AH EXAMINATION

INDULGENCES WITH REFERENCE TO THEIR INFLUENCE

AS A CAUSE
OF THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION
//sk

A Thesis

fxl

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Presented to the Department of History

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University of Southern California

In partial fulfillment
of the

Requirements for the

\
Degree of Master of Arts

By
Donald Gordon Davis
July 26, 1931

UMI Number: EP59152

All rights reserved

INFORMATION TO ALL USERS
The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted.

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a note will indicate the deletion.

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Dissertation Poraismmg

UMI EP59152

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This thesis, w ritten under the direction of the

candidate's F a c u lty Com m ittee and approved by
a l l its members, has been presented to and ac
cepted by the Council on G raduate Study and
Research in p a r t ia l fu lfillm e n t of the require

ter ...of..Ar.tts.

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ments f o r the degree of

D ate January..28> 1.932.

F a c u lty C om m ittee

Professor Gilliland.
C hairm an

Professor Douglas
Professor Early

S e c re ta ry

D ean

/4

W
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To

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MY MOTHER

whose love and prayer

have been a never-failing source

of inspiration and
encouragement

PREFACE
The author wishes to thank those who have made pos
sible the present work--a work which has proved profitable
to himself*

To the chairman of the author*s committee,

Dr* Clarence V. Gilliland, for his criticism of this

study and his heartening personal stimulation, both in
class and out

sincere appreciation*

The other members

of the committee, Mrs. Della T. Early and Dr* G. C.

Douglas, are deserving of thanks for their patience in
The splendid cooperation of the

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reading this paper*

library of the University of Southern California, the

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Los Angeles Public Library, and the Los Angeles Roman

Catholic Junior Theological Seminary merits recognition*
The author is especially grateful to Dr. William P.
White, president of the Bible Institute of Los Angeles,
for placing at his disposal a study room adjoining
the Los Angeles Public Library.

ii

CONTENTS
Page

CHAPTER
INTRODUCTION
THE DEVELOPMENT OF INDULGENCES TO THE TWELFTH
CENTURY...................... ...........

Confession in the apostolic church.....

Development of sacrament of Penance.....

I.

Catholic claims of early indulgences....

12

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The first genuine indulgences

Moderation in the early use of indulgen

16

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ces ....... ....................... .

II. THE DEVELOPMENT'OF INDULGENCES FROM THE

III.

-TWELFTH CENTURY TO THE REFORMATION.....

20

New uses for plenary indulgences........

20

The Treasury of Merit theory.

25

The origin of the Roman Jubilee...

32

The financial traffic in indulgences....

35

Application of indulgences to the dead*.

38

OPPOSITION'TO INDULGENCES PRIOR TO THE

REFORMATION..............................

41

The Waldenses and the Flagellants.......

41

John Wycliff

44

.......... .

Ill

........

John Hus.......

.IV.

48

John of Wesel..................... ....

51

John Wessel of GrBningen.............

53

THE INDULGENCE FOR THE CATHEDRAL OF ST.

PETER !S ......... ......................

5V

The ambition of Albert of Brandenburg.

57

Bargaining for the St. Peter!s Indul

gence..

.....

59

LUTHER AND THE INDULGENCE CONTROVERSY.....

61
65

....

68

The evolution of Luther!s position....

74

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The Ninety-five Theses

The turning-point:

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V.

The activities of John Tetzel.........

the Leipzig

debate....

SUMMARY, WITH CONCLUSIONS---------

..

76
80

APPENDIX.......

82

BIBLIOGRAPHY.....................

90

INTRODUCTION
The attention of Europe was monopolized almost
exclusively for a period of one hundred fifty years
b:y the Protestant Reformation and the subsequent wars
of religion which closed with the Treaty of Westphalia
in 1648.

The significant connection of indulgences

with the beginning of the movement is recognized by

Catholic and non-Catholic alike*

This v/ork proposes

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to trace the practice of granting indulgences by the

Church from its inception in the early penitential

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discipline, which found its roots in the New Testament,

itself, to the posting of Luther1s Theses in 1517
and the subsequent decline of interest in the contro
versial aspect of the indulgence dispute*

The

development of the theory of indulgences, including

the evolution of the Treasury of Merit conception and
the practice of granting indulgences for the dead, will
be examined concomitantly with the growth of abuses in
order to bring increased financial revenues to the
Church.

