Letter 6062: Your first letter, quickly followed by a second, had given me some hope of your return.

Your earlier letter, which others soon followed, had given me some measure of hope for your return; the second one emptied out the promise, so that, after many grounds for refusal, you committed it to me to follow my own counsel. But I, considering first my daughter's disturbed health, which cannot be deprived of the comfort of your presence; then the weakness of your stomach, which you write is unequal to undertaking the journey; next the counsel of your father's friend, who likewise gives precedence to leisure; then the awaited arrival of an illustrious gentleman, whom you reckon will be absent for a long while; and besides these the interpretations of people who, as you say, supposed you to have taken up a public office as an occasion for your own business affairs, refer the deliberation entrusted to me back to you. For it is unfair that my opinion should be made liable to so many opposing questions, and that the good faith of one who advises should be bound by the uncertain accidents of what is to come. In the meanwhile I judge that the day for settling the matter ought to be postponed, and I have refrained from delivering your letter to the magistrate for the time being: first, because it is bare of reverence; next, because it set down the grounds for refusal beneath what devotion requires [...]; and because I knew that what you had written ought to be read by several people. I wish, therefore, that with fuller reverence and weightier representations you should fortify your excuse, if the will remains to beg off from the labor and the journey. Farewell.