Α.Ό. 1245. SENTENCE PEONOT7NCEB AGAINST PBEDEBIC 255 favourers. And rejecting the actions and habits of Christian princes, and neglecting the integrity of his salvation and fame, he pays no attention to works of piety. Moreover, to say nothing of his nefarious and dissolute habits, though he has well learnt to oppress people, yet he has no care to relieve those who are oppressed by injustice, his hand being never stretched out in alms as that of a prince ought to be, nor is he known to have built any churches or monasteries, or hospitals, though he has busied himself with the destruction of churches, and overwhelmed men of religious orders and other ecclesiastical persons with the yoke of affliction. Now, therefore, these are not light, but powerful arguments for the suspicion of heresy against him, though nevertheless he asserts that the civil law is contained in the language of heretics, and those men are bound to submit to the sentences that have been pronounced against them who have been convicted, even on slight proof, from deviating from the judgment and path of the Catholic religion. "Besides all these things, he has seized the kingdom of Sicily, which is the special patrimony of the blessed Peter, and which the said prince held in the Apostolic See as a fee, and having driven out, by all kinds of insults, the clergy and laity, stripped of nearly all their property, he has reduced them to indigence and slavery, and compelled them to depart in a state of beggary. And those who have remained, he has forced to live in a servile condition, and in many ways to offend and to attack in hostile fashion the Roman church, of which they are the especial liege men and vassals. He might also be deservedly blamed, that for nine years and more he has omitted to pay the annual pension of a thousand sequins, which he is bound to pay the Roman church for that kingdom. We, therefore, on account of the before-mentioned wicked excesses of his, and many others of a similar kind, having deliberated diligently with our brethren and the sacred council, since, however undeservedly, we occupy the place of Jesus Christ upon earth, and since it has been said to us, in the character of the blessed apostle Peter, « Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth,' &c , we do hereby declare that the aforesaid prince, who has shown himself so unworthy of his empire and kingdoms, and of all honour and dignity, is, on account of his iniquities, cast off by God, so that he shall henceforth he. neither king nor emperor, being so bound in