Letter VII · C. R. Haines (1919) · Loeb Classical Library

Letter VII: Marcus Aurelius to Marcus Cornelius Fronto

W hen you rest and when you do what is good for your health, then am I, too, the better for it. Humour yourself and be lazy. My verdict, then, is: you have acted rightly in taking pains to cure your arm.1 I, too, have done something to-day since one o'clock on my couch, for I have been successful with nearly all the ten similes; in the ninth I call you in as my ally and adjutant, for it did not respond so readily to my efforts in dealing with it. It is the one of the inland lake in the island Aenaria;2 in that lake there is another island, it, too, inhabited. From this we draw a certain simile. Farewell, sweetest of souls. My Lady3 greets you.

Fronto to Marcus Aurelius as Caesar

? 139 A.D.

To my Lord.

1 Referring to a letter not preserved.
2 Off Naples. It is mentioned in connection with Marius by Plutarch.
3 Probably the mother of Marcus, to whom Fronto sends a greeting in the next letter.
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