Marcus Tullius Cicero→Titus Pomponius Atticus|c. 46 BC|Cicero|From Rome|To Rome/Athens|AI-assisted
As to my staying with Appuleius, since a permanent arrangement does not suit, you will see to it that I am excused day by day. In this solitude I am deprived of conversation with everyone, and when in the morning I have hidden myself away in a thick and rough wood, I do not come out of it before evening. Next to you, nothing is dearer to me than solitude. In it all my discourse is with books. Yet weeping interrupts it; I fight against it as far as I can, but so far we are not evenly matched. I will write back to Brutus, as you advise. You will have that letter tomorrow. When there is someone to give it to, you will send it on.
I do not wish you to neglect your business to come to me. I would rather go to you, if you are delayed any longer. However I should never even have come out of sight of you, if it were not that I absolutely could not get relief from anything. If there were any alleviation for my sorrow, it would
be in you alone, and, as soon as any will be possible from anyone, it will come from you. Yet at this very moment I cannot bear your absence. But it did not seem right to stay in your house and I could not stay at my own house; and, if I stayed somewhere nearer, still I should not be with you, for you would be prevented from being with me by the same reason that you are now. For myself, this solitude has suited me better than anything so far, though I am afraid Philippus will destroy it. He came yesterday evening. Writing and reading do not soften my feelings, they only distract them.
apud Appuleium, quoniam in perpetuum non placet, in dies ut excuser videbis. in hac solitudine careo omnium conloquio, cumque mane me in silvam abstrusi densam et asperam, non exeo inde ante vesperum. secundum te nihil est mihi amicius solitudine. in ea mihi omnis sermo est cum litteris. eum tamen interpellat fletus; cui repugno quoad possum, sed adhuc pares non sumus. Bruto ut suades, rescribam. eas litteras cras habebis. cum erit cui des, dabis.
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As to my staying with Appuleius, since a permanent arrangement does not suit, you will see to it that I am excused day by day. In this solitude I am deprived of conversation with everyone, and when in the morning I have hidden myself away in a thick and rough wood, I do not come out of it before evening. Next to you, nothing is dearer to me than solitude. In it all my discourse is with books. Yet weeping interrupts it; I fight against it as far as I can, but so far we are not evenly matched. I will write back to Brutus, as you advise. You will have that letter tomorrow. When there is someone to give it to, you will send it on.
AI-assisted translation - This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek below for scholarly use.
Latin / Greek Original
apud Appuleium, quoniam in perpetuum non placet, in dies ut excuser videbis. in hac solitudine careo omnium conloquio, cumque mane me in silvam abstrusi densam et asperam, non exeo inde ante vesperum. secundum te nihil est mihi amicius solitudine. in ea mihi omnis sermo est cum litteris. eum tamen interpellat fletus; cui repugno quoad possum, sed adhuc pares non sumus. Bruto ut suades, rescribam. eas litteras cras habebis. cum erit cui des, dabis.