To Pammachius against John of Jerusalem 1212

12. What, I ask, is the meaning of this effrontery and bombast? All philosophers and orators attack Gorgias of Leontini for daring openly to pledge himself to answer any question which any person might choose to put to him. If the honour of the priesthood and respect for your title did not restrain me, and if I did not know what the Apostle says, "I wist not, brethren, that he was the high priest: for it is written, Thou shalt not speak evil of the ruler of thy people," how loudly and indignantly might I complain of what you relate! You, on the contrary, disparage the dignity of your title by the contempt which you throw, both in word and deed, on one who is almost the father of the whole episcopate, and a monument of the sanctity of former days. You say that on a certain day, when something in the lesson for the day stirred you up, you made a discourse in his hearing, and in that of the whole Church, concerning the faith and all the doctrines of the Church. After this we cannot but wonder at the weakness of Demosthenes; for we are told that he spent a long time in elaborating his splendid oration against AEschines. We are quite mistaken in looking up to Tully; for his merit, according to Cornelius Nepos, who was present, was nothing but this, that he delivered his famous defence of the seditious tribune Cornelius, almost word for word as it was published. Behold a Lysias and a Gracchus raised up for us! or, to name one of more modern days, Quintus Aterius, the man who had all his powers at hand like a stock of ready money, so that he needed some one to tell him when to stop, and of whom Caesar Augustus said very well, "Our friend Quintus must have the break put on."