Pastoral Rule, Dialogues & Letters 546

Gregory to Anthemius, subdeacon. Maurus, the carrier of the present letter, asserts that he received certain merchandise from Felix, a magnificent man, for four hundred solidi, and that he promised to pay six siliquae per solidus by way of interest on the price. When this amount of interest had been gathered together into one sum, he issued two bonds, that is, one for four hundred and fifty, and the other for fifty solidi, pledging that he would pay off what he owed at a fixed time.

But because, as he relates, he suffered no light loss in the same merchandise, and, having restored four hundred and ten solidi, he is being compelled to make up what remains of the interest, and thereby he laments that he is subjected to greater necessity and rather to desperation, and therefore he asks that he be aided by some help;

let your experience, if it is so, strive—together with the aforesaid magnificent man our son, and with our most reverend brother and fellow-bishop Fortunatus, and our glorious son Maurentius, master of the soldiers, for we are writing to them also—to act so that in this matter, as befits a Christian and a nobleman, he ought to be more kindly than rigid, more merciful than strict, and should not look for gain from another's loss, but be content with the principal of the price once received—so that whatever he shall have yielded to the poor man, God almighty may repay him with a multiplied restitution, as he has promised. So then let your experience act zealously, that it may be able by all means to impose this upon him for the sake of his reward, and to free this man from the affliction of his obligation.