The study shows that the abuse of indulgen

ces for financial gain in its cumulative effect upon

the minds of right-thinking men provided the immediate
cause of the Reformation, the contributing or under
lying causes of which must be sought elsewhere.

CHAPTER I
THE DEVELOPMENT OF INDULGENCES TO THE TWELFTH CENTURY
Tli Roman Catholic practice of granting indulgences
to the communicants of the Church was not instituted in a
day.

While the earliest genuine indulgences, in the

accepted sense of the term, date from the latter part of

the eleventh century, the roots of the system extend

back to the Apostolic Church and to Christ himself.

It

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is impossible to correctly estimate the influence of

indulgences and the abuses involved in their distribution

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as a cause of the Protestant Reformation without carefully

tracing the evolution of the practice from its first
uncertain sources to the culmination of opposition
against it in 1517.

The opening chapters, therefore,

summarize the history of indulgences to the period of

the Reformation.

According to the definition given in tfThe New Code

of Canon Lav;,
An indulgence is the remission before God of the penalty
due to sins already forgiven as to their guilt, which the
ecclesiastical authority grants out of the treasury of
the Church, to the living by way of absolution, to the
dead by way of suffrage.-*Bishop Hedley of Newport quotes three definitions of
indulgences from Catholic catechisms in use in three differH.A. Ayrinhac, Legislation on the Sacraments in the
......
...
New Code of Canon Lav/" p.

ent countries, the United States, Scotland, and Germany.

The catechism used in American Catholic schools contains
this definition of the terms
An indulgence is the remission of the temporal punishment
which often remains due to sin after its guilt has been
forgiven.^
The following statement is taken from the catechism used
in Scotland*
An indulgence is the remission in whole or part of the
temporal punishment due to sin after its guilt has been
forgiven

er definition of indulgence.

The English translation

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follows*

A German work, The Catechism Explained, gives still anoth

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The remission of the temporal punishment due to us on

account of our sins is called an Indulgence.3
indulgence is thus seen to be in no sense forgiveness
of sin, far from being a permission to sin without guilt.
After sin h a ^ b e e n confessed to the priest and absolution
pronounced, the confessor imposes penance, one of many
types of works, as temporal satisfaction to be met by the
absolved sinner for the sins just forgiven as to eternal
guilt.

An indulgence commutes part or the whole of this

penance into some different type of works.

This has been

the Roman Catholic doctrine of indulgences from the middle

ages to the present, but the sources of the doctrine must
!j. C. Hedley, ffThe Roman Catholic Doctrine of Indul
gences, n nineteenth Century, XLIX (1901), p. 160.
^Ibid., loc. cit.
^Xbid., Loc. cit

be sought almost a thousand years earlier.

Purity of personal living was considered highly es
sential to Christian profession in the early days of the
Church, and a rigorous watch was maintained over the morals
of each congregation by its local minister or lower
officers.

The apostolic instruction to

Confess therefore your sins one to another: and pray one

for another, that you may be saved^was earnestly followed by these first century Christians.

Baptism, it was agreed, carried with it full forgiveness

required confession.

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for all past sins; but sins committed after baptism

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And many of them that believed, came confessing and

declaring their deeds. And many of them who had followed
curious arts, brought together their books, and burnt
them before all;^
All who were found guilty of open sin or disobedience v^ere
excluded from participation in communion services or were
excommunicated.

In many cases those who had been excluded

or excommunicated soon returned seeking readmission to

their former church privileges.

The apostle Paul ordered

the Church of Corinth to restore unconditionally the sin

ner upon their satisfaction of his sincere repentence.
And if any one have caused grief . . . . . To him who is
such a one, this rebuke is sufficient, which is given by
many:
So that on the contrary, you should rather forgive
him and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one be swallowed
up with overmuch sorrow. Wherefore I beseech you, that

r
James 5:16.
2Acts 19s18-19

you would confirm your charity towards him* '. . . And to

whom you have pardoned any thing, I also* For, what I
have pardoned, if I have pardoned anything, for your sakes
have I done it in the person of Christ.-*
Dionysius of Corinth wrote to the Church of Amastis en
joining them frto receive all that return from any sort of
apostasy, from sin, or from heretical e r r o r . T h e

con

fessors of Vienna and Lyons claimed to have loosed all and

bound none.

