Church Father Writings · Basil the Great
Letter 186
Basil the Great · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series · Vol. 8
Text
ST. BASIL OF CAESAREA
To Antipater, the governor.
Philosophy is an excellent thing, if only for this, that it even heals its disciples at small cost; for, in philosophy, the same thing is both dainty and healthy fare. I am told that you have recovered your failing appetite by pickled cabbage. Formerly I used to dislike it, both on account of the proverb, and because it reminded me of the poverty that went with it. Now, however, I am driven to change my mind. I laugh at the proverb when I see that cabbage is such a good nursing mother of men,
and has restored our governor to the vigour of youth. For the future I shall think nothing like cabbage, not even Homer’s lotus, not even that ambrosia, whatever it was, which fed the Olympians.
Edition Record
- Translator
- Translated by Blomfield Jackson.
- Series
- Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series
- Volume
- Vol. 8.
- Editor
- Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace.
- Publisher
- Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co.,
- Year
- 1895.