Letter 8002: It would be only fitting for Your Greatness to display the riches of your talent while following the teachings of...
Ennodius to Avienus.
It would be only fitting for Your Greatness to display the riches of your talent while following the teachings of your holy father, and to put to use the learning won by much toil as a proof of your devotion. A double praise would come to you from such a composition: as the devotion of those entrusted to your care grows, the triumph of your eloquence would be brought before the world. The very thing that reveals your love for us exalts you. By one and the same practice, both the splendor of your speech and the strength of your faith would be multiplied. Those who stand at the summit are believed to show their subjects only the affection they put into words. This, my lord, is what that most occupied father of yours, stationed at the heights of human affairs, still observes. For the man who has leisure and yet offers no words makes his contempt plain. I recall reading somewhere: "No honor attaches to a miser of words."
And so, having offered my greeting, I report that I am well. What remains is that my petition may rejoice in the abundance of a reply it has drawn forth.
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.
Related Letters
All would be well with my spirit if you would at least condescend to write.
The reports of your illness have reached me, and I write with the urgency that love demands.
If giving offense results in a doubling of your letters, how I wish the calm tranquility of your serene heart could...
It has been a long time now that I, suspended by genuine longing, have been nourished only by the service of letters.
If you ask why, though punished by your silence, the bold face of modesty does not keep still, and if you say my...