To Modestus. (359/360)
My companions -- your rhetors -- the men I gave to you and you admired -- these very men who carry this letter are now the target of decrees by which certain people are trying to drag them away from your doors. And these are the same people I have repeatedly rescued from your justified anger. Or rather, it is Eusebius they threaten, while the other one they are already hauling off to a public liturgy that requires a strong body.
Agroicius is so extraordinarily healthy that he has spent more money on doctors than anyone alive, being constantly in need of a physician's hands. Moreover, he has five sisters sitting at home who, because of their age, need husbands but, because of their poverty, cannot find them. For good birth counts for little these days.
Reflect, then, that it would be a disgrace for me if I could not help my friends, and not honorable for you if the ancient law protecting rhetors were broken under your administration. Persuade the bolder members of the council that...
My companions -- your rhetors -- the men I gave to you and you admired -- these very men who carry this letter are now the target of decrees by which certain people are trying to drag them away from your doors. And these are the same people I have repeatedly rescued from your justified anger. Or rather, it is Eusebius they threaten, while the other one they are already hauling off to a public liturgy that requires a strong body.
Agroicius is so extraordinarily healthy that he has spent more money on doctors than anyone alive, being constantly in need of a physician's hands. Moreover, he has five sisters sitting at home who, because of their age, need husbands but, because of their poverty, cannot find them. For good birth counts for little these days.
Reflect, then, that it would be a disgrace for me if I could not help my friends, and not honorable for you if the ancient law protecting rhetors were broken under your administration. Persuade the bolder members of the council that...
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.