Book 1, Chapter 5, Part 5, of History of the Inquisition of Spain, Volume 1. Recorded by Jamie Orango. History of the Inquisition of Spain, Volume 1. Book 1, Chapter 5, The Kingdoms of Aragon, Part 5. With more or less resistance the new Inquisition was thus imposed on the various provinces subject to the Crown of Aragon. The pretense put forward to secure its introduction that it, in no way violated the fueros and liberties of the land, was soon dropped, and, as we have seen, it was boldly pronounced to be superior to all law. For a while this was submitted to in silence, but the ever encroaching arrogance of the officials, their extension of their jurisdiction over matters unconnected with the faith, and their abuse of their irresponsible prerogatives aroused opposition which at length found opportunity for expression. In 1510 the representatives of Aragon, Catalonia, and Valencia were, for the first time, assembled together in the Cortés of Monzon. They came with effusive enthusiasm, stimulated by the conquest of Oran and Algiers, and the desire to retrieve the disaster of Gerbez, and they voted for Ferdinand, the unprecedented servicio or tax levy of five hundred thousand libras, obtaining in return the abolition of the Santa Hermandad. Yet, even this enthusiasm did not prevent murmurs of discontent, and complaints were made that the Inquisition assumed jurisdiction over cases of usury, blasphemy, bigamy, necromancy, and the like, and that the privileges and exemptions enjoyed by the officials led to their unnecessary multiplication, rendering the tribunals oppressive to those who bore the burdens of the state. Ferdinand eluded reform by promising it for the future, and the Cortés were dissolved without positive action. When they next met at Monzon in 1512, they were in a less confiding mood, and it is probable that popular agitation must have assumed a threatening aspect. An elaborate series of articles was drawn up, or rather two, one for Argonne and the other for Catalonia, nearly identical in character, which received the royal assent. It is significant that, with the exception of a clause as to appeals, these articles do not concern themselves with the prosecution of hearsay, but are confined to the excesses with which the tribunals and their underlings afflicted the faithful. The reform demanded by Catalonia embraced thirty-four articles, a few of which may serve to suggest the abuses that had grown so rankly. An especial grievance was the multiplication of officials, not only those engaged in the work of the tribunal, but the unsalaried familiars scattered everywhere, and the servants and slaves of all concerned, who all claimed the fuero, or jurisdiction of the inquisition, with the numerous privileges and exemptions that rendered them a most undesirable element in society. It was demanded that the number of familials in Catalonia should be reduced by thirty-four, whose name should be made known, that under the quiz of servants should be included only those actually resident with their masters or employers. That no one guilty of a grave offense should be appointed to office, that the privilege of carrying arms should be restricted to those who bore commissions, in default of which they could be disarmed like other citizens, that the claim to exemption from local taxes and imposts be abandoned, that officials caught flagrant delicto in crime should be subject to arrest by secular officials without subjecting the latter to prosecution, that civil suits should be tried by the court of the defendant, that the common clause and contracts by which one party subjected himself to whatever court the other might name should be held not to include the inquisition, that the rule forbidding officials to engage in trade should be enforced, that officials buying claims or property and litigation should not transfer the cases to the inquisition, nor use it to collect their rents, that the inquisitors should not issue safe conducts except to witnesses coming to testify, that in cases of confiscation, when the convict had been reputed a good Christian, parties who had brought property from him had paid their debts to him or had redeemed rent charges, should not lose the property or be obliged to pay the debts a second time, that the dowry of a Catholic wife should not be confiscated because her father or husband should be subsequently convicted of heresy, that possessions of for thirty years by a good Catholic should bar conviction of property formally owned by those now convicted of heresy, and that the inquisitors should not elude this prescription of time by deducting periods of war, of minority, of ignorance of the Fisk and other similar devices, that the inquisitors should withdraw their decree prohibiting all dealings with conversos, which was not only a serious restraint of trade, but involved much danger to individuals acting through ignorance. As regards the extension of jurisdiction over subjects unconnected with heresy, the inquisition was not in future to take cognizance of usury, bigamy, blasphemy, and sorcery except in cases inferring erroneous belief. Remaining under excommunication for a year involved suspicion of heresy, and the edict of faith required the denunciation of all such cases to the inquisition. But as there were innural decrees of ipsofacto-excommunications and others, which were privately issued, it was impossible to know who was or was not under the ban, wherefore the tribunal was not to take action except in cases where the censure had been publicly announced. The extent to which the inquisitors had carried their arbitrary assumption of authority is indicated by an article forbidding them in the future from interfering with the disputados of Catalonia or their officials in matters pertaining to their functions and the rights of the state and in the imposts of the cities, towns, and villages. The only reform proposed as to the procedure in an article providing that appeals may lie from the local tribunal to the inquisitor general and suprema with suspension of sentences until they are heard. But there is a hideous suggestiveness in the provision that, when perjured testimony had led to the execution of an innocent man, the inquisitors shall do justice and shall not prevent the king from punishing the false witnesses. The independence of the inquisition as an imperium in imperio is exhibited in the fact that its acceptance was deemed necessary to each individual article, an acceptance expressed by the subscription to each of Blau Asu revendisme senora, the senoria being that of inquisitor general Inguera, to confirm this he and the inquisitors were required to swear in a manner exhibiting the profound distrust entertained of them. The oath was to observe each and every article. It was to be taken as a public act before a notary of the inquisition who was to attest it officially and deliver it to the president of the Cortes. The authentic copies were to be supplied at the price of five suerdos to all demanding them. The future inquisitors, whether general or local, would take the same oath unassuming office, and all this was repeated in various formulas so as to leave no loophole or equivocation. Ferdinand also took an oath promising to obtain from the Pope orders that all inquisitors present in future should observe the articles, and also that, whenever requested by the Cortes, the deputados or the counselors of Barcelona, he would issue the necessary letters and provisions for their enforcement. This was the first of the agreements which became known as concordias, adjustments between the popular demands and the claims of the Holy Office. We shall have frequent occasion to hear of them in the future, for they were often broken and renewed and fresh sources of quarrel were never lacking. The present one was not granted without a binding consideration, for their tribunal of Barcelona was granted six hundred Libres a year secured upon the public revenues. If the Catalan's distrusted the good faith of King and Inquisitor-General, they were not without justification, for the elaborate apparatus of oaths proved a flimsy restraint on those who would endure no limitation on their arbitrary and irresponsible authority. At first Ferdinand manifested a desire to uphold the concordia, and to retain the Inquisitors who commenced at once to violate it. The city of Pepegnan complained that the prescription of time was disregarded, and that the duplicate payment of old debts was demanded, whereupon Ferdinand wrote, October 24, 1512, sharply ordering the strict observance of the terms agreed upon, and the revocation of any acts contravening them. Before long, however, his policy changed, and he sought relief. For potent dates who desired to commit a deliberate breach of faith, there was always the resource of the authority of the Holy See, which, amid its miscellaneous attributes, had long assumed that of releasing from inconvenient engagements those who could command its favor. And Ferdinand's power in Italy was too great to permit of the refusal of so trifling a request. Interestingly, on April 30, 1513, Leo X issued a motoproprio dispensing Ferdinand and Bishop Unguera from their oaths to observe the concordia of Monzon. The popular demands, however, had been too emphatically asserted to be altogether ignored, and an attempt was made to satisfy them by a series of instructions drawn up under date of August 28, 1514, by Bishop Louis Meccado of Tortosa, who had succeeded Unguera as inquisitor general. These comprised many of the reforms in the concordia, modified somewhat to suit inquisitorial views, as, for instance, the number of armed familials permitted for Barcelona was twenty-five, and ten each for other cities. From Vallodiad, September 10, Ferdinand dispatched these instructions by Fernando de Montemayor, Archdeacon of Marmazan, who was going to Barcelona as visitor or inspector of the tribunal. It was not until December 11 that they were read in Barcelona in presence of the inquisitors and of representatives of Catalonia. The letter demanded time for their consideration, and a copy was given to them. Another meeting was held, January 10, 1515, and a third on January 25, in which the instructions were published and the inquisitors promised to obey them. There is no record that the Catalans accepted them as fulfillment of the concordia, and, if they were asked to do so, it was merely as a matter of policy. In a letter of January 4 to the Archdeacon, Ferdinand assumed that the ascent of the Catalans was a matter of indifference. The instructions were to be published without further parlay, and no reference to Rome was requisite as the privileges of the inquisition were not curtailed by them. Cortes were held at Monzon and Lerida, where the popular dissatisfaction found expression in further complaints and demands, leading to some concessions on the part of Ferdinand. The temper of the people was rising and manifested itself in occasional assaults, sometimes fatal, on inquisitorial officials, to facilitate the punishment of which Leo X, by a brief of January 28, 1515, authorized inquisitors to try such