教牧守則·對話錄與書信 第 259 章

Whereas all affairs need the solicitude of investigating the truth, then especially those which pertain to the deposition of priestly grades are to be weighed more strictly, in which it is treated not so much of humble persons as, in a certain way, of the refusal of divine benediction. Which matter also admonished us, in the person of Florentius, bishop of the city of Epidaurus, to the exhortation of your fraternity (below, epistle 9). For it has been announced to us by certain persons that he was accused in criminal cases, and that, no canonical proofs being sought out, nor a judgment proceeding from a priestly council, he was deposed from the office of his honor not by right, but by authority.

Since therefore the concordant sentence of the priests cannot remove anyone from the grade of the episcopate except for just causes, we exhort your fraternity that you cause the aforesaid man to be cast out from the same exile into which he was thrust, and that his cause be inquired into by episcopal disputation. And if in those things of which he is accused he shall have been convicted by canonical proof, he is without doubt to be punished with canonical vengeance. But if, otherwise than was estimated concerning him, it shall have been ascertained by synodal inquiry, it is necessary both that just accusers dread the strictness of the law, and that to the man uncriminated the unimpaired suffrages of his innocence be preserved.

But the execution of the aforesaid affair we have committed to Antoninus our subdeacon by our command, so that by his diligence both those things which are pleasing to the laws and canons may be decreed, and the things decreed, the Lord helping, may be given effect. (Cf. John the Deacon, book 4, ch. 28.)