Page:The Church, by John Huss.pdf/318

266 the sentence that the excommunication enjoined in the processes is just.

Likewise, the doctors say that the processes [court proceedings] are to be obeyed, especially because in them nothing that is an absolute good is forbidden, nor is anything enjoined which is an absolute evil, but only things which are intermediate, in which obedience must be rendered in accordance with the teaching of the Gospel and in accordance with St. Bernard. Therefore the doctors pass sentence that the commands in the processes are just, among which is the excommunication of Master John Huss. Therefore, these doctors pass the sentence that the excommunication of Master John Huss is just. And they themselves are part of the clergy in Prague. Therefore, this very conclusion of theirs confutes these doctors.

Likewise, these doctors pronounce judgment that the excommunication which is enjoined in the processes is a thing intermediate, a thing between that which is absolutely good and that which is absolutely evil, and when it is enjoined in respect to the mode, time, place and person, then it passes over into a thing absolutely good, because it passes into an injunction of the pope and prelates. Therefore, the doctors, in pronouncing such a judgment about the excommunication, declare that it is just. Nevertheless, in view of their conclusion, they ought not to pronounce the judgment that it is just. And this they do, a thing they ought not to do; yea, they do not know what they are doing, for they say that it is not for the clergy in Prague to pronounce judgment that the excommunication of John Huss is unjust, and yet they pronounce judgment that it is just. It is certainly worthy of laughter how doctors of the law agree to this conclusion, doctors who pronounce judgment on the decrees, decretals and processes [court proceedings] whether they are just or justly given or by just men, when they ought by reasonable methods to expound the decrees and the decretals