Page:On papal conclaves (IA a549801700cartuoft).djvu/190

174 which are to be particularly named a Bull by Julius declaring ipso facto void a Papal election due to simoniacal practices, and a Bull by Alexander  against the alienation of Church property. This is the instrument that has been invoked with so much pertinacity by those who affirm that, in the matter of his temporal estate, the Pope is bound by ties that absolutely deprive him of all power to make any surrender of dominions he has succeeded to. We believe that it requires only to look a little into the history of this celebrated Bull to he convinced that there is no foundation for the exceptional sacredness thus ascribed to it, and which, if real, would at once limit the Pope's avowedly unbounded dispensing power.

The Bull of Alexander does not profess to be an original statute, but merely a revival and confirmation of enactments by former Popes that had been either repealed or lost sight of, and the texts whereof are incorporated at length in this deed. The first of these instruments, and therefore the groundwork of the whole Bull, is one issued by Pius in 1567, which begins by expressing grief that 'divers persons too ambitious and covetous of rule' should have