The Emperor Justinian Augustus to Hermogenes, most glorious master of the sacred offices, ex-consul and patrician. Among the other things which we have reduced to a fitting order, we have thought that neither those matters which concern our honorable referendaries should be left outside the bounds of our providence, and this all the more because they are wont to be of great use to us in very many affairs. For since at the beginning they were comprised in a number not very ample, we—that we might the more aid many through their intervention, more easily learning thoroughly the desires of individuals—brought it about that they should be more numerous than before.
But there arose certain men who, provoking our liberality to an immeasurable degree—partly by introducing many who might make supplication to us, partly by employing many entreaties—drew out this most exalted dignity, by daily additions, almost to infinity. For they did not make an end of petitioning before their number swelled all the way to fourteen.
Lest, therefore, that which we have rightly held in esteem should lose its dignity if it be poured out upon a multitude, it has pleased us to confine them to a fixed number, not so as to take away the privileges granted to those who now hold the office (for that is hardly proper to royal magnificence), especially since we are by no custom ever wont to expel from our service any of those who please us and who serve us honorably.
But we ordain that they remain in the same form as they now are, and that no one whatever be added, until their number settles within eight men, so that there be perpetually eight, that number being increased neither now nor at any time; while they ever strive that, in obedience toward us and in goodwill toward the imperial majesty, each may in turn surpass the other. No one shall have license henceforth to seek anything of that kind, knowing that he will by no means obtain what he seeks, and that, because he has dared to seek it, he shall not only be liable to a penalty of ten pounds of gold, but shall also be cast out from his own office.
For we wish that they be kept within measure up to the aforesaid number, and that they be ever increased in justice and in other things, and grow more and more illustrious in virtues. For a multitude that is regarded by number alone obtains no dignity, since out of so many you would scarcely find a few in whom life according to virtue is preserved. Wherefore let them indeed remain (as we have said) for now in this form. And let Your Excellency, taking cognizance of these things, so keep guard that at no time it permit any of the things ordained by us to be transgressed; but rather let it exact the aforesaid penalty from those who act contrary to anything herein, inasmuch as they seek things which it is neither lawful equally to seek nor possible to grant.
And thus may this our law, with the multitude driven away, altogether introduce virtue, which does not shine forth greatly among many, especially among those men who, though born of good parents, yet keep their fortunes and means laid up for the laying forth of suppliants' petitions and for the obtaining of aid for them from us. The things, then, which have pleased us and are expressed through this sacred law, let Your Excellency be zealous to bring to effect and to deliver to a sure conclusion. Given on the Ides of May, at Constantinople, Belisarius, vir clarissimus, being consul.