oney as I shall lose in
virtue. The saying, 'Move not the immovable,' may be repeated in a
new sense; and there is a common belief which asserts that such deeds
prevent a man from having a family. To him who is careless of such
consequences, and, despising the word of the wise, takes up a treasure
which is not his--what will be done by the hand of the Gods, God only
knows,--but I would have the first person who sees the offender, inform
the wardens of the city or the country; and they shall send to Delphi
for a decision, and whatever the oracle orders, they shall carry out.
If the informer be a freeman, he shall be honoured, and if a slave,
set free; but he who does not inform, if he be a freeman, shall be
dishonoured, and if a slave, shall be put to death. If a man leave
anywhere anything great or small, intentionally or unintentionally, let
him who may find the property deem the deposit sacred to the Goddess
of ways. And he who appropriates the same, if he be a slave, shall be
beaten with many stripes; if a freeman, he shall pay tenfold, and be
held to have done a dishonourable action. If a person says that another
has something of his, and the other allows that he has the property in
dispute, but maintains it to be his own, let the ownership be proved out
of the registers of property. If the property is registered as belonging
to some one who is absent, possession shall be given to him who offers
sufficient security on behalf of the absentee; or if the property is not
registered, let it remain with the three eldest magistrates, and if it
should be an animal, the defeated party must pay the cost of its keep. A
man may arrest his own slave, and he may also imprison for safe-keeping
the runaway slave of a friend. Any one interfering with him must produce
three sureties; otherwise, he will be liable to an action for violence,
and if he be cast, must pay a double amount of damages to him from whom
he has taken the slave. A freedman who does not pay due respect to his
patron, may also be seized. Due respect consists in going three times
a month to the house of his patron, and offering to perform any lawful
service for him; he must also marry as his master pleases; and if his
property be greater than his master's, he must hand over to him the
excess. A freedman may not remain in the state, except with the consent
of the magistrates and of his master, for more than twenty years; and
whenever his census exceeds that of the thir