Letter 11015: A royal gift that has been obtained should bring joy to all, so that you may be encouraged to do better when you see...

15. Senator [Cassiodorus], Praetorian Prefect, to the Ligurians. [1] A royal gift, once obtained, ought to be the joy of all, that you may be summoned toward better things, when you have found that what has been granted to you is most welcome. For if it belongs always to one who loves to come to aid, of what sort do you understand yourselves to be esteemed, you whom you perceive to have been relieved? But, lest we defer your gladness with long preambles, since the swiftest acknowledgment of good things is always desired, the most glorious lords [the royal house], taking thought for the needs of devoted Liguria, have, with their accustomed devotion, assigned one hundred pounds of gold from their own chamber through this man and that man, so that, by your judgment, to whom the situation is most fully known, each one may rejoice in so great a share of this gift as the burden of need by which he is known to be weighed down, that the unharmed man may not usurp what has been given to the afflicted, but that those may rise up with their strength restored who had fallen beneath the pressing load of their losses. [2] But let the city of Hasta [Asti], which above the others is reported to be more heavily burdened, be relieved most of all by the justice of your arrangement, so that according to the measure of its loss it may fully enjoy the benefit's advantage. Receive the stipend of devotion, you taxpayers, and weigh the clemency of your lords, who, the condition being changed, see that you receive this from the treasury which you had been accustomed to pay in. But so that the benefits of the lords may be increased by the removal of the burdens of exactions, let your report instruct us more quickly as to what you judge ought to be remitted to each one out of this sum, so that we may have suspended from the first levy as much as the information sent has made known to us. Wherefore render to your most devout lords with vows of salvation what you owe, that your account may accomplish by supplication that which the whole community may recognize that it has received in this very thing.

XV. LIGURIBUS SENATOR PPO. [1] Regale munus impetratum gaudium debet esse cunctorum, ut provocetis ad meliora, cum de vobis concessa probaveritis esse gratissima. nam si subvenire semper amantis est, cuiusmodi vos aestimatos intellegitis, quos relevatos esse sentitis? sed ne vestram laetitiam longis praelocutionibus differamus, quia bonarum rerum celerrima semper desideratur agnitio, gloriosissimi domini devotae Liguriae necessitatibus consulentes centum libras auri per illum atque illum de cubiculo suo pietate solita destinarunt, ut, iudicio vestro quibus est causa notissima, tanta unusquisque huius muneris participatione laetetur, quanta necessitate gravatus esse cognoscitur, ne quod afflictis datum est usurpet inlaesus, sed illi reparatis viribus consurgant, qui damnorum sarcina premente corruerant. [2] Hastensis autem civitas, quae supra ceteras suggeritur ingravata, dispositionis vestrae iustitia maxime sublevetur, ut secundum modum dispendii commoditate beneficii perfruatur. sumite pietatis stipendium, tributarii, et dominorum aestimate clementiam, qui condicione mutata hoc vos ab aerario videtis accipere, quod consueveratis inferre. sed ut beneficia dominorum subtractis exactionum incommodis augeantur, celerius relatio vestra nos instruat, quid unicuique de hac summa relaxandum esse iudicatis, ut tantum de prima illatione faciamus suspendi, quantum ad nos notitia directa vulgaverit. quapropter piissimis dominis votis salutaribus reddite quae debetis, ut ratio vestra supplicando peragat, quod se in ipso universitas recepisse cognoscat.