Source--Text in Michael Doeberl, _Monumenta Germaniae Historica Selecta_ (Muenchen, 1889), Vol. III., p. 26. Translated in Oliver J. Thatcher and Edgar H. McNeal, _Source Book for Mediaeval History_ (New York, 1905), pp. 155-156. [Sidenote: Gregory denies that he ever sought the papal office] [Sidenote: Henry deposed by papal decree] St. Peter, prince of the apostles, incline thine ear unto me, I beseech thee, and hear me, thy servant, whom thou hast nourished from mine infancy and hast delivered from mine enemies that hate me for my fidelity to thee. Thou art my witness, as are also my mistress, the mother of God, and St. Paul thy brother, and all the other saints, that the Holy Roman Church called me to its government against my own will, and that I did not gain thy throne by violence; that I would rather have ended my days in exile than have obtained thy place by fraud or for worldly ambition. It is not by my efforts, but by thy grace, that I am set to rule over the Christian world which was especially intrusted to thee by Christ. It is by thy grace, and as thy representative that God has given to me the power to bind and to loose in heaven and in earth. Confident of my integrity and authority, I now declare in the name of the omnipotent God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, that Henry, son of the Emperor Henry,[389] is deprived of his kingdom of Germany and Italy. I do this by thy authority and in defense of the honor of thy Church, because he has rebelled against it. He who attempts to destroy the honor of the Church should be deprived of such honor as he may have held. He has refused to obey as a Christian should; he has not returned to God from whom he had wandered; he has had dealings with excommunicated persons; he has done many iniquities; he has despised the warnings which, as thou art witness, I sent to him for his salvation; he has cut himself off from thy Church, and has attempted to rend it asunder; therefore, by thy authority, I place him under the curse. It is in thy name that I curse him, that all people may know that thou art Peter, and upon thy rock the Son of the living God has built his Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it. 49. The Penance of Henry IV. at Canossa (1077)