CATALONIA
That the Córtes of Monzon, in 1563-4, should protest energetically against these abuses was natural. Indeed, a Catalan named Gaspar Mercader carried the protest so far as to say, among other odious things, that the Inquisition had been introduced only for a limited time which had expired and that it should be abolished, for which the tribunal arrested, tried and punished him.[1130]In spite of this interference with the freedom of debate, the general disaffection, as we have seen, led to the visitation of de Soto Salazar. In Barcelona he found that not the slightest attention had been paid to the orders of the Suprema based on the report of Cervantes. Advocates, familiars and commissioners continued to be appointed in profusion, without investigation as to fitness. When an inquisitor visited his district he carried with him blank commissions which he distributed at will. All these, with their families, were protected and defended by the tribunal in civil and criminal cases, nor was this all, for it would seem that any one who claimed the fuero, whether he was entitled to it or not, was admitted and, in the absence of lists filed with the magistrates, the latter hadno means of resisting the arrogant and peremptory demand of the tribunal to surrender cases. Instances were given which showed that the tribunal was a court where justice—or rather injustice—was bought and sold and there had been no reform in the excessive fees which had scandalized Cervantes.[1131]
That it should be hated was inevitable. In 1566, Govilla, Bishop of Elna, defending himself for acts committed when he was inquisitor of Barcelona, declared that the Inquisition was even more odious in Catalonia than elsewhere.[1132]This hatred sometimes expressed itself more forcibly than by complaints. In 1567, the evocation of a case, which the local authorities claimed as their own, led to the fiercest excitement which the viceroy fruitlessly sought to allay and appealed to Philip II for his immediate interposition. Disregarding the inviolable secrecy of the Inquisition, the Diputados, with the veguer, forced their way into the palace, penetrated to the audience-chamber where the inquisitors were trying a case, and inventoried and sequestrated everything, even to the private property of the Inquisitor Padilla in his apartments—apparently a seizure of temporalities under an order of the Banch Reyal. Even more flagrant was the insult committed when the messenger and the secretary were conveying from Perpignan to Barcelona two government officials accused of impeding the Inquisition and also a prisoner under a charge of heresy. Near Gerona, one of the Diputados, at the head of an armed band, seized the whole party and carried them back to Perpignan, where they were paraded through the streets with blare of trumpets, as though criminals on the way to execution, and were then cast into prison, where they lay until discharged without accusation. This was a most serious assault on the dignity of the Holy Office and even worse was permitting the escape of the heretic, but it was obliged to submit without vindicating its authority.[1133]
Such being the temper of the Catalans and such the provocation to meet lawlessness with lawlessness, it is not surprising that, when the Concordia of 1568 was prepared for the three kingdoms, Catalonia would have none of it. When, in September, it was submitted to the Diputados, they were incensed and proposed to send envoys to the king to remonstrate against it.There was a universal outcry that it was contrary to the constitution and privileges of the land; they would observe it in so far as it was in their favor, but as to the rest they were ready to lose life, property and children rather than to submit to it. In February, 1569, the inquisitors wrote that the people would not be content until they had driven the Inquisition from the land; as for themselves they proposed to go on as they had previously done until the Concordia should be accepted, to which the Suprema cordially assented.[1134]
CATALONIA
This attitude of mutual defiance was not conducive to peace. In 1570, there arose a quarrel so bitter that the Diputados invoked the protection and interposition of Pius V, and he urged Philip II to come to some understanding with them, in view of possible serious consequences. Philip took the position that they were so excited and so obstinate that any concessions would lead only to further demands, but he asked the pope to dismiss the envoys, referring them to him with recommendation for favorable consideration, so that anything that he might yield would be to the Holy See and not to recalcitrant subjects. The situation was critical; the rebellion of Granada was exhausting his resources, there was acute apprehension of attack by a Turkish fleet and the Catalans were soon afterwards called upon to contribute to the defence of the coasts, but if any concessions were enforced on the Inquisition they have left no traces. In fact, the Venetian envoy, Leonardo Donato, in his relation of 1573, states that, after the Catalans had spent a hundred thousand ducats in these efforts, the Inquisition imprisoned those who had been most active in the matter and that they subsequently refused to leave the prison without a formal declaration that they had not been arrested for heresy.[1135]Dissension naturally continued. In 1572 we hear of a demand from the Diputados that the inquisitors should show them their commissions and take an oath to obey the constitution of Catalonia, because they held rents on the Diputacion; the inquisitors acceded to the first of these and were rebuked by the Suprema because it was a demand that had been persistently refused before and they must not do it again. Then, in 1574, there came a complaint from all the cities that familiarsrefused obedience to the local laws respecting prices, pasturage and other matters as required under the Concordia, to which the Suprema superciliously replied by instructing the inquisitors that, as the people had rejected the Concordia, they need not observe it.[1136]Then, in 1585, as we have seen (p. 416) the Córtes obtained an advantage in excluding familiars and officials from public offices.