Bishop Creighton of London describes this

early confessional practice as follows 2

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The element of sin against God, which was forgiven through

penitence, was distinguished from the wrong done to man,
which required punishment before it could be remitted.
The requirements of divine and human justice mere both
satisfied by the same temper of mind on the part of the
penitent*^
Christians became more numerous as time went on, and

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it became impossible to continue this simple community

method of dealing with the sinner.

A new criterion of a

m a n fs penitence began to replace the old method of simply

noting his conduct and demeanor.

If the outward evidence

of the erring ones repentence and contrition satisfied

the local minister of his earnestness, the excluded one
submitted to a long and wearisome penitential discipline,
after which, by taking certain actions, he was allowed to
^11 Corinthians 2 2 6-8, 10.
^H.. M. Gwatkin, Early Church History to A.D. 313,
I, p. 230.
3

M . Creighton, A History of the Papacy from the Great

Schism to the Sack of kome, Vi, p. 68.

resume full church fellowship.

The penitential discipline

was made up of mortifications, abstinences, and good works

of every description, such as giving' alms, making pilgrim-'
ages to distant churches, fasting, and praying.

The whole

process of application for readmission to fellowship, pen

itential discipline, a n d reinstatement to good standing
gradually developed into the sacrament of penance, con
sisting of confession, prescription of penance, and abso

official.

lution pronounced by the priest or a higher ecclesiastical

The forgiveness of sin by the priest finds its

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authority in the Roman Catholic interpretation of the

statement of Jesus:

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Thou art Feter; and upon this rock I will build my church,
and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I
will give to thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven.
And
whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth, it shall be bound
also in heaven:
and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth,
it shall be loosed in heaven.1
According to the Roman Church, Peter here received from
Jesus his commission as Head of the Church and Vicar of
Christ on earth; the power here delegated to him to remit
sins descends to all future popes and loiter officials
appointed by them.

With the gradual development of the pen

itential discipline a new conception arose -- that while

the priest cancels the etdrnal guilt of confessed sin
through the power of the keys (absolution), there still
remains a temporal punishment or earthly satisfaction for
^Matthew 16:18-19.

sin which must he met personally by the penitent hims

Briefly summarized, the system which developed ,?orked
thus:

there were two supplementary factors in penance;

absolution pronounced by the priest released the soul from

the eternal guilt and condemnation of sin; by doing pen
ance the individual meets the temporal satisfaction r e -
quired of his sin.

Edward J. Hanna, a modern Catholic

authority, thus defines penances

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Penance is a sacrament of the New Law instituted by Christ

in which forgiveness of sins committed after baptism is
granted through the priestfs absolution to those who with
true sorrow confess their sins and promise to satisfy for.
the same.-**
The early penitential discipline, or canonical pen

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ance as it came to be known, was extremely heavy in its

requirements, and it became the custom to substitute some
lighter form of works when the penitent exhibited unusual
ly deep contrition.

Only bishops were at first empowered

to thus commute one form of penance into another, but in

the course of time this authority descended to the ordin
ary priest.

As Thurston suggests, ffthe practice of Indul

gences in the medieval Church arose out of the author

itative remission, in exceptional cases, of a certain
proportion of this canonical penance.11^
The eminent medieval historian, Henry Charles Lea,
calls attention to the fact that Homan Catholic theologi-----

J.. Hanna, 11Penance,11 The Catholic Encyclopaedia,

XI, p. 618.
^H. Thurston, The Holy Year of Jubilee, p. 315.

ans prior to the Council of Trent (1545-1565) freely ad

mitted that indulgences were unknown by the Church Fath
ers, and that nthe protagonists in the conflict with Luth
eranism conceded that there was no point of Catholic doc
trine so difficult to defend and so impossible to justify
with proof n 3- as the early use of indulgences.

Catholic

theologians of the middle ages admitted the ignorance of

the Church Fathers on many subjects, such as purgatory,

transubstantiation, the procession of the Holy Ghost, and

indulgences, and justified the later introduction of these

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doctrines by the Churchls authority to pronounce upon her

own doctrine through her supreme head, the bishop of Home.

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Guided as was the pope by Christ his new pronouncements

in doctrine carried the authority of Christ, himself,
although the fundamental bases of the doctrines were always
held to be found in the Bible.

