Page:On papal conclaves (IA a549801700cartuoft).djvu/191

 Rh ventured to inveigle several Popes by false suggestions of policy into the step of infeoffing, under various titles, possessions belonging to the Church, whereby these had become virtually alienated, to the signal impoverishment of that institution. Desirous to remedy this state of things, Pius as he goes on to say, had taken counsel with the Cardinals, who unanimously had sworn not only to observe the present Constitution, but also neither to assent to any Pope attempting alienations contrary to its tenor, nor to seek or accept any dispensation from the oath they themselves had sworn thereto.' Accordingly he proceeded to declare and pronounce all such infeoffments, grants, or alienations of Church possessions null and void, any persons guilty of counselling such hereafter, on any pretext, even of 'necessity or manifest utility,' incurring pain of excommunication by that fact; and to invest this Bull with the highest character of sacredness, the Cardinals present in Consistory swore to it by proxy for their absent brethren, while it was also expressly ordered that this same oath should be administered to all future Cardinals before receiving the hat, and that it should be