from your error, by admonition and warning, but you have drawn back, you have refused to obey us or Germanus or our fathers, the holy and glorious miracle-workers and doctors, and you have followed the teaching of perverse and wicked men who wander from the truth. You shall have your lot with them. As we have already informed you, we shall proceed on our way to the extreme western regions, where those who are earnestly seeking to be baptized are awaiting us. For although we have sent them bishops and clergymen from our church, their princes have not yet been induced to bow their heads and be baptized, because they hope to be received into the church by us in person. Therefore we gird ourselves for the journey in the goodness of God, lest perchance we should have to render account for their condemnation and for our faithlessness. May God give you prudence and patience, that you may be turned to the truth from which you have departed; may he again restore the people to their one shepherd, Christ, and to the one fold of the orthodox churches and prelates, and may the Lord our God give peace to all the earth now and forever to all generations. Amen. {58} Note the plain statement that the emperor has no authority in ecclesiastical matters. Observe also the general tone of the whole letter. {59} This is equivalent to the excommunication of the emperor. But as Gregory's authority was not recognized in Constantinople, his excommunication of the emperor would not be observed. {60} The first six general councils of the church here referred to were (1) Nicæa, 325; (2) Constantinople, 381; (3) Ephesus, 431; (4) Chalcedon, 451; (5) Constantinople, 553; (6) Constantinople, 681. {61} The text of this passage, as Migne has it, is perhaps corrupt; its meaning, at any rate, is obscure. We have given the only reasonable interpretation that seemed possible. Apparently the pope agrees to assume the responsibility for the destruction of images in the past, if only the emperor will accept the papal view and cease from his opposition to images in the future. 42. Gregory III Excommunicates all Iconoclasts, 731 A.D. Mansi, XII, cols. 272 f; Duchesne, Liber Pontificalis, I, p. 416. See introductory note to no. 41. The pope [Gregory III] made a decree in the council that if anyone, in the future, should condemn those who hold to the old custom of the apostolic church and should oppose the veneration of the holy images, and should remove, destroy, profane, or blaspheme against the holy images of God, or of our Lord Jesus Christ, or of his mother, the immaculate and glorious Virgin Mary, or of the apostles, or of any of the saints, he should be cut off from the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. And all the clergy present solemnly signed this decree. 43. The Pope, Gregory III, Asks Aid of the Franks against the Lombards, 739. A Letter of Gregory III to Karl Martel. Jaffé, IV, p. 14.