To Germanus. (360)
I have not yet met you, but I long to, and I am fond of you even before seeing you -- so many fine things are reported about you by fine and good men. To be fond of someone yet not bold enough to ask a favor seemed to me one of those absurd situations.
So I ask you to receive this young man -- Hyperechius is his name -- with every kindness and send him on his way quickly. For he needs speed, I think: he left behind his mule team and is riding a single horse, and that with a body unequal to the strain.
It is in your power to spare him much of the hardship. Do so, and then command me for whatever service I can render. I think it is fitting that since the beginning of our correspondence came from me, the beginning of real deeds should come from you. That way we would stand on equal footing -- or rather, even so the victory would be yours, if deeds are better than words.
I have not yet met you, but I long to, and I am fond of you even before seeing you -- so many fine things are reported about you by fine and good men. To be fond of someone yet not bold enough to ask a favor seemed to me one of those absurd situations.
So I ask you to receive this young man -- Hyperechius is his name -- with every kindness and send him on his way quickly. For he needs speed, I think: he left behind his mule team and is riding a single horse, and that with a body unequal to the strain.
It is in your power to spare him much of the hardship. Do so, and then command me for whatever service I can render. I think it is fitting that since the beginning of our correspondence came from me, the beginning of real deeds should come from you. That way we would stand on equal footing -- or rather, even so the victory would be yours, if deeds are better than words.
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.