Letter 22
People who lack confidence in themselves seek letters of recommendation from me. But this case is different. I've given this letter to my friend Potitus [a fellow senator] on the condition that he recommend it, not the other way around. He's every bit as much one of your closest friends as I am.
Once he's presented himself to you in person, I'm afraid my excuse for staying behind won't be easily forgiven. But if I know your forgiving nature — and I've tested it thoroughly — you won't hold my absence against me by comparison with his arrival. Instead, you'll welcome him all the more warmly on behalf of us both. Farewell.
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.
Related Letters
1. I remember our old conversations with one another, and am forgetful neither of what I said, nor of what you said. And now public life has no hold upon me.
Æmona was a Roman colony not far from Stridon, Jerome's birthplace. The virgins to whom the note is addressed had omitted to answer his letters, and he now writes to upbraid them for their remissness. The date of the letter is 374 A.D.