delinquents and hand them over to the secular arm for execution, without incurring the irregularity consequent of judgments of blood. Ferdinand was too shrewd to provoke his subjects too far. He recognized that the overbearing arrogance of the inquisitors and their illegal extension of their authority gave great offense, even to the well-affected, and he was ready to curb their petulance. A case occurring in May 1515 shows how justifiable were the popular complaints, and gave him opportunity to administer a severe rebuke. It was the law in Ergon that, when the deputados appointed anyone as lieutenant to the Justicia, if he refused to serve, they were to remove his name from the list of those eligible to public office. A certain Miser Manuel, so appointed, refused to serve, and to escape the penalty procured from the inquisitors of Saragossa, letters prohibiting under pain of excommunication, the deputados from striking off his name. This arbitrary interference with public affairs gave great offense, and Ferdinand sharply told the inquisitors not to meddle with matters that in no way concerned their office. The deputados were under oath to execute the law on the letters must be at once revoked. Finally, he recognized that the demands of the Cortes of Monzón had been justified, and that he had done wrong in violating the Concordia of 1512. One of his latest acts was a cédula of December 24, 1515, announcing to the inquisitors that he had applied to the Holy See for confirmation of the agreements made and sworn to in the Cortes of Monzón and Herida. There was no doubt that this would speedily be granted, wherefore he straightly commanded under pain of forfeiture of office that the articles must not be violated in any manner, direct or indirect, but must be observed to the letter. The inquisitor general had agreed to this, and would swear to comply with the bull when it should come. Ferdinand died January 23, 1516, followed in June by inquisitor general Mercader. Leo X probably waited to learn what the new monarch Charles desired to continue the policy of his grandfather. It is true that he had dispensed Ferdinand and Nunguera from their oaths in view of great offense to God and danger to conscience involved in the observance of the Concordia, but a word from the monarch was sufficient to overcome his scruples. If Ferdinand had felt it necessary to concede could not be withheld when, in the youth and absence of Charles, his representatives could scarce repress the turbulent elements of civil discord. Accordingly, Leo confirmed all of the articles of both the Catalan and Argonese Concordias by the Pob Pastorales of Fisi, August 1, 1516, in which he declared the officials of the inquisition frequently transgress the bounds of reason and propriety in their abuse of their privileges, immunities, and exemptions, and that their overgrown numbers reduced almost to nullity the jurisdiction of the ordinary ecclesiastical and secular courts. This action, he says, is taken as the especial prayer of King Charles and Queen Juana, and all inquisitors and officials contravening its prescriptions, if they do not, within three days after summons revoked through unlawful acts are subject to excommunication latosentio, deprivation of office, and perpetual disability for re-employment ipso facto. Moreover the archbishops of Azaragosa and Tarragona were authorized and required, whenever called upon by the authorities, to compel the observance of the bold bioclassical censures and to other remedies without appeal, invoking, if necessary, the secular arm. Thus, after four years of struggle, the Concordias of 1512 were confirmed in the most absolute manner and the relations between the inquisition and the people appeared to be permanently settled. The inquisitors, however, as usual, refused to be bound by any limitations. They claimed, and acted on the claim, that the papal bull of confirmation was surediptus, and not entitled to obedience, and that both the Concordias and the instructions of Bishop Mercader were invalid as being restrictions impeding the jurisdiction of the holy office. On the other hand, the people grew more restive and increased their demands for relief. The occasion presented itself when Charles came to Spain to assume possession of his mother's dominions. At Cortes, held in Zaragoza, May 1518, he received the allegiance of Aragon, and swore to observe the fueros of the Cortes of Zaragoza, Tarazona, and Monzón. Money was soon wanted to supply the reckless liberality with which he filled the pouches of his greedy flemmings, and towards the end of the year he summoned another assembly to grant him a subsidio. It agreed to raise two hundred thousand libras, but coupled with a series of thirty-one articles, much more advanced than anything either to demand it in Aragon. In fact, copied with little change from those agreed to in Castile by Juan Lissave, and abandoned in consequence of his death. Articles which revolutionized inquisitorial procedure, and assimilated it to that of secular criminal courts. Articles in these matters was now wholly under the influence of his former tutor and president inquisitor general, Carnal Adrien. He wanted the money, however, and he gave an equivocal consent to the articles. It was, he said, his will that in each and all the holy cannons should be observed, with the decrees of the holy sea, and without attempting anything to the contrary. If doubts arose, the pope should be asked to decide them. If many one desired to accuse inquisitors or officials, he could do so before the inquisitor general, who would call in counselors and administer justice, or if the crime pertained to the secular courts, he would see the justice was speedy. This declaration, with the interpretation to be put on each and every article by the pope, he promised under oath to observe and enforce, and he further swore not to seek dispensation from this oath, or to avail himself of it obtained. The people were amply justified in distrusting the rulers, for as Charles subsequently instructed the court of Sifuentes, his ambassador at Rome, to procure the revocation of the articles and the dispensation from his oath to observe them, Charles had thus shuffled off from his shoulders to those of the pope the responsibility for this grave alteration to inquisitorial procedure, which, by forcing the holy office to administer open justice, would have diminished so greatly its powers of evil. The question was thus transferred to Rome, and the courtes lost no time in seeking and to obtain from Leo the Tenth the confirmation of the articles. A letter requesting this was procured from Charles and was forwarded to Rome with a copy of the articles and of Charles's oath, officially authenticated by Juan Pratt, the notary of the courtes. The papers were sent to Rome by a certain Diego de la Casas, a converse of Seville who, as his subsequent history shows, must have been amply provided with the funds necessary to secure a favorable hearing. The situation was one which called for active measures on the part of the inquisition. The courtes dissolved January 17, 1519, and a letter of the 22nd from the Suprema to the inquisitor of Cala de Jud shows that already steps had been taken to prosecute all who had endeavored to influence them against the inquisition, or who had complaints to Charles or Adrienne. A more effective and bolder scheme was to accuse Juan Pratt of having falsified the series of articles sent to Rome. Charles had appointed a commission consisting of the Archbishop of Sarabosa, Cardinal Adrienne, and Chancellor Gattinata, to consider all matters connected with the inquisition. To them Pratt had submitted the articles which they returned to him with a declaration, which must have been an approval as its character was seducially suppressed in the subsequent proceedings. Notwithstanding this, the Sarabosa inquisitors, Pedro Albures and Torbidio Saldaña promptly reported to Charles, who had left Sarabosa for Barcelona, that Pratt had falsified the articles, and Charles, from Igualada, February 4, replied ordering them to obey the instructions of Cardinal Adrienne and collect evidence as to the falsifications which they claimed to have discovered. They postponed action, however, for some weeks until the Archbishop had left the city, and did not arrest Pratt until March 16. Their investigation revealed some trivial irregularities, but nothing to invalidate the accuracy of the articles transmitted to Rome. Yet on the 18th they communicated to the Suprema the results of their labours, as though the whole record was vitiated and Pratt had been guilty of falsification. A way thus was opened to escape from the engagements entered into with the Cortes. A series of articles was drawn up, signed by Catinara, which was sent to Rome as the genuine one, and urgent letters were dispatched, April 30, to all the Roman agents, the Pope and four of the Cardinals in the Spanish interest, stating that the official copy was falsified. The genuine one that was that bearing Catinara's name, the honor of God, was involved in the safety of the Catholic faith, and no effort was to be spared to secure the papal confirmation to the right articles. To justify this it was necessary that Pratt should be convicted and punished, apparently fearing that this could not be accomplished in Saragossa, Cardinal Adrian ordered the inquisitors to send him to Barcelona for trial. In ignorance that this was in violation of one of the dearest of the Argonese privileges, forbidding the deportation of any citizen against his will. This aroused a storm, and the leading officials of church and state interposed so effectually with the inquisitors that Pratt was allowed to remain in the secret prison of the Alphagedia. The quarrel was now assuming serious proportions. Not only was the kingdom of flame with this attempted violation of its privileges, but it was universally believed that Charles had granted all of the demands of the Cortes in return for the Servicio, and his interference with the papal confirmation was bitterly resented. The diputados summoned the inquisitors to obey the Concordia 1512, as confirmed by the Bowl of August 1st, 1516, while awaiting confirmation of the new Concordia, and at the same time they called the barons and magnates of the realm to a conference at Fuentes. Wents on May 9th they sent to Charles a remonstrance more emphatic than respectful, with an intimation that the Servicio would not be collected until Pratt should be released, the pretext being that the papers related to it were in his office. After this Charles responded lawfully, May 17th, that no personal interest would be neglected his soul and conscience, nor to preserve his kingdom, would he allow anything against the honor of God and to the determinant of the holy office. Under threat of excommunication and other severe penalties he ordered the diputados not to convoke the estates of the realm, or to send an envoy to him. He would comply with the Concordia and had already asked its confirmation of the Pope. The fact being that he had, on May 7th, written to Rome, and this he repeated on May 