In its last session

(1563), the Council of Trent was obliged to make some

statement concerning indulgences, and declared that Christ
while still upon earth had given the Church through St.
Peter the power of granting indulgences and affirmed their
continuous use from the very beginning of the Christian
Church.

The opening statement of the decree follows:

Whereas the power of conferring indulgences was granted

by Christ to the Church; and she has, even in the most
ancient times, used the said power, delivered unto her of
------ T

H. C. Lea, A History of Auricular Confession and In

dulgences in the Latin Church, III, p. 4.

God; the sacred and holy synod teaches and enjoins, that
the use of indulgences, most salutary for the Christian
people, and approved of by the authority of sacred'* councils,
is to be retained in the Church; and it condemns with
anathema those who either assert that they are useless, or
whydeny that there-is in the Church the power of granting
them.
Since this dogmatic pronouncement at Trent, the Catholic
Church has bent every effort toward building up a convinc
ing array of uindulgences stretching from the days of the
apostles to the tenth and eleventh centuries.

After such

a decree, this was the only possible procedure open to the

church which claimed infallibility.

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After the Council of Trent, the desire to prove the

existence of indulgences in the early church resulted in

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the minutest search of all ecclesiastical writings from

apostolic days through the early middle ages for any sug
gestions which might be presented as evidence for the
veracity of the decree.

Dr. Lea does not hesitate to

assign as a second reason for the early dating of indul

gences by Catholic theologians and historians the material
furnished . . .

by the incurable tendency of unscroupulous

ecclesiastics to manufacture evidence in support of any

claims which interest may lead them to advance.2

A num

ber of simple absolutions have been advanced as early in

stances of indulgences.

Perhaps the most conspicuous of

these is inferred from one of the three hundred extant

T
The Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent,
p. 252.
2

H. G. Lea, op. cit., Ill, p. 131.

letters of Pope John VIII, in reply to certain Frankish

bishops who had enquired concerning the pardoning of
the sins of the fallen in battle against the heathen
Northmen.

This letter, written in 879, granting absolu

tion to the men in question and commending them to God

cannot be construed as an indulgence; because the issue
involved is neither therrelease from temporal punishment
for forgiven sin nor release from purgatorial fires, but

simply the pardon of sin, or salvation.

After these absolutions follows a long list of alleged

canonical penance.

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indulgences which are nothing more than commutations of

Canonical penance, as has been noted,

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was extremely heavy and irksome,

including periods of anything up to twenty years, or even

more, during which the penitent wore a special dress, sat
apart in church, abstained from holy communion, and fasted
a large proportion of the year on bread and waters . those
who had done penance could not, in the early days, ever be
admitted to the clerical militia.
Milman speaks of the ffmany hours of fasting . many
blows of the scourge . . many prayers . . . many pious
e jaculations, ^

and it is not surprising that by the

ninth or tenth century a Penitential prefaces a list of

commutations of Penance with an apology stating that
in these times we are unable to persuade penitents to un
dergo the long terms prescribed in the canons, wherefore
they should be induced to wash out their sins by other
-j.

IvT. Deane sly, A. History of the Medieval Church, pp.ll'4f

^Ii. H. Milman, History of Latin Christianity, I, p. 553

pious works prayers and psalmody, and vigils and alms

giving and lamentations, standing at the cross, often
bending the knee, showing hospitality to the poor and to
pilgrims and fasting.-1These commutations of penance were made upon the basis of
petition to the Holy See at Rome, and pilgrimages were
sometimes made in person for this purpose.

An example of

early commutations of canonical penance alleged to be in

dulgences is the commutation in the ninth century of one

of the Feast of the 1480 Martyrs.

day of penance a year granted those attending the vigil

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A great many assumptions have been made as to early

indulgences which involve nothing more than the Latin word

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indulgentia used in its ordinary sense of ,fto yield, favor,

or humor,u and not at all in the highly technical meaning
which developed in later centuries.

A case in point, often

referred to by Catholic historians, is that of Ulric of

Augsburg,, who in his old age, about 970, made a pilgrimage
to Rome for the salvation of his soul; after making his
.vows he returned to his own country with many gifts of
emoluments and indulgences.

The term here cannot signify

anything beyond Hpriviliges.11

Many early Hindulgences11 have been conclusively proved
to have been forgeries.

Two grants, one of ten years

and the other of twelve, said to have been granted to St.

