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Translated by Ch. Browne and J. Swallow.
Gregory Theologian Bilingual Anthology, Resources Online and in Print
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72 Pages
Page 52
Ep. CLXXXVI.
(A letter of introduction for a relative.)
What would you have done if I had come in person and taken up your time? I am quite certain you would have undertaken with all zeal to deliver me from the slander, if I may take as a token what has happened before. Do me this favour, then, through my most discreet kinswoman who approaches you through me, reverencing first the age of your petitioner, and next her disposition and piety, which is more than is ordinarily found in a woman; and besides this, her ignorance in business-matters, and the troubles now brought upon her by her own relations; and above all, my entreaty. The greatest favour you can do me is speed in the benefit for which I am asking. For even the unjust judge in the Gospel [4751] shewed kindness to the widow, though only after long beseeching and importunity. But from you I ask for speed, that she may not be overwhelmed by being long burdened with anxieties and miseries in a foreign land; though I know quite well that Your Piety will make that alien land to be a fatherland to her.
Ep. CCII.
(An important letter on the Apollinarian controversy has already been given above.)
S:7. To Theodore, Bishop of Tyana.
(Theodore, a native of Arianzus, and an intimate friend of Gregory, accompanied him to Constantinople a.d. 379, and shared his persecution by the Arians, who broke into their church during the celebration of the divine liturgy, and pelted the clergy with stones. Theodore could not bring himself to put up with this, and declared his intention of prosecuting the aggressors. Gregory wrote the following letter to dissuade him from this course, by shewing him how much more noble it is to forgive than to revenge.)
[4751] S. Luke xviii. 1, etc.
Reference address : https://elpenor.org/gregory-nazianzen/letters.asp?pg=52
