To Pantaleo the Notary, on the False Grain Measure

Gregory to Pantaleo, and so on. [a]

Your experience remembers what oath, and what kind of oath, you took over the most sacred body of the blessed apostle Peter. That is why we entrusted to you without fear the task of inquiry in the patrimony of the district of Syracuse. It is your duty, then, always to keep before your eyes your own good faith and the fear of the same blessed apostle Peter, and so to act that you may be open to blame neither with men in this present life nor with Almighty God at the last judgment. Now we have learned from the report of Salerius our chartulary that you have found that the measure in which the church’s tenant farmers have been made to pay their grain held twenty-five pints. We utterly detested this, and were sorry that you had been late in looking into it. We rejoice, then, at your telling us that you have broken that measure and made a just one. But the chartulary we mentioned has also taken care to mention what has already been collected, while you were in charge, by the fraudulent dealings of the leaseholders in two territories. So, just as we rejoice, with a view to the future, that you have acted zealously in breaking the unjust measure, so we also think of the sins of the past; lest, if what the leaseholders have fraudulently taken from the peasants comes to us, we should be entangled in their sins. [b]

Accordingly we want your experience, with all faithfulness and all integrity, keeping in view the fear of Almighty God and calling to mind the strictness of the blessed apostle Peter, to draw up a list, estate by estate, of the poor and needy tenant farmers, and with the money found to have been gained by fraud to buy cows, sheep and pigs and distribute them among the poor tenant farmers one by one. And we want you to do this with the advice of the most reverend lord Bishop John, and of Adrian, our chartulary and rector. If, moreover, it should be needed for the sake of consultation, our son the lord Julian should also be called in, so that no one else may know, but all may be kept quite secret. Consult among yourselves, then, whether this help should be given to these poor tenant farmers in money or in kind. But whatever the common fund may be, first, as I have said, make a list, and afterwards take pains to distribute to each according to the degree of his poverty. For I, as the teacher of the Gentiles testifies, have everything and abound; nor do I seek money, but reward (Philippians 4). So act, then, that on the day of judgment you may show me the fruit of your labor from the service entrusted to your experience. If you do this purely, faithfully and energetically, you will both receive it back here in your children, and hereafter have full repayment at the examination of the eternal Judge.