Letter 8043: Has there ever been a time when you were free from the obligation of my letters?
Has anyone ever failed of effect who has supplicated God with confidence? If the mind does not falter in faith, desires and the abundance of desires are joined together. Behold, my silence has accomplished with you what the loquacity of so long a time could not obtain. As far as I can see, your writings are only merited by taciturnity: those you consider mute, you address; from those who are believed to have a tongue, you abstain. Yet you have done what befitted a lord and, as you yourselves say, a parent — that you should deem me worthy of being addressed when weighed down by grave illness. I ask that you do this with continuity. My lord, paying the reverence of re-greeting, I beseech that you never cease to supplicate on my behalf through all the saints of God, so that, restored to life, I may rejoice together at the sight of you.
AI-assisted translation — This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek below for scholarly use.
Latin / Greek Original
XXXXIII. ENNODIVS MESSALAE.
Numquid aliquando ab effectu destitit qui deo cum fiducia
subplicauit ? si animus in fide non claudicet, uota et uotorum
copia coniunguntur. ecce egit apud uos silentium meum, quod
tanti temporis non ualuit obtinere loquacitas. quantum uideo,
scripta uestra nisi taciturnitas non meretur: quos mutos putatis
alloquimini: . ab his, quibus lingua. esse creditur, abstinetis.
fecisti tamen quod decuit domnum et, ut ipsi dicitis, parentem,
ut me graui aegritudine depressum dignum putetis alloquio.
rogo, ut hoc sub continuatione faciatis. domine mi, resalutationis
reuerentiam soluens posco, ut pro me per omnes dei
sanctos supplicare non desinas, quatenus uitae redditus de
uisione uestra congaudeam.
2 celesti B praeteritam B occultis b et Sirm . 3 IUspiret
B domine PTb aiuiene T 4 tantum] tamen Pb
timorem] amorem Pb 5 tales B disperatione B 6 demissistes
B praecibus B 8 caeler B 9 m T, mihi BL V
hamilitate B 10 nestra P et SWm . nuntietnr Sirm.
agnoacam] finit add. B
XXXXm. 12 meesale LBT 13 destitet B 14 non V 8.I .
nota] et nota b 15 cupia B 16 optinere B 17 potates
B 19 dontl B, dominum b dicetia B, dictis L et parentem
BLPlTV 20 egritudine B depraessum B potatis
B 21 faciates B m T, mihi BL V salntationis Pb
23 quatinus LTV de uiaione] diuisione Bb 24 congaadiam.
L, gaudeam b
15*
Related Letters
[Messala appears to be a young man of good family whose rhetorical education Ennodius is overseeing -- or at least...
I endure the absence of your letters if — as it seems — your silence is the price of excellence.
Good fortune that arrives without warning is the best kind, because it carries no burden of anticipation.
I know you well enough to trust that your devotion will only grow with time.
If the divine favor has at last turned you from your habit of negligence toward the correspondence I have long...