Patrick and the Irish in the sixth century are no/ gener-

11

ally recognized as spurious.

An indulgence of seven years

and seven quarantines granted by Gregory the Great to vis

itants to Roman churches has been persistently exhibited
as evidence for early indulgences despite the protests of
such Catholic scholars as Father Papenbroek and Father
Pagi, who readily admit its true fraudulent character.
Father Morin has proved the spuriousness of those indul
gences claimed to have been granted by Leo III in the

and altars for Charlemagne,

early ninth century when consecrating churches, -chapels,

internal evidence showing them

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to have been executed three hundred years later.

The negative argument against the early granting of
An incredibly

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indulgences seems well nigh overwhelming.

vast literature remains of Latin Christianity during the

first millenium after Christ, and the Innumerable omis
sions of any mention of indulgences upon occasions which
a few centuries later could not be thought of without
indulgences is ample indication of their nonexistence.
A case more provocative of an Indulgence, had the practice
been customary at that time, could not be found than the
occasion of the visit of Leo IX to Germany in 1049 at the
request of Herimar, Abbot of S. Remi, against the wishes
of Henry I, to dedicate the abbatial church of S. Remi.
S. Remi had baptized Clovis and his men; the dedication
took place on the day of S. Remi, when yearly great crOY?ds
thronged Rheims in veneration of the saint; here, indeed,

12

was a. great occasion.

During the procession to the new

church, Leo, himself, carried the coffin of the Apostle

of Prance for a time, interring with his own hands the
remains of the saint in the splendid new sepulchre.
Wilman gives a picture of the city in festive array:

It was a time singularly well chosen for the papal visit.

Such was vast multitudes thronged from all sides (at the
council there were representatives of England, no doubt
many English among the zealous votaries) that the Pope was
obliged to address them from the roof of a house.
The
church was with the utmost difficulty cleared for the
performance of the ceremony; the pious spectators
trampled each other under foot.3The bull which Leo issued on this memorable occasion,

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while it granted special privileges to the church and

imposed careful restrictions upon those who should in the

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future minister at its specially consecrated altar, gives

not the slightest hint of an indulgence of any sort.

In

the same century, the dedication of the basilica of San

Lorenzo by Nicholar II in which he confirmed its posses
sions and took it'under papal protection and the consecra
tion by Urban II of the church of St. Mary of Monte Cassino carried with the accompanying bulls no mention of in
dulgences.

A century or two later, dedications and con

secrations such as these would not have been thought of

apart from indulgence grants.

The negative argument cov

ering this lengthy period is formidable.

The actual beginning of the practice of granting inT 'H. H. Milman, op. cit., Ill, p. 250.

13

dulgences was simultaneous with the beginning of the First

Crusade.

Gruel treatment of Christian pilgrims to Jerusa

lem from the West by the Turks and interference by the lat
ter with trade between the West and the Orient combined to
arouse intense antagonism between the Christians and the
infidels, as they were termed, of the east; this antagonism
resulted in the decision of Urban II to recover Jerusalem
j*
and its holy relics of the founder of the Church from the
At'the close of the regular busi

domination of the Arabs.

ness of the Council of Clermont, held in November, 1095,

First Crusade.

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Urban made the celebrated address in which he announced the

Frenchman as he was, Urban knew the power

PR
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of an emotional appeal, and he dropped his staid ecclesias

tical Latin for his native fiery French as he called upon
his countrymen to assume the burden of
avenging these wrongs and of recovering this territory
. . L e t the deeds of your ancestors encourage you and in
cite your minds to manly achievements . . Let the holy
sepulchre of our Lord^and Saviour, which is possessed by
the unclean nations, especially arouse you, and the holy
places which are now treated with ignominy and Irreverently
polluted with the filth of the unclean. Oh most valiant
soldiers and descendants of invincible ancestors, do not
degenerate, but recall the valor of your ancestors.!
The climax of Urbans appeal for soldiers of the cross came
I

when he. offered, i-so far as is k n o w n , ^ the first genuine

indulgence known to history;
Whoever, out of pure devotion and not for the sake of gain
ing honour or money, shall go to Jerusalem to liberate the
*

r
F. A. Ogg, A Source Book of Mediaeval History, p. 285.
2H. C. Lea, op. cit., III, pp. 9f. and pp. I42f;.'

