EXPULSION OF THE JEWS FROM SPAIN.
1492.
Excitement against the Jews.--Edict of Expulsion.--Dreadful Sufferings of
the Emigrants.--Whole Number of Exiles.--Disastrous Results.--True Motives
of the Edict.--Contemporary Judgments.
While the Spanish sovereigns were detained before Granada, they published
their memorable and most disastrous edict against the Jews; inscribing it,
as it were, with the same pen which drew up the glorious capitulation of
Granada and the treaty with Columbus. The reader has been made acquainted
in a preceding chapter with the prosperous condition of the Jews in the
Peninsula, and the pre-eminent consideration, which they attained there
beyond any other part of Christendom. The envy raised by their prosperity,
combined with the high religious excitement kindled in the long war with
the infidel, directed the terrible arm of the Inquisition, as has been
already stated, against this unfortunate people; but the result showed the
failure of the experiment, since comparatively few conversions, and those
frequently of a suspicious character, were effected, while the great mass
still maintained a pertinacious attachment to ancient errors. [1]
Under these circumstances, the popular odium, inflamed by the discontent
of the clergy at the resistance which they encountered in the work of
proselytism, gradually grew stronger and stronger against the unhappy
Israelites. Old traditions, as old indeed as the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries, were revived, and charged on the present generation, with all
the details of place and action. Christian children were said to be
kidnapped, in order to be crucified in derision of the Saviour; the host,
it was rumored, was exposed to the grossest indignities; and physicians
and apothecaries, whose science was particularly cultivated by the Jews in
the Middle Ages, were accused of poisoning their Christian patients. No
rumor was too absurd for the easy credulity of the people. The Israelites
were charged with the more probable offence of attempting to convert to
their own faith the _ancient Christians_, as well as to reclaim such
of their own race as had recently embraced Christianity. A great scandal
was occasioned also by the inter-marriages, which still occasionally took
place between Jews and Christians; the latter condescending to repair
their dilapidated fortunes by these wealthy alliances, though at the
expense of their vaunted purity of blood. [2]
These various offences were urged against the Jews with great pertinacity
by their enemies, and the sovereigns were importuned to adopt a more
rigorous policy. The inquisitors, in particular, to whom the work of
conversion had been specially intrusted, represented the incompetence of
all lenient measures to the end proposed. They asserted, that the only
mode left for the extirpation of the Jewish heresy, was to eradicate the
seed; and they boldly demanded the immediate and total banishment of every
unbaptized Israelite from the land. [3]
The Jews, who had obtained an intimation of these proceedings, resorted to
their usual crafty policy for propitiating the sovereigns. They
commissioned one of their body to tender a donative of thirty thousand
ducats towards defraying the expenses of the Moorish war. The negotiation,
however, was suddenly interrupted by the inquisitor-general, Torquemada,
who burst into the apartment of the palace, where the sovereigns were
giving audience to the Jewish deputy, and, drawing forth a crucifix from
beneath his mantle, held it up, exclaiming, "Judas Iscariot sold his
master for thirty pieces of silver. Your Highnesses would sell him anew
for thirty thousand; here he is, take him, and barter him away." So
saying, the frantic priest threw the crucifix on the table, and left the
apartment. The sovereigns, instead of chastising this presumption, or
despising it as a mere freak of insanity, were overawed by it. Neither
Ferdinand nor Isabella, had they been left to the unbiassed dictates of
their own reason, could have sanctioned for a moment so impolitic a
measure, which involved the loss of the most industrious and skilful
portion of their subjects. Its extreme injustice and cruelty rendered it
especially repugnant to the naturally humane disposition of the queen. [4]
But she had been early schooled to distrust her own reason, and indeed the
natural suggestions of humanity, in cases of conscience. Among the
reverend counsellors, on whom she most relied in these matters, was the
Dominican Torquemada. The situation which this man enjoyed as the queen's
confessor, during the tender years of her youth, gave him an ascendency
over her mind, which must have been denied to a person of his savage,
fanatical temper, even with the advantages of this spiritual connection,
had it been formed at a riper period of her life. Without opposing further
resistance to the representations, so emphatically expressed, of the holy
persons in whom she most confided, Isabella, at length, silenced her own
scruples, and consented to the fatal measure of proscription.
