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The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Third-day, January 14, 1868

FromReview and Herald, Vol. XXXI, No. 5

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Scripture Notes.

HOW TO TREAT PROPERTY FOUND.

LEV. vi, 3. Or have found that which was lost, and lieth concerning it, and sweareth falsely; in any of all these that a man doeth, sinning therein; 4. then it shall be, because he hath sinned, and is guilty, that he shall restore the lost thing which he found.
The Roman lawyers laid it down as a sound maxim in jurisprudence, that he who found any property, and applied it to his own use [even when the owner remained unknown], should be considered as a thief, whether he knew the owner or not. It is said of the Dyrboeans (a people between Bactria and India), that if they met with any lost property, even on the public road, they never even touched it. This was actually the case in this kingdom (England) in the time of Alfred the Great, about A. D. 888; so that golden bracelets hung up on the public roads, were untouched by the finger of rapine. One of Solon's laws was, Take not up what you laid not down.—Dr. A. Clarke.