1Your letter, in which you pressed me to send you something of my writings, was delivered most opportunely, since I had already intended to do that very thing. 1So you have spurred a willing horse, and have removed both your own excuse for declining the labour and my diffidence in asking it of you. 2For it is neither fitting for me to make timid use of what has been offered, nor for you to make difficulties about what you have demanded. 2There is no reason, however, for you to expect any new work from an idle man. 2For I am going to ask you to give your time once more to the speech I delivered before my fellow townsmen when I was about to dedicate a library.
3I remember, indeed, that you have already made some notes, but in general terms; 3so I now ask you not only to attend to it as a whole, but also to go through its smaller parts with your file, as you usually do. 3For even after correction I shall be free either to publish it or to keep it back. 4Indeed, perhaps the process of correction will itself bring this hesitation of mine down on one side or the other, since by going over it repeatedly it will either find it unworthy of publication or, by that very testing, make it worthy. 5And yet the reasons for my hesitation lie not so much in the writing as in the very nature of the subject: it is, as it were, a little too boastful and lofty.
5This will burden my modesty, even if the style itself is restrained and subdued, because I am compelled to speak both of the generosity of my forebears and of my own. 6This is a dangerous and slippery place, even when necessity pleads in its favour. 6For if even praise of others is usually received with less than fair ears, how difficult it is to ensure that the speech of a man discoursing on himself or his family does not seem tiresome! 6For we grudge virtue itself, and still more its glory and the proclaiming of it, and we are least inclined to distort and carp at those good deeds which are laid away in obscurity and silence.
7For this reason I often ask myself whether I ought to have composed this, whatever it is, for myself only, or for others as well. 7That it was for myself, I am reminded by the fact that most things which are necessary for carrying out an undertaking retain neither the same usefulness nor the same favour once it is done. 8And, not to seek examples further afield, what was more useful than to follow up the reasoning of my generosity with the pen as well? 8For by this I achieved, first, that I dwelt on honourable thoughts, next, that I perceived their beauty by longer handling, and lastly, that I guarded against the regret that accompanies sudden lavishness.
8From these arose a kind of training in despising money. 9For although nature has bound all men to guard it, the love of liberality, long and much weighed, released me, by contrast, from the common chains of avarice, and my generosity seemed likely to be all the more praiseworthy because I was drawn to it not by some impulse but by deliberation. 10There was added to these reasons the fact that I was promising not games or gladiators but an annual sum for the maintenance of freeborn children. 10Pleasures of the eyes and ears, moreover, are so far from needing recommendation that they ought not so much to be encouraged by a speech as restrained; 11but to get someone to take on willingly the tedium and toil of bringing up children, one must use not only rewards but also carefully chosen exhortations.
12For if doctors accompany wholesome but unpleasant food with coaxing words, how much more was it fitting for one who was looking after the public good to introduce a most useful but not equally popular gift with courteous speech? 12especially as I had to strive to ensure that what was given to parents should be approved by the childless too, and that the rest should patiently both wait for and deserve the privilege of a few. 13But just as then I was more concerned with the common good than with private display, when I wanted the purpose and effect of my gift to be understood, so now, in the matter of publishing, I fear that I may perhaps seem to have served not the benefit of others but my own praise.
14Besides, I remember how much nobler it is to lay up the reward of virtue in one's conscience than in one's reputation. 14For glory ought to follow, not to be sought, and if by some chance it does not follow, what deserved glory is no less fine for that. 15But those who adorn their good deeds with words are believed not to proclaim them because they did them, but to have done them in order to proclaim them. 15So what would have been magnificent if another reported it vanishes when it is recounted by the man who did it; 15for when men cannot destroy a deed, they attack the boasting of it.
15Thus if you have done things that should be kept quiet, the deed itself is blamed; if you do not keep quiet about things that deserve praise, you yourself are blamed. 16But in my case a particular reason stands in the way. 16For I delivered this very speech not before the people but before the town council, and not in the open but in the council-house. 17I fear, then, that it may be hardly consistent, when in speaking I avoided the approval and applause of the crowd, now to pursue those same things by publication, and when I separated the very common people whose interests were being looked after by the threshold and walls of the council-house, so as not to fall into any appearance of courting favour, now to seek out by a kind of forward display even those to whom nothing from my gift belongs except the example.
18You have the reasons for my hesitation; 18I shall nevertheless follow your advice, whose authority will be reason enough for me. 18Farewell.