§12.38A.1quod putas oportere pervideri iam animi mei firmitatem graviusque quosdam scribis de me loqui quam aut te scribere aut Brutum, si qui me fractum esse animo et debilitatum putant sciant quid litterarum et cuius generis conficiam, credo, si modo homines sint, existiment me, sive ita levatus sim ut animum vacuum ad res difficilis scribendas adferam, reprehendendum non esse, sive hanc aberrationem a dolore delegerim quae maxime liberalis sit doctoque homine dignissima, laudari me etiam oportere.
As for your thinking that the strength of my mind ought to be clearly seen by now, and your writing that certain people speak of me more severely than either you or Brutus write, if those who think that I am broken in spirit and weakened should know what kind of writing and of what quantity I am producing, I believe they would judge—if only they are human—that either, if I am so far relieved that I bring a mind free of care to the writing of difficult matters, I should not be blamed, or, if I have chosen this distraction from pain which is most gentlemanly and highly worthy of a learned man, I ought even to be praised.
§12.38A.2sed cum ego faciam omnia quae facere possim ad me adlevandum, tu effice id quod video te non minus quam me laborare.
But while I am doing everything I can to relieve myself, you, bring about that which I see you are striving for no less than I am.
hoc mihi debere videor neque levari posse nisi solvero aut videro me posse solvere, id est locum qualem volo invenero.
I seem to owe this to myself, and I cannot be relieved unless I pay it or see that I can pay it, that is, unless I find such a place as I want.
heredes Scapulae si istos hortos, ut scribis tibi Othonem dixisse, partibus quattuor factis liceri cogitant, nihil est scilicet emptori loci; sin venibunt, quid fieri possit videbimus.
If the heirs of Scapula think of bidding for those gardens after dividing them into four parts, as you write that Otho told you, there is of course no room for a buyer; but if they are sold as a whole, we shall see what can be done.
nam ille locus Publicianus qui est Treboni et Cusini erat ad me adlatus.
For that Publician property, which belongs to Trebonius and Cusinius, had been proposed to me.
sed scis aream esse.
But you know it is just a vacant plot.
nullo pacto probo.
I do not approve of it at all.
Clodiae sane placent sed non puto esse venalis.
Clodia's gardens indeed please me, but I do not think they are for sale.
de Drusi hortis, quamvis ab iis abhorreas, ut scribis, tamen eo confugiam nisi quid inveneris.
As for Drusus' gardens, although you shrink from them, as you write, yet I shall have recourse to them unless you find something else.
aedificatio me non movet.
The building does not affect me.
nihil enim aliud aedificabo nisi id quod etiam si illos non habuero.
For I shall build nothing else than what I would build even if I did not have them.
Κῦρος δ', ε' mihi sic placuit ut cetera Antisthenis, hominis acuti magis quam eruditi.
Antisthenes' Κῦρος δ', ε' pleased me, just like the other works of that man, who is more acute than learned.