Letter 3034: My brothers Dorotheus and Septimius, praiseworthy men, carried a single letter from you.

My brothers Dorotheus and Septimius, praiseworthy men, delivered a single letter from you. But I made it a matter of conscience to seize upon a short-cut of this kind, so that a doubled discharge of duty might answer you in return, and that to each man the honor of the testimony owed him might accrue. For although our brother Dorotheus has been proved to you, I nevertheless desire that the prerogative of my own recommendation may commend him in a still greater degree -- which I do not doubt will come to pass, since the affection of a well-disposed mind is capable of increase, as often as it is called forth by merits. Symmachus to Ambrose. Although I suppose that my earlier letter, in which I asked that you vindicate my brother Marcianus from the injuries done him, has been delivered into your hands, I nevertheless ought not to refrain even from a second petition, so that a doubled entreaty may attest the hard necessity of an excellent man entangled in the ill-will of a tyrannical time [the usurpation of Eugenius]. Wherefore again I exhort you to the defense of a friend, whose slender means, arising from his integrity, do not allow him to pay off the prices of the grain-levies, which the imperial clemency has already remitted for many men named in the records of that same time. The path to obtaining your request will therefore be the easier for you, since the assistance of your own merits is aided by the examples of others. Farewell.

Fratres mei Dorotheus et Septimius laudabiles viri unam tuam epistnlam pertn- lerunt. sed mihi religio fuit istiusmodi captare compendium, ut et tibi geminata officii 30 responderet usura, et singulis honor debiti testimonii proveniret. nam etsi tibi Doro- 2 om, VF 3 praecepi (7^) 4 moris PVF promiBerunt F 6 illad latiua praedicares maUem aequaret ratio V latius om. F 7 de nobis om, VF 8 adfectionem P 9 hac pnri- tate F rependam dlgnum V actenus P J m. 11 uale om. V 12 Tii explicit ad marinianum inc ad ambrosium Py om, VF 14 om, VF 15 salustio VF 17 Buggerentur Schoitus superuacuaneum P 18 nale add. VF 2S om. VM 31 proueniret coff. ex praeueniret P LIBEB m. 8t iheas frater noster probatns est, cnpio tamen, nt enm in maiorem modum indieii mei PVM praerogativa eonciliet, qnod fnturnm esse non ambigo, cnm adfectio boni animi capax sit angmenti, qnotiens meritis provocatur. XXXm a. 395? ^ SYMMACHVS AMBROSIO. Licet arbitrer, superiores litteras meas, qnibns, nt fratrem menm Marciannm ab ininriis vindices, postulavi, in manns tuas esse delatas, abstinere tamen etiam secnnda petitione non debui, ut necessitatem yiri optimi sed invidia tyrannici temporis involnti precatio geminata testetur. quare mrsus te ad amici defensionem exhortor, cuius 10 tenuitas orta ex integritate non patitur, nt annonarum pretia possit exsolvere, quae iam mnltis einsdem temporis indicibus imperialis clementia relaxavit. erit igitur tibi facilior ad impetrandum via, cum meritomm tuomm opitulatio aliorum iuvetur exem- plis. vale. XXXira a. 392—393.