Letter 12002: SENATOR, PRAETORIAN PREFECT, TO ALL PROVINCIAL JUDGES

SENATOR, PRAETORIAN PREFECT, TO ALL PROVINCIAL JUDGES [1] I give thanks to the Almighty that the provincials have done what I recommended and that I have fulfilled all that I promised. For no one has found me tainted by any venality, and I have not had to endure unwilling taxpayers. We have, on both sides, cause to value one another: they found judges who cared for them; we gained heralds of the most exemplary integrity. Let us therefore, with God's help, continue as we have begun. Let the landowner gladly bring me the public revenues; I will pay him his assessed tax in the public sessions of justice. [2] What has been done in good faith is fittingly rehearsed again, when great hope for the future is given from past deeds. You have demonstrated that we compelled no one to give what he would not have been bound to offer. No one was afflicted by losses, public or private, through my agency. We have caused the terrors of the tax inspectors to be unknown. We sought no extraordinary levies, since we desired everything to proceed according to law. But let you not be otherwise in this regard. The laws wished provincial governors to be imitators of our own dignity, to whom they have assigned a jurisdiction nearly equal to our own in the provinces. [3] Justice that is to be followed rejects no one; it ennobles all whom it elevates by sharing in itself; only the man who departs from it diminishes himself. Why should we pursue the desire to receive? The man called wealthy acquires no glory; by contrast, the man declared just is adorned with every praise. Let us rather desire what makes us more precious than the rich. We take up the fasces so that we may be men of gravity; we mount the tribunal so that we may be raised by the steps of character. [4] Nothing base, nothing grasping befits judges. For those in whom many place their trust render their own faults conspicuous if they are stained by any reproach. Otherwise it is better not to be seen at all than to be branded by the mockery of all. Let all of us, then, who seek the heights of the bench, abandon the low places of vice. Let our brow be free, so that we may be able to correct the sins of others. Every crime taints equally those it corrupts, and therefore the judge must be unlike the accused. It is fitting that we speak these things in our annual address, for there can be no surfeit of good things. I confess the eagerness of my desire: I wish to be praised alongside you. [5] Let us come now to the customary matter, which ought to be received with good will because it is known to be an established obligation. Therefore — and may this be said under good auspices — we order you and your staff to admonish the landowner, with God's assistance, to pay the taxes of the thirteenth indiction with a willing spirit, so that by observing the regulation of a threefold payment he may fulfill his due obligation to the state. Let the established times for collection be maintained, yet in such a way that no one groans that he has been collected from under the compulsion of premature coercion, nor, on the other side, let a damaging liberality of delays be granted through disgraceful venality. For delay in the payment of tax becomes the cause of greater loss when that which cannot be avoided by any postponement is fruitlessly suspended. [6] You will also hasten to send to our offices, in the accustomed manner, a faithful account of expenditures compiled over four months, so that the darkness of every error being dispelled, the clarity of public accounting may be evident. For if you do otherwise, the losses that are inflicted on the public interest through your negligence will fall upon yourself. And so that you may the more easily accomplish what has been established, with God's help, we customarily order those and those soldiers of our court to attend upon you and your office, so that our arrangement may receive its effect without reproach. Take care, therefore, not to fall short of our admonitions, for it is a matter of deep disgrace when we require praiseworthy conduct from someone and find instead that it must be corrected.

II. UNIVERSIS IUDICIBUS PROVINCIARUM SENATOR PPO. [1] Gratias divinitati refero, quia et provinciales fecerunt quae monui et ego complevi omnia quae promisi. nam nec me sensit quisquam aliqua venalitate pollutum nec ego pertuli tributarios indevotos. habemus utrimque quod in nobis diligere debeamus: illi repererunt affectuosos iudices, nos adquisivimus integerrimos praecones. agamus itaque deo praestante quod coepimus. possessor mihi publicas pecunias libens inferat: ego illi in conventu iustitiae tributa persolvam. [2] Vobis autem commode repetitur, quod veraciter actum esse sentitur, quando de rebus praeteritis spes magna redditur in futuris. probastis enim, quia nullum coegimus dare quod non debuisset offerre. non publicis, non privatis a me quisquam damnis afflictus est. discussorum terrores fecimus ignorari. nec extraordinaria quaesivimus, qui cuncta geri legibus optabamus. sed nec vos sitis in ea parte dissimiles. praesules imitatores esse dignitatis nostrae iura voluerunt, quibus paene eandem quam nobis iurisdictionem per provincias contulerunt. [3] Nullum repudiat sequenda iustitia: omnes clarificat, quos sui participatione sublimat: minorem se ille solus facit, qui ab ipsa discesserit. cur accipiendi vota sectemur? nullam gloriam recipit qui dives vocatur: contra omni laude decoratur qui iustus edicitur. desideremus potius quod nos pretiosiores locupletibus facit. fasces accipimus, ut graves esse debeamus: tribunalia conscendimus, ut morum gradibus evehamur. [4] Nil vile, nil cupidum iudices decet. claras enim suas maculas reddunt, si illi ad quos multi respiciunt aliqua reprehensione sordescunt. alioquin expedit non videri quam cunctorum irrisione signari. omnes ergo, qui gremiorum celsa petimus, vitiorum humilia deseramus. sit in nobis frons libera, ut aliorum possimus emendare peccata. aequat crimen omne quos inquinat et ideo dissimilis ab accusato debet esse qui iudicat. haec nos annuo sermone convenit loqui, quia bonarum rerum nulla satietas est. fateor aviditatem desiderii mei: cupio me vobiscum velle praedicari. [5] Veniamus nunc ad consueta: quae ideo debent suscipi grata, quia probantur esse sollemnia. quapropter, quod feliciter dictum sit, te officiumque tuum cum dei iuvamine possessorem praecipimus ammonere, ut tributa indictionis tertiae decimae devota mente persolvat, quatenus trinae illationis moderamine custodito debitam rei publicae inferat functionem. tempora exactionum statuta serventur, ita tamen, ut nullus sub immaturae compulsionis iniuria se ingemiscat exactum nec iterum sub turpi venalitate indutiarum largitas damnosa praebeatur. dilatio enim tributi maioris fit causa dispendii, quando irrite suspenditur quod nullis protractionibus evitatur. [6] Expensarum quoque fidelem notitiam quaternis mensibus comprehensam consuetudine custodita ad scrinia nostra dirigere maturabis, ut totius erroris detersa caligine publici ratiocinii possit claritas apparere. nam si aliter facias, te damna respiciunt, quae per neglectum tuum publicis utilitatibus ingeruntur. et ut facilius possis deo auxiliante quae sunt statuta perficere, illum atque illum sedis nostrae milites tibi officioque tuo consuetudinarie praecipimus imminere, quatinus ordinatio nostra inculpabiliter sortiatur effectum. cave ergo, ne te imparem praestes nostris ammonitis, quia nimis foedum est ut a quo laudanda reposcimus, resecanda potius approbemus.