To Trajan.
It is difficult. Sir, to find words to express the pleasure I have received at the favour you have shown my wife's mother * and myself in transferring her relative, Caelius Clemens, to this province. For I begin to realise thoroughly the full measure of your kindness when I and all my household receive such abundant favours at your hands, adequate thanks for which I dare not venture to offer you, though I do thank you from the bottom of my heart. Consequently, I take refuge in vows on your behalf, and pray to Heaven that I may not be thought unworthy of the kindnesses you shower so plentifully upon me.
[Note: Pompeia Celerina; see for instance letter i. 4.]
L To Trajan.
It is difficult. Sir, to find words to express the pleasure I have received at the favour you have shown my wife's mother * and myself in transferring her relative, Caelius Clemens, to this province. For I begin to realise thoroughly the full measure of your kindness when I and all my household receive such abundant favours at your hands, adequate thanks for which I dare not venture to offer you, though I do thank you from the bottom of my heart. Consequently, I take refuge in vows on your behalf, and pray to Heaven that I may not be thought unworthy of the kindnesses you shower so plentifully upon me.
(*) Pompeia Celerina; see for instance letter i. 4.
◆
To Trajan.
It is difficult. Sir, to find words to express the pleasure I have received at the favour you have shown my wife's mother * and myself in transferring her relative, Caelius Clemens, to this province. For I begin to realise thoroughly the full measure of your kindness when I and all my household receive such abundant favours at your hands, adequate thanks for which I dare not venture to offer you, though I do thank you from the bottom of my heart. Consequently, I take refuge in vows on your behalf, and pray to Heaven that I may not be thought unworthy of the kindnesses you shower so plentifully upon me.
[Note: Pompeia Celerina; see for instance letter i. 4.]
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.