[Rabelais cites the ancient Roman legal formulas Do – Dico – Addico (I give – I say – I adjudicate) as though they were in the second person: ‘You give – You say – You adjudicate’. This makes nonsense of those august formulaic utterances by which the Praetor, on auspicious days, solemnly authorized judgement to be done: Do judicem (I appoint the judge) dico jus (I state the case of the plaintiff) and addico litem (I hand over the cause to the magistrate to judge).
