[PAULUS libro singulari ad regulam Catonianam. ] §49.17.20.prSed si ponas filium testamentum fecisse et patrem heredem instituisse: cum utique pater testamento suo seruo filii libertatem dedisset, qui ad eum ex testamento filii pertinere coeperit, uidendum est, numquid ei comparari debeat, qui, cum manumitteretur, alienus erat, deinde postea adquisitus est.
[PAULUS in his single book on the Catonian Rule.] But if you suppose that the son made a testament and appointed his father heir: when indeed the father had by his own testament given freedom to the son's slave, who had begun to belong to him under the testament of the son, it must be considered whether he ought to be compared to one who, when he was being manumitted, belonged to another and was subsequently acquired afterwards.
sed fauorabile est libertatem a patre relictam admittere: et ab initio patris esse eum uideri ex hoc, quod postea contigit, ostenditur.
But it is favorable to admit the freedom left by the father: and it is shown from that which occurred afterwards that he is deemed to have belonged to the father from the beginning.