The edict for the expulsion of the Jews was signed by the Spanish
sovereigns at Granada, March 30th, 1492. The preamble alleges, in
vindication of the measure, the danger of allowing further intercourse
between the Jews and their Christian subjects, in consequence of the
incorrigible obstinacy, with which the former persisted in their attempts
to make converts of the latter to their own faith, and to instruct them in
their heretical rites, in open defiance of every legal prohibition and
penalty. When a college or corporation of any kind,--the instrument goes
on to state,--is convicted of any great or detestable crime, it is right
that it should be disfranchised, the less suffering with the greater, the
innocent with the guilty. If this be the case in temporal concerns, it is
much more so in those which affect the eternal welfare of the soul. It
finally decrees, that all unbaptized Jews, of whatever sex, age, or
condition, should depart from the realm by the end of July next ensuing;
prohibiting them from revisiting it, on any pretext whatever, under
penalty of death and confiscation of property. It was, moreover,
interdicted to every subject, to harbor, succor, or minister to the
necessities of any Jew, after the expiration of the term limited for his
departure. The persons and property of the Jews, in the mean time, were
taken under the royal protection. They were allowed to dispose of their
effects of every kind on their own account, and to carry the proceeds
along with them, in bills of exchange, or merchandise not prohibited, but
neither in gold nor silver. [5]
The doom of exile fell like a thunderbolt on the heads of the Israelites.
A large proportion of them had hitherto succeeded in shielding themselves
from the searching eye of the Inquisition, by an affectation of reverence
for the forms of Catholic worship, and a discreet forbearance of whatever
might offend the prejudices of their Christian brethren. They had even
hoped, that their steady loyalty, and a quiet and orderly discharge of
their social duties, would in time secure them higher immunities. Many had
risen to a degree of opulence, by means of the thrift and dexterity
peculiar to the race, which gave them a still deeper interest in the land
of their residence. [6] Their families were reared in all the elegant
refinements of life; and their wealth and education often disposed them to
turn their attention to liberal pursuits, which ennobled the character,
indeed, but rendered them personally more sensible to physical annoyance,
and less fitted to encounter the perils and privations of their dreary
pilgrimage. Even the mass of the common people possessed a dexterity in
various handicrafts, which afforded a comfortable livelihood, raising them
far above similar classes in most other nations, who might readily be
detached from the soil on which they happened to be cast, with
comparatively little sacrifice of local interests. [7] These ties were now
severed at a blow. They were to go forth as exiles from the land of their
birth; the land where all whom they ever loved had lived or died; the
land, not so much of their adoption, as of inheritance; which had been the
home of their ancestors for centuries, and with whose prosperity and glory
they were of course as intimately associated, as was any ancient Spaniard.
They were to be cast out helpless and defenceless, with a brand of infamy
set on them, among nations who had always held them in derision and
hatred.
Those provisions of the edict, which affected a show of kindness to the
Jews, were contrived so artfully, as to be nearly nugatory. As they were
excluded from the use of gold and silver, the only medium for representing
their property was bills of exchange. But commerce was too limited and
imperfect to allow of these being promptly obtained to any very
considerable, much less to the enormous amount required in the present
instance. It was impossible, moreover, to negotiate a sale of their
effects under existing circumstances, since the market was soon glutted
with commodities; and few would be found willing to give anything like an
equivalent for what, if not disposed of within the prescribed term, the
proprietors must relinquish at any rate. So deplorable, indeed, was the
sacrifice of property, that a chronicler of the day mentions, that he had
seen a house exchanged for an ass, and a vineyard for a suit of clothes!
In Aragon, matters were still worse. The government there discovered, that
the Jews were largely indebted to individuals and to certain corporations.
