_402._ _Innocent I_ writes: “I have read through the treatise of Pelagius. I found in this much that was antagonistic to the Grace of God, much that was blasphemous, and hardly anything that was deserving of approval. The book is one the evil influence of which each believer ought to be able to recognise for himself and to condemn.” This papal utterance is, of course, not to be classed as a prohibition. I make place for it in the schedule because it is an early expression of the literary policy that is now, fifteen centuries after Innocent, being followed by the Church, namely, to characterise pernicious books and to place upon believers the responsibility of condemning them for themselves. _431._ _The Council of Ephesus_ condemns the errors and the writings of the Nestorians. _435._ _The Emperor Theodosius_ issues an edict forbidding the possession, the reading, or the copying of the Nestorian books, and ordering existing copies to be delivered up for burning.[16] _436._ _Theodosius_ issues an edict forbidding the possession and the reading of the books of the Manichaeans and ordering the burning of the same.[17] _446._ _Pope Leo I_ issues an edict ordering destruction of the books of Porphyry and of Origen, and the writings of the Nestorians, the Manichaeans, the Eunomians, the Montanists, the Eutychians, and all others which were antagonistic to the Christian religion, and which were not in accord with the teachings of the Synods of Nicaea and Ephesus. The prohibition reads: “Whoever owns or reads these books is to suffer extreme punishment.” _494._ Under _Pope Gelasius I_, was issued what is afterwards referred to as the first papal Index. It was a catalogue of works prohibited, and is so cited in the Decretals of Gratian. It was, however, not properly a prohibitory Index, in that it has to do, not with private and general, but with public or official reading. _496._ _Pope Gelasius_ issues a decree, published at a council of Rome, and confirmed in a decree of Gratian, which specifies the patristic writings accepted and approved by the Church, and which then proceeds to the condemnation of a long series of apocryphal and heretical writings and writers. These writings are specified as follows: “_Haec et omnia his similia non solum repudiata, verum etiam ab omni Romana catholica et apostolica ecclesia eliminata atque cum suis auctoribus auctorumque sequacibus sub anathematis indissolubili vinculo in aeternum confitemur esse damnata._”[18] This decree, known as the _Decretum Gelasianum_, is sometimes referred to as the earliest example of an Index emanating from the Church. It is, however, an Index only in a restricted sense of the term, as it does not order a general prohibition of the reading of the works specified but calls simply for their rejection and condemnation. The phrase _omnia his similia_ is curiously vague for an Index specification.