Letter 2031: ...and you care for me, but I worry that you might take up some fight on my behalf while I'm away and draw hostility...

...and you care for me, but I worry that you might take up some fight on my behalf while I'm away and draw hostility onto yourself. Please, I ask you, stand down. Perhaps one day I'll have the chance to make my case before the eternal emperor, our lord Theodosius [Emperor Theodosius I, r. 379–395], whose favor toward me is exactly what provoked certain people's jealousy in the first place. I don't think my situation under a legitimate ruler will be the same as it was under the usurper [Magnus Maximus, who held power 383–388], on whose written orders — issued at Marcellinus's instigation — my household staff were punished, as you know. And this I did not pass over in silence when defending the panegyric.

et amantem mei, et vereor, ne snscipias nllnm pro absentis existimatione certamen i5 atque in te aliqua odia detorqneas. peto igitur, nt qniescas. erit fortasse copia mihi adserendae qnandoqne apnd aetemnm principem dominum nostram Theodosinm veri- tatis, cuius erga me favor fecit, ut aliqnid interim moliretur invidia. non pnto eam causae meae bonis temporibns condicionem futuram, qnae sub tyranno fuit, cuius lit- teris ad Marcellini suggestionem datis homines meos scis esse multatos. quod in 20 panegyrici defensione non tacui. XXXn a. 389?