It accordingly caused their property to be sequestrated for the benefit of
their creditors, until their debts should be liquidated. Strange, indeed,
that the balance should be found against the people, who have been
everywhere conspicuous for their commercial sagacity and resources, and
who, as factors of the great nobility and farmers of the revenue, enjoyed
at least equal advantages in Spain with those possessed in other
countries, for the accumulation of wealth. [8]
While the gloomy aspect of their fortunes pressed heavily on the hearts of
the Israelites, the Spanish clergy were indefatigable in the work of
conversion. They lectured in the synagogues and public squares, expounding
the doctrines of Christianity, and thundering forth both argument and
invective against the Hebrew heresy. But their laudable endeavors were in
a great measure counteracted by the more authoritative rhetoric of the
Jewish Rabbins, who compared the persecutions of their brethren to those
which their ancestors had suffered under Pharaoh. They encouraged them to
persevere, representing that the present afflictions were intended as a
trial of their faith by the Almighty, who designed in this way to guide
them to the promised land, by opening a path through the waters, as he had
done to their fathers of old. The more wealthy Israelites enforced their
exhortations by liberal contributions for the relief of their indigent
brethren. Thus strengthened, there were found but very few, when the day
of departure arrived, who were not prepared to abandon their country
rather than their religion. The extraordinary act of self-devotion by a
whole people for conscience' sake may be thought, in the nineteenth
century, to merit other epithets than those of "perfidy, incredulity, and
stiff-necked obstinacy," with which the worthy Curate of Los Palacios, in
the charitable feeling of that day, has seen fit to stigmatize it. [9]
When the period of departure arrived, all the principal routes through the
country might be seen swarming with emigrants, old and young, the sick and
the helpless, men, women, and children, mingled promiscuously together,
some mounted on horses or mules, but far the greater part undertaking
their painful pilgrimage on foot. The sight of so much misery touched even
the Spaniards with pity, though none might succor them; for the grand
inquisitor, Torquemada, enforced the ordinance to that effect, by
denouncing heavy ecclesiastical censures on all who should presume to
violate it. The fugitives were distributed along various routes, being
determined in their destination by accidental circumstances, much more
than any knowledge of the respective countries to which they were bound.
Much the largest division, amounting according to some estimates to eighty
thousand souls, passed into Portugal; whose monarch, John the Second,
dispensed with his scruples of conscience so far as to give them a free
passage through his dominions on their way to Africa, in consideration of
a tax of a _cruzado_ a head. He is even said to have silenced his
scruples so far as to allow certain ingenious artisans to establish
themselves permanently in the kingdom. [10]
A considerable number found their way to the ports of Santa Maria and
Cadiz, where, after lingering some time in the vain hope of seeing the
waters open for their egress, according to the promises of the Rabbins,
they embarked on board a Spanish fleet for the Barbary coast. Having
crossed over to Ercilla, a Christian settlement in Africa, whence they
proceeded by land towards Fez, where a considerable body of their
countrymen resided, they were assaulted on their route by the roving
tribes of the desert, in quest of plunder. Notwithstanding the interdict,
the Jews had contrived to secrete small sums of money, sewed up in their
garments or the linings of their saddles. These did not escape the
avaricious eyes of their spoilers, who are even said to have ripped open
the bodies of their victims, in search of gold, which they were supposed
to have swallowed. The lawless barbarians, mingling lust with avarice,
abandoned themselves to still more frightful excesses, violating the wives
and daughters of the unresisting Jews, or massacring in cold blood such as
offered resistance. But without pursuing these loathsome details further,
it need only be added, that the miserable exiles endured such extremity of
famine, that they were glad to force a nourishment from the grass which
grew scantily among the sands of the desert; until at length great numbers
of them, wasted by disease, and broken in spirit, retraced their steps to
Ercilla, and consented to be baptized, in the hope of being permitted to
revisit their native land. The number, indeed, was so considerable, that
the priest who officiated was obliged to make use of the mop, or hyssop,
with which the Roman Catholic missionaries were wont to scatter the holy
drops, whose mystic virtue could cleanse the soul in a moment from the
foulest stains of infidelity. "Thus," says a Castilian historian, "the
calamities of these poor blind creatures proved in the end an excellent
remedy, that God made use of to unseal their eyes, which they now opened
to the vain promises of the Rabbins; so that, renouncing their ancient
heresies, they became faithful followers of the Cross!" [11]
Many of the emigrants took the direction of Italy. Those who landed at
Naples brought with them an infectious disorder, contracted by long
confinement in small, crowded, and ill-provided vessels. The disorder was
so malignant, and spread with such frightful celerity, as to sweep off
more than twenty thousand inhabitants of the city, in the course of the
year, whence it extended its devastation over the whole Italian peninsula.
