into his own hands under pretence of impartial justice, and leave the
weaker tyrant to eat the fruit of his doings. But since that time pope
and king have been again united in the management of the Holy Office, the
latter, however, in abject subservience to the former. Neither in the
appeals nor in the brief was there anything that could divert Torquemada
from the prosecution of his purposes; and therefore he hastened to bring
Aragon under his jurisdiction. Ferdinand convened the cortes of that
kingdom in the city of Tarragona, April, 1484; in that assembly appointed
a junta to prepare measures for the establishment of another tribunal;
and then Torquemada, in pursuance of the latest pontifical decision,
created Friar Caspar Inglar, a preacher of the Dominican community, and
Pedro Arbues de Epila, a canon of the metropolitan church, inquisitors.
The King gave a mandate to the civil authorities--a firman, it might
be called--compelling them to lend aid to the new officers; and, on
September 13th following, the Grand Justice of Aragon, with his five
lieutenants of the long robe and various other magistrates, swore upon
the holy Gospels that they would give men and arms to defend and to
enforce the authority of the Holy Inquisition. And as they swore
thus, the King's chief secretary for Aragon, the prothonotary, the
vice-chancellor, the royal treasurer--whose own father and grandfather
were Jews, and persecuted by the old inquisitors--together with a
multitude of persons of high rank and office, in whose veins flowed
Jewish blood, and whose descendants are now among the first families in
Spain, looked on with dismay, and sent a deputation to Rome, bearing
remonstrance against the newly created Inquisition; and deputed others
to present their appeal to the same effect at the court of Ferdinand
and Isabella. All these deputies were afterward proceeded against as
hinderers of the Holy Office; and meanwhile the inquisitors, in contempt
of opposition, set themselves to work without delay.
In the months of May and June, 1485, two acts of faith were celebrated in
Saragossa, capital of Aragon, and a large number of New Christians burned
alive. The public was enraged, certainly, but helpless; yet not so
helpless but that many awoke to a conviction that, since the inquisitors
had resorted to terror for the conservation of the faith, they ought to
be restrained by terror in their turn.
In the night of September 14, 1485, one of the inquisitors, Pedro Arbues,
covered as usual with a coat of mail under his robes, and wearing a steel
skull-cap under his hat--for he was every moment conscious of guilt and
apprehensive of retribution--took a lantern in one hand and a bludgeon in
the other; and, like a sturdy soldier of his peculiar Church, walked from
his house to the cathedral of that same Saragossa, to join in matins. He
knelt down by one of the pillars, setting his lantern on the pavement.
His right hand held the weapon of defence, yet stealthily half covered
with the cloak. The canons, in their places, were chanting hymns. Two men
came and knelt down near him. They understood, as most Spaniards do, how
most effectually to attack a man, and how to kill him quickest. Therefore
one of them suddenly disabled him on one side by a blow on the left arm.
The other swung his cudgel at the back of his head, just below the edge
of the steel cap, and laid him prone. He never spoke again, but expired
in a few hours. This murder, as might be expected, was well made use of
by the priests, serving them to plead the necessity of an inquisition to
repress violence; and the inhabitants of the city were instantly overawed
by a display of high judicial authority which they had no power to
resist.
Queen Isabella, horrified at the murder of her confessor--for "confessor
of the kings" was an honorary dignity conferred on each inquisitor in
Spain--erected a monument to his memory at her own expense; and when the
murders perpetrated by Arbues himself had somewhat faded out of public
memory, he was beatified at Rome, and a chapel was constructed for his
veneration in the church where he had fallen. Therein his remains were
laid; and over the spot where he received the mortal blow a stone was
placed, with the inscription: "_Siste, viator,_" etc. "Stay, traveller!
