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Here you find in private life, as well as in public, the vincire et verberare nefas. If, again, one had a mind to lose 80 shillings of gold, he need but to commit the offence of 'meerworphin, a word which will puzzle you somewhat, till you find it to signify 'mare warping, to warp, or throw one's neighbour off his mare or horse.
Punishments by stripes, by imprisonment, or by cruel or degrading methods, there are none. The person of a freeman is sacred, 'Vincire et verberare nefas, as Tacitus said of these Germans 600 years before.
Ceterum neque animadvertere neque vincire, ne verberare quidem, nisi sacerdotibus permissum; non quasi in poenam, nec ducis jussu, sed velut deo imperante, quem adesse bellantibus credunt: effigiesque et signa quaedam, detracta lucis, in proelium ferunt.
"Ceterum neque animadvertere, neque vincire, neque verberare quidem, nisi sacerdotibus permissum; non quasi in pœnam, nec ducis jussu, sed velut Deo imperante," says Tacitus, de Mor. German. 7. Si quis emendationem oppidorum vel pontium vel profectionem militarem detrectaverit, compenset regi cxx solidis, ... vel purget se, et nominentur ei xiv, et eligantur xi. Leges Cnuti, 62.
SCELUS: this word looks chiefly to the criminal intention, whether it be carried into action or not, malum, facinus to the completed crime; flagitium is sin rather than crime, Facinus in sense is often rather narrower and lighter than scelus; cf. Verr. 5, 170 facinus est vincire civem Romanum, scelus verberare, prope parricidium necare.
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