particular against men who are in the truest sense
friends, to exert all their power to put an end to
them; but it belongs to foolish men and those who most
lightly bring on themselves the enmity of Heaven to
devise occasions for war and insurrection which have
no real existence. Now to destroy peace and enter
upon war is not a difficult matter, since the nature
of things is such as to make the basest activities
easy for the most dishonourable men. But when
they have brought about war according to their intention,
to return again to peace is for men, I think, not easy.
And yet thou chargest me with writing letters which
were not written with any dark purpose, and thou hast
now made haste to interpret these with arbitrary judgment,
not in the sense in which we conceived them when we
wrote them, but in a way which will be of advantage
to thee in thy eagerness to carry out thy plans not
without some pretext. But for us it is possible
to point out that thy Alamoundaras recently overran
our land and performed outrageous deeds in time of
peace, to wit, the capture of towns, the seizure of
property, the massacre and enslavement of such a multitude
of men, concerning which it will be thy duty not to
blame us, but to defend thyself. For the crimes
of those who have done wrong are made manifest to
their neighbours by their acts, not by their thoughts.
But even with these things as they are, we have still
decided to hold to peace, but we hear that thou in
thy eagerness to make war upon the Romans art fabricating
accusations which do not belong to us at all.
Natural enough, this; for while those who are eager
to preserve the present order of things repel even
those charges against their friends which are most
pressing, those who are not satisfied with established
friendships exert themselves to provide even pretexts
which do not exist. But this would not seem to
be becoming even to ordinary men, much less to kings.
But leaving aside these things do thou consider the
number of those who will be destroyed on both sides
in the course of the war, and consider well who will
justly bear the blame for those things which will
come to pass, and ponder upon the oaths which thou
didst take when thou didst carry away the money, and
consider that if, after that, thou wrongly dishonour
them by some tricks or sophistries, thou wouldst not
be able to pervert them; for Heaven is too mighty to
be deceived by any man.” When Chosroes
saw this message, he neither made any immediate answer
nor did he dismiss Anastasius, but he compelled him
to remain there.