Letter 8007: It was not as one master to another, nor as one pupil to another, that you sent me your book - though you say it was...
L To Tacitus.
It was not as one master to another, nor as one pupil to another, that you sent me your book - though you say it was the latter - but it was as a master to his pupil, for you are the master and I am the pupil, and whereas you summon me back to school, I am for extending the holidays. There, could I possibly have written a more involved sentence than that? * Does it not absolutely prove that, so far from being worthy to be called your master, I do not deserve to be even called your pupil? None the less, I will put on the master's gown, and I will exercise the right of correcting your book which you have granted me, and will do so all the more freely because, in the meanwhile, I shall not send you any book of mine upon which you may take your revenge. Farewell.
(*) Literally, "could I have stretched hyperbaton further ...".
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.
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