Letter 7032: Every public function should certainly be carried out with faithful action, because everything is vitiated where...

32. THE FORMULA BY WHICH THE MINT IS ENTRUSTED. [1] Every public benefit ought indeed to be carried out by faithful conduct, since the whole business is done corruptly wherever there is no purity of conscience: yet above all the integrity of the coinage must be sought, where both our countenance is stamped and the general advantage is found. For what will be secure, if there is wrongdoing against our likeness, and if a sacrilegious hand hastens to violate her whom the subject ought to venerate in his heart? It is added that all dealing is undone if the metals that serve as the means of livelihood are debased, since whatever appears offered corrupted in trade must of necessity be rejected. Who, then, would suffer that the criminal losses of all should be one man's profit, so that a detestable vice could come to a price? [2] Let that which is brought to the likeness of our serenity be clean: royal splendor admits nothing tainted. For if any man's face is depicted in pure color, much more justly is the prince's favor kept safe by the purity of the metals. Let the gleam of gold grow pale by no injury of admixture; let the color of silver smile with the grace of its whiteness; let the redness of bronze remain in its native quality. For if to harm one person is held by the laws to be worthy of condemnation, what could that man deserve who has done wrong against so great a multitude of men? [3] We command, moreover, that the established weight be preserved for the denarii, which were once sold by weight rather than by number: whence antiquity, fittingly drawing the terms of the words from their origin, beautifully named them "compendium" [gain by weight] and "dispendium" [loss by weight]. For money [pecunia], named from the hide of cattle [pecus] on the authority of the Gauls, was as yet without any stamp when it was transferred to metals. We do not allow it to be made contemptible by foul admixture, lest it be found to return again to its ancient cheapness. [4] Accordingly we command you, whose integrity of conduct has been praised before us, to have charge of the mint from that indiction onward through a full five years -- the mint which King Servius is reported first to have impressed upon bronze: in such a way that you should not doubt that inquiry will be made at your peril, if any fraud can be found in it. For just as you will undergo harsh trials if perhaps you should commit any offense, so we will not leave you unrewarded, if we perceive that you have acted blamelessly.

XXXII. FORMULA QUA MONETA COMMITTITUR. [1] Omnis quidem utilitas publica fideli debet actione compleri, quia totum vitiosum geritur, ubi conscientiae puritas non habetur: tamen omnino monetae debet integritas quaeri, ubi et vultus noster imprimitur et generalis utilitas invenitur. nam quid erit tutum, si in nostra peccetur effigie, et quam subiectus corde venerari debet, manus sacrilega violare festinet? additur quod venalitas cuncta dissolvitur, si victualia metalla vitiantur, quando necesse est respui quod in mercimoniis corruptum videtur offerri. quis ergo patiatur unius esse commodum dispendia scelesta cunctorum, ut detestabile vitium venire possit ad pretium? [2] Sit mundum quod ad formam nostrae serenitatis adducitur: claritas regia nil admittit infectum. nam si vultus cuiuslibet sincero colore depingitur, multo iustius metallorum puritate principalis gratia custoditur. auri flamma nulla iniuria permixtionis albescat, argenti color gratia candoris arrideat, aeris rubor in nativa qualitate permaneat. nam si unum laedere legibus putatur esse damnandum, quid ille mereri poterit, qui in tanta hominum numerositate peccaverit? [3] Pondus quin etiam constitutum denariis praecipimus debere servari, qui olim penso quam numero vendebantur: unde verborum vocabula competenter ab origine trahens compendium et dispendium pulchre vocitavit antiquitas. pecunia enim a pecudis tergo nominata Gallis auctoribus sine aliquo adhuc signo ad metalla translata est. quam non sinimus faeculenta permixtione fieri contemptibilem, ne iterum in antiquam cognoscatur redire vilitatem. [4] Proinde te, cuius nobis laudata est integritas actionis, ab illa indictione per iuge quinquennium monetae curam habere praecipimus, quam Servius rex in aere primum inpressisse perhibetur: ita ut tuo periculo non dubites quaeri, si quid in illa fraudis potuerit inveniri. nam sicut casus asperos subibis, si quid fortasse deliqueris, ita inremuneratum non derelinquimus, si te egisse inculpabiliter senserimus.