Letter 7041: It is a glorious petition that seeks a dispensation from youth -- when one professes to receive from character the...
Cassiodorus→Unknown|c. 522 AD|Cassiodorus
imperial politics
From: Cassiodorus (formula template)
To: [Minor petitioning for venia aetatis -- legal majority before the standard age]
Date: ~522 AD
Context: Template granting early legal majority to a young person, allowing them to conduct binding legal transactions.
It is a glorious petition that seeks a dispensation from youth -- when one professes to receive from character the gravity that the maturity of years has not yet brought. Young in birth, you wish to be old in judgment. What is the most audacious thing in human affairs -- you disdain the benefit of your youth as an excuse for error. In your petition, you state that since your judgment is sound, your actions should not be left uncertain, lest what cannot waver in practical effect be invalidated in law. We gladly accept this, because those who wish to bind themselves to free contracts proclaim that they intend no deception.
Therefore, if the age at which the laws permit access to this dispensation has indeed passed, we too do not deny permission to your commendable wishes. Let the proceedings required by ancient law in such cases be duly carried out in the appropriate court, though the authority for alienating rural and urban properties must remain subject to existing constitutional provisions -- lest in trying to enhance reputation we harm the petitioner's interests. Take therefore by our benefit an age more potent than your years, and demonstrate by your conduct what you have promised from the bench. For the profession of premature maturity leaves no room for excuse when the fault is far graver that assaults the authority of one's own promise.
XLI.
FORMULA AETATIS VENIAE.
[1] Gloriosa est supplicatio, quae veniam quaerit aetatis: quando se gravitatem de moribus profitetur accipere, quam maturitatem vitae adhuc non contingit intulisse. minor nascendo grandaevus cupis esse consilio. ita quod in humanis rebus audacissimum est, ad erroris auxilium beneficium contemnis annorum. quapropter oblata supplicatione depromis, ut, cum tibi sit ratio firma prudentiae, actiones tuae non relinquantur ambiguae, ne infirmetur iure quod non potest utilitate titubare. hoc nos, quibus cordi est bona desideria perficere, libenter accipimus, quia nullas se captare velle profitetur insidias, quisquis habere liberos contractus constanter affectat. [2] Atque ideo, si id tempus constat elapsum, quo ad hanc veniam accedi iura voluerunt, nos quoque probabilibus desideriis licentiam non negamus, ut in competenti foro ea quae in his causis reverenda legum dictat antiquitas, sollemniter actitentur, ita ut alienandis rusticis vel urbanis praediis constitutionum servetur auctoritas: ne cum opinioni praestare volumus, utilitatem supplicis laedere videamur. cape igitur nostro beneficio potiorem annis aetatem et quod petis ab oraculo, moribus exhibeto. nam professio maturitatis acerbae locum denegat actionis, quando multo gravior est culpa, quam suae promissionis impugnat auctoritas.
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From:Cassiodorus (formula template)
To:[Minor petitioning for venia aetatis -- legal majority before the standard age]
Date:~522 AD
Context:Template granting early legal majority to a young person, allowing them to conduct binding legal transactions.
It is a glorious petition that seeks a dispensation from youth -- when one professes to receive from character the gravity that the maturity of years has not yet brought. Young in birth, you wish to be old in judgment. What is the most audacious thing in human affairs -- you disdain the benefit of your youth as an excuse for error. In your petition, you state that since your judgment is sound, your actions should not be left uncertain, lest what cannot waver in practical effect be invalidated in law. We gladly accept this, because those who wish to bind themselves to free contracts proclaim that they intend no deception.
Therefore, if the age at which the laws permit access to this dispensation has indeed passed, we too do not deny permission to your commendable wishes. Let the proceedings required by ancient law in such cases be duly carried out in the appropriate court, though the authority for alienating rural and urban properties must remain subject to existing constitutional provisions -- lest in trying to enhance reputation we harm the petitioner's interests. Take therefore by our benefit an age more potent than your years, and demonstrate by your conduct what you have promised from the bench. For the profession of premature maturity leaves no room for excuse when the fault is far graver that assaults the authority of one's own promise.
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.