Thou adorest the place (_locum adoras_) where the blessed Pedro de Arbues
was laid low by two missiles. Epila gave him birth. This city gave him a
canonry. The apostolic see elected him to be the first Father Inquisitor
of the Faith. Because of his zeal he became hateful to the Jews; by whom
slain, he fell here a martyr in the year 1485. The most serene Ferdinand
and Isabella reared a marble mausoleum, where he became famous for
miracles. Alexander VII, Pontifex Maximus, wrote him into the number of
holy and blessed martyrs on the 17th day of April in the year 1664. The
tomb having been opened, the sacred ashes were translated, and placed
under the altar of the chapel (built by the chapter, with the material
of the tomb, in the space of sixty-five days), with solemn rite and
veneration, on the 23d day of September, in the year 1664."
The intelligence of that murder threw all Aragon into commotion. The
powers, ecclesiastical and royal, panted for vengeance, and the murderers
were put to a most painful death. The Jews and New Christians trembled
with terror and rage. The inhabitants of many towns, Teruel, Valencia,
Lerida, and Barcelona included, compelled the inquisitors to cease from
inquest; and it was only by means of military force, after edicts and
bulls had failed, that the King and Pope together could quash two years'
public resistance. In Saragossa, where the murder had been contrived by a
party of chief inhabitants, a consciousness of guilt weakened their hands
and they endeavored to save themselves by flight. Thousands of people
deserted the city, although they had no participation in the deed and
were everywhere treated as rebels; and in that migration incidents
occurred which might throw a tinge of horrible romance on our history.
Let me briefly mention two.
An inhabitant of Saragossa found his way to Tudela, and there begged for
shelter and concealment in the house of Don Jaime, Infante of Navarre,
legitimate son of the Queen of Navarre and nephew of King Ferdinand
himself. The Infante could not refuse asylum and hospitality to an
innocent fugitive. He allowed the man to hide himself for a few days and
then pass on to France. For this act of humanity Don Jaime was arrested
by the inquisitors, thrown into prison as an impeder of the Holy Office,
brought thence to Saragossa, a place quite beyond the jurisdiction of
Navarre, and there made to do open penance in the cathedral, in presence
of a great congregation at high mass. And what penance! The Archbishop
of Saragossa presided; but this Archbishop was a boy of seventeen, an
illegitimate son of the King; and he it was that commanded two priests to
flog his father's lawful nephew, the Infante of Navarre, with rods. They
whipped Don Jaime around the church accordingly.
The other case was diabolical. Gaspar de Santa Cruz escaped to Toulouse,
where he died and was buried after his effigy had been burned in
Saragossa. In this city lived a son of his, who, in duty bound, had
helped him to make good his retreat. This son was delated as an impeder
of the Holy Office, arrested, brought out at an act of faith, made
to read a condemnation of his deceased father, and then sent to the
inquisitor at Toulouse, who took him to his father's grave, and compelled
him to dig up the corpse and burn it with his own hands. Whether the
inquisitors were most barbarous or the young man most vile, it may be
difficult to say. But it is a most infamous glory of the Inquisition
that, for satisfaction of its own requirements, the express laws of God
and man and the first instincts of humanity are equally set at naught.
The Arch-inquisitor of Spain, shortly after his accession to the office,
summoned the subalterns from their stations to meet him at Seville, and
framed, with them, a set of instructions for uniform administration. They
were published, twenty-eight in number, on October 29, 1484. On January
9, 1485, eleven more were added. The spirit of these instructions
pervades the _Directory_ of Eymeric, into which they were incorporated by
his commentator. It is only important to mention here that on the present
occasion an agent was appointed to represent this Inquisition at Rome,
and there to defend the inquisitors on occasion of appeals from the
subjects of inquisitorial violence or from their friends or their
survivors. And this was in spite of a bull sent into Spain two years
before, appointing the Archbishop of Seville sole judge of such appeals.
But that bull was a mere feint for conciliation and never acted on at
Rome.
We must not fail to mark this point in the history, forasmuch as here
begins the practically juridical relation between the court of Rome as
supreme, and the provinces of the Roman Church as subordinate, in matters
concerning inquisition.
