contrary to the law on
these matters, if he be a guardian of the child, may be fined by a
magistrate, or, if he be himself a magistrate, the guardian may bring
him before the court of select judges, and punish him, if convicted, by
exacting a fine of double the amount of that inflicted by the court. And
if a guardian appears to the relations of the orphan, or to any other
citizen, to act negligently or dishonestly, let them bring him before
the same court, and whatever damages are given against him, let him pay
fourfold, and let half belong to the orphan and half to him who procured
the conviction. If any orphan arrives at years of discretion, and thinks
that he has been ill-used by his guardians, let him within five years
of the expiration of the guardianship be allowed to bring them to trial;
and if any of them be convicted, the court shall determine what he shall
pay or suffer. And if a magistrate shall appear to have wronged the
orphan by neglect, and he be convicted, let the court determine what
he shall suffer or pay to the orphan, and if there be dishonesty in
addition to neglect, besides paying the fine, let him be deposed from
his office of guardian of the law, and let the state appoint another
guardian of the law for the city and for the country in his room.

Greater differences than there ought to be sometimes arise between
fathers and sons, on the part either of fathers who will be of opinion
that the legislator should enact that they may, if they wish, lawfully
renounce their son by the proclamation of a herald in the face of the
world, or of sons who think that they should be allowed to indict their
fathers on the charge of imbecility when they are disabled by disease
or old age. These things only happen, as a matter of fact, where the
natures of men are utterly bad; for where only half is bad, as, for
example, if the father be not bad, but the son be bad, or conversely,
no great calamity is the result of such an amount of hatred as this. In
another state, a son disowned by his father would not of necessity cease
to be a citizen, but in our state, of which these are to be the laws,
the disinherited must necessarily emigrate into another country, for
no addition can be made even of a single family to the 5040 households;
and, therefore, he who deserves to suffer these things must be renounced
not only by his father, who is a single person, but by the whole family,
and what is done in these cases must be reg