In this spirit of undisguised hostility both sides were aligned for a decisive struggle in the Córtes of 1599, under the new royalty of the youthful Philip III. As the Catalan efforts failed and the Inquisition was left in possession of its usurped powers, the details of the contest have no interest except as an exhibition of shameless duplicity, by which the king tricked his vassals. They hoped to win favor by a subsidio of a million libras to the king and a hundred thousand to his bride, besides shrewdly granting ten thousand to the Marquis of Denia (soon to become Duke of Lerma) and six thousand to the Vice-chancellor of Aragon,[1137]but they reaped nothing but deceit. Long discussions resulted in a series of articles, divided into two categories, to one of which Philip gave unqualified assent and to the other his assent as far as concerned himself, with a promise to procure that of the inquisitor-general and pope. It was proposed to withhold the pension of six hundred libras granted in 1520, if the papal confirmation were not procured within a year, but Philip declared that no such guarantee was necessary, for the letters which he had ordered to be written to the pope were so strong that no influence could counteract them. His despatches to his ambassador were sent through the Diputados in order to satisfy them, but they assuredly were not allowed to see others which instructed the ambassador to be circumspect in urging the matter. He also sent word to the inquisitor-general that the delivery of these despatches had been delayed in order to give him time to express his views. The Suprema, in appealing to Clement VIII to withhold confirmation, did not hesitate to say that Philip had endeavored to escape under cover of the inquisitor-general and pope and had finally signed only in so far as concerned himself. Indeed, in a subsequent official paper, it was unblushingly asserted that he had done so only to get rid of the Catalans. Under these influences it is needless to say that theconfirmation never came and the subsidio was the only practical result of the labors of the Córtes.[1138]
One of the articles required the execution of the Concordia of 1520, which embraced that of 1512, the fulfilment of which the Catalans had never ceased to demand, and the manner in which these solemn compacts were argued away is instructive. In 1566, Govilla, Bishop of Elna, who had been inquisitor of Barcelona, calmly asserted that the articles of 1512 had been revoked as prejudicial to the free exercise of the Inquisition. The Suprema, in urging Clement VIII to refuse confirmation of the new Concordia of 1599, argued that the transactions of 1512 and 1520 were invalid through simony, as the Córtes had obtained the assent of Ferdinand in 1516 (sic) and of Charles in 1520 by conditioning subsidios on it. Leo’s bull of condemnation in 1513 was relied upon and that of confirmation in 1516 was dismissed as obreptitious and surreptitious. So Cardinal Adrian’s action in 1520 was represented as conditional on confirmation by the Holy See, and as in no way binding on the Inquisition. So, in 1632, the Barcelona tribunal drew up a statement to be laid before Philip IV by the Suprema, adroitly mixing up the affairs of Aragon and Catalonia and telling him that the Córtes of 1518 demanded the revival of the articles of 1512, that Charles refused to swear to them, that Juan Prat interpolated others, for which he was imprisoned and that the effort failed. In transmitting this the Suprema added that the fact that the Córtes never ceased to demand the enforcement of the articles showed that they had never been observed.[1139]From first to last it was a history of deception, in which kings conspired with inquisitors to betray their subjects, without even the excuse that the faith was concerned in these details of secular jurisdiction.
CATALONIA
The Catalan temper was not soothed by the disappointment of 1599, and the refusal of redress prompted resort to forcible measures. There was a contest in 1608 in which the Banch Reyal uttered a sentence of banishment against the inquisitors; a vessel was made ready for their deportation but, when the day came, they barred their door and hung over it a portière of black velvet to which was attached a crucifix. The city showed its piety byplacing candles in front of the sacred emblem and the chapter sent priests to pray before it. No one ventured to disturb it; the Diputados, the chapter and the city authorities interposed, and an accommodation was reached.[1140]A more savage quarrel arose, in 1611, in consequence of the veguer disarming the coachman of an inquisitor. The city authorities seized the temporalities, laid siege to the palace of the Inquisition, sentenced the inquisitors to banishment and proclaimed it with trumpets through the streets. This they justified to the king by telling him that the Holy Office had been instituted for a limited term which had expired, so that it should be abolished in Catalonia and the cognizance of matters of faith be restored to the episcopal courts, all of which, we are told, gave his majesty much concern.[1141]
Mutual detestation did not diminish and, when the Córtes of 1626 were approaching, the inquisitors anxiously urged the Suprema to impress upon the king that the peace and preservation of Catalonia depended upon the maintenance of their temporal jurisdiction. The deputies, they said, were holding daily juntas and accumulating stores of documents from the archives, asserting that the time had expired for which the Inquisition was instituted, and if they accomplish their intention they will destroy it wholly. That they were really alarmed is visible in their asking the Suprema to secure some compromise. The Suprema duly represented the danger to Philip IV, who in reply gave assurance that no prejudicial change would be approved, for his unceasing desire was to promote the exaltation of the Inquisition. After the Córtes had assembled, the tribunal reported, June 27th, that they had drawn up a series of articles effectually disabling the jurisdiction of the Inquisition and that they declare that they will not vote a subsidio until the king shall have confirmed them. The articles deemed so obnoxious scarce amounted to more than the Concordia of Castile so long in force, save provisions that the inquisitors should be Catalans and should take an oath to obey the laws, and that disputes of jurisdiction should be settled by a junta consisting of an inquisitor, a judge of the Audiencia and the Bishop of Barcelona. Moderate as they were, Philip kept his promise and referred them, September 23d, to Diego de Guzman, Archbishop of Seville, acting head of the Suprema in thevacancy of the inquisitor-generalship, so that, on the adjournment of the Córtes, the whole matter remained suspended.[1142]