A graphic picture of these horrors is thus given by a Genoese historian,
an eye-witness of the scenes he describes. "No one," he says, "could
behold the sufferings of the Jewish exiles unmoved. A great many perished
of hunger, especially those of tender years. Mothers, with scarcely
strength to support themselves, carried their famished infants in their
arms, and died with them. Many fell victims to the cold, others to intense
thirst, while the unaccustomed distresses incident to a sea-voyage
aggravated their maladies. I will not enlarge on the cruelty and the
avarice which they frequently experienced from the masters of the ships
which transported them from Spain. Some were murdered to gratify their
cupidity, others forced to sell their children for the expenses of the
passage. They arrived in Genoa in crowds, but were not suffered to tarry
there long, by reason of the ancient law which interdicted the Jewish
traveller from a longer residence than three days. They were allowed,
however, to refit their vessels, and to recruit themselves for some days
from the fatigues of their voyage. One might have taken them for spectres,
so emaciated were they, so cadaverous in their aspect, and with eyes so
sunken; they differed in nothing from the dead, except in the power of
motion, which indeed they scarcely retained. Many fainted and expired on
the mole, which, being completely surrounded by the sea, was the only
quarter vouchsafed to the wretched emigrants. The infection bred by such a
swarm of dead and dying persons was not at once perceived; but, when the
winter broke up, ulcers began to make their appearance, and the malady,
which lurked for a long time in the city, broke out into the plague in the
following year." [12]
Many of the exiles passed into Turkey, and to different parts of the
Levant, where their descendants continued to speak the Castilian language
far into the following century. Others found their way to France, and even
England. Part of their religious services is recited to this day in
Spanish, in one or more of the London synagogues; and the modern Jew still
reverts with fond partiality to Spain, as the cherished land of his
fathers, illustrated by the most glorious recollections in their eventful
history. [13]
The whole number of Jews expelled from Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella is
variously computed from one hundred and sixty thousand to eight hundred
thousand souls; a discrepancy sufficiently indicating the paucity of
authentic data. Most modern writers, with the usual predilection for
startling results, have assumed the latter estimate; and Llorente has made
it the basis of some important calculations, in his History of the
Inquisition. A view of all the circumstances will lead us without much
hesitation to adopt the more moderate computation. [14] This, moreover, is
placed beyond reasonable doubt by the direct testimony of the Curate of
Los Palacios. He reports, that a Jewish Rabbin, one of the exiles,
subsequently returned to Spain, where he was baptized by him. This person,
whom Bernaldez commends for his intelligence, estimated the whole number
of his unbaptized countrymen in the dominions of Ferdinand and Isabella,
at the publication of the edict, at thirty-six thousand families. Another
Jewish authority, quoted by the Curate, reckoned them at thirty-five
thousand. This, assuming an average of four and a half to a family, gives
the sum total of about one hundred and sixty thousand individuals,
agreeably to the computation of Bernaldez. There is little reason for
supposing, that the actual amount would suffer diminution in the hands of
either the Jewish or Castilian authority; since the one might naturally be
led to exaggerate, in order to heighten sympathy with the calamities of
his nation, and the other, to magnify as far as possible the glorious
triumphs of the Cross. [15]
The detriment incurred by the state, however, is not founded so much on
any numerical estimate, as on the subtraction of the mechanical skill,
intelligence, and general resources of an orderly, industrious population.
In this view, the mischief was incalculably greater than that inferred by
the mere number of the exiled; and, although even this might have been
gradually repaired in a country allowed the free and healthful development
of its energies, yet in Spain this was so effectually counteracted by the
Inquisition, and other causes in the following century, that the loss may
be deemed irretrievable.
The expulsion of so numerous a class of subjects by an independent act of
the sovereign, might well be regarded as an enormous stretch of
prerogative, altogether incompatible with anything like a free government.
