49.  Then indeed the prefect became excited, and rose from his seat, boiling with rage, and making use of harsher language.  “What?” said he, “have you no fear of my authority?  “Fear of what?” said Basil, “How could it affect me?”  “Of what?  Of any one of the resources of my power.”  “What are these?” said Basil, “pray, inform me.”  “Confiscation, banishment, torture, death.”  “Have you no other threat?” said he, “for none of these can reach me.”  “How indeed is that?” said the prefect.  “Because,” he replied, “a man who has nothing, is beyond the reach of confiscation; unless you demand my tattered rags, and the few books, which are my only possessions.  Banishment is impossible for me, who am confined by no limit of place, counting my own neither the land where I now dwell, nor all of that into which I may be hurled; or, rather, counting it all God’s, whose guest and dependent I am.  As for tortures, what hold can they have upon one whose body has ceased to be?  Unless you mean the first stroke, for this alone is in your power.  Death is my benefactor, for it will send me the sooner to God, for Whom I live, and exist, and have all but died, and to Whom I have long been hastening.”

Τότε δὴ κινηθέντα τὸν ὕπαρχον ζέσαι τε πλέον τῷ θυμῷ καὶ τῆς καθέδρας ἐξαναστῆναι καὶ τραχυτέροις πρὸς αὐτὸν χρήσασθαι λόγοις. »Τί δαί; Οὐ φοβεῖ τὴν ἐξουσίαν; φησί. _Μὴ τί γένηται, μὴ δὲ τί πάθω; _Μή τι τῶν πολλῶν ἓν ἃ τῆς ἐμῆς δυναστείας ἐστίν. _Τίνα ταῦτα; γνωριζέσθω γὰρ ἡμῖν. _ Δήμευσιν, ἐξορίαν, βασάνους, θάνατον. _Εἴ τι ἄλλο, φησίν, ἀπείλει: τούτων γὰρ οὐδὲν ἡμῶν ἅπτεται.« Καὶ τὸν εἰπεῖν: »Πῶς καὶ τίνα τρόπον; _Ὅτι τοι, ἔφη, δημεύσει μὲν οὐχ ἁλωτὸς ὁ μηδὲν ἔχων, πλὴν εἰ τούτων χρῄζεις τῶν τρυχίνων μου ῥακίων καὶ βιβλίων ὀλίγων, ἐν οἷς ὁ πᾶς ἐμοὶ βίος: ἐξορίαν δὲ οὐ γινώσκω, ὁ μηδενὶ τόπῳ περιγραπτὸς καὶ μήτε ταύτην ἔχων ἐμὴν ἣν οἰκῶ νῦν, καὶ πᾶσαν ἐμὴν εἰς ἣν ἂν ῥιφῶ: μᾶλλον δὲ τοῦ Θεοῦ πᾶσαν, οὗ πάροικος ἐγὼ καὶ παρεπίδημος: αἱ βάσανοι δὲ τί ἂν λάβοιεν, οὐκ ὄντος σώματος; Πλὴν εἰ τὴν πρώτην λέγοις πληγήν, ταύτης γὰρ σὺ μόνης κύριος: ὁ δὲ θάνατος εὐεργέτης, καὶ γὰρ θᾶττον πέμψει με πρὸς Θεόν, ᾧ ζῶ καὶ πολιτεύομαι καὶ τῷ πλείστῳ τέθνηκα καὶ πρὸς ὃν ἐπείγομαι πόρρωθεν.«