To Spectatus. (~358 AD)
This letter should have been praise for what you have done for Honoratus, but instead it arrives still carrying a request. That much is tolerable — but I fear the next letter after this one will imitate it.
And yet, why have you not done what you promised? Is it because lying is admirable? Surely you would never praise falsehood. Is it because your power falls short of the favor we ask? And yet you laughed while Cyrinus pressed his case without relenting, and you made it clear that such trifling matters you could grant even in your sleep.
We are still waiting for you to give willingly to one who asks and to stop pushing away one who insists. The only remaining explanation is that you neglect those who love you. But when you say that about your own mother, then you may say it against us too.
Come now — you who do whatever you wish, yet practice making excuses for what you deliberately pass over — consider the young man's excellence of character; be ashamed before the daily entreaties of Cyrinus, a man whom even a god would respect on sight; consider that I too am something of a father to my student; and know that your mother wishes this, as does our uncle — I would add the whole city besides. Reflect on all this, and worry not about what you will say to us, but about what you will do to please us.
This letter should have been praise for what you have done for Honoratus, but instead it arrives still carrying a request. That much is tolerable — but I fear the next letter after this one will imitate it.
And yet, why have you not done what you promised? Is it because lying is admirable? Surely you would never praise falsehood. Is it because your power falls short of the favor we ask? And yet you laughed while Cyrinus pressed his case without relenting, and you made it clear that such trifling matters you could grant even in your sleep.
We are still waiting for you to give willingly to one who asks and to stop pushing away one who insists. The only remaining explanation is that you neglect those who love you. But when you say that about your own mother, then you may say it against us too.
Come now — you who do whatever you wish, yet practice making excuses for what you deliberately pass over — consider the young man's excellence of character; be ashamed before the daily entreaties of Cyrinus, a man whom even a god would respect on sight; consider that I too am something of a father to my student; and know that your mother wishes this, as does our uncle — I would add the whole city besides. Reflect on all this, and worry not about what you will say to us, but about what you will do to please us.
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.