I have received your letter, O Caesar, and the great delight it gave me you will easily gauge if you consider these separate points. First, and this is the head and front of all my joy, that I know you are well; then because I felt that you loved me so well as not to be able to set any bound or limit to your love, so as not to find something to do for me every day more kindly and more friendly than before. In fine, I have long thought myself loved enough, but you are not yet satisfied with your affection for me, so that deeper than ever plummet sounded is your love toward me, insomuch that I might quite well make the complaint, Why do you not yet love me with the utmost love possible, for by loving me more from day to day you prove that your love hitherto has fallen short of its utmost measure?
Think you that my consulship has been such a delight as the many tokens you have given me of your love in this one case? Samples of my speech, which I had picked out for you, you read to your father yourself, and took the pains to declaim them, wherein you lent me your eyes, your voice, your gestures, and, above all, your mind for my service. Nor can I see which single one of the ancient writers, whose writings were declaimed to the people by Aesopus1 or Roscius, was more fortunate than I. My speech has had Marcus Caesar for its actor and declaimer, and it was by your agency and through your voice that I pleased the hearers, whereas to be heard by you and to please you would be the height of every man's ambition. No wonder, then, my speech found favour, set off, as it was, by the dignity of your utterance. For many a thing, that lacks all intrinsic charm, borrows from elsewhere a grace that is not its own, and this is the case even with our homeliest eatables. No pot-herb, no bit of flesh is so cheap or commonplace a food as not to gain piquancy if served in a golden dish. The same is true of flowers and garlands: they have one scale of worth when sold by flower-vendors in the Flower-market, another when offered in a temple by the priests.
So much more fortunate am I than was Hercules or Achilles, for their armour and weapons were borne by Philoctetes and Patroclus, men far inferior to them in manhood, while my poor, not to say sorry, speech has been rendered famous by Caesar the most learned and eloquent of all men. Never was scene so impressive—M. Caesar actor, Titus Imperator audience! What nobler fate could befall anyone save that alone, when in Heaven, as poets tell, the Muses sing, while Jove their sire is audience? Indeed, with what words could I express my delight at your sending me that speech of mine copied out with your own hand? True, surely, is what our Laberius2 says, that in inspiring love charms are but harms3 and the foison of gifts poison. For never with cup or philtre could anyone so have stirred the flame of passion in a lover as by this act of yours you have dazed and amazed me by the ardour of your love. For every letter of your letter I count myself to have gained a consulship, a victory, a triumph, a robe of honour.
What fortune like this befell M. Porcius or Quintus Ennius, Gaius Gracchus, or the poet Titius? What Scipio or Numidicus? What M. Tullius, like this? Their books are valued more highly and have the greatest credit, if they are from the hand of Lampadio or Staberius, of Plautius or D. Aurelius, Autrico or Aelius, or have been revised by Tiro or transcribed by Domitius Balbus, or Atticus or Nepos. My speech will be extant in the handwriting of M. Caesar. He that thinks little of the speech will be in love with the very letters of it; he who disdains the thing written will reverence the writer. Just as if Apelles painted an ape or a fox, he would add a value to the lowest of creatures. Or as M. Cato (said) of . . . .4
? 144–145 A.D.