Letter 2016: It has been a long time — if you will take my word for it, or if you judge rightly from our mutual affection — since...

Bishop Avitus to the most illustrious Apollinaris. It has been a long time now - if you put any trust in my word or hold worthy sentiments of our mutual affection - that, desiring to receive a letter from some member of your family, I nonetheless wished still more to offer the duty I owe; and that the obligations I owe in your person, first to love, then to kinship, and finally even to your dignity, ought not always to be left to be discharged through the chance opportunities of those who pass our way. For although the very availability of letter-carriers, on account of their frequency, ought to be something we welcome, it is nevertheless necessary that that solicitude should take precedence which presents itself by its own desire, without the intervention of another's need. Knowing myself bound by this service, I had long been silently groaning that the just repayment of it was being cut off, an unjust barrier of obstruction standing in the way. For there had come, not only to our notice but to our grief, the smoke of a fire that had been laid - which a stormy conspiracy, blowing upon your holy and pure innocence with lying winds as though upon spent ashes, had tried in vain to set in motion. For this reason we feared to add to the burden of your anxiety with the offering of a token, and to send an increase of grief in place of consolation. And so, while we hung in confused expectation beneath the cloud of this uncertainty, God unexpectedly brought me a letter from your Serenity that bore the marks of your former affection. There I recognized - with great delight - your hand, and still more your fatherly eloquence, and most of all your inherited kindness. You wrote, then, that by Christ's favor all was now safe again with your return, and that around you the regard of the lord King Alaric remained unharmed and as before. Although I would judge that, after any shaking whatever, the favor of such personages is not restored without increase, just as it is not ended without danger. For they wish, as it were, to make satisfaction to an innocence that has been assailed; and they exalt a man the moment they perceive they have believed him, and our conscience is enough for them only if their own knowledge comes forward as witness. Yet I, having received the news of your security - or rather of ours - lo, I speak with God as my witness, burst into tears mingled with joy at the recollection of things past. For into my mind, as your poet says, there came the image of my dear father [a quotation of Virgil, Aeneid: 'subiit cari genitoris imago']; and in memory I went back over the matter, that our persons - however different in our calling - are brought up to a certain shared lot of our common forebears, an equality of toils with envy following after. Yet, in God's name, that same consolation is available to us too which was theirs: that, assailed by every effort of rivals, by every tooth of the malice barking round about on all sides, however often it has seemed to be attacked, our family has been subject to accusation, not to a true charge. For if you have learned this from your father, that a man serving the world is in less danger amid arms than amid slanders, I take my example from my own Sidonius - whom I do not dare to call father - as to how much a cleric can endure. And so may the Divinity grant this: that, as it is nothing new for such things to be thrown against us, so may no novelty make us deserve to be accused. But now, in a time of joy, let bitterness cease - a discourse cut short as occasion allows: rather let the boldness of one jesting clumsily furnish you something to laugh at. Some months ago I saw a letter you had sent to a certain friend common to us both, men of your magnificence, in which, after the customary greeting, in a later part of your eloquent epistle you wrote that you had been pleased by the little books which - amid occupations of writing serious and more necessary matters - I nonetheless composed, by way of play, even on the deeds of sacred history in the manner of poetry [Avitus's poem De spiritalis historiae gestis]. Here now I call God to witness, before your sincerity, that I speak nothing falsely, nothing flatteringly: that I was delighted by your judgment alone, just as if, having confessed before the ears of the lord my father - your father - the things I had pondered, I were granted at any moment of whatever praise the gift of having him as my critic. For first I rejoiced that here you weighed your opinion more freely than elsewhere; then that I recognized that you wished, no less than you believed, some good to come of a brother's effort: certainly that you offered, by your wish, what you could not fulfill by your judgment - to supply meters of distinction not so great as you desired in what had been composed. The book, however - the friend who, as I think, had it brought to you - snatched it away from me so uncorrected and raw, not from the copyists but still from the notary's hand, that you would not easily mark whether to be angrier at the faults of the author or of the scribe. For this reason, that I might not delay your desire, I have quickly sent off the little work itself, reduced to parchment and not yet polished with as much correction as I had wished. If indeed it pleases you, not only as one who loves but as one who judges - since among strangers there will perhaps be no lack of someone whom envy of a bold attempt touches - it will be abundantly enough for me that you should feel, as I desire. For just as the famous work of our common Sollius [Sidonius Apollinaris, whose full name was Gaius Sollius Apollinaris Sidonius] has come to my glory no less than yours, so, with Christ's favor as you flourish more and more in military action, if a feeble effort in me should accomplish anything worth reading, even the old man Arcadius will at some time not be ashamed.