An attempt at compromise was made in what was known as the Concordia of Cardinal Zapata, arranged, December 24, 1630, between him as inquisitor-general and the Council of Aragon. This made no substantial change in the jurisdiction of the Inquisition but was directed chiefly to restraining the misuse of excommunication on the one side and the recourse to the Banch Reyal on the other, by providing that all disputed cases should be settled by competencias conducted according to the received form of procedure, under penalty for a first offence of five hundred ducats on the tribunal refusing, and suspension from office for a second. This left untouched the roots of trouble and accomplished little, in consequence, it is said, of the delays and evasions of the inquisitors, and frequent recourse continued to the Banch Reyal, especially by creditors.[1143]
CATALONIA
The Córtes of 1626 had not been dissolved and they met again in 1632 to conclude their unfinished business. As usual, the tribunal and the Suprema prepared for the struggle by earnest appeals to Philip, who responded with assurances of special care in all that concerned the Inquisition. The Suprema had the hardihood to tell him that the Concordia of 1512, on which the Catalans based their claims, had never been confirmed, but it was within the truth when it said that it had never been observed. It declared moreover that the articles framed by the Córtes would so prostrate the tribunal that it would have to cease its functions. A memorial by the secretary of the tribunal, Miguel Rodríguez, gives a deplorable account of the social condition of Catalonia, where the barons and gentlemen, the cities and church foundations, he says, possessed excessive powers and where the bishops were also barons. The hostility of the nobles and cities to the familiars was manifested by the daily murders committed on them and their children and the burning of their houses. But for the protection of the Inquisition they would be exterminated, for its jurisdiction was the only one respected. Fathers endured the murder of their sons, sons that of their fathers and wives thatof their husbands, for fear of greater evils and, in addition to this, was the turbulent temper of the population. The viceroys had nominal power, but it was exercised only on the common folk and not on the powerful, whom no one dared to accuse or to bear witness against. All this busy preparation was superfluous; the Córtes were dissolved without gaining their object.[1144]
The Inquisition, as usual, had triumphed, but peace was impossible between the incompatible claims of rival jurisdictions. In 1637 the Suprema complained of the continuous series of troubles and of the disregard of the Concordia of Zapata. This time the offender was the viceroy, the powerful Duke of Cardona, who had imprisoned a familiar for carrying a pistol and refusing to surrender it, and had arrested two servants of the receiver, fining one and discharging the other. When the tribunal sent to him a priest bearing a monitorio with excommunication, he shut the priest up,incomunicado, in a room of the palace. Then he invited to dinner the fiscal of the tribunal and shut him up likewise. He ordered the inquisitor to withdraw the excommunication and, on his refusal, he pronounced sentence of banishment, posted four hundred men around the Inquisition and made ready a vessel to carry him to Majorca. The inquisitor assembled five bishops who declared that Cardona had incurred the excommunication of the bullSi de protegendisand the inquisitor so declared him, though for the avoidance of scandal he forbore to publish it. Under the intervention of the bishops the sentences of banishment and excommunication were mutually withdrawn, and the viceroy released the priest and fiscal, boasting that he had carried his point. Thereupon the Suprema asked the king to execute on Cardona the penalties of the Concordia of Zapata and greater ones in view of his unprecedented acts and also that theipso factocensures of the canonSi quis suadenteand the bullSi de protegendisbe published in order that he might seek the salvation of his soul. To this the weary king could only reply by deprecating these unseemly quarrels and ordering that viceroys should not try the cases of familiars—Cardona apparently having undertaken to do this only because there was no other authority that ventured to do so, although the offence was one which forfeited the fuero.[1145]Soon after this, in 1639, a still more serious troublebroke out in Tortosa, in which the magistrates were involved and the people rose against the Inquisition, but while this was in progress the Catalan rebellion broke out and prudence counselled abstention from severe measures of repression.[1146]
