Letter 3012: Your servant delivered two letters from you, and I would be guilty of bad faith if I did not reply in kind.
Your servant delivered two letters from you, and I would be guilty of bad faith if I did not reply in kind. In both letters you promised to return to Rome -- if your years permit it. You have written the same thing many times before; I no longer put any stock in your pledges. Repeating a promise is just a rehearsal for breaking it.
I know that old men grow slow to take on effort, but since bad habits only deepen with time, I need to drag you here tomorrow -- before the passing days give you an even better excuse. Nestor [the legendary Greek elder from Homer's Iliad], in his third generation of life, never asked for an exemption from service, and even the aged Phoenix [tutor to Achilles] never excused Achilles from duty on account of his own advanced years. And truly, the distance between us is nothing. Spoletium [modern Spoleto, about 100 miles north of Rome] is practically a suburb. While you chew over your poems and compose epigrams inspired by groves and rivers, the pleasure of learned thoughts will make the journey painless.
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.
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Fortune often upsets the best-laid plans -- and that's exactly what happened to me.
Since our dear Sibidius returned to Rome and reported how badly my daughter is suffering physically, my own spirits...
I take great pleasure whenever I receive one of your letters.
Not only the first of the letters but probably the earliest extant composition of Jerome (c. 370 A.D.). Innocent, to whom it is addressed, was one of the little band of enthusiasts whom Jerome gathered round him in Aquileia.
The moment I heard that Rome had claimed you, I counted you fortunate.