Avitus episcopus viro illustrissimo Apollinari. Diu est, si aut verbo meo creditis aut de affectu mutuo digna sentitis, quod lit- teras alicuius vestri sumere desiderans plus tamen officii mei offerre cupiebam, quae- que in persona vestra dilectioni primum, deinde necessitudini, ad ultimum etiam dig- nitati a me debentur, non semper occasionibus commeantum solvenda committere. Quia licet et ipsa nobis opportunitas portitorum propter frequentiam debeat esse votiva, necesse est tamen, ut illa sollicitudo praecellat, quae se appetitu proprio sine inter- ventu alienae necessitatis insinuat. Huius obsequii me obnoxium sciens intercludi redhibitionem iustam, iniusta obstaculi praepediente obice, iam dudum tacitus in- gemiscebam. Pervenerat quippe non ad notitiam tantummodo, sed ad maestitiam no- stram dispositi fumus incendii, quod sanctae ac simplici innocentiae vestrae velut de effetis cineribus coniuratio procellosa ventis mendacibus sufflans in cassum movere temptaverat. Ob quam causam verebamur anxietatis vestrae sarcinam voto libaminis adgravare et maeroris augmentum pro consolatione transmittere. Sub huius ergo am- biguitatis nubilo confusa expectatione pendentibus litteras vestrae serenitatis pristinae pietatis expertas inopinanti mihi deus obtulit. Recognovi illic, qua satis delectatus sum, manum vestram, quam plus paternam declamationem, quam maxime heredita- riam benignitatem. Scripsistis igitur Christo praestante iam redux omnia tuta esse circaque vos dignationem domni regis Alarici illaesam et pristinam permanere. Quam- quam ego censeam, quod post quamcumque nutationem gratia talium personarum ita sine augmento non redditur, sicut sine periculo non finitur. Volunt enim quasi satis- facere innocentiae lacessitae, tumque erigunt, credidisse cum cernunt, et sic eis con- scientia nostra sufficit, si scientia sua testis accedit. Ego tamen nuntio vestrae immo nostrae securitatis accepto, ecce deo teste loquor, in lacrimas mixtas laetitia praete- ritorum recordatione prorupi. Animo namque, ut ait vester poeta, subiit cari ge- nitoris imago, at memoria retractavi usque ad nostras quamlibet dispari pro- fessione personas quandam parentum communium sortem, parilitatem laborum invidia sequente, perduci. Illa tamen in dei nomine etiam nobis suppetit, quae illis con- solatio fuit: quod toto aemulorum nisu, toto circumlatrantis undique livoris dente temptata, quotienscumque appeti visa est, criminationi subiacuit familia nostra, non crimini. Quoniam, si vos a patre vestro hoc didicistis virum saeculo militantem minus inter arma quam inter obloquia periclitari, exemplum a Sidonio meo, quem patrem vocare non audeo, quantum clericus perpeti possit, adsumo. Quo circa illud divinitas tribuat, ut nobis quam novum non est talia obici, tam nos ulla novitas meritos faciat accusari. Sed desistant nunc laetitiae tempore amaritudines, ex opportunitate sermo perstrictus: quin potius inepte iocantis audacia, unde rideatis, exhibeat. Ante aliquot menses datas ad amicum quendam communem magnificentiae vestrae litteras vidi, quibus salutatione praefata in epistulae declamantis parte succi- dua scribebatis placuisse vobis libellos, quos inter occupationes seria et magis neces- saria conscribendi nihilominus tamen de spiritalis historiae gestis etiam lege poematis lusi. Hic nunc nihil falso, nihil adsentatorie me loqui coram sinceritate vestra im- precor testem deum; tantum me tuo iudicio delectatum, veluti si auribus domni mei patris tui meditata confessus cuiuscumque laudis momentis eo censore donarer. Pri- mum namque gaudebam, quod sensum vestrum hic liberius quam alibi pendebatis; deinde quod agnovi vos aliquod bonum de conatu fraterni operis non minus velle, quam credere: certe metris distinctionis non quantae volebatis inventis suppeditare vos voto, quod non poteratis implere iudicio. Libellum tamen amicus, qui ut puto ad vos pervenire fecit, non de librariis sed adhuc ex notarii manu adeo mihi in- emendatum crudumque praeripuit, ut non facile denotes, auctoris