14

Church of God, may count that journey in lieu of all

penance*1
This act of Urban II constituted a tri^Jndu^^^
the remission,

that is,

in whole or in part, of temporal punishment

for sin; in addition, this was a plenary indulgence for it

provided uremission of all punishment that has thus far been
incurred by the contrite offender.**2

Besides providing the

genesis of true indulgences, the crusades had a profound

effect upon their development, as will appear later.

A few months after the Council of Clermont, in February, 1096, Urban II granted a second indulgence.

This grant

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took place at the dedication of the Church of St. Nicholas

In Angers when a perpetual indulgence was Instituted for the

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dedication and all subsequent anriual celebrations ; this

decree carried remission of one-seventh of enjoined penance.
Here is seen the origin of partial indulgences -- those
which remitted only part of the individuals penance.

Thus

in two consecutive years, 1095 and 1096, Urban II established

two distinct types of indulgences.

The first was the plen

ary or full indulgence remitting all penance for the man who
served the pope and the Church In conflict vtfith the Saracens,
in Palestine.

The second was the partial indulgence grant

ed at the dedication of a church which remitted a specified

^

Anonymous, 11I n d u l g e n c e , T h e hncvclopaedia Britannica,

XII, p. 275.
2
E. M. Hulme, The Renaissance, the Protestant Revolu
tion, and the Catholic Reformation in Continental Europe,
p. 225.
"

15

fraction of penance.

These two types of indulgences have

been dispensed by the Church ever since.

Hedley!s statement

of the Catholic position on the two forms is as follows:

What the Catholic Church teaches is, first, that she can
make plenary remission of punishment; and, secondly, that
the partial Indulgences, although we do not know what they
exactly avail to remit, do most usefully and mercifully re
mit in some degree those chastisements which are deserved.^
The practice of granting indulgences for fractional parts of
enjoined penance such as one-seventh, one-tenth, or one-

twentieth gradually was abandoned for indulgences granting

the remission of penance in chronological terms such as
Catholic

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ten days, forty days, two years, or twenty years.

theologians ^admit the uncertainty of these chronological

Father Thurston, an eminent Catholic authority,

PR
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values.

admits that nothing

has ever been defined as to the precise meaning of an Indul

gence of so many days or years. . . there can be no cer
tainty even about the theory most commonly propounded, that
the gaining of an Indulgence of seven years would benefit
the sinner to the same extent as the performance of seven
years of the old canonical penance,2
ThurstonTs explanation makes clear the reason for Hedleyfs
uncertainty as to the exact value of partial indulgences.
This much is certain, that in the beginning plenary indul
gences v/ere considered the greatest boon obtainable by hum
anity and were conferred only in return for the highest ser
vice to the Church, serving in her cause in Palestine
"*M. C. Hedley, ,fThe Roman Catholic Doctrine of Indul
gences,H Nineteenth Century, XLIX ( 1901), p'. 163
2

H. Thurston, The Holy Year of Jubilee, p. 317.

16

against the Saracens; partial indulgences, while highly val

ued, were given for more modest services and devotions.
In justice to Catholic doctrine, it should be noted that
sincere confession and absolution of sin was the prime pre
requisite for obtaining an indulgence.

If an individual

secured an indulgence without meeting this requirement,

the temporal penalty held against him remained undiminished.
The Church, officially, never wavered upon this important
point, although her emissaries in the late middle ages of

ten placed a minimum of emphasis upon deep contrition for

sin in their haste to gather in alms.

Indulgences satis

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fied only the temporal punishment due sin and were valueless
Hin so far as they work for holiness and make men stronger

PR
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in the struggle against evil,*11 except insofar as they i m - .

press upon one the graciousness of G o d rs mercy.
''-'n n ii.B 'iw * m W - n n iii-

i ,

For a period of two hundred years, from the beginning

of the twelfth century to the beginning of the fourteenth, par
tial indulgences were granted with the greatest moderation,
although there is evidence of an everwidening use of them in
new situations and under different conditions as the eccles
iastical officials began to realize the eagerness of the
people to^thus purchase immunity from the penalty of
Indulgence grants of less than ten days were enthusiastical
ly sought after.

There were occasional grants of forty days

and a few for a year and forty days.

Occasions for issuing

N. Paulus, Indulgences as a Social Factor in the Mid

dle Ages, p. 16.