Whatever share the Inquisition may have had in stimulating the disaffection that led to the rebellion, the unredressed grievances which so excited the Córtes nowhere appear on the surface. The proximate cause, as has been stated above, was the burning of the churches of Montiró and Rio de Arenas by the Neapolitan troops quartered on the people; some consecrated hosts were found reduced to coals and the peasants, who had suffered from the outrages of the unpaid soldiery, rose in arms, cut them off in detail, styled themselves the Exercit Christiá and bore on their banners the Venerable Sacrament, with the legend “Senor judicau vostra causa” and claimed that their object was to protect the people and defend the Catholic faith. In fact, the Inquisition was invited to prosecute the guilty authors of the sacrilege and undertook to do so, but of course the culprits could not be identified and it was reduced to excommunicating them in bulk. It was against the representatives of the king that the initial riots of June 7 and 8, 1640, were directed, when the judges of the royal Audiencia and the Viceroy, the Count of Santa Coloma, were murdered. The inquisitors at once proffered their services to the Diputados and, at the request of the latter, they wrote to the king and inquisitor-general praising the efforts of the Diputados to preserve peace, not knowing that for months they had been organizing the rebellion in correspondence with France. When too, in September, a tax was laid to put the land in a state of defence, the assent of the tribunal was asked as to levying it on familiars.[1147]
CATALONIA
There was thus no open hostility towards the Inquisition, but, at the same time, there was no respect for its inviolability. When the mob rose again on Christmas day, to put to death all Castilians, there was a report that two thousand of them were concealed in the Inquisition. Led by a coachman of one of the inquisitors, the people broke into the Inquisition, maltreated the officials, hanged some of them, emptied the money chests andfound in the secret prison a solitary Castilian on trial for heresy. Him they carried to the town-council who returned him to the tribunal and garroted the coachman.[1148]
When, on January 23, 1641, terms of submission to France were concluded, the Inquisition was provided for. Having cut loose from Spain, it was impossible to permit the tribunal to remain subject to the Suprema in Madrid, and the clause respecting it was that all inquisitors and officials should be Catalans, jurisdiction should be restricted to matters of faith, and it should be directly under the Roman Congregation of the Holy Office.[1149]Still the inquisitors remained at their posts; for five months they had had no word from the Suprema; they expected to be called upon to take the oath of allegiance to King Louis and they sent their secretary, Juan de Eraso, to Madrid for instructions, suggesting that they had better move to Tarragona or Tortosa. Philip ordered them to remain and they resolutely obeyed, but the situation grew constantly worse and, on November 7th, they made another appeal, representing their danger, their destitution, their inability to perform their functions, and their expectation that they would be forced to kiss the hands of the Marshal de Brézé, the approaching French governor. This was confirmed by Don Antonio de Aragon, who had just returned from Barcelona; on two occasions the mob had set fire to the Inquisition and heresy was rampant, for many of the French troops were Calvinists and Calvinism was openly preached. The Suprema characteristically debated the question under four heads—Shall the Inquisition be removed to Tarragona or Tortosa? Shall the inquisitors kiss the hands of the French governor? Does their lack of means to prosecute relieve them from prosecuting native or French heretics? Shall testimony against such heretics be taken in Madrid and action be based on it? After elaborate discussion the fourth question was decided in the affirmative and the other three in the negative. Juan de Mañozca was appointed to gather testimony in Madrid, and the inquisitors were told to stand their ground and do their duty, using censures and interdict if necessary. If driven from the town, they were to carry with them the records so as to be able to work elsewhere.[1150]
One of the inquisitors, Dr. Cotoner, had left Barcelona for his home in Majorca. The other two, with most of the officials, stood to their post and, in August, 1643, they were called upon to utter fearful curses on unknown parties supposed to have committed a sacrilegious theft of consecrated hosts.[1151]Towards the end of September, however, they were expelled, to give place to a native tribunal, and it was done with a refinement of cruelty. There were ten in all—seven subordinates and the son of one of them, besides the two inquisitors—who had stood faithful to their duty. They were put on board a vessel, with orders to land them in Portugal, which, like Catalonia, was in revolt against Spain. Although the crew consisted of Catalans and Frenchmen, they were persuaded to put into Cartagena, with a promise of being allowed to sell their cargo there. The reception of the refugees was most inhospitable; the vessel was seized and the cargo and effects of passengers and crew were embargoed: much red tape had to be cut and it was not until December that the conclusion was reached that the crew had rendered an essential service exposing them to punishment by the rebels, wherefore the vessel was released and they were allowed to dispose of the cargo.[1152]
The refugees were without salaries or resources and it was not without difficulty and delay that the Suprema, professing its own inability to help them, secured from Philip some moderateayudas de costato keep them alive. Then, in March, 1644, it ordered them to open a tribunal at Tarragona, at the same time representing to the king that this would cost forty-five hundred ducats in silver for the first year, and four thousand annually thereafter, which might be supplied from the two millions of maravedís coming from the tribunal of Cartagena—apparently some recent large confiscation—as otherwise they would die of starvation. They were doubtless thus provided for and did what they could to restore the old-time dread of the Holy Office. It had sadly diminished in these evil days for, in this same year, 1644, in the neighboring town of Tortosa, Inquisitor Roig of Valencia complained that, on reaching there during his visitation, the magistrates did not come to receive him, they assigned him no lodgings and they refused to publish his proclamation.[1153]
CATALONIA
