Letter 28

**From:** Ennodius, deacon (later bishop) of Pavia **To:** Avienus [Flavius Avienus, Roman aristocrat and former consul, 501 AD], son of the consul Faustus **Date:** ~503–510 AD **Context:** Avienus has apparently asked Ennodius to write more frequently — giving Ennodius the occasion for an elaborate and self-amused meditation on the paradox of restraint and eloquence, silence and speech. --- Thanks be to God — and this must stand in the first place, the place of honor — who caused Your Greatness to demand from me what I had been preparing to offer. You have bestowed a prize upon my talkativeness, which I have scarcely managed, until now, to keep confined within the decent inner chamber of restraint. I make use of a writing-talent that has been coaxed back into the open — one I had called rather harshly away from its importunate urge to compose. Now I take full possession of the reward owed to a voice pressed into service: an unusual abundance of words. For after you commanded me to send pages your way, you commended to my own mind the very things I had been keeping silent. Bravo! A brow long given to extravagance has at last found its way — somehow — to an abundance of affection, without any expense to you. Let us learn not to hate what helps us. The grace of silence has worked this result: that I now speak of you without restraint. Conversations often dismissed as tedious are now eagerly expected from me. I will not press the point further: the proper function of the tongue is, as I can now see, actually affirmed by the very rarity of its utterances. And in this matter, my confidence in my joy is no lame thing — our position is shored up by the testimony of truth itself. Consider: here stands one who could barely bring himself to taste, with the very tips of his lips, the letters of learned men, laden as they are with the rich harvest of cultivated conversation — and yet this same man does not disdain to receive the humble stalks of my modest little tablet. O Modesty, you have served me with a twofold gladness: both when you hold your proper ground, and when the conversations of those once disdained are subsequently found to be desired. Behold — the judgment of the one we love has been improved. And so I have looked out for myself through restraint, and for our consul [Avienus, who held the ordinary consulship in 501 AD] through the occasion for amendment. But lest this page run on at excessive length, transgressing the limits set in advance — and lest, by saying much, I prove that what I previously kept silent was never a matter of deliberate choice — farewell, my lord. Deign to honor those who love you with this fellowship of correspondence, for the lofty pinnacles of your distinction receive no increase except the kind that is born from humility.

XXVIII. AVIENO ENNODIVS. Deo gratias, quod principe loco ponendum est, qui magnitudinem tuam quae a me erant offerenda fecit exigere. dedisti pretium garrulitati, quam uix hactenus intra uerecundum. penetrale continui. eliciti utor stili genio, quem duriter ab 1 sociantur P, sentientur T actenas B, ∗actenus L raa uennantibuB L 5 respondent B 6 permittat Tl men B, om. T 7 dedala LTV, ded∗la B prouissione L indedinti B 9 artifices B comoditati T 10 negaturum non T 12 diligis Bb, diligit LPTV 18 enim eet b 14 acholasticum B 15 ad] ab T 16 quidquid B 19 ąępe (q postea add. m. I) V, spe Pb susteneo B fata BTYb, facta fata P, facta L et Sirm. XXVIII. 21 ennodius om. T 22 principe BT\', principis LP T1Vb 24 precium LTV uix ex iaa corr. T ∗actenus L, bactinas B uericandum Bl 25 geno B inportuna scriptione reuocaui : meritum coactae uocis inusitata loquacitate possideo. nam postquam me iussisti paginas destinare, animo meo; quod tacueram, commendasti. euge, frons diu prodiga aliquando mihi contigit ad affectionis copiam sine tui dispendio peruenire. discamus non odisse quod adiuuat. silentii gratia fecit, ut te libera iam loquamur: expectantur a nobis saepe fastidita conloquia. non ibo longius: adseritur, ut uideo, linguae officium raritate sermonum. in qua parte non clauda laetitiae meae fides est, sententia nostra ueri adstipulatione fulcitur. ecce ille, qui doctorum epistulas grauidi dotatas messe conloquii summis labiis uix libabat, tabellae nostrae culmos non dedignatur accipere. gemina, pudor, mihi hilaritate profuisti, cum tu in statione certus es et cum frequenter contempti desiderantur affatus: facta est ecce melior eius sententia, quem amamus. nobis ergo uerecundia, consuli nostro emendatione prospeximus. sed ne in longum procedat pagina transcendens terminos praefinitos et loquendo multa quod tacuimus demonstremus non fuisse consilii, uale, mi domine, et amantes tui hac communione dignare, quia praecelsi honorum tuorum apices haec sola recipiunt augmenta, quae de humilitate nascuntur. I cohacte B in naitata fort . 2 post////|qua ̃ (qui eras.) L iussistis L 3 comendasti T, commodasti fort . 4 prodig-a (i eros.)\'L contingit T1 9 letitiae V fidis B soutentis TJ uestra T 10 grauidi] grandi Sirm . 11 messe colloquii messe Tx 12 calmus B 16 emendatio B 18 demostremas LV, demustremus P 19 sttantes Bb, amantis LPTV poessi T* 20 agments T* 21 dė B s. k