is eating flesh or
drinking wine contrary to abstinence from such things, and yet these
latter vows may be a matter for dispensation.

For this reason others [*Innocent IV, on the above decretal] maintain
that one may be dispensed even from a solemn vow of continency, for
the sake of some common good or common need, as in the case of the
example given above (Obj. 1), of a country being restored to peace
through a certain marriage to be contracted. Yet since the Decretal
quoted says explicitly that "not even the Sovereign Pontiff can
dispense a monk from keeping chastity," it follows seemingly, that we
must maintain that, as stated above (A. 10, ad 1; cf. Lev. 27:9, 10,
28), whatsoever has once been sanctified to the Lord cannot be put to
any other use. For no ecclesiastical prelate can make that which is
sanctified to lose its consecration, not even though it be something
inanimate, for instance a consecrated chalice to be not consecrated,
so long as it remains entire. Much less, therefore, can a prelate
make a man that is consecrated to God cease to be consecrated, so
long as he lives. Now the solemnity of a vow consists in a kind of
consecration or blessing of the person who takes the vow, as stated
above (A. 7). Hence no prelate of the Church can make a man, who has
pronounced a solemn vow, to be quit of that to which he was
consecrated, e.g. one who is a priest, to be a priest no more,
although a prelate may, for some particular reason, inhibit him from
exercising his order. In like manner the Pope cannot make a man who
has made his religious profession cease to be a religious, although
certain jurists have ignorantly held the contrary.

We must therefore consider whether continency is essentially bound up
with the purpose for which the vow is solemnized. Because if not, the
solemnity of the consecration can remain without the obligation of
continency, but not if continency is essentially bound up with that
for which the vow is solemnized. Now the obligation of observing
continency is connected with Holy Orders, not essentially but by the
institution of the Church; wherefore it seems that the Church can
grant a dispensation from the vow of continency solemnized by the
reception of Holy Orders. On the other hand the obligation of
observing continency is an essential condition of the religious
state, whereby a man renounces the world and binds himself wholly to
God's service, for this is incompatible with matrimony,