JAMES BALMES
As to the Spanish Inquisition, which was only an extension of that which
was established in other countries, we must divide it, with respect to
its duration, into three great periods. We omit the time of its existence
in the kingdom of Aragon, before its introduction into Castile. The
first of these comprehends the time when the Inquisition was principally
directed against the relapsed Jews and Moors, from the day of its
installation under the Catholic sovereigns till the middle of the
reign of Charles V. The second extends from the time when it began to
concentrate its efforts to prevent the introduction of Protestantism into
Spain until that danger entirely ceased; that is, from the middle of the
reign of Charles V till the coming of the Bourbons. The third and last
period is that when the Inquisition was limited to repress infamous
crimes and exclude the philosophy of Voltaire; this period was continued
until its abolition, in the beginning of the nineteenth century.
It is clear that, the institution being successively modified according
to circumstances at these different epochs--although it always remained
fundamentally the same--the commencement and termination of each of these
three periods which we have pointed out cannot be precisely marked;
nevertheless, these three periods really existed in its history, and
present us with very different characters.
Everyone knows the peculiar circumstances in which the Inquisition was
established in the time of the Catholic sovereigns; yet it is worthy of
remark that the bull of establishment was solicited by Queen Isabella;
that is, by one of the most distinguished sovereigns in our history--by
that Queen who still, after three centuries, preserves the respect and
admiration of all Spaniards. Isabella, far from opposing the will of the
people in this measure, only realized the national wish. The Inquisition
was established chiefly against the Jews. Before the Inquisition
published its first edict, dated Seville, in 1481, the Cortes of Toledo,
in 1480, had adopted severe measures on the subject. To prevent the
injury which the intercourse between Jews and Christians might occasion
to the Catholic faith, the cortes had ordered that unbaptized Israelites
should be obliged to wear a distinctive mark, dwell in separate quarters,
called _juiveries_, and return there before night. Ancient regulations
against them were renewed; the professions of doctor, surgeon,
shopkeeper, barber, and tavern-keeper were forbidden them. Intolerance
was, therefore, popular at that time. If the Inquisition be justified in
the eyes of friends to monarchy, by conformity with the will of kings, it
has an equal claim to be so in the eyes of lovers of democracy.
No doubt the heart is grieved at reading the excessive severities
exercised at that time against the Jews; but must there not have been
very grave causes to provoke such excesses? The danger which the Spanish
monarchy, not yet well established, would have incurred if the Jews, then
very powerful on account of their riches and their alliances with the
most influential families, had been allowed to act without restraint, has
been pointed out as one of the most important of these causes. It was
greatly to be feared that they would league with the Moors against the
Christians. The respective positions of the three nations rendered this
league natural; this is the reason why it was looked upon as necessary to
break a power which was capable of compromising anew the independence of
the Christians. It is necessary also to observe that at the time when the
Inquisition was established the war of eight hundred years against the
Moors was not yet finished. The Inquisition was projected before 1474; it
was established in 1480, and the conquest of Granada did not take place
till 1492. Thus it was founded at the time when the obstinate struggle
was about to be decided; it was yet to be known whether the Christians
would remain masters of the whole peninsula or whether the Moors should
retain possession of one of the most fertile and beautiful provinces;
whether these enemies, shut up in Granada, should preserve a position
excellent for their communication with Africa, and a means for all the
attempts which, at a later period, the Crescent might be disposed to make
against us. Now, the power of the Crescent was very great, as was clearly
shown by its enterprises against the rest of Europe in the next century.
In such emergencies, after ages of fighting, and at the moment which was
to decide the victory forever, have combatants ever been known to conduct
themselves with moderation and mildness?
It cannot be denied that the system of repression pursued in Spain, with
respect to the Jews and the Moors, was inspired, in great measure, by the
instinct of self-preservation: we can easily believe that the Catholic
princes had this motive before them when they decided on asking for the
establishment of the Inquisition in their dominions. The danger was not
imaginary; it was perfectly real. In order to form an idea of the turn
which things might have taken if some precaution had not been adopted,
it is enough to recollect the insurrections of the last Moors in later
times.