29th, to impede the confirmation of the official Concordia and to urge that of his own version. There was a rumor that the estates on May 14th had resolved to take Pratt from the Argeria by force, and to meet this, on May 17th, he sent the Commodore Garcia de la Risa to Saragossa with instructions to arm the cofradia of San Pedro Martir, an association connected with the Inquisition, to raise the people and to meet force with force. The authorities were to be bullied and told that the king would assert his sovereign authority and that nothing should prevent the extradition of Pratt. In the hands of his ghostly advisors he was prepared to receive a war in deference to the abuses of the Inquisition. There was fear that the inquisitors might be intimidated into releasing Pratt, and Colonel Adrian took the unprecedented step of writing directly to the goeller of the Alphagedia, instructing him to disobey any such orders. In spite of this assertion of absolutism, Charles's orders were treated with contempt. The Cortesmet Azugada refused to obey his angry commands to disperse and sent him to Don Sancho de la Caballera with the unpleasant message that the Servicio would be withheld until he should grant justice to the kingdom. His finances, in the hands of his Flemish favorites, were in complete disorder. The emperor Maximilian had died January 22, and the contest for the succession against the gold of Francis I was expensive. Moreover, in expectation of the Servicio, Chivares had obtained advances at usurious interests so that the expected funds were already nearly exhausted, and as soon as the electoral struggle ended in Charles's nomination, June 28, there came fresh demands for funds to prepare for his voyage to assume his new dignity. Chivares therefore eagerly sought for some compromise to relieve the deadlock, but the Argonese on the one hand and the Cardinal Adrian on the other were intractable. The high-handed arrest of Pratt had fatally complicated the situation. Charles yielded in so far as to order that Pratt should not be removed from the kingdom, and several tentative propositions were made as to the trial of Pratt, which only show how little he and his advisers realized the true condition of affairs. With wanted Argonese tenacity, the Buddha was adhered to the position that the accuracy of the record should not be called in question, and that the only point to be determined was whether the inquisition rightfully had any jurisdiction in the matter. At the same time, Toschele were not seeking to elude payment of the Servicio, they agreed on September 7 to levy it, at the same time begging Charles to release Pratt. They were probably led to make this concession by a victory which they had gained in Rome. Both sides had been vigorously at work there, but the Argonese had the advantage that Leo X at the moment was incensed against the Spanish inquisition because of the insolent insubordination of the Toledo Tribunal in the case of Bernardino Diaz, of which more hereafter. His own experience showed him of what it was capable, and the request of the Cortes for the confirmation of the Concordia was to a great extent granted by three briefs, received August 1, addressed respectfully to the king, to Corneladrian, and to the inquisition of Saragossa, reducing the inquisition to the rules of the common law. Charles did not allow the briefs to be published, and when the Diputalos presented to the inquisitors the one addressed to them, they refused to obey it without instructions from Adrien, whereupon, on August 8, the Diputalos applied to Rome for some further remedy. End of Book 1, Chapter 5, Part 5, Recorded by Jamie Arango. Although the briefs were thus dormant, they became the central point of the contest. On September 24, Charles dispatched to Rome Lope Juardo de Mendoza as a special envoy with long and detailed instructions. He had been advised, he said, that the pope intended to issue a bull revoking all inquisitorial commissions save that of Cardinal Adrien, that in future the bishops with their chapters in each sea were to nominate two persons of whom the inquisitor general was to select the fittest and present him to the pope for confirmation. The acts of these inquisitors were to be judiciously investigated every two years, and their procedure was to conform to the common law and to the canons. The elaborate arguments which Charles urged against each feature of this revolutionary plan show that it was not a figment but was seriously proposed with likelihood of its adoption. Moreover, he said that influences were at work to secure the removal of the San Banditos of convicts from the churches against which he earnestly protested. And had refused three hundred thousand dukets offered him to procure this concession. In conclusion Charles declared that no importunity should shake his determination to make no change in the inquisition, and he significantly expressed his desire to preserve the friendship of his holiness. What secret influences were at work to effect a complete reversal of papal policy it would be vain to guess? But Mendoza had scarce time to reach Rome when he procured a brief of October 12th addressed to Cardinal Adrian. In this, Sadoleto's choicest Latiny was employed to cover up the humiliation of conscious wrongdoing, in its effort to shift the responsibility to the shoulders of others. Charles's letters and Mendoza's message had enlightened him as to the intentions of the king with regard to the preservation of the faith and the reform of the inquisition. He promised that he would change nothing, and would publish nothing without the assent of the king and the information of the inquisitor general, but he dwelt on the complaints that reached him from all quarters of the aravus and iniquity of the inquisitors. He warned Adrian that the infamy of the wickedness of his subdelegates redounded to the dishonor of the nation and affected both him and the king. He was responsible, and must seek to preserve his own honour and that of the king by seeing that they desist from this insolence, with which they disregarded the papal mandates and rebelled against the holy sea. While thus the three briefs were not revoked, they were practically annulled. The ignignation of Arengonose, at finding themselves thus juggled, was warm, and found expression January 30th, 1520, in discontinuing the collection of the Servicio. Charles was now at Cornunia, preparing for his voyage to Flanders and Thither. On February 3rd, the Diputados sent Azor Zapata and Igno de Mendoza to procure the liberation of Pratt and urged Charles to obtain the confirmation of the Condordia. To liberate Pratt without a trial was tacitly to admit the correctness of his record, yet on April 21st Cardinal Adrian issued an order for their fiscal to discontinue the prosecution and for the inquisitors to relax Pratt. This order was presented made first to the inquisitors, but the word relaxation was that used in the delivery of convicts to the secular arm for burning. Pratt stoutly refused to accept it and remained in prison. Charles embarked May 21st, and the rest of the year, 1520, was spent in endeavors by each side to obtain the confirmation of their respective formulas of the Concordia, and in fruitless attempts by Charles to have the three briefs revoked. Though unpublished and virtually annulled, they were the source of great anxiety to the inquisition. The correspondence between Charles and his Roman agents shows perpetual insistence on his part and perpetual promises and evasions by the Pope, sometimes on the flimsiest pretext for postponement. The secret of which is probably to be found in a report by Juan Manuel, the Spanish ambassador, on October 12th, that the Pope was promised 46,000 or 47,000 dukets if he could induce the king to let the briefs stand. Thus it went on throughout the year, and when Leo died December 1st, 1521, the briefs were still unrevoked. A year earlier, however, December 1st, 1520, he had confirmed the Concordia, in a bull so carefully drawn as not to commit the Holy See to either of the contesting versions. It was limited to the promises embraced in Charles' oath, and as regards the articles, it merely said that the canons and ordinances and papal degrees should be involubly observed under pain of ipso facto excommunication, dismissal from office, and disability for reappointment. Their side was consequently at liberty to put what construction it pleased on the papal utterance. Charles, meanwhile, had been growing more and more impatient for the Servicio so long withheld. He had written to Adrian and also to the inquisitors, ordering that the Concordia de Monzón, 1512, and that of Zaragoza, according to his version, should be strictly obeyed, so that the abuses thus sought to be corrected should cease, and the people should pay the impost. The inquisitors dallyed, and seemed to have asked him what articles he referred to. For he replied, September 17, explaining that they were those of Monzón and Zaragoza, the latter as expressed in the papers signed by Adrian and Cartinara. And therefore he received the papal confirmation of December 1st he lost no time in writing, December 18, to Adrian and the inquisitors announcing it and ordering the articles to be rigidly observed without gloss or interpretation, so that the abuses and disorders prohibited in them may cease. But he was careful to describe the articles as those agreed on at Monzón and lately confirmed at Zaragoza, in the form adopted by Adrian and Cartinara. The Aragonose, on the other hand, adhered to their version. The bull of confirmation seems to have reached Zaragoza through Flanders, accompanied by a letter from Charles, and it was not until January 15, 1521, that the Diputados wrote to Adrian in closing the royal letter and a copy of the bull. In obeying it he conceded the Aragonose version of Concordia, though with a bad grace. From Torcedillas, January 28, he wrote to the Diputados and the inquisitors that the bull must be obeyed, although it might properly be considered surreptitious, as it asserted that Charles had sworn to the fictitious articles inserted by Juan Prat, for which the latter deserved the severest punishment. In spite of this burst of petulance, however, he practically admitted Prat's innocence by ordering his liberation, and, on February 13, 1521, the order was carried in triumph by the governor. The Diputados and a concourse of nobles and citizens to the Alapharrilla, and solemnly presented to the inquisitors, who asked for copies, and with these in their hands said that they would do their duty without swerving from justice and reason. So well satisfied were the Aragonose that, to show their gratitude, they had already, on January 18, ordered the cities and towns to pay all current imposts, as well as the suspended subsidio within forty-five days. It may be added that finally Cardinal Adrian recognized the innocence of Prat in the most formal manner, in a letter of April 20 to the inquisitors, imposing silence on the fiscal and ordering the discharge of Prat and his securities. Triumph and gratitude were alike misplaced. Cardinal