教牧守則·對話錄與書信 第 612 章

Gregory to Theodoric and Theodebert, kings of the Franks. The highest good in kings is to cherish justice, to preserve each one's rights, and not to allow to be done to their subjects that which belongs to power, but rather that what is just be guarded. And since we both confidently believe that you love this and altogether apply yourselves to it, we are invited to make known to your excellency those things which call for amendment, so that by this we may be able both to succour the oppressed and to acquire a reward for you by our letters.

They say, then, that our brother and fellow-bishop Ursicinus, prelate of the city of Turin, in his parishes which are constituted within the border of your kingdom, sustains altogether grievous prejudice, so that — against ecclesiastical observance, against priestly gravity, and against the decrees of the sacred canons, no crime of his requiring it — another has presumed to be ordained bishop there. And since it seemed too little if unlawful things were not joined to unlawful, even the goods of his Church, as is reported, have been taken away.

And if the truth stands thus — since it is exceedingly intolerable that one be oppressed by force whom no fault has harmed — having first sent the address of a fatherly and charitable greeting, we ask that what your excellency out of love for ecclesiastical reverence and out of regard for equity can bestow of its own accord, you may strive more kindly to grant by our intercession, and cause justice to be guarded for him in all things, as we trust from the goodness of his equity; and that, the truth being laid open, you may order both what has been unlawfully done to be corrected, and the goods violently taken from him to be restored, with equity favouring. Nor ought the fact that his Church is for a time held by enemies to disadvantage him at all;

but this ought more and more to move the minds of your Christianity to succour, so that, consoled by the gift of your bounty, he may not be able to feel the losses of the captivity which he endured. Therefore for the profit of your soul let this our exhortation find place with you, that for your reward you may, with the hand of justice stretched forth, relieve his dejection, so that through this — in that you guard equity for priests — you may ever flourish by their prayers before the eyes of God.