Meanwhile, in accordance with the terms arranged with France, the Catalans had organized a national Inquisition. Doctor Paulo Ferran and Doctor Joseph Pla were appointed and application was made for the usual papal faculties. These were granted and, when the briefs were received, September 26, 1643, they were installed and the Castilians were expelled. The new tribunal had not much to do. It did not meddle with the Calvinists in the French armies, but it vindicated its authority by an auto de fe, celebrated February 23, 1644, in which one victim was garroted and burnt and there were two penitents. There was another, November 7, 1647, in which there was an execution for unnatural crime and six men and five women penitents, mostly for bigamy and sorcery. The only other evidence of activity that I have met is an investigation ordered by Pla, at the request of the parish priest of Pineda, resulting in the trial of Anthoni Morell.[1154]
When the troubles of the Fronde compelled Mazarin to withdraw the French armies, the rebellion collapsed, in spite of the obstinate determination of the Catalans to sever relations with Castile. When Barcelona surrendered, October 11, 1652, Catalonia was left at the mercy of the conqueror, but Philip, with true statesmanship, restored it to its ancient privileges and liberties, save a few exceptions which have no bearing on our subject.[1155]Inquisitor Pla had lingered at Gerona, continuing his functions in virtue of his papal brief. He was found there by the Marquis of Olias y Mortara, who only ventured to suspend him and wrote to the king, October 12, 1652, for instructions, adding that the prompt re-establishment of the Inquisition would conduce greatly to the pacification of the land. The Council of Aragon, November 16th, approved of this and the next day Philip instructed the inquisitor-general to make the appointments and despatch the inquisitors at once.[1156]There were financial difficulties, however. January 18, 1653, the Suprema reported the appointments; the infection of heresy by the French promised much work, but there was an utter lack of money; the tribunal would cost six thousand ducats a year, while its resources were but two thousand, for the separation of Roussillon lost it athousand and it had two thousand more in Barcelona loans which were incollectable; there was prospect however of large confiscations, for many Catalans had fled to France who would be prosecuted and, on the strength of this, the king was asked for four thousand a year.[1157]The adjustment of these questions probably required time, for it was not until August 2d that the new inquisitors took possession of their office, riding in state through the city, with drums and trumpets and the standard of the Holy Office, followed by all the familiars and officials of Barcelona, and making public proclamation in the customary places. The next day, Sunday, the Edict of Faith was read and on Monday they commenced their functions. Of the Catalan inquisitors, Pla died within a few days and Ferran was arrested at night as were many others, some of whom were sent to France and others were deported to Majorca. Apparently their official acts were not recognized, for familiars of their appointment continued for some years to apply for reinstatement.[1158]
CATALONIA
No sooner was the tribunal re-established than the old troubles recommenced. Abuses must have been flagrant to call forth from Philip, June 2, 1661, a cédula ordering the exact observance of the Concordias and restraining the excessive use of excommunication.[1159]The quarrels which arose were prolonged and complicated by every possible device. On February 15, 1664, Juan Matheu, actual receiver and acting alguazil mayor of the tribunal, was murdered. On most slender suspicion, the next day, it arrested Joseph Guimart and Joseph Massart; the Audiencia claimed the case and the tribunal refused to enter into a competencia until the Banch Reyal threatened the inquisitors with banishment. Then they averted the preliminary conference by questions of etiquette, repeatedly disregarding the orders of the Suprema, until the intervention of the queen-regent enforced obedience. The conference was at last held and the papers were transmitted to the Suprema and Council of Aragon to decide as to the jurisdiction. While this was pending, the inquisitors started another trouble. They had confined the prisoners in the secret prison as though guilty of heresy. This was a grievous hardship and the queen ordered them transferred to the common prison; the inquisitors reported that this had been done and then, onpretext of information as to a plot to escape, brought them back to the secret prison. When the Suprema heard of this it wrote in a tone of mingled anger and fear, lest it should be discovered by the Council of Aragon; the prisoners must be moved back again; the affair had become too important, the Council of Aragon had made too many efforts and the queen imputed it all to the Suprema as they would see by her enclosed order. Then the competencia was suspended by the escape of the prisoners, March 9, 1666, and the last we hear of the matter is their negotiation for a pardon, in 1668, on terms of which the viceroy advised the acceptance, in order to avoid decision of the competencia. It was doubtless so settled, for competing jurisdictions had brought the administration of justice into such shape that it was better to let criminal accusations remain untried than to decide between the rival claims.[1160]
These quarrels were not merely occasional but were continuous and perpetual. A letter of June 18, 1667, happens to mention that there were then four or five competencias delayed by the question whether in the conferences the royal judge should bring his own notary.[1161]Perverted ingenuity was constantly devising new points over which strife could be created. Prisoners on trial in the royal gaols were sometimes borrowed by the tribunal to be prosecuted for blasphemy or other trivial offence against the faith. In 1666 a case of this kind gave rise to a question as to the exact form of receipt to be given for the body of the culprit, when it was pushed to such a point that the Suprema ordered the excommunication of all the judges of the Audiencia, and the Council of Aragon complained to the queen-regent about the oppressive abuse of censures and asked her to provide that for the future the mutual obligations of the two tribunals should be equal and reciprocal.[1162]
