De sacrarum stationum veteri instituto a Xisto Quinto pont. max. revocato oratio habita in templo S. Sabinae in die Cinerum

who would go around the established stations, that is, clerics who would perform sacred duties on appointed days, and he made a golden station cup. Gregory arranged these in a more certain order through the Basilicas and cemeteries of the martyrs; he added the primicerius chief of the acolytes, cantors, regionaries, acolytes, and the stational Cross. Those ancient Pontiffs were held by such a desire to retain that custom that, when they suspected the minds of posterity could not be sufficiently drawn by the dignity of the thing itself, they strove to capture and entice them with emoluments and rewards as well. But we, being notable men, with whom it must be dealt in such a way that we might be invited by huge rewards—even to do those things from which it would be right that we not be deterred even by the greatest punishments—we are barely, or indeed not even barely, moved. But those same most holy men proposed rewards, and excellent ones at that, and brought forth new and old things from their treasures. While opening the treasures of the holy Church, for which the keys were handed to them, and heaping gifts upon gifts (to use the words of Boniface VIII), they granted stational indulgences of various terms out of the munificent liberality of the Apostolic See. I speak of those indulgences, the origins, traditions, authority, examples, fruits, dispensations, and similar things of which, because they are explained everywhere by many Doctors of the holy Church, I believe should by no means be repeated by me in this most serious assembly. Only this must be added: that he does not know or think well of how grave, miserable, and cruel the punishments of purgatory’s fire are, who less eagerly seeks and pursues the benefits of indulgences. Indeed, because we show ourselves to be sluggish, lazy, and idle in visiting the Basilicas, I fear, as I was saying, that we signify that the examples of the holy Pontiffs are held in little regard by us; that we less eagerly acquire for ourselves the indulgences granted to the stational churches, and furthermore reject their gifts and benefits. But, because not a few of them even ended their lives in martyrdom, they accumulated the treasures of the Church and the heaps (so to speak) of indulgences with their own blood.