But to judge the matter rightly, we must take into view the actual
position of the Jews at that time. Far from forming an integral part of
the commonwealth, they were regarded as alien to it, as a mere
excrescence, which, so far from contributing to the healthful action of
the body politic, was nourished by its vicious humors, and might be lopped
off at any time, when the health of the system demanded it. Far from being
protected by the laws, the only aim of the laws, in reference to them, was
to define more precisely their civil incapacities, and to draw the line of
division more broadly between them and the Christians. Even this
humiliation by no means satisfied the national prejudices, as is evinced
by the great number of tumults and massacres of which they were the
victims. In these circumstances, it seemed to be no great assumption of
authority, to pronounce sentence of exile against those whom public
opinion had so long proscribed as enemies to the state. It was only
carrying into effect that opinion, expressed as it had been in a great
variety of ways; and, as far as the rights of the nation were concerned,
the banishment of a single Spaniard would have been held a grosser
violation of them, than that of the whole race of Israelites.
It has been common with modern historians to detect a principal motive for
the expulsion of the Jews, in the avarice of the government. It is only
necessary, however, to transport ourselves back to those times, to find it
in perfect accordance with their spirit, at least in Spain. It is indeed
incredible, that persons possessing the political sagacity of Ferdinand
and Isabella could indulge a temporary cupidity at the sacrifice of the
most important and permanent interests, converting their wealthiest
districts into a wilderness, and dispeopling them of a class of citizens
who contributed beyond all others, not only to the general resources, but
the direct revenues of the crown; a measure so manifestly unsound, as to
lead even a barbarian monarch of that day to exclaim, "Do they call this
Ferdinand a politic prince, who can thus impoverish his own kingdom and
enrich ours!" [16] It would seem, indeed, when the measure had been
determined on, that the Aragonese monarch was willing, by his expedient of
sequestration, to control its operation in such a manner as to secure to
his own subjects the full pecuniary benefit of it. [17] No imputation of
this kind attaches to Castile. The clause of the ordinance, which might
imply such a design, by interdicting the exportation of gold and silver,
was only enforcing a law, which had been already twice enacted by cortes
in the present reign, and which was deemed of such moment, that the
offence was made capital. [18]
We need look no further for the principle of action, in this case, than
the spirit of religious bigotry, which led to a similar expulsion of the
Jews from England, France, and other parts of Europe, as well as from
Portugal, under circumstances of peculiar atrocity, a few years later.
[19] Indeed, the spirit of persecution did not expire with the fifteenth
century, but extended far into the more luminous periods of the
seventeenth and eighteenth; and that, too, under a ruler of the enlarged
capacity of Frederic the Great, whose intolerance could not plead in
excuse the blindness of fanaticism. [20] How far the banishment of the
Jews was conformable to the opinions of the most enlightened
contemporaries, may be gathered from the encomiums lavished on its authors
from more than one quarter. Spanish writers, without exception, celebrate
it as a sublime sacrifice of all temporal interests to religious
principle. The best instructed foreigners, in like manner, however they
may condemn the details of its execution, or commiserate the sufferings of
the Jews, commend the act, as evincing the most lively and laudable zeal
for the true faith. [21]
It cannot be denied, that Spain at this period surpassed most of the
nations of Christendom in religious enthusiasm, or, to speak more
correctly, in bigotry. This is doubtless imputable to the long war with
the Moslems, and its recent glorious issue, which swelled every heart with
exultation, disposing it to consummate the triumphs of the Cross by
purging the land from a heresy, which, strange as it may seem, was
scarcely less detested than that of Mahomet. Both the sovereigns partook
largely of these feelings. With regard to Isabella, moreover, it must be
borne constantly in mind, as has been repeatedly remarked in the course of
this History, that she had been used to surrender her own judgment, in
matters of conscience, to those spiritual guardians, who were supposed in
that age to be its rightful depositaries, and the only casuists who could
safely determine the doubtful line of duty. Isabella's pious disposition,
and her trembling solicitude to discharge her duty, at whatever cost of
personal inclination, greatly enforced the precepts of education. In this
way, her very virtues became the source of her errors. Unfortunately, she
lived in an age and station, which attached to these errors the most
momentous consequences. [22]--But we gladly turn from these dark prospects
to a brighter page of her history.