Adrian had followed his letter of January 28, with another, of the thirtieth, to the inquisitors, instructing them that the papal confirmation must be construed in accordance with the sacred canons and the decrees of the Holy See, so that they could continue to administer justice duly, and he encouraged them with an Ayuda de Costa, or Gratturri. They went on imperturbably with their work. Not only was the concordia of Saragossa never observed, but that of Monzon was treated as non-existent, and we shall see hereafter that, towards the close of the century, the inquisition coolly asserted that the latter had been invalidated when Leo the Tenth released Ferdinand from his oath to observe it, and that the former had never been confirmed, and that there was no trace of either having ever been observed. The inquisition, in fact, was invulnerable and impenetrable. It made its own laws, and there was no power in the land save that of the crown that could force it to keep its engagements. Meanwhile, the obstinacy of the Catalan's, which detained the impatient Charles in Barcelona throughout the year 1519, secured, nominally at least, the formal confirmation by both Charles and Adrian of the Monzon Condoria of 1512 with additions. One of these provided that anyone who entered the service of the Holy Office, while liable to a civil or criminal action, should still be held to answer before his former judge, and that criminal offenses, unconnected with the faith, committed by officials, should be exclusively justifiable in the civil courts. This struck at the root of one of the most serious abuses, the immunity with which the inquisition shielded its criminals, and scarcely less important to all who had dealt with the new Christians, was another article providing that property acquired in good faith, from one reputed to be a Christian, should be exempt from confiscation, in case the seller should subsequently be convicted, even though the thirty years' prescription should still exist. The agreement was reached January 11, 1520, but experience of the faithlessness of the inquisition had made the Catalan's wary. They were about to grant a Servicio to Charles, and they sought a guarantee by addressing to him a supplication that he should make Cardinal Adrian swear to the observance of the Concordia of 1512, and the new articles, and that he should procure within four months from the Pope a bowl of confirmation, in which the bishops of Lerida and Barcelona should be appointed conservators, with full power to enforce the agreement. They offered to pay 200 Ducats toward the cost of the bowl, and they demanded that they should retain 20,000 libras of Servicio until the bowl should be delivered to the diputados. The same condition was attached to a liberal donation of 12,000 libras, which they made to the inquisition, probably a part of the bargain. Meanwhile, Charles was to give orders that the inquisitors should be bound by the articles, and, in case of infraction, satisfaction for such violation should be deducted from the 20,000 libras. In due time, August 25, Leo X executed a formal bowl of confirmation of the articles of 1512 and 1520, and appointed the bishops of Lerida and Barcelona as conservators. What was the value of the Concordia thus solemnly agreed to and liberally paid for, with its papal confirmation and conservators, was speedily seen when, in 1523, the authorities of Perpignan became involved in a quarrel with inquisitor Juan Naverdu over the case of the wife of Juan Noguer. They complained of an infraction of the Concordia and applied to the bishop of Lerida for its enforcement. He appointed Miguel Roeg, a canon of Elna, as the executor of his decision, who issued letters ordering the inquisitors and his secretary to observe the Concordia under pain of excommunication, and to drop the cases which they were prosecuting. Appeal was also made to Rome, and letters were obtained from Clement VII. Charles, however, intervened and obtained another brief, January 6, 1524, annulling the previous one, and transferring the matter to inquisitor general Manrique. The result was that nearly all the magistrates of Perpignan, the consuls, the jurados, with their lawyers, and Miguel Roeg were obliged to swear obedience in all things to the inquisition, were exposed to the irredeemable disgrace of appearing as penitents at the mass, and were subjected to fines from which the Holy Office gathered in the comfortable sum of one thousand one hundred fifteen duquets. The motto of the inquisition was no le me tanghere, and it administered a sharp lesson to all who might venture even under papal authority to make it conform to its agreements. It was in vain that the sturdy subjects of the Crown of Aragon struggled and gained concessions, paid for them, and fenced them around with all the precautions held sacred by public law. The inquisitors felt themselves to be above the law, and all the old abuses continued to flourish as rankly as ever. About this time the Cotes of the Three Kingdoms, by command of Charles, addressed to the inquisitor general Malrique a series of sixteen grievances, repeating the old complaints, the extension of jurisdiction over usury, blasphemy, bigamy, and sodomy, the acceptance by the inquisitors of commissions to act as conservators in secular and ecclesiastical cases and profane matters, their arresting people for private quarrels and on trivial charges and insufficient evidence leaving on them and their descendants an invasible stain, even though they were discharged without penance, their multiplication of familiars and concealing of their names, appointing criminals and protecting them in their crimes, and finally their overbearing and insulting attitude in general. In answer to this the inquisitor general contended himself with asserting that the laws were obeyed and asking for specific instances of infraction and the names of the parties secure that no one would dare to come forward and expose himself to the vengeance of the tribunal. Again in 1528 at the Cortes of Monson we find a repetition of grievances, the abuse of confiscations, the cognizance of usury and other matters disconnected with heresy and general observance of the articles agreed upon. To the petition that he remedy these and procure from the inquisitor general and order to his subordinates to conform themselves to the Concordias, Charles returned the equivocating answer. His Majesty will see that the inquisitor general orders the observance to that which should be observed, removing abuses, if there are any. The imperial attitude was not such as to discourage the audacity of the inquisitors and, at the Cortes of Monson in September 1533, the deputies of Aragon presented two inquisitor general Manrique, who was present, two series of grievances. One of these he promptly answered by characterizing some of the demands as impertinent, scandalous, and illegal, and others as not worthy of reply. The other series was referred to Charles and was not answered until December. It commenced by asking that the Concordia confirmed by Leo the Tenth in 1516 should be observed, to which the reply was that such action should be taken as would comport with the service of God and proper exercise of the Inquisition. The request that the inquisitors confine themselves to matters of faith was met with the assertion that they did so, except when under orders from their superiors, to the demand that the dowries of Catholic wives should not be confiscated, the dry response was that the laws should be observed. In this cavalier spirit the rest of the petition was disposed of, and the whole shows how completely the Holy Office was emancipated from any subjugation to the laws, which had cost such struggles to obtain and which had been paid for so largely. While Manriqui and the Suprema were at Monzon, they were called upon to take action with regard to troubles at Barcelona, between the Inquisitor Fernando de Lorazes and the magistrates Diputados. These had been on foot for some time. A letter from Charles from Bologna, February 25, 1533, to Lorazes assures him of his sympathy and support, and, in September, the Suprema at Monzon resolved to send a judge thither to prosecute and punish the offenders for their enormous delinquencies. What were the merits of the quarrel do not appear, but it was doubtless provoked by the overbearing arrogance of Lorazes, who, at the Cortes of Monzon, the Catalans represented to Charles that the pretensions of the Inquisitor impeded the course of justice in matters involving the regalillas or prerogatives of the crown, and asked to have him prosecuted by the Bishop of Barcelona. Charles thereupon addressed to Lorazes a letter, January 16, 1534, forbidding him in future to interfere with the royal judges, as no one could claim exemption from the royal jurisdiction. At the same time, he instructed his lieutenant for Aragon, Fadrique de Portugal, Archbishop of Saragossa, to enforce this mandate. It was not long before Lorazes had the opportunity of manifesting his contempt for these expressions of royal will. One of the councils holding the Admiralty Court of Barcelona was hearing a case between two merchants, Juan Ribas and Geralt Camps. A quarrel ensued between them. Ribas, with his servant Juan Monceni, struck camps in the face, and then, drawing his sword, threatened the council's life. This was a scandalous offence to the dignity of the crown, under whose protection the court was held. By order of the Archbishop and royal council, the culprits were arrested and thrown in prison. But Ribas was a familiar of the inquisition, and Lorazes presented himself before the Archbishop in full court and claimed him. The letters of Charles V were read, and his claim was rejected, whereupon, on June 13, he issued a mandate demanding the surrender to him of Ribas, and forbidding all proceedings against him under pain of excommunication. What was the termination of this special case we have no means of knowing? But Lorazes did not suffer by reason of his audacity. In 1542 he was made Bishop of Elna. Wince, he passed by successive translations through the seas of La Rida, Tortosa, and Taragonia, dying at last, full of years and honors, in 1568 as Archbishop of Valencia. It is not worthwhile at present to pursue these disputes which reveal the character of the inquisition and the resistance offered to it by the comparatively free population subject to the crown of Aragón. We shall have ample opportunity hereafter to note the persistent arrogance of the inquisitors under the royal favor, the restlessness of the people, and the fruitlessness of their struggle from relief from oppression. The Holy Office had become part of the settled policy of the House of Austria. The Lutheran revolt had grown to enormous proportions, and no measured seems too severe that would protect the faith from an enemy even more insidious and more dangerous than Judaism. The system grew to be an integral part of the national institutions, to be uprooted only by the cataclysm of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic War. At what cost to the people was this effected is seen in the boast in 1638 of learned official of the inquisition that in its favor the monarchs had succeeded in breaking down the municipal laws and privileges of their kingdoms, which otherwise would have presented inseparable obstacles to the extermination of heresy, and he proceeds to enumerate the various restrictions on the arbitrary power of the secular courts which the experience of ages has framed for the protection of the citizen from oppression, all of which had been swept away where the inquisition was concerned, leaving the subject to the discretion of the inquisitor. Book 2, Chapter 1, Part 1 of History of the Inquisition of Spain, Volume 1. