Letter 7002: How can you reconcile your statement that you are kept constantly busy by your never-ceasing engagements, with your...
Pliny the Younger→Fabius Justus|c. 107 AD|Pliny the Younger
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To Justus.
How can you reconcile your statement that you are kept constantly busy by your never-ceasing engagements, with your request for something of mine to read, when, as a rule, it is all I can do to get people with plenty of leisure to waste time over my writings? I will therefore let the summer go by, when you are always busy and have no time to yourself, and as soon as winter comes - when I suppose you will at least have some leisure at nights - I will look among my trifles for something suitable to lay before you. In the meantime, I will do well if my letters do not bore you, but, as that is inevitable, they will be as brief as possible. Farewell.
L To Justus.
How can you reconcile your statement that you are kept constantly busy by your never-ceasing engagements, with your request for something of mine to read, when, as a rule, it is all I can do to get people with plenty of leisure to waste time over my writings? I will therefore let the summer go by, when you are always busy and have no time to yourself, and as soon as winter comes - when I suppose you will at least have some leisure at nights - I will look among my trifles for something suitable to lay before you. In the meantime, I shall do well if my letters do not bore you, but, as that is inevitable, they shall be as brief as possible. Farewell.
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To Justus.
How can you reconcile your statement that you are kept constantly busy by your never-ceasing engagements, with your request for something of mine to read, when, as a rule, it is all I can do to get people with plenty of leisure to waste time over my writings? I will therefore let the summer go by, when you are always busy and have no time to yourself, and as soon as winter comes - when I suppose you will at least have some leisure at nights - I will look among my trifles for something suitable to lay before you. In the meantime, I will do well if my letters do not bore you, but, as that is inevitable, they will be as brief as possible. Farewell.
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.