FOOTNOTES
[1] It is a proof of the high consideration in which such Israelites as
were willing to embrace Christianity were held, that three of that number,
Alvarez, Avila, and Pulgar, were private secretaries of the queen. (Mem.
de la Acad. de Hist., tom. vi. Ilust. 18.)
An incidental expression of Martyr's, among many similar ones by
contemporaries, affords the true key to the popular odium against the
Jews. "Cum namque viderent, Judaeorum tabido commercio, qui hac horâ sunt
in Hispaniâ _innumeri Christianis ditiores_, plurimorum animos corrumpi ac
seduci," etc. Opus Epist., epist. 92.
[2] Paramo, De Origine Inquisitionis, p. 164.--Llorente, Hist. de
l'Inquisition, tom. i. cap. 7, sec. 3.--Peter Martyr, Opus Epist., epist.
94.--Ferreras, Hist. d'Espagne, tom. viii. p. 128.
[3] Paramo, De Origine Inquisitionis, p. 163.
Salazar de Mendoza refers the sovereign's consent to the banishment of the
Jews, in a great measure, to the urgent remonstrances of the cardinal of
Spain. The bigotry of the biographer makes him claim the credit of every
fanatical act for his illustrious hero. See Crón. del Gran Cardenal, p.
250.
[4] Llorente, Hist. de l'Inquisition, tom. i. chap. 7, sect. 5.
Pulgar, in a letter to the cardinal of Spain, animadverting with much
severity on the tenor of certain municipal ordinances against the Jews in
Guipuscoa and Toledo, in 1482, plainly intimates, that they were not at
all to the taste of the queen. See Letras, (Amstelodami, 1670,) let. 31.
[5] Carbajal, Anales, MS., año 1492.--Recep. de las Leyes, lib. 8, tit. 2,
ley 2.--Pragmáticas del Reyno, ed. 1520, fol. 3.
[6] The Curate of Los Palacios speaks of several Israelites worth one or
two millions of maravedies, and another even as having amassed ten. He
mentions one in particular, by the name of Abraham, as renting the
_greater part of Castile_! It will hardly do to take the good Curate's
statement _à la lettre_. See Reyes Católicos, MS., cap. 112.
[7] Bernaldez, Reyes Católicos, ubi supra.
[8] Bernaldez, Reyes Católicos, MS., cap. 10.--Zurita, Analos, tom. v.
fol. 9.
Capmany notices the number of synagogues existing in Aragon, in 1428, as
amounting to nineteen. In Galicia at the same time there were but three,
and in Catalonia but one. See Mem. de Barcelona, tom. iv. Apend. num. 11.
[9] Bernaldez, Reyes Católicos, MS., cap. 10, 113.--Ferreras, Hist.
d'Espagne, tom. viii. p. 131.
[10] Zurita, Anales, tom. v. fol. 9.--Ferreras, Hist. d'Espagne, tom.
viii. p. 133.--Bernaldez, Reyes Católicos, ubi supra.--La Clède, Hist. de
Portugal, tom. iv. p. 95.--Mariana, Hist. de España, tom. ii. p. 602.
[11] Ferreras, Hist. d'Espagne, tom. viii. p. 133.--Bernaldez, Reyes
Católicos, MS., cap. 113.
[12] Senarega, apud Muratori, Rerum Ital. Script., tom. xxiv. pp. 531,
532.
[13] See a sensible notice of Hebrew literature in Spain, in the
Retrospective Review, vol. iii. p. 209.--Mariana, Hist. de España, tom.
ii. lib. 26, cap. 1.--Zurita, Anales, tom. v. fol. 9.
Not a few of the learned exiles attained to eminence in those countries of
Europe where they transferred their residence. One is mentioned by Castro
as a leading practitioner of medicine in Genoa; another, as filling the
posts of astronomer and chronicler, under King Emanuel of Portugal. Many
of them published works in various departments of science, which were
translated into the Spanish and other European languages. Biblioteca
Española, tom. i. pp. 359-372.