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. History of the Inquisition of Spain, Volume 1 by Henry Charles Lee. Book 2, Relations with the State. Chapter 1, Relations with the Crown. Part 1. What gave to the Spanish inquisition its peculiar and terrible efficiency were the completeness of its organization and its combination of the mysterious authority of the church with the secular power of the Crown. The old inquisition was purely an ecclesiastical institution. Empowered, it is true, to call upon the State for aid and for the execution of its sentences. But throughout Christendom, the relations between church and State were too often antagonistic for its commands always to receive obedience. In Spain, however, the inquisition represented not only the Pope, but the King. It practically wielded the two swords, the spiritual and the temporal, and the combination produced a tyranny similar in character, but far more minute and all pervading, to that which England suffered during the closing years of Henry VIII as supreme head of the church. While thus its domination over the people was secure and unvarying, its relations with the royal power varied with the temperament of the sovereign. At times it was the instrument of his will, at others it seemed as though it might almost supplant the monarchy. It was constantly seeking to extend its awful authority over the other departments of State, which struggled with varying success to resist the encroachments, while successive kings, autocratic in theory, sometimes posed as arbitrators, sometimes vainly endeavored to enforce their pacificatory commands, but more generally yielded to its domineering spirit. When Ferdinand consented to the introduction of the inquisition, it was no part of his policy to permit the foundation of an institution which should be independent of the royal authority. He who sought to forbid in Spain the residence of Papal Nuncios and Ligates was not likely to welcome the advent of a new swarm of Papal delegates, whose power over life and property would carry unchecked to every corner of the land the influence of Rome. Accordingly, as we have seen, he conditioned the admission of the inquisition on the concession of the power of appointment and dismissal, and he flatly told Sixtus IV that he would permit none but appointees of his own to exercise the office of inquisitor. As the institution developed and became more complex, he nominated to the pope the individual to whom the Papal delegation as inquisitor general should be given, and he appointed the members of the Suprema, which became known as the Concejo de su Medistad de la Santa Genera Inquisición. Although the papal commission granted to the inquisitor general faculties of subdelegating his powers and appointing and dismissing his subordinates, thus rendering his action indispensable, Ferdinand was careful to assert his right to control all appointments and to assume that at least they were made with his assent and concurrence. In 1485 the sovereigns had no scruble in appointing at Guadalupe the inquisitors who made such havoc among the apostates. August 8th, 1500, he writes to the bishop of Bonavalle that he had determined to commit to him the office of inquisitor of Sardinia, for which the commission and subdelegation will be dispatched to him by the inquisitor's general. He can appoint an assessor and notary, but the other officials will be sent from Spain. A letter of the same date to the Lieutenant General of Sardinia announces the appointment by the inquisitor's general con nuestra voluntad y consentamiento, which was the ordinary formula employed, even in such petty cases as when he advised Pedro Badia, receiver of confiscations at Barcelona, March 13, 1501, that they had appointed Gregorio Zamarado as portero or aparator of that tribunal in place of Guillen Donadal, and that he is to receive the same wages. Although the participation of the inquisitor general was indispensable, Ferdinand customarily assumed his acquiescence as a matter of course. He would make the appointment and then ask affectionately for the subdelegation of power. As regards subordinate positions, Torquemata recognized the royal participation when, in 1485, he instructed inquisitors that they could fill vacancies temporarily, quote, until the king and I provide for them, close quote. As a rule, it may be said that Ferdinand rarely troubled himself about subordinates, but had no hesitation in assuming full power when he saw fit, as in writing to an inquisitor, March 21, 1499, quote, we order you to appoint, as by these presents we appoint Juan de Montiéndez as fiscal in your tribunal, close quote. If he thus controlled appointments, he was equally concerned in dismissals. We find him writing, April 22, 1498, to an inquisitor of Saragossa, who had discharged an official at Caletaillud, to reinstate him, as he had done good service with danger to his person. And on September 19, 1509, ordering Diego Lopez de Cortagano, inquisitor of Cordova, to cease his functions at once and return to his benefits, though this latter order was counter-signed by the members of the Suprema. It would be superfluous to induce additional examples of the control thus exercised over the personnel of the inquisition, a control which remained inherent in the crown, although, as we shall see, often allowed to become dormant. In all, save spiritual matters, Ferdinand considered the Inquisition to be merely an instrument to carry out his will, though it must be added that this arose from his anxiety that it should be perfected in every way for the work in hand, and there is absolutely no evidence in his enormous and confidential correspondence that he ever used it for political purposes, even in the stormiest times when struggling with unruly nobles. Every detail in its organization and working was subject to his supervision, and, amid all the cares of his tortuous policy extending throughout Western Europe and the excitement of his frequent wars, he devoted the minutest care to its affairs. When, in December 1484, Torquemata issued his supplementary instructions, he was careful to state that he did so by command of the sovereigns who ordered them to be observed. So, in subsequent instructions, issued in 1485, Torquemata orders the Inquisitors to write to him and to Ferdinand about everything that should be reported. The king provides their salaries and promises them rewards. If there is anything that the king ought to remedy, he is to be written to. That, in fact, the king was recognized as controlling the Inquisition is seen in all the efforts of the Cortes, appealing to him to obtain a modification of its rigors. Although, as we have seen, the Concordia of 1512 was held to require the ascent of Inquisitor General Inguera to render it binding with subsequent confirmation by the Pope and, though, in later times, the monarchs found it convenient to throw upon the Inquisitor General the responsibility of rejecting the demands of their subjects. Ferdinand was too self-reliant to deem it necessary to assert his power consistently on all occasions. In a subsequent chapter, we shall see that he submitted to the inconveniences arising from an excommunication threatened by Torquemata on receivers of confiscations who honored royal drafts in preference to paying salaries. He had no scruples in making Torquemata join with him in grants of money or in settling competing claims on the debts due to a condemned heretic. He sometimes allowed his Seidulus to be countersigned by members of the Suprema, especially in the latter periods. Indeed, toward the end of his reign, this became so habitual that in letters of November 25 and December 10, 1515, he explained that his orders were to be obeyed, although not so authenticated because none of the members happened to be at hand. He sometimes delayed answering applications for instructions until he could consult the Inquisitor General, but the mere application to him shows that he was regarded as the ultimate arbiter. In fact, in a case in which some prisoners named Martinez had appealed to him, he replies to the Inquisitor's September 30, 1498 and March 2, 1499, that the Inquisitor's General send instructions, and it is his will that these should be executed, thus implying that his confirmation was requisite. Whatever participation he might thus allow to the head of the Inquisition, when he saw fit, he asserted his arbitrary control, and he by no means deemed it necessary to communicate with the tribunals through the Inquisitor General, but frequently issued his commands directly. March 14, 1499. He writes to an Inquisitor to have a certain confiscated property sold at an appraised value to Diego de Alcocerre, no matter what instructions he may have from the Inquisitor's General or what orders to the Contrary. Even for trifles, he took them sharply to task, as when, May 17, 1511, he vigorously rebuked one for sending Bacchier Vasquez to him on an affair which could have been well settled by letter with much less expense. He was fully aware that the power of the Inquisition rested on his support, and when there was the slightest opposition to his will, he had no hesitation in saying so, as when, in a letter of July 22, 1486, to the Inquisitors of Saragossa, he tells them that, although they have the name, it is to him and to Isabella that the Holy Office owes its efficiency. Without the Royal Authority, they can do little, and as they recognize his good intentions, they must not interfere with his orders. These instances illustrate the minute and watchful care which he exercised over all the details of the Holy Office. Nothing was too trivial to escape his vigilant attention, and this close supervision was continued to the end. The Receiver of Valencia consults him about a carpenter's bill of 90 sueldos for repairs on the royal palace occupied by the tribunal, and Ferdinand tells him, May 31, 1515, that he may pay it this time, but it is not to be a precedent. On January 18 of the same year, he had written to the Receiver of Hyann that he learns that the audience chamber is ill furnished and that the vestments for mass are lacking or worn out, wherefore he orders that what the Inquisitors may purchase shall be paid for. Ferdinand's control over the Inquisition rested not only on the Royal Authority, the power of appointment, his own force of character, and his intense interest in its workings, but also on the fact that he held the purse strings. He had insisted