CATALONIA
When the Inquisition took such pains to make itself detested, one is scarce surprised to learn, from a complaint of the Suprema in 1677, that in Barcelona it had so fallen in public esteem that it was able to procure but one familiar and that the alguazil mayor had asked to be relieved from carrying his wand of office, for nonoble was willing to be seen walking with him when he bore it.[1163]This hostility it continued carefully to cultivate. In December, 1695, the Diputados and judges addressed to Carlos II a complaint of the multiplied excesses of the tribunal, which trampled on the laws and liberties of the land, causing such scandals that they could no longer be endured in silence. This had been especially the case since Bartolomé Antonio Sans y Muñoz had been inquisitor, whose methods can be appreciated by a single example. Captain-general Marquis of Gastañara, had imprisoned a Frenchman named Jaime Balle, on a matter of state, Spain being at the time at war with France, with strict orders to keep himincomunicado. Muñoz suddenly demanded an opportunity of taking testimony of him. Gastañara was absent and no one had authority to violate his instructions, but the regent of the royal chancery and the gaoler offered, if Muñoz would declare it to be a matter of faith, to endeavor to find some means of compliance. This assurance he refused to give, even verbally, and he threatened the regent with excommunication. The Audiencia invited him to a conference, which he refused and it then cited him before the Banch Reyal, with the customary warning of banishment and seizure of temporalities. Muñoz responded, December 29th, with a mandate to the regent ordering him, under pain of excommunication, to allow the deposition of the prisoner to be taken and he followed this, within an hour, with an excommunication published in all the pulpits and affixed to all the church-doors. The next day this was re-aggravated and the regent was publicly cursed with the awful anathema formulated for hardened and impenitent sinners. The Audiencia rejoined with the decree of banishment and seizure of temporalities, under the customary term of fifteen days. The tribunal answered this with a threat of interdict on the city; it convoked all the superiors of the religious Orders and arranged with the clergy for a great procession when it should take its departure. It kept its doors closed and even refused to receive the messengers of Gastañara, who had hastened back to Barcelona, but he delayed further action until he should communicate with Madrid and receive the royal orders. When they came, on January 11, 1696, he was at Montealegre, a couple of leagues from the city; they were sent to him by a special courier and he returned the next morning andmade secret arrangements for their execution. At 2P.M.he sent word to Muñoz that he wished to see him on the king’s service. At 4.30P.M.Muñoz came, bringing the fiscal with him. A scrivener was introduced who read to him the king’s order, which he said he was ready to obey. Gastañara told him that he must start at once; a coach was at the door to which he was escorted with all honor; lackeys with flambeaux were ready and a guard of twenty-five musketeers. Gastañara gave him money and he was provided with all comforts, even to a courteous gentleman as a companion to enforce all proper respect for him. As he was leaving the palace, his violent temper burst forth in regrets that he had not been allowed time to cast the interdict on the city. He was driven to the embarcadero, placed on board a vessel that had been made ready and was conveyed to the nearest Valencian port. It is symptomatic of Spanish conditions that in war-time the captain-general was obliged to abandon all other duties and devote a day to kidnapping a troublesome priest, and this is emphasized by the fact that the inquisitor-general rewarded the conduct of Muñoz by appointing him to one of the most desirable tribunals of Spain.[1164]Possibly this affair may have influenced Carlos II in reissuing, in 1696, his father’s injunction of 1661 to observe the Concordias exactly and to be more sparing of excommunications.[1165]
Philip V was scarce seated on the throne when he found himself confronted with the eternal question of Catalan hostility towards the tribunal. A consulta of the Suprema, October 16, 1701, warns him that the inquisitors of Barcelona report that, in the Córtes about to assemble, efforts will be made to limit its usefulness and he is exhorted to follow the example of his predecessors.[1166]Whatever was done was of little consequence for, in the war which broke out soon afterwards, Catalonia enthusiastically acknowledged the Archduke Charles as Carlos III and became the stronghold of the Austrian party. The situation of the rebellion of 1640-52 was duplicated. The tribunal was withdrawn, but seems to have been replaced by a local organization, for an article of the Córtes of 1706, duly approved by the AustrianCarlos, regulating the insaculacion for public office, recognizes its certificates respecting its officials.[1167]Of course it could exercise no jurisdiction over the heretic English allies; it has left no traces of its activity and was replaced by a revival of the episcopal cognizance of heresy. As to places beyond the control of the Austrian party, a provision of the Suprema, March 16, 1706, extended the jurisdiction of the Saragossa tribunal over all that should be recovered from the enemy until such time as the Inquisition of Barcelona should be re-established.[1168]The desperate resistance of the Catalans postponed this until 1715, and when the tribunal was reinstated it found in the secret prison two captives, Juan Castillo a bigamist and Mariana Costa accused of sorcery, both of them confined by order of the vicar-general of the diocese.[1169]As all the liberties and privileges of Catalonia were abolished by the conquerors, its subsequent relations with the Inquisition offer no special characteristics.
