1Others set out for their estates in order to come back richer; I, in order to come back poorer. 1I had sold my grape harvests to dealers who were competing to buy them. 1The price was tempting, both the price at that moment and what it seemed likely to become. 2Their hopes were disappointed. 2It would have been simple to grant everyone the same rebate, but not quite fair. 2To me, however, it seems especially admirable to practise justice at home as abroad, in small matters as in great, in one's own affairs as in other people's. 2For if faults are equal, the praise is equal too. 3And so to everyone, so that no one 'should go away from me without a gift', I granted an eighth part of the price at which each had bought; 3then I made separate provision for those who had laid out the largest sums on their purchases.
3For they had both helped me more and suffered a greater loss themselves. 4So to those who had bought for more than ten thousand sesterces, on top of that common and, as it were, public eighth I added a tenth of the amount by which they had exceeded ten thousand. 5I am afraid I have not expressed this clearly enough: I shall show it more plainly with a calculation. 5If any had bought, say, for fifteen thousand, they received both an eighth of fifteen thousand and a tenth of five thousand. 6Moreover, when I reflected that some had paid off a good part of what they owed, some a little, some nothing, I thought it by no means right that those whom honesty in payment had not made equal should be made equal by generosity in remission.
7So once again I remitted to those who had paid a tenth of what they had paid. 7For in this way it seemed that, most fittingly, thanks were returned to each for the past according to his merit, and all were encouraged for the future not only to buy but also to pay. 8This method, or this indulgence, has cost me a great deal, but it was worth it. 8For throughout the whole district both the novelty of the remission and its form are being praised. 8Even among those very men whom I did not treat, as the saying goes, with one measuring-rod, but distinctly and by degrees, the better and more honest each man was, the more obliged to me he went away, having found that with me it is not the case that 'the bad man and the good are held in one honour'.
8Farewell.