t
have his legacy abated by onefourth; if three hundred and fifty have
been given in legacies, each legacy will be diminished by one-eighth; if
five hundred, first a fifth, then a fourth, must be deducted: for
when the amount given in legacies actually exceeds the sum of the
inheritance, there must be struck off first the excess, and then the
share which the heir is entitled to retain.

TITLE XXIII. OF TRUST INHERITANCES

We now proceed to fiduciary bequests or trusts; and let us begin with
trust inheritances.

1 Legacies or inheritances given by trust had originally no binding
legal force, because no one could be compelled against his will to do
what he was merely asked to do. As there were certain classes of persons
to whom testators were unable to leave inheritances or legacies, when
they wished to effect these objects they used to trust to the good faith
of some one who had this kind of testamentary capacity, and whom
they asked to give the inheritance, or the legacy, to the intended
beneficiary; hence the name 'trusts,' because they were not enforced
by legal obligation, but only by the transferor's sense of honesty.
Subsequently the Emperor Augustus, either out of regard for various
favourites of his own, or because the request was said to have been made
in the name of the Emperor's safety, or moved thereto by individual
and glaring cases of perfidy, commanded the consuls in certain cases to
enforce the duty by their authority. And this being deemed equitable,
and being approved by the people, there was gradually developed a new
and permanent jurisdiction, and trusts became so popular that soon a
special praetor was appointed to hear suits relating to them, who was
called the trust praetor.

2 The first requisite is an heir directly instituted, in trust to
transfer the inheritance to another, for the will is void without an
instituted heir in the first instance. Accordingly, when a testator has
written: 'Lucius Titius, be thou my heir,' he may add: 'I request you,
Lucius Titius, as soon as you can accept my inheritance, to convey and
transfer it to Gaius Seius'; or he can request him to transfer a part.
So a trust may be either absolute or conditional, and to be performed
either immediately or on a specified future day.

3 After the transfer of the inheritance the transferor continues heir,
the transferee being sometimes regarded as quasi-heir, sometimes as
quasi-legatee.

4 But during the reign of N