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Her councillors, moreover, should have impressed this on her, instead of imagining that she would live for ever, always at the same age, or even that she was freed from the influence of time...

If I had any information I was on no account to conceal it from her. This was not the first occasion on which I had an interview with her. In fact, even during Monomachus’s...

To blazes with all those who tell us there is a spiritual life, and who then declare that its direction lies in the hands of their newfangled gods! These are the folk who deny...

9. This will explain why the gentleman I was talking about, by acting the philosopher in matters that were not the proper object of philosophy, earned the reputation, not of being a philosopher, but...

I myself admire the inflexibility of such a mind, but its proper place, in my opinion, lies not in time, but in eternity: not in this present life, but in the existence hereafter. The...

6. Nevertheless, the situation called for an energetic man, one who understood the functions of government, one thoroughly conversant with the imperial rescripts, but none of Theodora’s courtiers was entrusted with this responsibility. She...

2. Convinced that she was doing what was right, the empress proceeded to use her authority in all matters of government, quite openly. Without the slightest embarrassment she assumed the duties of a man...

There were certain factors that made her influence with them all-powerful: the fact that she had been born in the purple; her gentle character; the sad circumstances of her former life. The emperor was...

In fact, he sent me other messages, of quite a different tenor, in which he congratulated me on preferring the spiritual life and actually encouraged me in my resolve. He criticized the courtier’s brilliant...

The function of Rhetoric is not merely to deceive by persuasive argument, or to deck itself out with ambiguous sentiments: it is an exact science. On the one hand, it expresses philosophic ideas; on...