Letter 7002: How much is added to the burden of grief when affliction is interrupted — when adversity, to sting all the more...

Ennodius to Faustus. How greatly does an interrupted tribulation add to the burden of grief, when adversity, that it may sear the more sharply, flatters us with a change to prosperous things! Has any heavier weight ever come upon us than that which has cast off the load of unbroken calamity? How well had the long experience of the times fitted me for the patient endurance of your absence, when, this thing which my good fortune did not possess, even my prayers had not learned to presume upon! Behold, once again out of inveterate sorrows a fresh suffering tears at me, and a keener blow rips open the scar that had grown over. I had implored mercy of you as you departed, that what I was losing from your present conversation might be made up by letters, and yet, hungering, I did not earn this fruit for all my longings. I, not neglectful of my own custom, compose these writings amid tears, in which I believed nothing more ought to be disclosed concerning my affliction, content with the report of the illustrious man, the lord Pamfronius. Now, my lord, deign to accept the dutiful service of your servant, and bestow the accustomed remedies upon a soul set in straits.

II. ENNODIVS FAVSTO. Quantum ad fascem maeroris adiungit interrupta tribulatio, quando ut acrius urat aduersitas, prosperorum mutatione blanditur! ad acrius umquam onus accessit, quod continuatae sarcinam calamitatis abiecit? quam bene me ad patientiam absentiae uestrae longus temporum usus aptauerat, dam hoc, quod felicitas non habebat, didicerant nec uota praesumere! ecce iterum de inueteratis doloribus passio nouella me lacerat, et obductam cicatricem rescindit ictus acutior. inploraueram a discedente misericordiam, ut quod de praesenti confabulatione perdebam, litteris pensaretur, nec hanc frugem omnibus desideriis ieiunus emerui. ego consuetudinis meae non neglegens inter lacrimas scripta concinno, quibus de adflictione mea credidi nil potius indicandum, inlustris uiri domni Pamfroni relatione contentus. nunc, mi domine, obsequia famuli uestri dignanter accipite et animae in angustiis constitutae remedia consueta praestate.