίκαιος, ὁ πενίαν οὐδαμοῦ δυσχεράνας. ὁ λόγους τοὺς μὲν γνησίους τιμῶν, τοὺς δ’ οὐ τοιούτους ἐλέγχων· πάντως δὲ οὐκ ἀμνημονεῖς ὡς τὸν Ἀθήνηθεν, τὸν ἐσθήμασι λαμπρὸν ἐκωμῴδησεν ἄκοντα ἐμ- βαλών, οὗ δείξειν τὴν ἀσθένειαν ἔμελλεν. ἀπὸ δὴ τῶν χρόνων ἐκείνων εὐεργέτην τε τὸν ἄνδρα ἐγραψάμην καὶ οὐδὲν οὕτως ἐπιτάξει χαλεπόν, ὃ μὴ ποιῶν οὐκ ἂν ἡγοίμην ἀδικεῖν. τὸ δὲ δὴ νῦν καὶ μάλα ῥᾷστον· κελεύει γάρ με δι’ ἐπιστολῆς δεηθῆναί σου γυναικῶν τινων ἐπιμεληθῆναι δύο, Φιλοπάτρα ὄνομα θατέρᾳ, τῇ δὲ ‘Eρμογἐνεια. ἐγὼ δὲ οὐκ ἠρόμην, ἐφ’ ὁποῖα δὴ χρῄζουσι τῆς βοηθείας, ὅπως πρὸς τὴν φύσιν τῶν πραγμάτων ἢ γράψω ἢ μή, ἀλλ’ ‘ὲν ἐκεῖνο πεπεικὼς ἐμαυτόν, ὡς οὐκ ἂν Πομπηιανὸς γυναιξὶν ἐπὶ νόμους ἤμυνε, δίδωμι τὴν ἐπιστολὴν εὐθέως. σὺ δ’ οἷς ποιεῖς εὔφραινε τὸν ἄνδρα ἐκεῖνον, ὅς μοι πολλάκις ἠγωνοθέτησεν