MAJORCA-CASTILE
Majorca had no Concordia and its tribunal was free to claim what extent of jurisdiction it saw fit, limited only by the resistance of the civil authorities, which, as we have seen, was energetically expressed at an early period. As defined by Portocarrero, in 1623, in practice it asserted complete jurisdiction, active and passive, in civil and criminal cases, over its salaried and commissioned officials and their families; over familiars, in criminal matters, active and passive; in civil, passive only, with exclusion of their families.[1170]The occasion of his book was a violent struggle between the viceroy and the tribunal, which presents the ordinary features of these contests for supremacy between rival departments of the government. In a search for arms in the house of Juan Zuñez, receiver of confiscations, some were found. The viceroy at once arrested him, sentenced him to leave the island within twenty-four hours and shipped him away. The inquisitor promptly excommunicated the viceroy; the royal fiscal appealed; the viceroy and royal judges summoned the inquisitor to a conference preparatory to a competencia or to appear in the Banch Reyal and defend his proceedings. On his refusal the Banch Reyal pronounced sentence of banishment and seizureof temporalities, which was published with sound of drum and trumpet. They also issued an edict declaring the censures null and void and ordering the clergy to disregard them; they refused to consider themselves excommunicated, they attended mass and apparently had the support of the people and clergy, for no attention was paid to the interdict cast on the city by the inquisitor.[1171]What was the final result does not appear, nor does it much matter; the significance in these affairs is the spectacle presented to the people of lawless collisions between the representatives and exponents of the law.
In Majorca the most impressive cases of this kind occurred between the Inquisition and the ecclesiastical courts and will be considered hereafter. It suffices here to say that broils with the secular authorities were constant and contributed their share to occupy and distract the attention of the central government. It would be superfluous to enumerate those of which the details have chanced to reach us; they would merely prove that, considering their small size and scanty population, the Balearic Isles were not behind their continental sisters of Aragon in adding to the perplexities of the monarchy.
This somewhat prolonged recital of the struggles of the kingdoms of the Crown of Aragon gives an opportunity of realizing the stubborn resistance, to the arrogant pretensions of the Inquisition, of provinces which still retained institutions through which public opinion could assert itself. The people of the kingdoms of Castile had been reduced to submission under the absolutism of the House of Austria and, though they might at times complain, they could make no effective efforts to ameliorate their position. When, in 1579 and again in 1583, the Córtes of Castile complained of the arrest and immurement in the secret prisons of individuals in every quarrel with an official of the Inquisition, to the permanent disgrace of families, Philip II merely replied that he would make inquiry and take such action as was fitting.[1172]The only resource was to raise contests in individual cases and these were frequent enough and violent enough to prove that there was the same spirit of opposition to inquisitorial encroachment and the same pervading discontent with the abuses flourishing so rankly under inquisitorial protection. Instances of thiscould be cited almost without limit, but one or two will suffice as examples of the multiform aspect of these quarrels and the temper in which they were fought over. It should be borne in mind that, in these struggles as in those of Aragon, there was no question of freedom of conscience and no desire to limit the effectiveness of the Holy Office as the guardian of purity of faith. The Castilian, like the Catalan, looked with exultation on the triumph over heresy in the autos de fe, and he desired only to set bounds to the intrusion of the Inquisition on the field of secular justice.
