'Linacrum tuum, virum apprime doctum, vt arbitror, hie allocutus sum non semel, cum inuicem viseremus ego et ipse. Visus est mihi vir bonus, benignusque ac nihil fastus pre se ferens. Ei exemplar vnum De Asse misi, quoniam sub eius discessum liber ab officina exiit. Is mihi inter loquendum dixerat aliqua eorum quae explicuisse me plane confido, illustrari hae aetate non posse, et ego me id facturum receperam, quod ille admirabatur.
...
Liber tamen propediem imprimetur et plenior et emendatior. Tunc enim in manibus habebam, eum haec ad te scriberem. Vt autem opto te legisse, ita a te hoc petere non ausim, ne improbus aut importunus esse dicar, si hoc commiserim vt ἀπὸ τῶν σπουδαίων τε καὶ ἱερῶν te auocare ad meas nugas videar incommodo reipublicae. Sed scitum illud quod mihi persuadere conaris. Primum, inquis, videor tua legisse eximiasque ingenii tui dotes agnoscere. Ego vt credam te nostra legisse? nisi si quis amicorum tuorum in mentionem libri inter fabulandum incidit et tibi ἀναγνώστης fuit.'
(Allen et al. 1906-1958, vol. 2, pp. 272-6, letter 435)
['Your friend Linacre - a most learned man, I think - I have spoken with here more than once, when he and I were exchanging visits. He seemed to me a man of high character, kindly, and devoid of all self-importance. I sent him a copy of my De Asse, since it came from the press about the time he left. He had said to me in the course of conversation that it was impossible in our generation to throw light on certain problems, which I am quite confident of having cleared up, and I had undertaken to do so, which surprised him.
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But the book will shortly be reprinted with additions and corrections; for I have it in my hands at this moment that I am writing to you. But, although I wish you to have read it, I would not dare ask you to do so, for fear of being called selfish or importunate, if I behave in such a way as to summon you from serious or sacred things to attend to my own worthless work, to the public detriment. But this is a pretty thing that you try to persuade me to believe. "First I let it be seen," you say, "that I have read your work and recognise your outstanding intellectual gifts." I am to believe that you have read my work? - maybe one of your friends happened to mention the book in conversation, and read it aloud to you.']
(translation from Mynors - Thomson - McConica 1976, pp. 328-333, letter 435)