magis scriptorisne vitiis irascaris. Qua propter opusculum ipsum in membranas redactum et adhuc non quanta volueram correctione politum, ne moram desiderio tuo facerem, celeriter desti- navi. Si revera non solum amantibus, sed et iudicantibus vobis placet, quoniam apud extraneos forte non deerit, quem audacis conatus tangat invidia, abunde mihi sufficiet, ut vos, quod cupio, sentiatis. Quia sicut non minus ad meam quam vestram gloriam pervenit communis Sollii opus illustre, ita vobis favente Christo militari actu magis magisque florentibus si in me nisus tenuis aliquid dignum lectione confecerit, etiam senem quandocumque Arcadium non pudebit. LII (46) Avitus episcopus viro illustrissimo Apollinari. Communi quidem sed veraci sermone vulgatum est, quod sese mutuae dilec- tionis intuitu concordantium cernant motus animorum. Potest namque tam una nobis sollicitudo nostri esse, ut litteris, quas harum portitor filius meus at- tulit, ante, si bene metiamini, responderim, quam venirent? Nam in pagina famulatus, quam per meos ex causa direxeram, et gaudium de vestra prosperitate conceptum plus affectionibus quam sermonibus exhalavi, et necessitatem nostram patrumque commu- nium mixta lacrimis exultatione perstrinxi. De cetero autem tribuat divina miseratio, quae spem reparandae prosapiae in personae vestrae honore constituit et secuturae posteritati nostrae te unigenitore etiam nos patres esse concessit, ut calcatis iugiter prosperante successu inimicorum coniurationes seu perfidorum livores, primus victoriae vestrae gradus sit integritatem in conscientia reponere; secundus, cum discutitur, in audientia comprobare; tertius criminantibus post sententiam pepercisse. Torqueatur animo etiam pro indulgentia sibi collata hostis subpressus, et duplici nostro bono, supplicio suo, cum vos gemuerit non posse decipi, doleat posse misereri. Sic pote- stati vestrae ad hoc tantum redditus, ne periret, dum oblatae ultro veniae amarus so irascitur, vitae quodammodo suae invidere cogatur. De reliquo, domine piissime fra- ter, cura pectoris mei, pompa generis tui, fer paulisper trepidantem fraternae admo- nitionis ineptiam. Cavete attentive malos et linguarum mordacium dolis sibilantibus blandimenta venenaque machinantibus docti post experimenta non credite. Nec mi- nus vos sollertia faciat cautos, quam innocentia praestat securos. Siquidem intercluso explorandi nocendique aditu vel ob hoc rarius debetis debellandis eorum conatibus laborare, quod ultionem divino iudicio reservantes debellantibus semper statuistis ignoscere. Quamquam, ut supra iam fatus sum, non ex toto impunitus habeatur, quem gloria lacessit. non debeam: fructum tamen in vobis mercedis taliter adquisitae non tam verbis valeo exaggerare quam gaudiis. Nam nisi vos a praeconio vestro maturitate senatoria tem- peratissimi pudores cohiberent, effectum certaminis gloriosi ipsa forsitan lingua digne laudaret apud proprios, quae mirabiliter convincit adver so s. Habuistis igitur, ut audio, cum rege tractatum, de quo, quantum comperi, quia non seducebamini, liminibus transistis ad proelium. Discussum est nutu divino, qui caelis dudum notus iam et hominibus appareret religionis adsertor. Os saecularis eloquentiae pompis adsuetum et fluentis exundantibus Romuleae profunditatis irriguum alacritate debita missam sibi de supernis materiam dignae disputationis arripuit; facundia cum interfuit aut de- scribendi mundi iucunditatibus aut regalium triumphorum praeconiis, patronam ubi primum melior pars poposcit, adstruendae veritati non servire non potuit. Sicut alias laudando regem reddidistis Caesari, quod Caesaris erat, ita hic, ut redderetis deo, quae dei sunt, nec Caesari pepercistis. Quapropter habet hic in vobis, etsi non sequatur, potestas regia, quod miretur, quae se aliquotiens declamantibus vobis nunc evidentius sentit ornatam. Siquidem nec scire vos adsentationis illecebram, cum res admonuit, etiam resistendo monstrastis. Illos igitur denotat sapientia potestatum facile humanis fidem posse mutare, quos