[14] From a curious document in the _Archives of Simancas_, consisting of
a report made to the Spanish sovereigns by their accountant general,
Quintanilla, in 1492, it would appear, that the population of the kingdom
of Castile, exclusive of Granada, was then estimated at 1,500,000
_vecinos_, or householders. (See Mem. de la Acad. de Hist., Apend.
no. 12.) This, allowing four and a half to a family, would make the whole
population 6,750,000. It appears from the statement of Bernaldez, that the
kingdom of Castile contained five-sixths of the whole amount of Jews in
the Spanish monarchy. This proportion, if 800,000 be received as the
total, would amount in round numbers to 670,000, or ten per cent, of the
whole population of the kingdom. Now, it is manifestly improbable that so
large a portion of the whole nation, conspicuous moreover for wealth and
intelligence, could have been held so light in a political aspect, as the
Jews certainly were, or have tamely submitted for so many years to the
most wanton indignities without resistance; or finally, that the Spanish
government would have ventured on so bold a measure as the banishment of
so numerous and powerful a class, and that too with as few precautions,
apparently, as would be required for driving out of the country a roving
gang of gypsies.
[15] Bernaldez, Reyes Católicos, MS., cap. 110.--Llorente, Hist. de
l'Inquisition, tom. i. chap. 7, sect. 7.--Mariana, Hist. de España, tom.
ii. lib. 26.--Zurita, Anales, tom. v. fol. 9.
[16] Bajazet. See Abarca, Reyes de Aragon, tom. ii. p. 310.--Paramo, De
Origine Inquisitionis, p. 168.
[17] "In truth," Father Abarca somewhat innocently remarks, "King
Ferdinand was a politic Christian, making the interests of church and
state mutually subservient to each other"! Reyes de Aragon, tom. ii. fol.
310.
[18] Once at Toledo, 1480, and at Murcia, 1488. See Recop. de las Leyes,
lib. 6, tit. 18, ley 1.
[19] The Portuguese government caused all children of fourteen years of
age, or under, to be taken from their parents and retained in the country,
as fit subjects for a Christian education. The distress occasioned by this
cruel provision may be well imagined. Many of the unhappy parents murdered
their children to defeat the ordinance; and many laid violent hands on
themselves. Faria y Sousa coolly remarks, that "It was a great mistake in
King Emanuel to think of converting any Jew to Christianity, old enough to
pronounce the name of Moses!" He fixes three years of age as the utmost
limit. (Europa Portuguesa, tom. ii. p. 496.)
Mr. Turner has condensed, with his usual industry, the most essential
chronological facts relative to modern Jewish history, into a note
contained in the second volume of his History of England, pp. 114-120.
[20] They were also rejected from Vienna, in 1669. The illiberal, and
indeed most cruel legislation of Frederic II., in reference to his Jewish
subjects, transports us back to the darkest periods of the Visigothic
monarchy. The reader will find a summary of these enactments in the third
volume of Milman's agreeable History of the Jews.
[21] The accomplished and amiable Florentine, Pico di Mirandola, in his
treatise on Judicial Astrology, remarks that, "the sufferings of the Jews,
_in which the glory of divine justice delighted_, were so extreme as
to fill us Christians with commiseration." The Genoese historian,
Senarega, indeed admits that the measure savored _of some slight degree
of cruelty_. "Res haec primo conspectu laudabilis visa est, quia decus
nostrae Religionis respiceret, sed aliquantulum in se crudelitatis
continere, si eos non belluas, sed homines a Deo creatos, consideravimus."
De Rebus Genuensibus, apud Muratori, Rerum Ital. Script., tom. xxiv.--
Illescas, Hist. Pontif., apud Paramo, De Origine Inquisitionis, p. 167.
[22] Llorente sums up his account of the expulsion, by assigning the
following motives to the principal agents in the business. "The measure,"
he says, "may be referred to the fanaticism of Torquemada, to the avarice
and superstition of Ferdinand, to the false ideas and inconsiderate zeal
with which they had inspired Isabella, to whom history cannot refuse the
praise of great sweetness of disposition, and an enlightened mind." Hist.
de l'Inquisition, tom. i. ch. 7, sec. 10.