A.D. 1200. LETTER OF POPE INNOCENT. to aid the Holy Land, after, using therein the counsels of discreet men, you shall have duly considered the rank of such persons and their means, and shall have taken into consideration the intensity of their devotion, you shall have power to change works of penance that have been enjoined for works of almsgiving. "We do further will, that, joining with you two brethren, where the same can be found, one of the Hospital of Jerusalem and the other one of the Knights of the Temple, as also other religious laymen, you shall provide for discreet knights, or other soldiers, who have assumed the sign of the Cross of our Lord, if they shall be unable to make the voyage at their own expense, a suitable supply out of the said sum, having taken from them a sufficient security that they will remain in defence of the Eastern lands one year or more, according to the amount of the assistance they shall have received ; and that if, which God forbid, they shall die on the way, they will not apply the amount so received to other uses, but will, on the contrary, restore it, to be applied in payment of the troops ; and such persons, when they shall have returned, shall not be discharged from the sureties which they have given, before they shall have presented to you letters from the king, or Patriarch, or Hospital of Jerusalem, or order of the Temple, or else from our legate, giving full testimony to the fact of their attendance there. But, inasmuch as supreme necessity demands, and common utility requires, that the people of Christendom should, not onlyinresources,but in person, render aid to theHoly Land without delay against the attacks of the pagans, we do by these ApostoBc writings inform your brotherhood, forthwith, prudently and diBgently to make it your care to exhort and induce the faithful, both of yourselves and by means of other fitting persons, to the end that those who are capable of fighting the battles of the Lord, may, in the name of the Lord of Sabaoth, assume the sign of the Cross. Let the rest also, according to the extent of their means, bestow their pious alms. "We also ourselves, trusting in the mercy of God, and in the authority of the blessed Apostles, Saint Peter and Saint Paul, by virtue of that power which, unworthy as we are, God has bestowed upon us, of binding and loosing, do indulgently grant to aB who shall in their own person undergo the labours of this expedition, and incur the expense thereof, plenary pardon for those sins, for which they shaB have shown repentance both with voice and