CASTILE
The chancellery of Granada was the supreme tribunal of New Castile as that of Valladolid was of Old Castile. The alcaldes of its Sala del Crimen constituted the highest criminal court, from which there was no appeal save to God. April 15, 1623, the alcalde mayor, after five days’ trial, condemned Gerónimo Palomino, an habitual criminal andrufian, to two hundred lashes and six years of galleys for various offences, including sundry blasphemies; on the 24th, the Sala confirmed the sentence and ordered its execution. On the same day the Inquisition served two notices on the alcalde mayor prohibiting his cognizance of the case, as some of the alleged crimes concerned the faith, over which it had exclusive jurisdiction, and it demanded the surrender of the accused and of all the papers under the customary comminations. The alcalde mayor responded by calling for a competencia and offering to deliver Palomino for trial on any charges of heresy, if record were made that he was already a galley-slave to be returned to the royal prison. The next day the tribunal sent to the prison and claimed him, on the pretext that the case had been transferred to it, whereupon the alcaide of the prison surrendered him without orders from the judges. When the latter heard of this they also learned that the transfer had been effected through the efforts of the prisoner’s friends and liberal bribery of the officials of the tribunal, who had been active in getting him out of prison. After satisfying themselves of this by investigation, they ordered the arrest of four laymen—a notary, a messenger and two familiars—and they further imprisoned in their houses the alcalde mayor and alcaide of the prison for acting without informing the Sala. The tribunal concluded Palomino’s trial within forty-eight hours, sentencing him to hear a mass in the audience chamber, and it appears that it returned him. It further commenced proceedings against thealcaldes, summoning them to liberate the officials within three hours under pain of excommunication. The alcaldes protested against this and demanded a competencia, as provided under the Concordia, but the next day they were excommunicated in all the churches and this was followed by an interdict laid on the city. This forced a compromise by which the prisoners were liberated, subject to rearrest in case the competencia should result in justifying the alcaldes, and the latter were absolved from the censures. The matter seemed to be settled, but all parties had counted without the impetuous and aggressive Inquisitor-general Pacheco. Without awaiting further information, and in disregard of the laws prescribing peaceful settlement by competencias, he had evoked the case to himself and acted upon it off-hand. Two days after the absolution, the inquisitors reimposed the excommunication by his command, and notices were served on the alcaldes and their alguazil mayor to appear before him within fifteen days to stand trial. Against this they protested and, on their failure to appear, they were not only excommunicated afresh but anathematized in all the churches. The scandal had thus assumed national proportions.[1173]
The alcaldes were the direct and highest judicial representatives of the king, but such was Philip’s subservience to the Inquisition that he would not permit a competencia following the regular course but took the affair into his own hands. The President of the Council of Castile, in remitting to the royal favorite Olivares, July 4, 1623, a memorial from the Council, declared that the condition to which the chancellery of Granada was reduced, owing to the methods of the Inquisition, was the most ignominious that had ever been heard of in Spain, especially considering how slight was the cause of all this disquiet, for, when everything was settled it was again enkindled at the mandate of the inquisitor-general. As the matter was in the king’s hands, the Council could do nothing but appeal to his majesty, with all the disadvantages under which it labored in combating the inquisitor-general; had its hands been free it might already have conquered, to the benefit of the royal jurisdiction and service of the king, for every day brought greater disturbance to the Republic.[1174]
In spite of this appeal, Philip decided in favor of the Inquisition and the humiliation of the chancellery was complete. Yet Pacheco was not satisfied with victory and proceeded to trample on the vanquished. In the course of the quarrel, Gudiel de Peralta, one of the judges, and Matias González de Sepúlveda, the fiscal of the court, had drawn up legal arguments in its justification. These Pacheco submitted to his censors, who of course discovered latent heresies lurking in them, whereupon he ordered them to be suppressed as heretical and announced his intention of proceeding rigorously against the authors. The Council, on October 7th, again appealed to Philip. The accused, it said, had only defended the royal jurisdiction in a perfectly legitimate manner; the inquisitor-general should not have attacked royal officials and inflicted irreparable injury on them and their posterity by denouncing them as heretics, without consulting the king. He was begged to intervene and order Pacheco to suspend proceedings, while a junta of the two Councils should consider the papers and decide what course should be taken.[1175]It is probable that in some such way this indefensible attempt was suppressed, for neither of the inculpated names appear in the Expurgatory Index of Zapata, in 1632.
It would seem difficult to set bounds to the power of an organization which could thus arbitrarily employ the censures of the Church on any department of the government, without being subject to control save to that of a king docile to its exigencies. Yet the Suprema, which always sustained the tribunals in their wanton excesses, adopted their quarrels and fought them unsparingly to the end, was thoroughly conscious of their wrong-doing. While this conflict was in progress, it issued a carta acordada, April 23d, earnestly exhorting the tribunals to maintain friendly relations with the royal officials and not to waste time in dissensions to the neglect of their duties in matters of faith; competencias were always to be admitted and no censures were to be employed without consulting the Suprema, unless delay was inadmissible.[1176]