Letter 1003: With the arrival of the present bearers, the gifts of your longed-for and revered affection have reached me now for...

Bishop Avitus to Bishop Eustorgius. With the arrival of the present letter-carriers, behold, now for a second time the gifts of your longed-for and revered affection have come to me: gifts which, however, would prove more abundant in their happy outcome if they came in greater number. In truth a twofold matter for rejoicing has been added in your letter. First, that you show, by an affection inherited as it were, that my standing in favor remains secure in your own mind, just as it stood in the mind of your predecessors; and second, that you have charged me with a service of such a kind that, while you take up the care of guarding or restoring liberty, you have judged even me not unworthy of so great a ministry. The holy and spiritual command of your blessedness has therefore been fulfilled. You have heaped up the reward by your prayer: through your intervention the ransom which you sent has been made more precious; through reverence for you, savagery has been overcome amid barbarian harshness by humility, cruelty by your intercession, greed by your offering. We infer in what manner you tame harder hearts there by your preaching, when by the force of your intervening you thus break, even in your absence, stones such as these. By your work the affliction of our regions is relieved: and the abundance of an irrigating spring, flowing forth from your treasury of bounty, when it has watered Italy, sprinkles Gaul as well. Wherefore, having paid the service of an honorable salutation, I commend myself in any case to your intercession or favor with the prayers of an outpoured supplication: desiring your letters indeed in all things, yet more especially in these matters; in which may it so befall you through mercy, that the fruit of your works may reach even me through obedience.

Avitus episcopus Eustorgio episcopo. Adventu praesentium portitorum ecce iam secundo ad me desiderandi reverendi- que affectus vestri dona venerunt: quae tamen plus fierent prosperitate secunda, si fierent numerositate copiosa. Revera duplex in litteris vestris materia gratulationis accessit. Primum quod salvam mihi gratiam sic etiam in vestro, sicut in vestrorum extitit animo decessorum, hereditario monstratis affectu; deinde quod in eo me famu- lari negotio praecepistis, quo dum tuendae vel reparandae libertatis curam geritis, etiam me non indignum tali ministerio censuistis. Impletum est igitur beatitudinis vestrae sanctum ac spiritale praeceptum. Cumulastis oratione mercedem: interventu vestro pretiosius factum est pretium, quod misistis; victa est per reverentiam vestri in rigore barbarico humilitate immanitas, intercessione crudelitas. inlatione cupiditas. Conicimus, qualiter illic praedicationibus duriores animos edomatis, cum etiam inter- veniendi viribus absentia vobis saxa sic frangitis. Visitatur opere vestro nostrarum aerumna regionum: et emanans ex largiendi thesauro irrigui fontis ubertas, cum Ita- liam rigaverit, respergit et Galliam. Quapropter depenso salutationis honorificae famu- latu me utique vestro intercessu vel favori votis profusae supplicationis insinuo: optans licet in cunctis, in his tamen specialius causis litteras vestras: in quibus sic vobis per misericordiam competat, ut etiam me per oboedientiam vestrorum operum fructus attingat.