divinis vident terrena praeponere. Ceterum cognosci in promptu est, custodem primarum partium etiam quae sunt residua, servaturum. Haec igitur dicta sint, cum de saeculari parte tractamus. Si vero ad sacerdotum causam venitur, quorum adhuc non augetis scolam et iam sustinetis iniuriam atque ornaturi contubernio prius informatis exemplo: quis horum vos, quis. inquam. nesciat ad cer- tamen huius spiritalis palaestrae non rudes aut ignaros legis, sed sub longo salutarium meditationum gymnasio pervenisse? Quocirca novum sit aliis necessitatem belli huius a perfectione vos virtutis ordiri; ego autem, in cuius animo caritatis arcem tenetis, iam dudum incunctanter agnoveram ad catholicos sensus intuendos per studium tuen- dosque per verbum probato in vobis devotionis ardore non tam desideria deesse quam tempora. Qua propter famulatu salutationis oblato, pastu, quo mentem vestram ieiuno corpore satiastis, significans etiam me refectum, unde vobis paucula haec saturitas meae gratulationis eructat, deum, quod restat, exposco, ut, cui praedicatoris officium iam imposuit, honorem subiungat. Quod exercetis actu, ostendatur et habitu; non docilem sed doctum, nec discentem sed doctorem cathedra suscipiat. In qua velut triumphatori conspicuo sertis laureae victricis aut myrto, inter adclamantum gaudio consonas voces, quantus in clipeum adsurgas, etiam nolens adstipuletur hostis expertus, numquam inventurus, quod de qualitate meriti contradicat, sed habiturus semper de proelii inaequalitate, quod timeat. Heraclius Avito Viennensi episcopo. Vtinam mihi subinde contingat, ut alloquii vestri fecunditate iugi eruditione cor- roborer. Duplicis enim gratiae effectus tali succedit eventu, dum et fides tepore marcida ferventis hortaminis calescit affatu et ingenium naturali paupertate ieiunum perspicui cultoris ope ditescit. Vnde, si dignamini, comitante salutationis officio maxi- mas grates referre praesumo, quod responsio mea apud principem habita et ad vos, ut indicastis, rumore perlata competens iudicium non ex meo ore, sed ex vestro amore promeruit; quamquam praecellentissimus princeps, cum sit ad inveniendum igneus, profluus ad dicendum, ita sensus scrutatur humanos, ut semper conventibus mitissimo pareat auditu. Tamen laboris mei seriem amputato aequore prolixitatis insinuo; labo- rem, inquam, dico, quia procellas inopinis flatibus irruentes imperitus nauta vix susti- net. Ergo cum dei beneficio tandem cessantis taedii tranquillitas se publica reddi- disset, quasi mutatis diu castris destinatum certamen inveni. Semper enim ignavas imbellesque personas petulantior conflictus adgreditur. Primum quidem e diversa parte proprii luctaminis sermo praelusit; deinde velut ab insidiis repentinis fusus est vomi- tus transmarinus; denique incidi chartam, vacuam et chaere oblatrante, quae ita se circumductis irridebat erroribus, ut salva respondentis libertate propositionis pravitate exitum non haberet et ex propriis instrumentis in iugulum suum resistenti arma sug- gereret. Quid multis? pagina, quae legi coeperat, ad silentium se conferre maluit: omnibus probabiliter innotescat quam sit divisa, quam facilis, quam spernenda per- suasio, quae excogitatis multiplicibus argumentis divinae instructionis non inopem tur- bare non valuit. Haec ita replico, ut, quicquid est, quod in causa dei placeat, vobis procul dubio faciam adscribendum. Enim vero in propatulo habetur, quod me sedulo collocutionis vestrae lima componit omnesque in commune praedicationum vestrarum cultus inuberat; ut sedes illa, cui vos contulit caeleste iudicium, multum administra- tionis muneri praestitisse, sed non minus in administrantis persona meruisse videatur. Incumbe ergo orationi, domicilium pectoris mei, et auxilium dei quam pro te tam pro omnibus, sicut facere consuesti, pius et pervicax tutor implora. Tuae fidei murus nulla obpugnatione quassabitur. Procurandum est, ut filios alumnosque tuos vulgata indesinenter castigatione tuearis et validissimis doctrinae armis, sicut legimus, tecum vincere cogas.