[MARCELLUS libro uicensimo secundo digestorum. ] §39.5.20.prSi patronus ex debita parte heres instituatur et libertus fidei eius commisit, ut quid daret, et hoc stipulanti fideicommissario promiserit, non erit cogendus soluere, ne pars ex legibus uerecundiae patronali debita minuatur.
[MARCELLUS, in the twenty-second book of the Digests.] If a patron is appointed heir to the share due to him by law, and his freedman has entrusted to his good faith to give something, and he has promised this to the beneficiary of the trust who stipulated for it, he shall not be compelled to pay, lest the share due by law to patronal respect be diminished.
§39.5.20.1De illo dubitari potest, qui, quod per Falcidiam retinere poterat, uoluntatem testatoris secutus spopondit se daturum: sed magis est, ut non possit suae confessioni obuiare.
Doubt may be raised concerning a person who, having followed the testator’s will, has promised that he will give what he could have retained under the Falcidian law; but the better opinion is that he cannot go against his own acknowledgment.
quemadmodum enim, si soluisset, fidem testatori suo adimplesse uidebatur et nulla ei repetitio concessa fuerat, ita et stipulatione procedente contra fidem testatoris, quam adgnouit, uenienti ei merito occurretur.
For just as, if he had paid, he would have been deemed to have fulfilled his duty to his testator, and no recovery would have been granted to him, so too, now that a stipulation has intervened, if he goes against the faith due to the testator which he himself acknowledged, he will deservedly be opposed.