urbem jam exarata, vel in posterum exaranda, dubium aliquod subinde emerserit, site quoad Indulgentiarum concessiones, sive quod præscriptas conditiones adimplendas ad præsentem decimam tertiam Romanam editionem in Actis ipsius S. Congregationis relatam recursus habeatur; ac propterea ut hoc Decretum omnibus omnino pateat, typis similiter tum Latino turn Italico idiomate impressuro, ad calcem præfatæ Editionis apponi mandavit.
Datum Romæ ex Segretaria ejusdem S. Congregationis Indulgentiarum, die 15 Decembris 1854.
F. CARD. ASQUINIUS, Præfectum.
Loco ✠ Signi.
Aloisius Colombo, Segretarius.
(Translation.)
DECREE.
The Sovereign Pontiffs of Rome, to whom especially has been committed the care of advancing the eternal salvation of the flock of Christ, have granted an almost countless number of Indulgences for the spiritual benefit of Christians, the holy Council of Trent teaching that "the use of Indulgences is most wholesome to Christian people." (Sess. xxv. in the Decree of Indulgences.) Cases, however, occur, and that not unfrequently, when the said Indulgences are not gained by the faithful, either because the grants of the Indulgences, or the conditions enjoined to be fulfilled, are altogether unknown, or because, in certain little tracts or printed papers hawked about without the approbation of this Holy Congregation (not to speak of those Indulgences which are apocryphal and false), the conditions are not singly and integrally specified. For this reason, it has long seemed to the said Sacred Congregation fitting and necessary that the prayers and good works, and especially those to which, from the general grants of Sovereign Pontiffs, Indulgences have been
