Page:The Satyricon of Petronius Arbiter (1922), vol. 1.djvu/88

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THE SATYRICON OF

owner an article not his own, it ought to come to a civil action and a judgment secured.


CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH. Not so Ascyltos, who was afraid of the law, and demurred, “Who knows us here? Who will place any credence in anything we say? It seems to me that it would be better to buy, ours though it is, and we know it, and recover the treasure at small cost, rather than to engage in a doubtful lawsuit.”


Of what avail are any laws, where money rules alone,
Where Poverty can never win its cases?
Detractors of the times, who bear the Cynic’s scrip, are known
To often sell the truth, and keep their faces!
  So Justice is at public auction bought,
  The knight gives judgement as Gold says he ought.


But, with the exception of a two-as piece with which we had intended purchasing peas and lupines, there was nothing to hand; so,

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