§ 1. Therefore, we, after having
repressed the audacity of those who dare to violate the rights of marriage and
presume to dissolve the indissoluble bond as far as they can, and who do not
hesitate to defile themselves with certain more shameful acts of incest,
desiring also to eradicate this evil as much as we can with the strength
entrusted to us by the Lord, especially in our own times; And we decree and
ordain, by this constitution of ours, which shall endure perpetually, that all
and any persons, whether men or women, of whatever status, degree, order, or
condition, even clerics, seculars, or members of any religious order, shining
with any ecclesiastical or worldly dignity and pre-eminence, who henceforth,
either by themselves or through intermediaries, procure the ejection of an
abortus or an immature fetus, whether animated or even inanimate, formed
or unformed, by means of blows, poisons, drugs, potions, burdens imposed on the
pregnant woman, and even by other unknown or most intricate means, such that
abortion indeed follows, and also the pregnant women themselves, who knowingly
commit the aforementioned acts, incur, by the very fact, the penalties
prescribed and inflicted by both divine and human law, as well as by canonical
sanctions and apostolic constitutions, and by civil laws against true murderers
who have committed voluntary homicide by act and deed (the texts of all of
which we have expressly and word for word inserted in these our letters), and
by this our constitution, which shall endure perpetually, we establish and
ordain that they incur these penalties, laws, and constitutions extended to the
aforementioned cases. (Pope Sixtus V, Effraenatam,
November 19, 1588)
The Latin for “animated or even inanimate” is “tam animati
quam etiam inanimate.”
