Letter 7018: You ask me how the money which you have given to our fellow-townsmen for an annual feast may be secured after you...
Pliny the Younger→Caninius Rufus|c. 107 AD|Pliny the Younger|Human translated
property economics
To Caninius.
You ask me how the money which you have given to our fellow-townsmen for an annual feast may be secured after you are dead and gone. It is quite right of you to consult me on such a subject, but it is not easy to give an answer. If you hand over the money in a lump sum to the community, the danger is that it may be squandered, and if you give it in the form of land it will be neglected as all public lands are. For my own part, I can find no more satisfactory plan than that which I followed myself. For instead of paying down the 500,000 sesterces which I had promised as an endowment for the education of free-born boys and girls, I transferred some land of mine, which was worth considerably more, to the State agent and received it back from him, after he had fixed a rent for it, the arrangement being that I should pay 30,000 sesterces a year. By this plan the principal is secured to the community and the interest is also safe, while the land in question will always find a tenant to keep it in good order, as it is worth much more than the rent put upon it. Of course I am aware that the transaction has cost me more than the sum which people think I have given, for the selling price of that fine bit of land has been diminished by the obligation to pay the reserved rent. However, we ought to prefer public interests to private ones, and interests which will go in perpetuity to those which perish with us, and we should give much more careful consideration to our benefactions than to merely growing rich. Farewell.
L To Caninius.
You ask me how the money which you have given to our fellow-townsmen for an annual feast may be secured after you are dead and gone. It is quite right of you to consult me on such a subject, but it is not easy to give an answer. If you hand over the money in a lump sum to the community, the danger is that it may be squandered, and if you give it in the form of land it will be neglected as all public lands are. For my own part, I can find no more satisfactory plan than that which I followed myself. For instead of paying down the 500,000 sesterces which I had promised as an endowment for the education of free-born boys and girls, I transferred some land of mine, which was worth considerably more, to the State agent and received it back from him, after he had fixed a rent for it, the arrangement being that I should pay 30,000 sesterces a year. By this plan the principal is secured to the community and the interest is also safe, while the land in question will always find a tenant to keep it in good order, as it is worth much more than the rent put upon it. Of course I am aware that the transaction has cost me more than the sum which people think I have given, for the selling price of that fine bit of land has been diminished by the obligation to pay the reserved rent. However, we ought to prefer public interests to private ones, and interests which will go in perpetuity to those which perish with us, and we should give much more careful consideration to our benefactions than to merely growing rich. Farewell.
C. PLINIUS CANINIO SUO S.
Deliberas mecum quemadmodum pecunia, quam municipibus nostris in epulum obtulisti, post te quoque salva sit. Honesta consultatio, non expedita sententia. Numeres rei publicae summam: verendum est ne dilabatur. Des agros: ut publici neglegentur. Equidem nihil commodius invenio, quam quod ipse feci. Nam pro quingentis milibus nummum, quae in alimenta ingenuorum ingenuarumque promiseram, agrum ex meis longe pluris actori publico mancipavi; eundem vectigali imposito recepi, tricena milia annua daturus. Per hoc enim et rei publicae sors in tuto nec reditus incertus, et ager ipse propter id quod vectigal large supercurrit, semper dominum a quo exerceatur inveniet. Nec ignoro me plus aliquanto quam donasse videor erogavisse, cum pulcherrimi agri pretium necessitas vectigalis infregerit. Sed oportet privatis utilitatibus publicas, mortalibus aeternas anteferre, multoque diligentius muneri suo consulere quam facultatibus. Vale.
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To Caninius.
You ask me how the money which you have given to our fellow-townsmen for an annual feast may be secured after you are dead and gone. It is quite right of you to consult me on such a subject, but it is not easy to give an answer. If you hand over the money in a lump sum to the community, the danger is that it may be squandered, and if you give it in the form of land it will be neglected as all public lands are. For my own part, I can find no more satisfactory plan than that which I followed myself. For instead of paying down the 500,000 sesterces which I had promised as an endowment for the education of free-born boys and girls, I transferred some land of mine, which was worth considerably more, to the State agent and received it back from him, after he had fixed a rent for it, the arrangement being that I should pay 30,000 sesterces a year. By this plan the principal is secured to the community and the interest is also safe, while the land in question will always find a tenant to keep it in good order, as it is worth much more than the rent put upon it. Of course I am aware that the transaction has cost me more than the sum which people think I have given, for the selling price of that fine bit of land has been diminished by the obligation to pay the reserved rent. However, we ought to prefer public interests to private ones, and interests which will go in perpetuity to those which perish with us, and we should give much more careful consideration to our benefactions than to merely growing rich. Farewell.
Human translation — Attalus.org
Latin / Greek Original
C. PLINIUS CANINIO SUO S.
Deliberas mecum quemadmodum pecunia, quam municipibus nostris in epulum obtulisti, post te quoque salva sit. Honesta consultatio, non expedita sententia. Numeres rei publicae summam: verendum est ne dilabatur. Des agros: ut publici neglegentur. Equidem nihil commodius invenio, quam quod ipse feci. Nam pro quingentis milibus nummum, quae in alimenta ingenuorum ingenuarumque promiseram, agrum ex meis longe pluris actori publico mancipavi; eundem vectigali imposito recepi, tricena milia annua daturus. Per hoc enim et rei publicae sors in tuto nec reditus incertus, et ager ipse propter id quod vectigal large supercurrit, semper dominum a quo exerceatur inveniet. Nec ignoro me plus aliquanto quam donasse videor erogavisse, cum pulcherrimi agri pretium necessitas vectigalis infregerit. Sed oportet privatis utilitatibus publicas, mortalibus aeternas anteferre, multoque diligentius muneri suo consulere quam facultatibus. Vale.