Letter 7020: So I've been keeping silent for nothing, waiting confidently for you to keep your promise.

Quintus Aurelius SymmachusUnknown|c. 375 AD|Quintus Aurelius Symmachus
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So I've been keeping silent for nothing, waiting confidently for you to keep your promise. Now I have to go back to the old consolations, having given up on anything better. And perhaps you're annoyed at my long silence. That's really the final straw -- to be accused of neglecting you when it's you who left me hanging.

You'd do better to keep your word about starting the journey. I'll gladly settle for that much comfort. At the very least, this exchange of courtesies will either console me for your not coming, or earn me the reward of your visit. Farewell.

Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.

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