Oratio lamentabilis ... Iohannes Savageti Constantiensis et Basiliensis ... super turbatione dicte ecclesie Constantiensis ... una cum tractatu per eum, edito sex dubiis iuris clauso ... Per que evidens iustitia ... Ludovici de Freiberg ... confirmati episcopi ac iniustitia Ottonis de Sunnenberg ... declaratur et ostenditur

Nothing is more unhappy than the happiness of sinners, for the impunity of [their] punishment nurtures them, and their evil will is strengthened like an internal enemy. Therefore, Your Holiness, to whom I report these things grieving, speaking weeping, and denouncing moaning, will deign to think of a remedy that might meet this pestilence, so wicked and so unheard of. And [one] that might bring a salve to the recent wound of the Church in the present, and avail as a caution for posterity. If, I say, ecclesiastical vigor spares these men, who does not see what will follow: how many [others] in the whole world will be made to be promoted against right and law by the power of seculars, and not by the virtue of their merits? It must also be considered that unless the authority of the Apostolic See prevails against the slander of the rebels—so that the said provision, divulged through all of Germany, might force its due effect—it will be held in perpetual contempt and opprobrium, and will remain buried in those parts. But neither will there be any esteem for ecclesiastical censures hereafter, because where apostolic discipline is contemned, it remains that its authority will be shipwrecked. Therefore, it is appropriate to provide with the maturation of counsel, not merely by waiting for time, [lest] their rashness might be increased and the said Church meanwhile be totally overwhelmed. Especially considering that these rebels, for such great offenses, are not known to seek pardon nor to desist from their attempts, but are known to persevere in their malice with an obstinate mind. For where the reprover is not feared, the contemner grows secure. And not to argue against the perverse is nothing other than to foster [them]. Therefore, one of two things is necessary: either [to force] those rebels to the yoke of pressed obedience through due penance, or to allow them to freely abuse their offices for every illicit thing at random. And thus, where is justice? Where is law? Where is the authority of the sacred canons? Where is the reverence of majesty? What, moreover, is left to the spiritual sword? What to ecclesiastical censure? What to the Christian law and discipline? What, finally, is left to the fear of God? If such men are permitted to rage for their own lust to their own and others' destruction, many [things] move me to speak further against the most impudent presumption of the rebels. But I restrain the impetus, realizing that I am making words to very busy ears, and I fear becoming burdensome to Your Holiness with a longer sermon. And so, that the oration may take its end where it took its beginning, we ask and devoutly demand that you provide in such a way that the stain of schism and heresy may not blemish the decorum of the Church during the time of Your Holiness, and that the faculty of causing harm may be taken from those rebels, and the Church of Constance may attain peace with the glory and honor of the Apostolic See.