B.C. 46, ÆT. 60 the name of my extreme affection for you and your no less strong one for me, to preserve yourself alive for us, for your mother, your wife, and all near and dear to you, to whom you have ever been the object of the deepest affection. Consult for the safety of yourself and of those who hang upon you. The lessons gathered from the wisest of philosophers, and grasped and remembered by you from your youth up with such brilliant success—all these put in practice at this crisis. Sorrow for those you have lost[1]—so closely connected with you by the warmest affection and the most constant kindness—bear, if not without pain, yet at least with courage. What I can do I know not, or rather I feel how helpless I am; but this, nevertheless, I do promise: whatever I shall conceive to conduce to your safety and honour, I will do with the same zeal, as you have ever shewn and practically employed in what concerned my fortunes. I have conveyed this expression of my warm feelings for you to your mother,[2] the noblest of women and the most devoted of mothers. Whatever you write to me I will do, as far as I shall understand your wishes. But even if you fail to write, I shall yet with the utmost zeal and care do what I shall think to be for your interest. Good-bye.
CCCCLXIV (F IX, 4)
TO M. TERENTIUS VARRO (? AT CUMÆ)
Tusculum (June)
About things "possible," let me tell you my opinion agrees
with Diodorus. Wherefore, if you are to come, be assured
that your coming is "necessary," but if you are not, then it
is "impossible" that you should come. Now see which
