--- title: "Letters · Epistulae" author: "Augustine" translator: "James Houston Baxter" languages: [la, en] shelf: "Church Fathers" section: 37 of 62 url: https://scriptura.si/works/augustine-letters/37/ cite: "Augustine, tr. James Houston Baxter, Letters · Epistulae, section 37. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/augustine-letters/37/" --- # Letters · Epistulae *Augustine, tr. James Houston Baxter* Augustine’s letters in Latin beside English. > Latin: ed. James Houston Baxter, from the Perseus Digital Library (canonical-latinLit, stoa0040.stoa011, CC BY-SA 4.0). > English: James Houston Baxter, from the Perseus Digital Library (stoa0040.stoa011.perseus-eng1). Notes are not included. > Rows follow the references the two texts share (books, chapters and sections), cut where both reach the end of a sentence. ## 37. Letter 37 Source: https://scriptura.si/works/augustine-letters/37/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/augustine-letters/37/#p-N [¶0] 1. You have filled my heart with joy, the more delightful because of your affection, and the more welcome because of your promptitude. For while the consecration of a daughter of your house to the life of virginity is being proclaimed by busy rumour wherever your fame is known, and that is everywhere, you outstripped its speediest flight by the surer and more trustworthy information in your letter and made us exult at the news of so very excellent a blessing before we had time to doubt the rumour of it. What words are adequate to tell, what commendation worthy to commemorate, how incomparably greater is the glory and the gain, that Christ should have women from your family dedicated to virginity than that the world should have men from it elevated to the consulship? For if it is a great and notable thing to leave the mark of an honoured name upon the scrolls of time, how much greater and more notable it is by unsullied innocence of mind and body to rise above them! So let this maiden, noble in her race, nobler in her holiness, find more cause for joy that she is destined to obtain through this divine espousal an especial distinction in heaven than if she had been destined to become through an earthly marriage the mother of a distinguished line. It was a more noble-minded thing for a scion of the Anicii a to prefer to magnify that illustrious family by repudiating marriage rather than to increase it by bearing children and now in the flesh to imitate the life of the angels rather than from the flesh still further to augment the number of mortals. It is a richer and more prolific happiness not to grow big with child but to grow great in mind, not to have milk in the breasts but to have purity in the heart, to bring forth not the earthly through travail, but the heavenly through prayer. May it be yours, ladies most worthy of honour and daughters deservedly famous and most distinguished, to enjoy in her what you surrendered to give her birth! May she be steadfast unto the end, cleaving to that union which has no end! May many low-born maids imitate her, the highborn mistress, and those whose eminence is perishable follow her who through humility has reached a higher eminence; may the virgins who covet the splendour of the Anician family choose to emulate its holiness! The one will always elude their grasp, however much they long for it; the other will soon be theirs, if their longing be whole-hearted. May the right hand of the Most High be your covering unto safety and fuller happiness, ladies most worthy of honour and daughters most distinguished! In the love of the Lord and with the respect due to your deservings, we greet the children of your holy house, especially her who is outstanding in holiness. We have been very glad to receive the gift a commemorating her taking the veil. > Latin: 1. Implestis gaudio cor nostrum tanto iucundius quanto carius, tanto gratius quanto citius. Vestrae namque stirpis sanctimoniam virginalem quoniam quacumque innotuistis, ac per hoc ubique, fama celeberrima praedicat, velocissimum volatum eius fideliore atque certiore litterarum nuntio praevenistis et prius nos fecistis exultare de cognito tam excellentissimo bono quam dubitare de audito. Quis verbis explicet, quis digno praeconio prosequatur, quantum incomparabiliter gloriosius atque fructuosius habeat ex vestro sanguine feminas virgines Christus quam viros consules mundus? Nam volumina temporum si magnum atque praeclarum est nominis dignitate signare, quanto est maius atque praeclarius cordis et corporis integritate transcendere! Magis itaque gaudeat puella nobilis genere, nobilior sanctitate, quod sit per divinum consortium praecipuam in caelis consecutum sublimitatem, quam si esset per humanum conubium prolem propagatura sublimem. Generosius quippe elegit Aniciana posteritas tam inlustrem familiam beare nuptias nesciendo quam multiplicare pariendo et in carne iam imitari vitam angelorum quam ex carne numerum adhuc augere mortalium. Haec est uberior fecundiorque felicitas non ventre gravescere sed mente grandescere, non lactescere pectore sed corde candescere, non visceribus terram sed caelum orationibus parturire. Dominarum honore dignissimae et merito inlustres et praestantissimae filiae, perfruamini in illa quod defuit vobis, ut nasceretur ex vobis; perseveret usque in finem, adhaerens coniugio quod non habet finem. Imitentur eam multae famulae dominam ignobiles nobilem, fragiliter excelsae excelsius humilem; virgines quae sibi optant Aniciorum claritatem, eligant sanctitatem. Illud enim quanta libet cupiditate quando adsequentur? Hoc autem, si plene cupierint, mox habebunt. Protegat vos incolumes et feliciores dextera altissimi, dominae honore dignissimae et praestantissimae filiae. Pignera sanctitatis vestrae, praecipue ipsam sanctitate praecipuam debito vestris meritis officio dilectione domini salutamus. Velationis apophoretum gratissime accepimus.