Yet it would be wrong, in this affair, to attribute all to the policy
of royalty; and it is necessary here to avoid exalting too much the
foresight and designs of men; for my part, I am inclined to think that
Ferdinand and Isabella naturally followed the generality of the nation,
in whose eyes the Jews were odious when they persevered in their creed,
and suspected when they embraced the Christian religion. Two causes
contributed to this hatred and animadversion: first, the excited state of
religious feeling then general in all Europe, and especially in Spain;
second, the conduct by which the Jews had drawn upon themselves the
public indignation.
The necessity of restraining the cupidity of the Jews, for the sake of
the independence of the Christians, was of ancient date in Spain: the old
assemblies of Toledo had attempted it. In the following centuries the
evil reached its height; a great part of the riches of the peninsula had
passed into the hands of the Jews, and almost all the Christians found
themselves their debtors. Thence the hatred of the people against the
Jews; thence the frequent troubles which agitated some towns of the
peninsula; thence the tumults which more than once were fatal to the
Jews, and in which their blood flowed in abundance. It was difficult for
a people accustomed for ages to set themselves free by force of arms to
resign themselves peacefully and tranquilly to the lot prepared for them
by the artifices and exactions of a strange race, whose name, moreover,
bore the recollection of a terrible malediction.
In later times an immense number of Jews were converted to the Christian
religion; but the hatred of the people was not extinguished thereby,
and mistrust followed these converts into their new state. It is very
probable that a great number of these conversions were hardly sincere,
as they were partly caused by the sad position in which the Jews who
continued in Judaism were placed. In default of conjectures founded on
reason in this respect, we will regard as a sufficient corroboration of
our opinion the multitude of Judaizing Christians who were discovered as
soon as care was taken to find out those who had been guilty of apostasy.
However this may be, it is certain that the distinction between New and
Old Christians was introduced; the latter denomination was a title
of honor, and the former a mark of ignominy; the converted Jews were
contemptuously called _maranos_ ("impure men," "pigs"). With more or
less foundation, they were accused of horrible crimes. In their dark
assemblies they committed, it was said, atrocities which could hardly be
believed for the honor of humanity. For example, it was said that, to
revenge themselves on the Christians and in contempt of religion, they
crucified Christian children, taking care to choose for the purpose the
greatest day among Christian solemnities. There is the often-repeated
history of the knight of the house of Guzman, who, being hidden one night
in the house of a Jew whose daughter he loved, saw a child crucified at
the time when the Christians celebrated the institution of the sacrifice
of the eucharist. Besides infanticide, there were attributed to the Jews
sacrileges, poisonings, conspiracies, and other crimes. That these rumors
were generally believed by the people is proved by the fact that the Jews
were forbidden by law to exercise the professions of doctor, surgeon,
barber, and tavern-keeper; this shows what degree of confidence
was placed in their morality. It is useless to stay to examine the
foundations for these sinister accusations. We are not ignorant how far
popular credulity will go, above all when it is under the influence of
excited feelings, which makes it view all things in the same light. It is
enough for us to know that these rumors circulated everywhere and with
credit, to understand what must have been the public indignation against
the Jews, and consequently how natural it was that authority, yielding
to the impulse of the general mind, should be urged to treat them with
excessive rigor.
The situation in which the Jews were placed is sufficient to show that
they might have attempted to act in concert to resist the Christians;
what they did after the death of St. Peter Arbues shows what they
were capable of doing on other occasions. The funds necessary for the
accomplishment of the murder--the pay of the assassins, and the other
expenses required for the plot--were collected by means of voluntary
contributions imposed on themselves by all the Jews of Aragon. Does not
this show an advanced state of organization, which might have become
fatal if it had not been watched?
