The letter uses Plato and Orpheus to mock the danger of being praised into a role one cannot fill.
Your uncle thinks he will do something great for your education if he must bring you letters from me; saying this, no doubt, he leads me toward writing. I admire the man's goodwill toward you, sparing not even the smallest things by which he knows he will please you. But I loved silence, blushing at myself and having nothing wise to write.
As the wisest Plato also thinks, it is not possible to know what virtue is without hastening toward virtue in deeds. About what cannot be known, I would blush to speak, doing the same as someone who knows nothing of music, not even in a dream, and then claims to be some Orpheus taming beasts with a lyre. If he had to touch the strings, the boast would immediately become laughable, and everything would easily be exposed.
Why then am I considered by your uncle to be what I am not by nature? You often said something to him, adorning me by the law of friendship; but he did not look at your affection. Thinking the words came from deeds, he demands that I become the kind of man you remade me in words. Now I am paying the penalty for your falsehood and exposing your words, since I cannot become a teacher of virtue. Yet since this letter is to you, go on admiring me again, so that you do not expose yourself as having lied.
Your uncle thinks he will do something great for your education if he must bring you letters from me; saying this, no doubt, he leads me toward writing. I admire the man's goodwill toward you, sparing not even the smallest things by which he knows he will please you. But I loved silence, blushing at myself and having nothing wise to write.
As the wisest Plato also thinks, it is not possible to know what virtue is without hastening toward virtue in deeds. About what cannot be known, I would blush to speak, doing the same as someone who knows nothing of music, not even in a dream, and then claims to be some Orpheus taming beasts with a lyre. If he had to touch the strings, the boast would immediately become laughable, and everything would easily be exposed.
Why then am I considered by your uncle to be what I am not by nature? You often said something to him, adorning me by the law of friendship; but he did not look at your affection. Thinking the words came from deeds, he demands that I become the kind of man you remade me in words. Now I am paying the penalty for your falsehood and exposing your words, since I cannot become a teacher of virtue. Yet since this letter is to you, go on admiring me again, so that you do not expose yourself as having lied.
AI-assisted translation - This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek below for scholarly use.