A.D . 1201. LETTER OF POPE INNOCENT. 519 If you recognized the authority of the Apostolic See, and the reverence due to the same, you would not presume in any way to derogate from the fulness of its power, and the privileges of its dignity, inasmuch as, you, who have been set apart by • her to share her anxieties, have more frequently found her acting as your assistant in the emergencies into which, in your rashness, you had brought yourself. For you cannot excuse yourself, as you ought to have been able to do, on the ground that you were ignorant of that privilege, by which the means of appealing to the Apostolic See lie open to all who have been unjustly aggrieved, inasmuch as you yourself have sometimes appealed to our presence, and from grievances committed by you, appeal has been made to us, not once only, but many times, so that it is not possible for you to be ignorant of the said privilege. But, to let alone other considerations, if on this ground only, you ought to have abstained from all molestation of those subject to you, when they invoked our name, because, in many and arduous emergencies, you have both asked and obtained that favour should be shown to you by the Apostolic See. But, as the result of circumstances sufficiently shows, you neither regard our authority, nor recognize the favour that has been shown to you, nor do you pay any deference to appeals which are interposed, by those aggrieved, to the Apostolic See. For instance, when our beloved son, Master Honorius, the archdeacon of Bichmond, being in full possession of the liberties of the archdeaconry of Eichmond, had, together with his clerks, appealed from you to the Apostolic See, by reason of manifest grievances and various injuries, you nevertheless pronounced upon him, and some of his clerks, sentence of suspension, and upon some churches in the same archdeaconry you pronounced sentence of interdict. And, not content with this indiscretion, after he had set out on his journey for the purpose of coming to the Apostolic See, suspending some of his clerks, and laying an interdict upon their churches, and excommunicating others, (in deed only, for of right you could not,) you extorted from the rest a certain sum of money, disturbing and molesting, in many respects, his state of quiet, as also that of his clerks. Wherefore, because we neither will, nor ought to, leave the excesses of such great presumption uncorrected, we do, by these Apostolic writings, enjoin and command your brotherhood, of yourself, to correct such matters as have been previously mentioned, in order that you may not compel us to be incensed against you to a greater degree, having hitherto borne with your