1.
I have preferred to reply to your last letter, not because I undervalued your earlier questions, or enjoyed them less, but because in answering you I undertake a greater task than you think. For although you enjoined me to send you a superlatively long 1 letter, I have not so much leisure as you imagine, and as you know I have always wished to have, and do still wish. Ask not why it is so: for I could more easily enumerate the things by which I am hindered, than explain why I am hindered by them.
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The phrase used by Nebridius had been "longior quam longissima," which Augustin here quotes, and afterwards playfully alludes to in sec. 3. ↩
