Erasmus expresses profound emotional turmoil and joy upon receiving Servatius' letter, describing how it moved him to tears of both sorrow and happiness. He pleads with Servatius not to cause him further emotional distress, insisting that true friendship requires honesty and openness rather than concealment. The letter reveals Erasmus' deep emotional vulnerability and his intense desire for authentic, transparent friendship.
Though, my dearest Servatius, your letter was such that I could scarcely read it without many tears, yet it not only did not drive away the grief of my spirit, which had already miserably consumed me, but it even affected me with incredible and unhoped-for pleasure. But how do joys mingle with tears? For while reading your sweetest letter—that not ineffective witness of your most longed-for love for me—I was both weeping for joy and, equally, rejoicing through my tears. But before, whole days had been spent weeping with tears of sorrow; then, however, that abundant moisture with which I drenched your letter flowed not from pain in my breast, but from incredible love for you. For believe me, love too has its tears; it also has its joys. And indeed, my Servatius, who is so stony-hearted that such a letter from you would not compel him to weep? What great sweetness of words is in it, what grace of thought, what does it not smell of, if not affection, if not exceptional love? As often as I read it (for I read it almost every hour), I seem to hear the sweet voice of my Servatius, to behold his most friendly countenance. And when, however, it is not at all permitted for us to converse face-to-face, that letter is my comfort; it brings me, though absent, back to you, it joins me to my absent Servatius, so that that most fitting line from Virgil applies to me: "Absent, he hears and sees the absent one." And so you have rendered me richer and even more blessed by your letters than Alexander the Great by the number of his triumphs or Croesus by his own riches. But I beg you, half of my soul, by my love for you, which is not ordinary, do not cast me back again into the abyss of sorrows. Believe me, I bear your anger so grievously that if I were to perceive it again, you would have slain me instantly. Spare, I pray, one who loves you; you are not ignorant of my character, you do not know not my nature. I am of too tender a spirit to be able to endure such cruel games so many times; and even, if I must speak more plainly, it is not the duty of one who loves to wound the lover, not even in jest. But if, as you write, I offended you first by saying that you pretend and dissemble, consider, I pray, my Servatius, if that is so harsh and bitter for you to hear, how much more bitter it is for me to endure it daily from you. And what is so far from true friendship as to hide anything from a friend, especially something it concerns him to know? Now to deny, now to assert, and repeatedly to turn the conversation—I beg you, is that not to pretend and dissemble? Come now, come, treat me as you please, only I pray you, do not mock a man most devoted to you with these arts. However the matter stands, tell me plainly; for to a modest spirit, I know not if anything is more vexing. But if in this one matter I cannot prevail upon you, and, as in Virgil, "Tears fall in vain for the wretched man," I pray for death; it wearies me to gaze upon the vault of heaven. Farewell, my hope, my only comfort in life. Bring it about, I beg, that your letter come to us as soon as possible.