that the confiscations should innure to the crown, and he subsequently obtained the pecuniary penances. The Inquisition had no endowment. One could easily have been provided out of the immense sums gathered from the victims during the early years of intense activity, but, although some slender provision of the kind was at times attempted, either the chronic demands of the royal treasury or a prudent desire to prevent the independence of the Inquisition rendered these investments fragmentary and wholly inadequate. Thus, the expenses of the tribunals and the salaries of the officials were in his hands. Nothing could be paid without his authorization and the accounts of the Receivers of Confiscations, who acted as treasurers, were scrutinized with rigid care. He regulated the salary of every official, and his letter books are full of instructions as to their payment. Besides this, it was the Spanish custom to supplement inadequate wages with ayudas de costa, or gifts of greater or less amount as the whim of the sovereign or the desserts of the individual might call for. In time, as we shall see, this became a regular annual payment, subject to certain conditions, but, under Ferdinand, it was still an uncertainty, dependent upon the royal favor, and the order of the king was requisite in each case, even including the Supremma and its officials. The crown thus held the holy office at its mercy, and the recipients of its bounty could not resent its control. Yet, in this perpetual activity of Ferdinand in the affairs of the Inquisition, it is to be observed that he confined himself to temporal matters, and abstained from interference with its spiritual jurisdiction. In his voluminous correspondence, extending with occasional breaks over many years, the exceptions to this only serve to prove the rule. I have met with but two, and these fully justified his interference. In 1508, the leading barons of Aragon complained that the Inquisitors were persecuting the Moors, and were endeavoring to coerce them to baptism. As they had no jurisdiction over infidels, he rebuked them severely, telling them that conversion through conviction is alone pleasing to God, and that no one is to be baptized except on voluntary application. So, when some had been converted and had been abandoned by their wives and children, he ordered the Inquisitors to permit the return of the latter and not to coerce them to baptism. The other case was that of Pedro de Viasis, receiver of Sevill, a man who possessed Ferdinand's fullest confidence. No name occurs more frequently in the correspondence, and he was entrusted with the management of an enormous and most complicated composition, in which the new Christians of Sevill, Cordova, Leon, Grenada, and Haying agreed to pay 80,000 dukats as an assurance against confiscation. While deeply immersed in this, the tribunal of Sevill commenced to take testimony against him. On hearing of this, Ferdinand was astounded. He expressed indignation that such action should be taken without consulting him, and ordered all the original papers to be sent to him for consideration with the Suprema, pending which and future orders nothing further was to be done. This was an extreme case. There are others which prove how useless it was to rely upon the royal favor in hopes of interposition. Thus, Ferdinand's vice chancellor for Aragon was Alonso de la Caballaria, a son of that better-nebos de la Caballaria, whose cielo de Cristo contra los judíos has been referred to above. The father's orthodox Zeal did not preserve his children from the Inquisition, and their names and those of their kindred frequently occur in the records. Alonso had already passed through its hands without losing his position. In December 1502, his brother Jaime was arrested by the tribunal of Saragossa, and Alonso ventured to ask Ferdinand's intervention in his favor, and also for himself in case he should be involved and be subjected to another trial. Ferdinand replied, December 23rd, expressing regret and the hope that all would turn out as he desired. If Alonso's case comes up again, he shall be tried by Desa himself, who can be relied upon to do exact justice. A second application from Alonso brought a reply, January 3rd, 1503, reiterating these assurances and promising a speedy trial for his brother, about whom he writes to the Inquisitors. In effect, a letter to them of the same day alludes, among other matters, to Jaime's case, with the customary injunctions to conduct it justly so as not to injure the Inquisition, and assuring them that if they do so, they shall not be interfered with. How little the appeal to Ferdinand benefited the accused is seen in the result that Jaime was penanced in an auto-defei of March 25, 1504. In one respect, Ferdinand showed favoritism, but he did so in a manner proving that he recognized that the royal power could not of itself interfere with the exercise of inquisitorial jurisdiction. Notwithstanding his settled aversion to papal intervention, he procured a series of curious briefs to spare those whom he favored from the disgrace of public reconciliation and penance, and their descendants from disabilities. So many of his trusted officials were of Jewish lineage that he might well seek to shield them and to retain their services. Thus, in briefs of February 11, 1484 and January 30, 1485, Innocent VIII recites that he is informed that some of those involved in this heresy would gladly return to the faith and abjure if they could be secretly reconciled, wherefore he confers on the inquisitor's faculties. In conjunction with Episcopal representatives to receive secretly, in the presence of Ferdinand and Isabella, 50 persons of this kind to abjuration and reconciliation. A subsequent brief of May 31, 1486, recites that he learns that the sovereigns cannot always be present on these occasions, wherefore he grants for 50 more similar power to be exercised in their absence but with their consent. Then, July 5, 1486, the same is granted for 50 more, even if testimony has been taken against them with the addition of the removal of disabilities and the stain of infamy in favor of their children, and moreover it authorizes the secret exhumation and burning of 50 bodies, doubtless the parents of those thus favored. These transactions continued for there are similar letters of November the 10th, 1487, and October 14th, 1489, each for 50 persons and 50 bodies to be nominated by the king and queen, and possibly there were subsequent ones that have not reached us. It was doubtless under letters of this kind that on January 10th, 1485, Eleonore and Isabella Badork were secretly reconciled in the royal palace of Barcelona. These apparently trivial details are of interest as revealing the basis on which the inquisition was established and from which it developed. They also throw light on the character of Ferdinand, whose restless and incessant activity made itself felt in every department of the government, enabling his resolute will to break down the forces of feudalism and lay the foundation of absolute monarchy for his successors. It would be doing him an injustice, however, to dismiss the subject without alluding to his anxiety that the inquisition should be kept strictly within the lines of absolute justice according to the standard of the period. Trained in the accepted doctrine of the Church that heresy was the greatest of crimes, that the heretic had no right, and that it was a service to God to torture him to death, he was pitiless, and he stimulated the inquisitors to incessant vigilance. He was no less eager in gathering in every shred of spoil which he could lawfully claim from his confiscation of the victims. But in the distorted ethics of the time, this comported with the strictest equity, for it was obedience to the canon law which was the expression of the law of God. There can have been no hypocrisy in his constant instructions to inquisitors and receivers of confiscations to perform their functions with rectitude and moderation so that no one should have cause to complain. This was his general formula to new appointees and is borne out by his instructions in the innumerable special cases where appeal was made to him against real or fancied injustice. His abstinence from intrusion into matters of faith limited such appeals to financial questions. But these, under the cruel canonical regulations as to confiscations, were often highly complicated and involved the rights of innocent third parties. His decisions in such cases are often adverse to himself and reveal an innate sense of justice wholly unexpected in a monarch who ranked next to Caesar Borgia in the estimation of Machiavelli. In instance or two, taken at random out of many, we'll illustrate this phase of his character. July 11th, 1486. He writes to his receiver at Saragossa, quote, 15 years ago, Jaime de Santiago, recently burnt, possessed a piece of land in Saragossa and did not pay the ground rent on it to Garcia Martinez. By the thorough of Aragon, when such rent is unpaid for four years, the land is forfeited. You are said to hold the land as part of the confiscated estate of Santa Gael, and for the above reason it is said to belong to Martinez. You are therefore ordered to see what is justice and to do it to Martinez without delay. And if you have sold the land, the matter must be put into shape that Martinez may obtain what is due, close quote. In a similar spirit, when Gaspar Roig of Cagliari deemed himself aggrieved in a transaction arising out of a composition for confiscation, Ferdinand writes to the Inquisitor of Sardinia, March 11, 1498, quote, As it is our will that no one shall suffer injustice, we refer the case to you, charging you at once to hear the parties and to do what is just, so that the said Gaspar Roig shall suffer no wrong. You will see that the said Gaspar Roig shall not again have to appeal to us for default of justice, close quote. End of Book Two, Chapter One, Part One. Book Two, Chapter One, Part Two of History of the Inquisition of Spain, Volume One. