Letter 12025: Those who observe changes in the usual order of things are often troubled, because what runs counter to custom...

XXV. Senator [Cassiodorus Senator], Praetorian Prefect, to Ambrosius, Most Illustrious, acting in his stead. [1] For the most part those become anxious who observe the altered orders of things, because often they portend certain matters that are found to be contrary to custom. For nothing is carried out without a cause, nor is the world entangled in chance accidents, but whatever we see come to its appointed end is established to be of divine design. Men are held in suspense when kings change their established usages, if they go forth clad otherwise than their practice had made customary. But who would not be disturbed with great curiosity over such things, if, the customs being reversed, something obscure should be seen to come from the stars? For just as it is a sure security to mark the running seasons in their own turns, so we are filled with great curiosity when such things are perceived to be changed. [2] What sort of thing is it, I ask, to behold the chief of the stars and not to see its accustomed light? to gaze upon the moon, the adornment of the night, full in its orb yet emptied of its natural splendor? We all even now discern, as it were, a sea-blue sun: we marvel that at midday bodies have no shadows, and that that vigor of the strongest heat has come down to the inertness of the faintest warmth, which it is established is nonetheless brought about not by the momentary failing of an eclipse, but by the passing of nearly a whole year. [3] What dread, then, is it to endure for a longer time what, even at its height, is wont to terrify peoples with the utmost swiftness? And so we have had a winter without storms, a spring without mild weather, a summer without heat. Whence now may it be hoped that mild weather can come, when the months that could ripen the crops were chilled severely by the blasts of the north wind? For what would bring forth fertility, if the earth does not grow warm in the summer months? what would open the bud, if the womb does not take up the rain again? These two things we find adverse to all the elements: perpetual rigor and contrary dryness. The seasons have changed themselves by not changing, and what was wont to be brought about by mingled rains cannot be obtained from dryness alone. [4] And therefore let your prudence overcome the coming scarcity by means of the old produce, since so great was the happy abundance of the past year that even for the coming months the provisions laid up may suffice. Let everything that is sought for sustenance be stored away. The private person readily finds his necessities once the public stock has been filled. [5] But lest the present situation torment you with great hesitation, return to the consideration of natural things, and what seems doubtful to the astonished crowd becomes certain by reason. For thus it stands disposed by divine ordination, thus the stars of the present year have come together in their dwellings by their mutual administrations, that the winter has been rendered, beyond what is usual, dry and cold. Hence the air, thickened by the snows with excessive rigor, has been brought by the heat of the sun into no rarity, but, persisting in the thickness it has assumed, has both withstood its heats and eluded the sight of human frailty. For the things that lie in the middle dominate our gaze, and through them we are able to see only as much as they grant us by the thinness of their own body. [6] For this great void, which ranges between heaven and earth after the manner of the most liquid element, when it happens to be pure and sprinkled with the brightness of the sun, truly opens itself to our sight; but if it has been gathered together by some admixture, then, as though by a kind of stretched hide, it allows neither the proper colors nor the warmth of the stars to come through. Which in other ages too is frequently brought about, according to the season, by a clouded air. Hence it is that for a longer time the rays of the heavenly bodies have been darkened with an unwonted color, that the harvester has dreaded a strange cold, that with the advance of the season the fruits have hardened, that the old age of the grapes is bitter. [7] But if this be handed over to divine providence, we ought not to busy ourselves, since by its very command we are forbidden to seek out prodigies. Yet that, without doubt, we recognize to be adverse to the fruits of the earth, where we do not see the accustomed nourishment fostered by its own law. Accordingly, let your solicitude act so that the barrenness of a single year may not seem to disturb us, since it has so been provided by that first administrator of our dignity that the preceding plenty had power to mitigate the ensuing want.

XXV. AMBROSIO V. I. AGENTI VICES SENATOR PPO. [1] Plerumque solliciti fiunt, qui mutatos rerum ordines intuentur, quia saepe portendunt aliqua, quae consuetudini probantur adversa. nihil enim sine causa geritur nec mundus fortuitis casibus implicatur, sed quicquid venire videmus ad terminum, divinum constat esse consilium. suspenduntur homines, cum sua reges constituta mutaverint, si aliter induti procedant quam eorum usus inoleverat. quis autem de talibus non magna curiositate turbetur, si versa vice consuetudinum a sideribus aliquid venire videatur obscurum? nam sicut certa securitas est suis vicibus tempora notare currentia, sic magna curiositate complemur, cum mutari talia sentiuntur. [2] Quale est, rogo, stellarum primarium conspicere et eius solita lumina non videre? lunam noctis decus intueri orbe suo plenam et naturali splendore vacuatam? cernimus adhuc cuncti quasi venetum solem: miramur media die umbras corpora non habere et vigorem illum fortissimi caloris usque ad extremi teporis inertiam pervenisse, quod non eclipsis momentaneo defectu, sed totius paene anni agi nihilominus constat excursu. [3] Qualis ergo timor est diutius sustinere quod vel in summa solet populos celeritate terrere? habuimus itaque sine procellis hiemem, sine temperie vernum, sine ardoribus aestatem. unde iam speretur posse venire temperiem, quando menses qui fructus decoquere poterant boreis flatibus vehementer algebant? quid enim fertilitatem producat, si terra aestivis mensibus non calescat? quid germen aperiat, si matrix pluviam non resumat? duo haec elementis omnibus probamus adversa rigorem perpetuum et contrariam siccitatem. mutaverunt se tempora non mutando et quod mixtis imbribus solebat effici, ex ariditate sola non potest optineri. [4] Atque ideo de veteribus frugibus prudentia tua futuram vincat inopiam, quia tanta fuit anni praeteriti felix ubertas, ut et venturis mensibus provisa sufficiant. reponatur omne quod ad victum quaeritur. facile privatus necessaria reperit, cum se publicus apparatus expleverit. [5] Sed ne te praesens causa magna haesitatione discruciet, ad considerationem revertere naturalium rerum et fit ratione certum, quod stupenti vulgo videtur ambiguum. sic enim constat divina ordinatione dispositum, sic astra praesentis anni in domiciliis suis mutuis amministrationibus convenerunt, ut supra solitum hiems sicca redderetur et frigida. hinc aer nivibus nimio rigore densatus ardore solis in nulla raritate perductus est, sed in assumpta crassitate perdurans et caloribus eius obstitit et aspectum humanae fragilitatis elusit. media enim quae sunt, nostris dominantur obtutibus et per ipsa tantum videre possumus, quantum nobis sui corporis tenuitate concedunt. [6] Hoc enim inane magnum, quod inter caelum terramque elementi more liquidissimi pervagatur, dum contigerit esse purum et solis claritate respersum, nostros veraciter pandit aspectus: si vero aliqua fuerit permixtione congregatum, tunc tenso quasi quodam corio nec colores proprios nec calores pervenire facit astrorum. quod etiam aliis saeculis aere nubilo pro tempore frequenter efficitur. hinc est quod diutius radii siderum insolito colore fuscati sunt, quod novum frigus messor expavit, quod accessu temporis poma duruerunt, quod uvarum senectus acerba est. [7] Sed si hoc divinae providentiae tradatur, satagere non debemus, quando ipsius imperio prodigia quaerere prohibemur. illud tamen sine dubio terrenis fructibus adversarium esse cognoscimus, ubi alimonia consueta nutriri lege propria non videmus. proinde agat sollicitudo vestra, ne nos unius anni sterilitas turbare videatur, dum sic ab illo primo amministratore dignitatis nostrae provisum est, ut praecedens copia sequentem valuisset mitigare penuriam.