THESSALONICA,15JUNE
BROTHER!Brother!Brother!did you really fear that I had been induced by some angry feeling to send slaves to you without a letter?Or even that I did not wish to see you?I to be angry with you!Is it possible for me to be angry with you?Why,one would think that it was you that brought me low!Your enemies,your unpopularity,that miserably ruined me,and not I that unhappily ruined you!The fact is,the much-praised consulate of mine has deprived me of you,of children,country,fortune;from you Ishould hope it will have taken nothing but myself.Certainly on your side I have experienced nothing but what was honourable and gratifying:on mine you have grief for my fall and fear for your own,regret,mourning,desertion.I not wish to see you?The truth is rather that I was unwilling to be seen by you.For you would not have seen your brother--not the brother you had left,not the brother you knew,not him to whom you had with mutual tears bidden farewell as be followed you on your departure for your province:not a trace even or faint image of him,but rather what Imay call the likeness of a living corpse.And oh that you had sooner seen me or heard of me as a corpse!Oh that I could have left you to survive,not my life merely,but my undiminished rank!
But I call all the gods to witness that the one argument which recalled me from death was,that all declared that to some extent your life depended upon mine.In which matter I made an error and acted culpably.For if I had died,that death itself would have given clear evidence of my fidelity and love to you.As it is,I have allowed you to be deprived of my aid,though I am alive,and with me still living to need the help of others;and my voice,of all others,to fail when dangers threatened my family,which had so often been successfully used in the defence of the merest strangers.
For as to the slaves coming to you without a letter,the real reason (for you see that it was not anger)was a deadness of my faculties,and a seemingly endless deluge of tears and sorrows.How many tears do you suppose these very words have cost me?As many as Iknow they will cost you to read them!Can I ever refrain from thinking of you or ever think of you without tears?For when I miss you,is it only a brother that I miss?Rather it is a brother of almost my own age in the charm of his companionship,a son in his consideration for my wishes,a father in the wisdom of his advice!
What pleasure did I ever have without you,or you without me?
