convicted, shall have his tongue cut out, except he redeem it with his
head. Murder, [661] adultery, shall be punished by death, [662]but not
theft, except it be some more grievous offence, or notorious offenders:
otherwise they shall be condemned to the galleys, mines, be his slaves
whom they have offended, during their lives. I hate all hereditary
slaves, and that duram Persarum legem as [663]Brisonius calls it; or as
[664]Ammianus, impendio formidatas et abominandas leges, per quas ob
noxam unius, omnis propinquitas perit hard law that wife and children,
friends and allies, should suffer for the father's offence.
No man shall marry until he [665]be 25, no woman till she be 20, [666]
nisi alitur dispensatum fuerit. If one [667]die, the other party shall
not marry till six months after; and because many families are
compelled to live niggardly, exhaust and undone by great dowers,
[668]none shall be given at all, or very little, and that by
supervisors rated, they that are foul shall have a greater portion; if
fair, none at all, or very little: [669]howsoever not to exceed such a
rate as those supervisors shall think fit. And when once they come to
those years, poverty shall hinder no man from marriage, or any other
respect, [670]but all shall be rather enforced than hindered,
[671]except they be [672]dismembered, or grievously deformed, infirm,
or visited with some enormous hereditary disease, in body or mind; in
such cases upon a great pain, or mulct, [673]man or woman shall not
marry, other order shall be taken for them to their content. If people
overabound, they shall be eased by [674]colonies.
[675]No man shall wear weapons in any city. The same attire shall be
kept, and that proper to several callings, by which they shall be
distinguished. [676]Luxus funerum shall be taken away, that
intempestive expense moderated, and many others. Brokers, takers of
pawns, biting usurers, I will not admit; yet because hic cum hominibus
non cum diis agitur, we converse here with men, not with gods, and for
the hardness of men's hearts I will tolerate some kind of usury.[677]If
we were honest, I confess, si probi essemus, we should have no use of
it, but being as it is, we must necessarily admit it. Howsoever most
divines contradict it, dicimus inficias, sed vox ea sola reperta est,
it must be winked at by politicians. And yet some great doctors approve
of it, Calvin, Bucer, Zanchius, P. Martyr, because by so many grand
lawyers, decrees of emperors, princes' statutes, customs of
commonwealths, churches' approbations it is permitted, &c. I will
therefore allow it. But to no private persons, nor to every man that
will, to orphans only, maids, widows, or such as by reason of their
age, sex, education, ignorance of trading, know not otherwise how to
employ it; and those so approved, not to let it out apart, but to bring
their money to a [678]common bank which shall be allowed in every city,
as in Genoa, Geneva, Nuremberg, Venice, at [679]5, 6, 7, not above 8
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