Quintus Aurelius Symmachus → destinatário desconhecido
Tradução moderna em inglês
I recently read your letter and could tell your spirits were low. I was deeply surprised that a sudden quarrel had erupted among people who are so close to each other. I've written to my lord and brother to urge him not to depart from his usual character.
As for you, I ask — not just for my sake but for your own — that you show the same patience that distinguishes your other virtues, and bear with everything that the conditions of living abroad tend to produce. I hope that the mediation of my son Flavianus, together with the physician Eusebius's soothing manner, will calm everything down.
Texto latino / grego
Aegrum proxime animum tuum litterarum, quas miseras, lectione cognovi, mul- tumque miratus inter coniunctissimos fortuitam subito emersisse discordiam 15 et dominum ac fratrem meum litteris obsecravi, ne a suo more dissentiat. te vero non meo tantum, verum etiam tuo nomine rogo, ut ceteris bonis morum tuorum simi- lem patientiam praestes ferasque omnia, quae solet peregrinationis habere condicio. spero autem et filii mei Flaviani conciliatione et Eusebi archiatri blanditiis posse omnia mitigari. 20 XXXVn (XXXV) a. 382—383?