Page:Notes upon Russia (volume 1, 1851).djvu/266

76 ritual, and to conform to the forms and ritual of the Latin and holy Roman Church, are to be admitted in all simplicity, and without any contradiction, obligation, or compulsion to be rebaptized; it being moreover intended that such rites as they may have been accustomed to observe in the Eastern Church, may continue to be observed by them, provided there be no heretical depravity therein; always provided that they first solemnly abjure all errors of the Greek ritual, and such things as differ from the ritual and institutions of the Latin and Roman Church. At the same time we exhort by the bowels of the mercy of our God, that each and all of such as are so baptized, and who live according to the Greek ritual, repudiating the errors which they have hitherto held according to the custom and ritual of the Greek Church, and contrary to the immaculate and holy Catholic Latin and Roman Church and to the approved institutions of her holy fathers, do willingly conform to the said holy Catholic Church and to her wholesome doctrines, for the sake of the salvation of their souls and the advancement of the knowledge of the true God; and that their holy resolution may meet with no hindrance from any one, we now charge and enjoin upon our venerable brother the bishop of Wilna, by virtue of sacred obedience, that he receive and admit each and all who may be so baptized, and who wish to conform to the unity of the aforesaid Latin Church, and abjure the aforesaid errors either by themselves, or by proxy, or by committing the same abjuration to any of the secular prelates, ecclesiastics, or preachers, or to the learned and worthy professors of the regular observance of the minor orders, or any fitting persons to whom such abjuration might be entrusted. And by these presents we grant to all and singular of the aforesaid full and free liberty to induct, as often as may be expedient, any such, as aforesaid, who may have in any way incurred the sentence of excommunication, or any other sentence or penalties of the Church on account of the observance of such errors or