Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume VIII/The Letters/Letter 334

To a writer.

straight, and make the lines straight. Do not let your hand go too high or too low. Avoid forcing the pen to travel slantwise, like Æsop&#8217;s crab. Advance straight on, as if following the line of the carpenter&#8217;s rule, which always preserves exactitude and prevents any irregularity. The oblique is ungraceful. It is the straight which pleases the eye, and does not allow the reader&#8217;s eyes to go nodding up and down like a swing-beam. This has been my fate in reading your writing. As the lines lie ladderwise, I was obliged, when I had to go from one to another, to mount up to the end of the last: then, when no connexion was to be found, I had to go back, and seek for the right order again, retreating and following the furrow, like Theseus in the story following Ariadne&#8217;s thread. Write straight, and do not confuse our mind by your slanting and irregular writing.