In alluding to the death of St. Peter Arbues, I wish to make an
observation on what has been said on this subject as proving the
unpopularity of the establishment of the Inquisition in Spain. What more
evident proof, we shall be told, can you have than the assassination of
the inquisitor? Is it not a sure sign that the indignation of the people
was at its height and that they were quite opposed to the Inquisition?
Would they otherwise have been hurried into such excesses? If by "the
people" you mean the Jews and their descendants, I will not deny that the
establishment of the Inquisition was indeed very odious to them, but it
was not so with the rest of the nation. The event we are speaking of gave
rise to a circumstance which proves just the reverse. When the report of
the death of the inquisitor was spread through the town, they went in
crowds in pursuit of the New Christians, so that a bloody catastrophe
would have ensued had not the young Archbishop of Saragossa, Alphonsus of
Aragon, presented himself to the people on horseback, and calmed them by
the assurance that all the rigor of the laws should fall on the heads of
the guilty. Was the Inquisition as unpopular as it has been represented?
and will it be said that its adversaries were the majority of the people?
Why, then, could not the tumult of Saragossa have been avoided in spite
of all the precautions which were no doubt taken by the conspirators, at
that time very powerful by their riches and influence?
At the time of the greatest rigor against the Judaizing Christians, there
is a fact worthy of attention. Persons accused, or threatened with the
pursuit of the Inquisition, took every means to escape the action of that
tribunal: they left the soil of Spain and went to Rome. Would those
who imagine that Rome has always been the hot-bed of intolerance, the
firebrand of persecution, have imagined this? The number of causes
commenced by the Inquisition, and summoned from Spain to Rome, is
countless, during the first fifty years of the existence of that
tribunal; and it must be added that Rome always inclined to the side of
indulgence. I do not know that it would be possible to cite one accused
person who, by appealing to Rome, did not ameliorate his condition. The
history of the Inquisition at that time is full of contests between the
kings and popes; and we constantly find, on the part of the holy see,
a desire to restrain the Inquisition within the bounds of justice and
humanity. The line of conduct prescribed by the court of Rome was not
always followed as it ought to have been. Thus we see the popes compelled
to receive a multitude of appeals, and mitigate the lot that would have
befallen the appellants if their cause had been definitely decided in
Spain. We also see the Pope name the judge of appeal, at the solicitation
of the Catholic sovereigns, who desired that causes should be finally
decided in Spain: the first of these judges was Inigo Manrique,
Archbishop of Seville. Nevertheless, at the end of a short time, the same
Pope, in a bull of August 2, 1483, said that he had received new appeals,
made by a great number of the Spaniards of Seville, who had not dared to
address themselves to the judge of appeal for fear of being arrested.
Such was then the excitement of the public mind; such was at that time
the necessity of preventing injustice or measures of undue severity. The
Pope added that some of those who had had recourse to his justice had
already received the absolution of the apostolical penitentiary, and that
others were about to receive it; he afterward complained that indulgences
granted to divers accused persons had not been sufficiently respected
at Seville; in fine, after several other admonitions, he observed to
Ferdinand and Isabella that mercy toward the guilty was more pleasing
to God than the severity which it was desired to use; and he gave the
example of the good shepherd following the wandering sheep. He ended by
exhorting the sovereigns to treat with mildness those who voluntarily
confessed their faults, desiring them to allow them to reside at Seville
or in some other place they might choose; and to allow them the enjoyment
of their property, as if they had not been guilty of the crime of heresy.
Moreover, it is not to be supposed that the appeals admitted at Rome, and
by virtue of which the lot of the accused was improved, were founded on
errors of form and injustice committed in the application of the law. If
the accused had recourse to Rome, it was not always to demand reparation
for an injustice, but because they were sure of finding indulgence. We
have a proof of this in the considerable number of Spanish refugees
convicted at Rome of having fallen into Judaism. Two hundred fifty of
them were found at one time, yet there was not one capital execution.
Some penances were imposed on them, and, when they were absolved, they
were free to return home without the least mark of ignominy. This took
place at Rome in 1498.