M. CORNELIUS FRONTO
everything good, which you write you have prayed of the Gods for me on this my birthday, above all others a red-letter day for you—all these good things are in your keeping and your brother's, O Antoninus, sweetest joy of my heart: whom, since I have known you and given myself up to you, I have ever held sweeter than all things, and will so hold you, although I live again other years as many as I have lived. This one thing, therefore, let all of us with joint prayers ask of the Gods, that you may both pass long lives in health and vigour, exercising your power to the advantage of the state and of your own households. Nor is there aught else I could wish so much to obtain either from the Gods or from Fairy Fortune or from yourselves, as that it may be my lot as long as possible to enjoy your presence, your converse, and your delightful letters; and to that end I am ready, if it were possible, to be a boy again.
2. Otherwise, as far as everything else is concerned, I have had my fill of life. I see you, Antoninus, as excellent an Emperor as I hoped; as just, as blameless as I guaranteed; as dear and as welcome[1] to the Roman People as I desired; fond of me to the height of my wishes, and eloquent to the height of your own. For now that you once begin to feel the wish again, to have lost the wish for a time proves to have been no set-back.[2] Indeed I see both of you becoming more eloquent
- ↑ So Melito in his Apology (Eus. H.E. iv. 26, § 7) calls him εὐκταῖος.
- ↑ About the year 146 Marcus devoted himself more exclusively to philosophy and neglected rhetoric (see Ad Mar. iv. 13, i. p. 216). Later he eschewed it entirely; see Thoughts, i. 7; i. 17, § 4. But there was rhetoric in his writings, and Dio, lxxi. 35, § 1, says he was "practised in rhetoric."
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