Quintus Aurelius Symmachus → destinatário desconhecido
Tradução moderna em inglês
Recommending leisure is easy enough -- but that kind of advice requires a man who's master of his own time. The hostility of my rivals won't let me sit still, and my young son's education won't let me travel far. So I shuttle back and forth as best I can, varying the scenery with comings and goings.
This letter, for proof, was just now dashed off from a country estate outside the city. If nothing disrupts my plans, another will follow from our place at Cora [modern Cori, south of Rome]. It's up to you to improve the conditions of my absence with frequent letters -- to sweeten it, if you approve, or at least to soften it, if you don't.
Texto latino / grego
Felix materia est suadere otium; sed haec adhortatio animum sui iuris requirit. nos neque residere patitur liventium factio nec filii iuvenis institutio longum peregri- 25 nari. quare ut possumus, modo abscessu modo reditu variamus locorum distinctionem. testimonio est haec epistula suburbano agro fnuper emissa, quam de Corano nostro, si nihil disposita turbaverit, alia consequetur. vestrum est huiusmodi absentiae nostrae condicionem litteris frequentibus augere, si placet, iuvare, si displicet. LXU (LXni) a. 398. 30