Page:Readings in European History Vol 1.djvu/525

 I The Popes and the Councils 489 They do not prudently observe that all control over the clergy, as well as over all ecclesiastical persons and their possessions, is denied them, but impose heavy burdens upon the prelates of the churches, upon the churches them- selves, and upon ecclesiastical persons both regular and secular, exacting tallages and other contributions from them. From such persons they require and extort the payment of a half, a tenth, a twentieth, or some other quota of their property or income, and strive in many other ways to sub- ject the churchmen to slavery and bring them under their control. And (with grief do we declare it) certain prelates of the churches and ecclesiastical persons, fearing where they ought not to fear, and seeking a temporary peace, dreading to offend a temporal more than the eternal majesty, do, without having received the permission or sanction of the apostolic see, acquiesce in such abuses, not so much from recklessness as from want of foresight. We, therefore, de- siring to check these iniquitous practices, by the counsel of our brothers, do, of our apostolic authority, decree that all prelates and ecclesiastical persons, whether monastic or secular, whatever their order, condition, or status, who shall pay, or promise or agree to pay, to laymen, any contribu- tions or tallages, tenths, twentieths, or hundredths of their own or of their churches' revenues or possessions, or shall pay any sum, portion, or part of their revenues or goods, or of their estimated or actual value, in the form of an aid, loan, subvention, subsidy, or gift, or upon any other pre- tense or fiction whatsoever, without authority of this same apostolic see: likewise emperors, kings and princes, dukes, counts, barons, podesta, captains, officers, rectors, whatever their title, of cities, castles, or other places, wherever situated, or any other persons, whatever their rank, condition, or status, who shall impose, exact, or receive such payments, or who shall presume to lay hands upon, seize, or occupy the pos- sessions of churches or of ecclesiastical persons deposited in the sacred edifices, or who shall order such to be seized or occupied, or shall receive such things as shall be seized