Letter 3017: I have good grounds for complaint: you were raised to the honor of a pontificate and gave me no sign of our shared joy.

I have plausible grounds for remonstrating with you, since, when you were exalted with the honor of a literary [or: priestly] office, you gave me no token of our shared rejoicing. But I do not wish to steep this first letter of mine with the gall of reproach, lest the bitterness of such words should make your spirit shrink back. Therefore I withdraw from my complaints, and on these terms I grant you this pardon: that for the future you hold the diligence of friendship as a matter of due account. Let there be between us a frequent exchange of honorable service; let there be unremitting alternations of familiar correspondence. For indeed a silent concord is the very likeness of [...]. For this reason either nature or human industry has skillfully brought letters into being, so that affection might never be mute, and that, whenever we are apart, written signs of words might perform the office of the tongue. For the present these things have been said in sufficient measure; I wish that hereafter occasion may be given me for replying by the favor of your gift, and not by the vexation of disdain. [About 379 AD.]