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We are accustomed from our earliest youth to see in the history of the Roman people public acts of injustice, so atrocious in themselves, always coloured with specious names, always accompanied by a proud eulogy on Roman virtues. The abolition of debts plays a great part from the earliest times of the republic. A withdrawal of the people to Mount Aventine, when the enemy was at the gates of Rome, forced the Senate to pass a sponge over the rights of creditors. The historian excites all our interest in favour of the fraudulent debtors who paid their debts by a bankruptcy, and does not fail to render odious those who were despoiled by an act of violence. And what was gained by this injustice? Usury, which had served as a pretext for the robbery, could not but be augmented the very next day after the catastrophe; for the exorbitant rate of interest was only the price of the risk caused by the uncertainty of engagements. The foundation of the Roman colonies has been celebrated as a work of profound policy. It always consisted in despoiling part of the lawful proprietors of a conquered country to create establishments in the way of favour or reward.
Jeremy Bentham, Principles of the Civil Code
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