“We, assembled in the city of Arles at the bidding of our most pious Emperor, in the common bonds of charity and unity, and knitted together by the ties of the mother Catholic Church, salute you, most holy Pope, with all due reverence. We have endured to listen to the accusations of desperate men, who have wrought grave injury to our law and tradition, men whom the present authority of our God and the rule of truth have so utterly disowned that there was no reason in their speeches, no bounds to the charges they brought, and no evidence or proof. And so, in the judgment of God and the Mother Church, which has known and attests them, they stand either condemned or rejected. Would that you, dearest brother, had found it possible to take part in such a gathering. We verily believe that in that case a more severe sentence would have been passed upon them, while if your judgment had coincided with ours, the joy of our assembly would have been intensified. But since you found it impossible to leave the chosen place where the Apostles make their daily home, and where their blood testifies ceaselessly to the glory of God, we thought, dearest brother, that we ought not simply to take in hand the subject for the discussion of which we had been called together, but also to consider other matters on our own account, and, as we have come from diverse provinces, diverse are the topics on which it seemed good to us to take counsel.” The letter then enumerates the canons to which the signatories had agreed and transmits them with the remark that as the Bishop of Rome’s dioceses were wider than those of any other bishop, he was the most suitable person to press the acceptance of these canons upon the Church.