Letter 1: To Dionysius (1-5)

If I were younger, I should not be sending you a letter, but should myself take ship and converse with you there; but inasmuch as it so happens that the fruitful period of my life and that of your own affairs have not coincided — since I am already spent with years, and with you it is the high time for action — I shall try to disclose to you my views about the situation as well as I can in the circumstances.

I know, to be sure, that when men essay to give advice, it is far preferable that they should come in person rather than send a letter, not only because it is easier to discuss the same matters face to face than to give their views by letter, nor yet because all men give greater credence to the spoken rather than to the written word, since they listen to the former as to practical advice and to the latter as to an artistic composition[*];

but also, in addition to these reasons, in personal converse, if anything that is said is either not understood or not believed, the one who is presenting the arguments, being present, can come to the rescue in either case; but when written missives are used and any such misconception arises, there is no one to correct it,[*] for since the writer is not at hand, the defender is lacking. Nevertheless, since you are to be the judge in this matter, I have great hope that I shall prove to be saying something of value, as I think you will disregard all the difficulties just mentioned and will direct your attention to the matters themselves.

And yet, certain persons who have been admitted to your presence have attempted to frighten me, saying that while you honor flatterers, you despise those who offer you advice. If I had believed their words, I should have remained quiet; but as it is, no one could persuade me that it is possible that a man should so surpass others in both judgement and action, unless he has become a learner, a listener, and a discoverer, and has drawn to himself and collected from every possible source those means which will enable him to exercise his own intellectual ability.

It was for these reasons, then, that I have been moved to write you. I intend to speak to you about important matters, matters about which no living person may more fittingly hear than you. And do not think that I am earnestly urging you in this way that you may become a listener to a rhetorical composition; for I am not, as it happens, in a mood to seek glory through rhetorical show-pieces, nor am I unaware that you on your part are sated with such offerings.