సాక్ష్యం 72. But he who guards against the lust and license of the pardon-preachers, let him be
blessed!
73.The Pope justly thunders against those who, by any art, contrive the injury of the traffic
in pardons.
74.But much more does he intend to thunder against those who use the pretext of pardons
to contrive the injury of holy love and truth.
75.To think the papal pardons so great that they could absolve a man even if he had
committed an impossible sin and violated the Mother of God – this is madness.
76.We say, on the contrary, that the papal pardons are not able to remove the very least
of venial sins, so far as its guilt is concerned.
77.It is said that even St.Peter, if he were now Pope, could not bestow greater graces;
this is blasphemy against St.Peter and against the Pope.
78.We say, on the contrary, that even the present Pope, and any Pope at all, has greater
graces at his disposal; to wit; the Gospel, powers, gifts of healing, etc., as it is written
in I Corinthians xii.
79.To say that the cross, emblazoned with the papal arms, which is set up [by the preachers
of indulgences], is of equal worth with the Cross of Christ, is blasphemy.
80.The bishops, curates and theologians who allow such talk to be spread among the
people, will have an account to render.
81.This unbridled preaching of pardons makes it no easy matter, even for learned men, to
rescue the reverence due to the Pope from slander, or even from the shrewd questionings
of the laity.
82.To wit:- "Why does not the Pope empty purgatory, for the sake of holy love and of
the dire need of the souls that are there, if he redeems an infinite number of souls for
the sake of miserable money with which to build a Church? The former reasons would
be most just; the latter is most trivial.”
83. Again:- "Why are mortuary and anniversary masses for the dead continued, and why
does he not return or permit the withdrawal of the endowments founded on their behalf,
since it is wrong to pray for the redeemed?”
84.Again:- "What is this new piety of God and the Pope, that for money they allow a man
who is impious and their enemy to buy out of purgatory the pious soul of a friend of
God, and do not rather, because of that pious and beloved soul’s need, free it for pure
love’s sake?”
85.Again:- "Why are the penitential canons long since in actual fact and through disuse
abrogated and dead, now satisfied by the granting of indulgences, as though they were
still alive and in force?”