教牧守則·對話錄與書信 第 439 章

Gregory to Virgilius, bishop of Arles, metropolitan. Although we are confident that your Fraternity is intent upon good works, and of your own accord shows yourself in causes pleasing to God, nevertheless we believe it useful to address you with fraternal charity, that the consolations which it befits you of your own will to bestow, you may, provoked also by our letters, increase. And therefore we make known to your Holiness that Augustine, a servant of God, the bearer of the present letter, whose zeal and study is well known to us, we have sent thither, with other servants of God, for the advantage of souls, as he himself, set before you in person, will be able to indicate to you.

In which matter it is necessary that you aid him with prayer and with helps, and, where the work shall demand, furnish him the supports of your consolations, and cherish him, as is fitting, with paternal and sacerdotal consolation; so that, when he shall have obtained the solaces of your Holiness, if he shall have been able to make some gain for our God, as we desire, you too may equally be able to acquire reward, who devoutly ministered abundance of your support toward good works. Candidus, moreover, a presbyter, our common son, and the little patrimony of our Church, let your Fraternity, as one of one mind with us, be zealous to hold commended, that from it something may, with your Holiness aiding, be made to profit for the sustenance of the poor.

Since therefore your predecessor held that same little patrimony for very many years, and kept with himself the collected rents, let your Fraternity consider whose the goods are, or to whom they should be paid out, and, for the sake of his own soul, restore them to our aforesaid son Candidus the presbyter, to be directed to us. For it is very execrable that what has been preserved by the kings of the nations should be said to have been taken away by bishops.