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. History of the Inquisition of Spain, Volume One, by Henry Charles Lee. Book Two, Chapter One, Relations with the Crown. Part Two. It was inevitable that, when this powerful personality was withdrawn, the royal control over the Inquisition would diminish, especially in view of the inability of Queen Juana to govern and the absence of the youthful Charles V. The government of Spain practically devolved Amon Jimenez, who was Inquisitor General of Castile, while his co-agitor Adrian speedily obtained the same post in Aragon. After the arrival of Charles and the death of Jimenez, Adrian became Chief of the Reunited Inquisition, and his influence over Charles in all matters connected with it was unbounded. The circumstances, therefore, were peculiarly propitious for the development of its practical independence, although theoretically the supremacy of the Crown remained unaltered. Thus, the Suprema, of which we hear little under Ferdinand, at once assumed his place in regulating all details. The appointing power, even of receivers, who were secular officials, accountable only to the royal treasury, passed into its hands. Thus, a letter of Jimenez, March 11, 1517, to a receiver of Toledo, states that there are large amounts of uncollected confiscations, wherefore he is directed to select a proper person for an assistant, and send him to the Suprema to decide as to his fitness, so that Jimenez may appoint him with its approval. Still, the nominating power remained technically with the Crown, and when Charles arrived, he was assumed to exercise it as Ferdinand had done, however little real volition he may have displayed. In a letter of December 11, 1518, concerning the appointment of Andrés Sanchez de Torquemada as Inquisitor of Seville, Charles is made to say that, being satisfied of Torquemada's capacity, he had charged him to accept the office, and that with his assent, Adrien had appointed him. In another case, where an abbot to whom Adrien had offered the Inquisitorship of Toledo had declined the office, Charles writes, September 14, 1519, charging him to accept it. That Adrien could not act alone was recognized, for after Charles left Spain in May 1520, questions arose on the subject, and by letters patent of September 12, he formally empowered Adrien during his absence to appoint all Inquisitors and other officials. Whether formal delegations of the appointing power were subsequently made does not appear, but practically it continued with the Inquisitor General, subject to an uncertain cooperation of the Suprema, whose members counter-signed the commissions, while, with the subordinate positions in the tribunals, the Inquisitors were sometimes consulted, their recommendations their recommendations received attention, and their remonstrances were heard. The various factors are illustrated in a letter of the Suprema, August 24, 1544, to the Inquisitors of Saracossa, who had furnished a statement of the qualifications of various aspirants for the vacant post of Notario del Juscado. In reply, the Suprema states that its secretary, Heronimo Surita, had recommended Martin Morales. It had advised with the Inquisitor General who had appointed him, but it will bear in mind Bartolome Malo, and we will give him something else. As far as I am aware, Philip II never interfered with his exercise of the appointing power, that he threw the whole responsibility on the Inquisitor General, and disclaimed any concurrence for himself is apparent in a series of instructions, May 8, 1595, to the new Inquisitor General, Heronimo Manrique. He orders him to observe the utmost care to select fit persons for all positions without favoritism, and, although it is his duty to appoint Inquisitors and Fiscals, he should communicate his selections in advance to the Suprema, as his predecessors had always done, because some of the members may be acquainted with the parties and prevent errors from being made. That a supervisory power, however, was still recognized in the crown, is seen in a consulta of June 21, 1600, presented to Philip III, by Inquisitor General Guevara, lamenting the unfitness of many of the Inquisitors. With the habitual tenderness manifested to unworthy officials, he did not propose to dismiss them, but to make a general shifting by which the best men should be made the seniors of the tribunals. To this, the King applied with a caution about discrediting the Inquisition, and a suggestion that the parties shifted should be made to ask for the change. He also called for their names and the reasons because he ought to be informed about all the individuals. This indicated a desire to resume the close watchfulness of Ferdinand, which had long since been forgotten in the turmoil and absences of Charles V, and the secluded labors of Philip II, over dispatches and consultas. A bureaucracy was establishing itself in which the various departments of the government were becoming more or less independent of the monarch, and Philip for the moment appeared disposed to reassert his authority. For, in 1603, we are told that he made many appointments of inquisitors, fiscals, and even of minor officials. If so, he was too irresolute, feeble and fitful to carry out a definite line of policy for when, in 1608, he issued the customary instructions to a new inquisitor, Sandoval Irohas. He merely repeated the injunctions of 1595, with the addition that transfers should also be communicated to the Suprema. Yet, in one case, he even exceeded Ferdinand by intervening in a case of faith. When he went to Toledo, with his court to witness the Otto de Fe of May 10th, 1615, he asked to see the sentence of Juan Cote, penanced for Lutheranism, and made some changes in the meritos, or recital of offenses, altered the imprisonment to perpetual and irremissible, and added 200 lashes. The tribunal consulted the Suprema, which approved the changes on the supposition that the inquisitor general had participated in them. But the day after the Otto, Cote was informed that the Suprema had mercifully remitted the scourging. Philip IV, in 1626, on the death of inquisitor general Pacheco, asked the Suprema to suggest the instructions to be given to the new incumbent, and was advised to repeat those of 1608. He virtually admitted the power of appointment to be vested in that office when, in the same year, the Cortes of Barbastro petitioned that in Aragon, all the officials of the tribunals should be Aragonis, and he replied that he would use his authority with the inquisitor general that a certain portion of them should be so. Notwithstanding his habitual subservience to the inquisition, however, he reserted his prerogative in 1640 by appointing the Archdeacon of V, as inquisitor of Barcelona, and he followed this, in 1641 and 1642, by several others, even descending to the secretarieship of Lima, which he gave to Domingo de Arroche. This brought on a struggle, ending in a compromise in which the inquisitor general was sacrificed to the Suprema. Papal intervention was deemed to be necessary, and a brief was procured on March 1643, under which Philip, by decree of July 2nd, ordered that in future, in all vacancies of positions of inquisitor and fiscal, the inquisitor general and Suprema should submit to him three names from which to make a selection. The Suprema, thus recognized, was satisfied, but Sotomayor, the inquisitor general, was obstinate. In June, Philip had called for his resignation, which he offered after some hesitation, and expressed his feelings in a protest presenting a sorry picture of the condition of the Holy Office. The present disorders, he said, had arisen from the multiplication of offices, whereby their character had depreciated, and as the revenues were insufficient for their support, they were led to improper devices. The Suprema had been powerless, for, on various occasions, the king had rewarded services in other fields by the gifts of these offices, when no consideration could be given to character, and he had also been forced to make appointments by commands as imperative as those of the king, an evident allusion to Olivares. Sotomayor's successor, Arcee Renoso, conformed himself to these new rules, and until his death in 1665, he submitted all appointments and transfers to the king. Philip survived him but three months, and under the Regency which followed, and the reign of the imbecile Carlos II, the inquisitor general resumed the power of appointment without consultation. So completely was the royal supervision forgotten that the instructions to inquisitor general Huacaberte in 1695 repeat the old formula of 1608. In this, the injunction of consulting the Suprema was displeasing to the Holy See after its intervention in the affair of Froylandias, of which, more hereafter, had caused it to take sides in a quarrel over the respective powers of the inquisitor general and the Suprema. As the commission of the former was a papal grant, it held that no restriction could be placed on him, and when Vidal Maureen was appointed, Clement XI sent to him August 8th, 1705, urgent instructions to uphold the dignity of his office which had exclusive authority in the premises. The command was too agreeable not to be obeyed, and from this time the unrestricted power of appointment was in the hands of the inquisitor general. About 1765, a writer tells us that all salaried offices were filled by him alone. If the king wished to gratify someone with a position, he would signify his desire to the inquisitor general that such a person should be born in mind at the first vacancy, and the royal wish was respected in the absence of special objection. If such there were, it was reported to the king and his decision was awaited. With the tendency to assert the prerogative under Carlos III, this was called in question in 1775, when the royal comara scrutinized the brief commissioning Felipe Bertrand as inquisitor general, but the protest was merely formal, the appointing power remained undisturbed, it survived the revolution and continued until the inquisition was suppressed. Of vastly greater importance was the power of selecting and virtually dismissing the inquisitor general, and this the crown never lost. In fact, this was essential to its dignity, if not to its safety. Had the appointment rested with the pope, either the inquisition would of necessity have been reduced to insignificance, or the kingdom would have become a dependency of the curia. Had the suprema possessed the power of presenting a nominee to the pope, the inquisition would have become an independent body, rivaling, and perhaps in time superseding the monarchy. Yet, after the death of Ferdinand, Cardinal Adrian, when elected to the papacy, seemed to imagine that Ferdinand's privilege of nomination had been merely personal, and that it had reverted to him. February 19th, 1522, he wrote to Charles that a successor must be provided. After much thought, he had pitched on the Dominican general, but had not determined to make the appointment without first learning Charles's wishes. If the Dominican was not satisfactory, Charles would name someone else, for which purpose he suggested three other prelates. Charles replied from Brussels, March 29th, assuming the appointment to be in his hands, but ordered his representative, La Chao, to confer with Adrian. He was in no haste to reach a decision, and it was not until July 13th, 1523, that he instructed his ambassador, the Duke of César, to ask for commission for Alfonso Manrique, Bishop of Cordova, on whom he had conferred the post of Inquisitor General and the Archbishopric of Seville. The records afford no indication of any questions subsequently arising as to the power of the crown to select the Inquisitor General. It was never, however, officially recognized by the Popes, whose commissions to the successive nominees or the form of Muto Proprio, the spontaneous act of the Holy See, by which, without reference to any request from the sovereign, the recipient was created Inquisitor General of the Spanish Dominions, and was invested with all the faculties and powers requisite for the functions of his office. No objection seems to have been taken to this until Carlos III exercised a jealous