Letter 6019: Since the opportunity to see you that my desires craved has been denied, I turn to letters as the next best thing.

Ennodius to Faustus. After the chance of seeing you slipped away from my longings, my mind has returned once more to letters: it is compelled to seek the aid of the page it had forsworn, and to feed or sustain by such trafficking a spirit accustomed to better fare, as though on cheaper food. Oh how grievous it is, how often a fugitive liberty, while it complies with various necessities, transfers a man over to new conditions! Things that are harsh are broken down by continuance: through use much is taken away from the weight of the burden; a lamentable lot leads on to things desired that are not destined to last; lighter is the portion of one occupied with unending cares. In this I am the more wretched for the bundle of my sins, that I have tasted of the savor of good things. But of this elsewhere. Those things which know no remedy by human counsel must be left to God. Meanwhile, paying you the reverence of a greeting, I have not failed to give signs of my return, desiring to be relieved by an equal cheerfulness in your own writing.

XVIIII. ENNODIVS FAVSTO. Postquam desideriis meis uidendi uos facultas elapsa est, iterum ad litteras mens reuertit: cogitur abiuratum poscere paginale subsidium et institutam melioribus copiis animam quasi uilioris cibi alere aut sustentare conmercio.s o quam graue est, quotiens uariis necessitatibus obsequentom fugitiua libertas ad noua instituta transducit! quae dura sunt continuatione franguntur: multum de grauitate oneris usus incidit: flebilis condicio ad optata quae non sunt mansura perducit: leuior sors est curis iugibus occupati. hoc sum infelicior peccatorum fasce, quod de bonarum rerum sapore gustaui. sed hinc alias. deo relinquenda sunt quae humano remedium nesciunt habere consilio. uobis interim reuerentiam salutationis inpendens reditus mei facere indicia non omisi, cupiens pari scrip- . tionis uestrae hilaritate releuari.