Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches

The Works of the Emperor Julian, Vol. 2

Oration VI Introduction to Oration VI Oration VII Introduction to Oration VII Oration VIII Introduction to Oration VIII Letter to Themistius the Philosopher Introduction Letter to the Senate and People of Athens Introduction Fragment of a Letter to a Priest Introduction The Ca...

Chapters

29. Part 29

(Now these were very trivial matters and could not so far make the city hostile to me. But my greatest offence of all, and what aroused that violent hatred of yours, was the fol...

30. Part 30

Zeus, 17, 41, 43, 83, 93, 105, 109, 111, 113, 115, 135, 137, 141, 145, 149, 197, 283, 305, 307, 351, 367, 369, 395, 409, 411, 413, 445, 467, 475, (Kasios) 487, 499

31. Part 31

494 The beginning is lost: Julian has apparently been describing the functions of good demons, and now passes on to the demons whose task is to punish evil‐doers; cf. _Oration_...

7. Part 7

(And now to confine myself to what is lawful for us, both for me to say and for you to hear. Every discourse that is uttered consists of language and the thought to be expressed...

12. Part 12

(Here however I am reminded of the report current that you are going not only to Illyria but to Thrace also, and among the Greeks who dwell on the shores of that sea.(360) Among...

4. Part 4

(Then let not the Cynic be like Oenomaus shameless or impudent, or a scorner of everything human and divine, but reverent towards sacred things, like Diogenes. For he obeyed the...

1. Part 1

Oration VI Introduction to Oration VI Oration VII Introduction to Oration VII Oration VIII Introduction to Oration VIII Letter to Themistius the Philosopher Introduction Letter...

28. Part 28

(In the tenth month, according to your reckoning,—Loos I think you call it—there is a festival founded by your forefathers in honour of this god, and it was your duty to be zeal...

3. Part 3

(Freedom from emotion they regard as the end and aim; and this is equivalent to becoming a god. Now perhaps Diogenes observed that in the case of all other foods he himself had...

17. Part 17

(But further, how did I behave to Constantius after this? Even to this day I have not yet used in my letters to him the title which was bestowed on me by the gods, but I have al...

15. Part 15

(From that place barely and by the help of the gods I was set free, and for a happier fate; but my brother was imprisoned at court and his fate was ill‐starred above all men who...

25. Part 25

(“What then?” you answer, “did you really suppose that your boorish manners and savage ways and clumsiness would harmonise with these things? O most ignorant and most quarrelsom...

10. Part 10

(And do not try to frighten me by bringing forward Diogenes as a sort of bogey. He was never initiated, they tell us, and replied to some one who once advised him to be initiate...

19. Part 19

(Now in so far as all soul, but in a much higher degree the soul of man, is akin to and related to the gods, so much the more is it likely that the gaze of the gods should penet...

16. Part 16

(After that, Constantius, thinking that there would be some improvement, but not that so great a transformation would take place in the affairs of Gaul, handed over to me in the...

26. Part 26

(But now I come to ponder the matter I find that I have committed yet other terrible sins. For though I was coming to a free city which cannot tolerate unkempt hair, I entered i...

24. Part 24

Julian came to Antioch on his way to Persia in the autumn of 361 and stayed there till March, 362. The city was rich and important commercially, but in Julian’s eyes her glory d...

23. Part 23

(Constantine was allowed to speak next. On first entering the lists he was confident enough. But when he reflected on the exploits of the others he saw that his own were wholly...

18. Part 18

(It is proper also to bear in mind how many discourses have been devoted by men in the past to show that man is by nature a social animal. And shall we, after, asserting this an...

9. Part 9

(When he had uttered this prayer a sort of slumber or ecstasy came over him. Then Zeus showed him Helios himself. Awestruck by that vision the youth exclaimed, “For this and for...

27. Part 27

(Once upon a time the citizens of Tarentum paid to the Romans the penalty for this sort of jesting, seeing that, when drunk at the festival of Dionysus, they insulted the Roman...

5. Part 5

(Now one could no more discover where myth was originally invented and who was the first to compose fiction in a plausible manner for the benefit or entertainment of his hearers...

13. Part 13

(I have purposely set down the whole of this speech for you lest you should think that I am cheating and defrauding by bringing forward ancient myths which may have some resembl...

8. Part 8

(Have done with all this nonsense! At any rate lay it aside now if not before, when you can get no advantage from your long hair and your staff. Shall I tell you how you have ca...

21. Part 21

(With Aurelian entered Probus, who in less than seven years restored seventy cities and was in many ways a wise administrator. Since he had been unjustly treated by impious men...

2. Part 2

(If the Cynics had composed treatises with any serious purpose and not merely with a frivolous aim, it would have been proper for my opponent to be guided by these and to try in...

11. Part 11

(Let me go back now to Africanus and Laelius. When Carthage had been destroyed(326) and all Libya made subject to Rome, Africanus sent Laelius home and he embarked to carry the...

22. Part 22

(When Caesar had spoken to this effect he still wished to go on talking, but Alexander, who had with difficulty restrained himself hitherto, now lost patience, and with some agi...

20. Part 20

(“Not one of those old‐fashioned ones such as Aesop(543) wrote. But whether you should call mine an invention of Hermes—for it was from him I learned what I am going to tell you...

6. Part 6

(Why in the name of Zeus did he go to Olympia? To see the athletes compete? Nay, could he not have seen those very athletes without trouble both at the Isthmian games and the Pa...

14. Part 14

(But since I seem to have harked back to the life of contemplation and to be comparing it with the life of action, though in the beginning of your letter you declined to make th...