care over the assertion and maintenance of the regalias against the assumptions of the curia. The first appointment he had occasion to make was that of Felipe Bertrand, Bishop of Salamanca, after the death of Inquisitor General Boniface. December 27, 1774 was dispatched the application to the papacy for the commission, carefully framed to avoid attributing to the latter any share in the selection or appointment, and merely asking for a delegation of faculties, accompanied with instructions to the Ambassador Florida Blanca to procure for Bertrand a dispensation from residence at his sea during his term of office. Clement XIV had died, September 22, 1774, and the intrigues arising from the suppression of the Jesuits delayed the election of Pius VI until February 15, 1775. But on February 27, the commission and dispensation were signed. March 25, Carlos sent the commission to the Royal Camara for examination before its delivery to Bertrand and the Camara reported, April 24, that its fiscal pronounced it similar to that granted to Boniface in 1755, but that it did not express as it should the royal nomination and had the form of a motu proprio. He also objected to its granting the power of appointment and further that some of the faculties included infringed on the royal and episcopal jurisdictions, while the clauses on censorship conflicted with the royal decrees. Under these reserves, the brief was ordered to be delivered to Bertrand. Whether or not a protest was made to the curia does not appear, but if it was, it was ineffective for the same formula was used in the commission issued to Inquisitor General Agustín Rubín de Ceballos, February 17, 1784. It may be assumed as a matter of course that the king had no power to dismiss an Inquisitor General who held his commission at the pleasure of the pope, but the sovereign had usually abundant means of enforcing a resignation. Whether that of Alfonso Suárez de Fuentes-Saz in 1504 was voluntary or coerced is not known, but the case of Cardinal Manrique, the successor of Adrian, shows that if an Inquisitor General was not forced to resign, he could be virtually shelved. Manrique, as Bishop of Barajós after Isabella's death, had so actively supported the claims of Philip I that Ferdinand ordered his arrest. He fled to Flanders where he entered Charles' service and returned with him to Spain, obtaining the Sea of Cordova and ultimately the Archbishopric of Seville. Perhaps he incurred the ill-will of the Empress Isabella soon after his appointment, for we find him complaining, January 23, 1524, to Charles, that when in Valencia he had ordered the disarmament of the familiars and the arrest of Mysore Artes, a salaried official of the Inquisition, violations of its privileges for which he asked a remedy. In 1529 he gave more serious cause of offense. When Charles sailed, July 28, to Italy for his coronation, he placed under charge of the Empress Doña Luisa de Acuña, heiress of the Count of Valencia, until her marriage could be determined. There were three suitors, Manrique's cousin, the Count of Treviño, heir apparent of the Duke of Najera, the Marquis of Astorga, and the Marquis of Mayorga. The Empress placed her ward in the convent of San Domingo el Real of Toledo, where Manrique abused his authority by introducing his cousin, an altar had been prepared in advance and the marriage was celebrated on the spot. The Empress, justly incensed, ordered him from the court to his sea until the Emperor could return and turned a deaf ear to the representations by the Suprema, December 12, of the interference with the holy work of the Inquisition and the discredit cast upon it. It was probably to this that maybe referred the delay in his elevation to the Cardinalate, announced March 22, 1531, after being kept in Peto since December 19, 1529. On Charles' return in 1533, he was allowed to take his place again, but he fell into disgrace once more in 1534, when he was sent back to his sea, where he died at an advanced age in 1538. Still, this was not equivalent to dismissal. He continued to exercise his functions, and his signature was appended to documents of the Inquisition at least until 1537. Yet, while this dealing with the Inquisitor General, the Crown could exercise no control over the tribunals. The Empress was interested in the case of Frey Francisco Ortiz, arrested April 6, 1529 by the Tribunal of Toledo, and she twice requested the expediting of his trial for which, October 27, 1530, she alleged reasons of state, but the tribunal was deaf to her wishes, as well as to those of Clement VII, who interposed July 1, 1531, and the sentence was not rendered until April 17, 1532. There was no occasion for a royal interference with Inquisitor's General Tavera Loissa or Valdes. If the latter was forced to resign in 1566, it was not by order of Philip II, but of Pius V, for his part, as we shall see hereafter, in the persecution of Carranza, Archbishop of Toledo. So, if Espenosa, in 1572, died in consequence of a reproof from Philip II, it was not for official misconduct, and merely shows the depth of servility attainable by the courtiers of the period. The reign of the feeble Philip III, however, afforded several instances that the royal will sufficed to create vacancy. He had scarce mounted on the throne as a youth of 20 on the death of Philip II, September 13, 1598, before he sought to get rid of Inquisitor General Horto Carrero, who had, it is said, spoken lightly of him, or had incurred the ill will of the favorite, the Duke of Lerma. To effect this, a bull was procured from Clement VIII, requiring episcopal residence. Horto Carrero was Bishop of Suenca, a sea reputed to be worth 50,000 Ducati a year, but he preferred to abandon this and to make fruitless efforts at Rome to be permitted to do so. He left Madrid in September 1599, for Suenca had died of grief within a 12-month, refusing to make a will because, as he said, he had nothing to leave but debts that would take two years' revenue of his sea to pay. His successor, Cardinal Fernando Niño de Guevara, fared no better. He was in Rome at the time of his appointment, but did not take possession of his office until December 23, 1599. But already, in May 1600, there were rumors that he was to be superseded by Sandoval Irojas, Archbishop of Toledo. Yet, in 1601, he was made Archbishop of Seville, and he sought to purchase Philip's favor by a gift of 40,000 Ducats, and nearly all his plate. This was unavailing, and in January 1602, he was ordered to reside in his sea when he dutifully handed in his resignation. Juan de Zuniga, who succeeded, had a clause in his commission, permitting him to resign the administration of his sea in the hands of the Pope. But the precaution was superfluous, for he died December 20, 1602, after only six weeks' enjoyment of the office, for which he had sacrificed 30,000 Ducats a year from his sea. He was old and feeble, and his death was attributed to his coming in winter from a warm climate to the rigors of Valladolid, then the residence of the court. The question of non-residence was happily solved, for a time at least, by selecting as the next incumbent Juan Bautista de Azavedo, Bishop of Valladolid, the seat of the court. He was a person of so little consequence that the appointment aroused general surprise until it was recalled that he had been a secretary of Lerma. When the court removed to Madrid in 1606, he was obliged to choose between the two dignities, and his resignation of the bishopric was facilitated by granting him a pension of 12,000 Ducats on the treasury of the Indies, besides which, as patriarch of the Indies, he had a salary of 8,000. His death soon followed in 1608, when Sandoval Irojas, the uncle of Lerma, obtained the position without sacrificing his prime HLC of Toledo, a dispensation for a non-residence being doubtless easily obtained by such a percentage. Sandoval was succeeded in 1619 by Fray Luis de Alliaga, a Dominican who had been Lerma's confessor. In 1608, Lerma transferred him to the king, over whom his influence steadily increased. Although his doubtful reputation is inferrable from the popular attribution to him of the spurious continuation of Don Quixote, published in 1614 under the name of Avallaneda, a work of which the buffoonery and indecency are most unclerical. Though he owed his fortune to Lerma, he joined in 1618 in causing his patron's downfall in favor of Lerma's nephew, the Duke of Uceda, and during the rest of Philip's reign, Uceda and Alliaga virtually ruled and misgoverned the land, filling the offices with their creatures, selling justice and intensifying the financial disorders which were bringing Spain to its ruin. When Philip IV succeeded to the throne, March 31, 1621, under tutelage to his favorite, Olivares, their first business was to dismiss all who had been in power under the late king. The secular officials were easily disposed of, but the papal commission of the Inquisitor General rendered him independent of the king. He did not manifest the accommodating disposition of the Porto Carrero and Guevara, and, as he was not bishop, he could not be ordered to his sea. It illustrates the anomalous position of the Inquisition as part of an absolute government, that for some weeks the question of his removal was the subject of repeated juntas and consultations. But finally, April 23, Philip wrote, ordering him to leave the court within 24 hours, for the Dominican convent of Huete, where his superior would give him further instructions. He obeyed, but he refused the bishopric of Zamora and the countenance of his ecclesiastical revenues as the price of his resignation. The only method left was to obtain from Gregory XV the withdrawal of his delegated powers by representing his unworthiness, his guilty complicity with Uceda and Osuna, and Philip III's reproach to him on his deathbed for misguiding his soul to perdition. Gregory listened favorably, and Aliaga seems to have recognized the untenableness of his position and to have resigned, although no evidence of it exists. All we know is that André Pacheco, Bishop of Suenca, was appointed as his successor in February 1622 and took possession of the office in April. Even after this, Aliaga was an object of apprehension. In June 1623, he came to Hortolesa, which was within a league or two of Madrid. Immediately the court was in a flutter. The king had earnest consultations. His propinquity was regarded as dangerous and he could not be allowed to return, as he had asked, to his native Aragon, which was in a chronically inflammable condition, while in Valencia his brother was archbishop. Nor could he be allowed to leave the kingdom, possessing as he did so intimate a knowledge of state secrets. There were messages and active correspondence, and finally he was allowed to settle in Guadalajara with ample means, where his remaining three years of life passed in obscurity. Llorente tells us that proceedings were commenced against him for propositions, savoring of Lutheranism and materialism, which were discontinued after his death, a device doubtless adopted to keep him in retirement. End of Book Two, Chapter One, Part Two