1Sempronius Caelianus acted in accordance with my instructions in sending to you those about whom it will have to be determined whether they appear to have deserved capital punishment. 1It matters, however, whether they offered themselves as volunteers, or were chosen by levy, or were even supplied as substitutes. 2If they were chosen, the inquiry was at fault; 2if they were supplied as substitutes, the blame lies with those who supplied them; 2if they came of their own accord, though aware of their status, they will have to be punished. 2For it makes little difference that they have not yet been assigned to units. 2The very day on which they were first approved demanded from them the truth about their origin.
Lectitō › Pliny the Younger › Letters, Book 10
Pliny · Epistulae X
Pliny, Letter 10.30
Trajan on the slave recruits
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Pliny, Epistulae X. Latin text: the Perseus digital text of Pliny's Letters, public domain; digital text from the Perseus Digital Library, CC BY-SA. Word analysis: drafted by our own tagger (trained on the hand-checked texts on this site), with every doubtful word checked by hand. English translation and section titles: written for this app, each checked against the Latin by a second reader.