If the authority of the canonical decrees is sometimes enforced in civil matters, and has frequently more effect when applied to the latter than the civil laws which treat of the same subject can exert, how much greater precedence should they enjoy over civil enactments when their own interests are directly involved? Why do I say this? The Sixth Council declared that a subdeacon could be ordained at the age of twenty years, but the Civil Law contradicted this, and ordered that he should not be ordained before he had reached the age of twenty-five. We, however, thinking that the ecclesiastical order should observe its own rules, do hereby direct that those who are worthy of the subdeaconate shall obtain that office when they are twenty years old.