[TRYPHONINUS libro nono disputationum. ] §16.3.31.prBona fides quae in contractibus exigitur aequitatem summam desiderat: sed eam utrum aestimamus ad merum ius gentium an uero cum praeceptis ciuilibus et praetoriis? ueluti reus capitalis iudicii deposuit apud te centum: is deportatus est, bona eius publicata sunt: utrumne ipsi haec reddenda an in publicum deferenda sint? si tantum naturale et gentium ius intuemur, ei qui dedit restituenda sunt: si ciuile ius et legum ordinem, magis in publicum deferenda sunt: nam male meritus publice, ut exemplo aliis ad deterrenda maleficia sit, etiam egestate laborare debet.
[TRYPHONINUS, Disputations, Book 9] Good faith which is required in contracts demands the highest equity: but do we estimate it according to the pure law of nations, or indeed in conjunction with civil and praetorian rules? For example, a defendant in a capital trial has deposited one hundred with you: he has been deported and his property confiscated: should this sum be returned to him or should it be delivered to the public treasury? If we look only to natural law and the law of nations, it must be restored to him who gave it: if to civil law and the order of the statutes, it should rather be delivered to the public treasury: for one who has deserved ill of the public ought even to suffer from poverty, so that he may serve as an example to others to deter wrongdoings.
§16.3.31.1Incurrit hic et alia inspectio.
Here another consideration arises.
bonam fidem inter eos tantum, quos contractum est, nullo extrinsecus adsumpto aestimare debemus an respectu etiam aliarum personarum, ad quas id quod geritur pertinet? exempli loco latro spolia quae mihi abstulit posuit apud Seium inscium de malitia deponentis: utrum latroni an mihi restituere Seius debeat? si per se dantem accipientemque intuemur, haec est bona fides, ut commissam rem recipiat is qui dedit: si totius rei aequitatem, quae ex omnibus personis quae negotio isto continguntur impletur, mihi reddenda sunt, quo facto scelestissimo adempta sunt.
Ought we to estimate good faith solely between those between whom the contract was made, without assuming any external factor, or also with respect to other persons to whom the transaction relates? For example, a robber has deposited spoils which he took from me with Seius, who is ignorant of the depositor's wickedness: ought Seius to restore them to the robber or to me? If we look only at the giver and the receiver by themselves, it is good faith that he who gave should receive the thing entrusted: if we look to the equity of the whole matter, which is made up of all the persons who are touched by that business, they must be restored to me, from whom they were taken by a most wicked deed.
et probo hanc esse iustitiam, quae suum cuique ita tribuit, ut non distrahatur ab ullius personae iustiore repetitione.
And I approve that this is justice, which attributes to each his own in such a way that it is not distracted by the more just claim of any person.
quod si ego ad petenda ea non ueniam, nihilo minus ei restituenda sunt qui deposuit, quamuis male quaesita deposuit.
But if I do not come to claim them, they must nonetheless be restored to him who deposited them, although he deposited what was wickedly acquired.
quod et Marcellus in praedone et fure scribit.
Which Marcellus also writes in the case of a robber and a thief.
si tamen ignorans latro cuius filio uel seruo rem abstulisset apud patrem dominumue eius deposuit ignorantem, nec ex iure gentium consistet depositum, cuius haec est potestas, ut alii, non domino sua ipsius res quasi aliena, seruanda detur.
If, however, a robber, not knowing from whose son or slave he had taken the thing, deposited it with the father or master of the same, who was also ignorant of the fact, the deposit will not stand even under the law of nations, the nature of which is that one's own property is given to another, not to the owner, to be kept as if it belonged to someone else.
et si rem meam fur, quam me ignorante subripuit, apud me etiamnunc delictum eius ignorantem deposuerit, recte dicetur non contrahi depositum, quia non est ex fide bona rem suam dominum praedoni restituere compelli.
And if a thief should deposit my property, which he stole without my knowledge, with me while I am still ignorant of his crime, it will be rightly said that no deposit is contracted, because it is not in accordance with good faith that an owner should be compelled to restore his own property to a robber.
sed et si etiamnunc ab ignorante domino tradita sit quasi ex causa depositi, tamen indebiti dati condictio competet.
But even if it has been delivered by the ignorant owner as if on the ground of a deposit, nonetheless an action for the recovery of what was not due will lie.