Epistulae

thoughts of him! If I were to speak like myself, you, who contrived these snares for me, were far more deserving of my disdain. You write for leave to visit me in my present illness. You are far from me; and yet, distant as you are, you wound deeply. I wondered with myself how you came to be named Acontius; but find now that you can dart wounds from far. It is certain that I have not yet recovered from this wound, pierced from far by your letter, as by a javelin. But to what end should you come here? To see my feeble body, the double trophy of your ingenuity? I am wasted to a skeleton, my color is become pale, such as I remember to have observed in the apple you threw at me. My fair cheeks are no more adorned with a becoming red, but have rather the appearance of newly-polished marble; or silver at a feast, when deadened by the chillness of water. Were you to see me now, you would deny me to be the same with her you first saw, nor think me worthy to be sought by so