Letter 600
Libanius→Βακχίῳ|libanius
To Bacchius. (~357 AD)
You don't know it, but we've composed another exercise — and you would certainly have asked for the second after the first. That's just how you are with me: the moment you hear I've said something, you're in love with it before you've even learned how I said it.
So I'll send both at once, as if you'd already asked for this one too. "At once" by our reckoning means two months — such is our abundance of scribes, or rather scarcity. If nothing arrives, feel free to complain. But if it arrives slowly, don't blame us — blame the culprit, with us.
Βακχίῳ. (357)
Οὐ γὰρ οἶσθ᾿ ὅτι καὶ ἑτέραν πεποιήμεθα μελέτην, ἡ
πάντως ἂν ᾔτεις ἐπὶ τῇ προτέρᾳ τὴν δευτέραν. τοιοῦτος γὰρ
δὴ σὺ πρὸς ἡμᾶς· ἂν ὅτι εἶπον ἀκούσῃς, πρὶν ὅπως εἶπον
μαθεῖν εὐθὺς ἐρᾷς.
ὡς οὖν καὶ ταύτην ᾐτηκότι πέμψομεν
ἀμφοτέρας αὐτίκα. τὸ δ’ αὐτίκα παρ’ ἡμῖν δύο μῆνες· τοσ-
αύτη τις ἀφθονία γραφέων, ἵνα μὴ λέγω σπάνις. μὴ λαμ-
βάνων μὲν οὖν ἐγκάλει· βραδέως δὲ εἰ λάβοις, ἀνθ’ ἡμῶν
μεθ’ ἡμῶν αἴτια τὸ αἴτιον.
◆
To Bacchius. (~357 AD)
You don't know it, but we've composed another exercise — and you would certainly have asked for the second after the first. That's just how you are with me: the moment you hear I've said something, you're in love with it before you've even learned how I said it.
So I'll send both at once, as if you'd already asked for this one too. "At once" by our reckoning means two months — such is our abundance of scribes, or rather scarcity. If nothing arrives, feel free to complain. But if it arrives slowly, don't blame us — blame the culprit, with us.
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.