Letter 4025: If the old bond of affection that came down from our parents still holds any force, then our friendship is not...

XXV. Ennodius to Bassus. If the old devotion, which from my parents toward Your Highness laid up rich fruits from the harvest of goodwill, were being kept in regard to my person for the remembrance of that loyalty, a frequency of letters would show it, and the speech of your heart, that witness, would disclose an affection not buried away. But as it is, I perceive that you have forgotten me and retain no concord of a better age, since no writings are dispatched that might unseal your concern. Yet I have turned the impatience of my longing into words, I who know that a new friendship has its sweetness only then, if it be kept through the years, and that that is purer in affection which our forebears have tested, knowing that, if you hold Camillus in mind, you will not pass over Ennodius. On which account, discharging the gifts of greeting through the care of a letter, I beg that you deign to receive favorably the bearer of the present letter, my cleric, whom both his own advantage and the order I gave him have brought to the Gauls. On his return, mark out your good fortunes by a letter of yours, so that, if forgetfulness has done any damage to our love, the attentiveness of letters may restore it.

XXV. ENNODIVS BASSO. Si uetus diligentia, quae a parentibus meis erga amplitudinem tuam fructus uberes de gratiae messe condebat, circa personam meam pro fidei memoria seruaretur, monstraret frequentia litterarum et insepuitam caritatem testis pectoris sermo recluderet. at nunc oblitum mei te sentio nec aliquam melioris saeculi retinere concordiam, quando nulla quae sollicitudinem tuam resignent scripta diriguntur. sed ego desiderii inpatientiam ad uerba conuerti, qui scio tunc nouellam amicitiam habere dulcitudinem, si annosa seruetur, et illud esse in affectione purius, quod nostri examinauere maiores, sciens quia si Camillum mente retines, Ennodium non omittes. qua de re salutationis munera epistolari cura persoluens precor, ut baiulum praesentium clericum meum, quem ad Gallias et suae utilitatis et meae iussionis causa perduxit, susceptum habere digneris. quo remeante prospera uestra scriptione signate, ut si quid in amore damni fecit obliuio, epistolaris sollicitudo restituat.