Humanitext Reader

Cicero · Letters to Friends §6.16.1

Trust in Personal Friendship and Request for Protection

Passage 116 of 413 · Latin

Summary

Cicero declares that his private friendship with the recipient is strong enough not to require tracing it back to their parents, and requests support during his absence based on this mutual trust.

§6.16.1si mihi tecum non et multae et iustae causae amicitiae privatim essent, repeterem initia amicitiae ex parentibus nostris, quod faciendum iis existimo qui paternam amicitiam nullis ipsi officiis prosecuti sunt.
If there were not many and just grounds of friendship between you and me privately, I would trace back the origins of our friendship from our parents, which I think should be done by those who have not themselves followed up their paternal friendship with any services of their own.
itaque contentus ero nostra ipsorum amicitia.
Therefore, I shall be content with our own friendship.
cuius fiducia peto a te, ut absentem me, quibuscumque in rebus opus fuerit, tueare, si nullum officium tuum apud me intermoriturum existimas.
Relying on this, I beg of you to protect me in my absence, in whatever matters there shall be need, if you believe that no service of yours will ever die out in my memory.
vale.
Farewell.

Notes

  1. §6.16.1si ... essent, repeterem — A present contrary-to-fact conditional sentence, using the imperfect subjunctive (essent and repeterem), expressing 'if it were not the case..., I would...'.
  2. §6.16.1quod — A relative pronoun in the neuter accusative singular, referring back to the action of the preceding clause (tracing back the friendship to the parents), serving as the subject of the infinitive clause with the gerundive faciendum [esse].
  3. §6.16.1tueare — The second-person singular present subjunctive of the deponent verb tueor (using the alternative ending -re instead of -ris), functioning as the verb of the indirect command introduced by peto a te ut.
  4. §6.16.1intermoriturum — The future participle (accusative masculine singular) of the deponent verb intermorior, forming a future infinitive with esse omitted. It functions in the accusative-and-infinitive construction dependent on existimas, with nullum officium tuum as its subject.

Cite this passage

Cicero, Letters to Friends §6.16.1. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi0474.phi056.humanitext-lat1:6.16.1

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