FLAGELLATION
Yet there was one species of abuse of the confessional, not contemplated in the papal briefs, which the Spanish Inquisition, by a somewhat forced construction, classed with solicitation. This, which was known as flagellation, consisted in imposing penance of the discipline and administering it on the spot, or letting the penitent administer it herself, in either case requiring her to disrobe and expose herself to a greater or less degree. Sometimes this was mingled with the debased mystic ardor, of which we have seen examples above, leading both parties to expose themselves and lash one another. The earliest case that I have met of this occurred in 1606, at Nájera, when María Escudero, a widow aged 40, testified that she had long confessed to the Franciscan Fray Diego de Burgos. They exchanged vows of obedience to each other; he would visit her in her house when they would discipline each other with exposure almost complete, under agreement that their eyes should be kept closed. Then he introduced a pious exercise still more indecent, but he was always scrupulously correctin the confessional. She chanced to make a general confession to another priest who refused absolution unless she would denounce Fray Diego. The case was evidently novel and dragged on until 1609, when it reached the Suprema, which submitted the matter to two calificadores. One opined that the acts savored of the heresy of the Adamites and Alumbrados; the other attributed it merely to imprudent simplicity and ignorance. Apparently there was no precedent for guidance and the case seems to have been suspended.[237]A parallel case, with a different ending, was one in which there were a number of women concerned and the practices were foul almost beyond belief. The priest was an ignorant and simple man who, by the advice of another confessor, came with the women to denounce themselves. He was sentenced to rigid reclusion in a convent, where he died after giving a most edifying example, and the women were not prosecuted, as they were mostly barefooted Carmelites and Capuchins.[238]
Theflagelantesoon came to be recognized as an offender akin to the solicitor, and was held to be subject to the papal briefs. The old inquisitor, who relates the last case, and writers like de Sousa and Alberghini, all speak of stripping penitents and disciplining them as a species of solicitation, to be visited with the same penalties.[239]As a rule, in fact, it was regarded as rendering the offence more serious, for it inferred more than the technical suspicion of heresy, especially after Molinism had deepened the guilt of Illuminism, and we find allusions tohereges flagelantes. Cases become frequent in the records and we even, in 1730, find a Fray Domingo Calvo spontaneously denouncing himself to the Madrid tribunal for having caused himself to be flagellated, showing to what means perverted sexual instincts resorted for gratification.[240]
The extent to which these practices were sometimes carried is indicated in the trial, in 1795, of Padre Paulino Vicente Arevalo, priest of Yepes, as “solicitante y flagelante.” He confessed to the most flagrant indecencies committed in this manner, with his female penitents, among whom were nine pupils or sisters of the Bernardine convent. Sometimes he made them discipline themselvesin his presence and, as the scourge had to be applied to the peccant parts, he had choice of such exposure as he desired, an opportunity of which he admitted availing himself. The record is discreetly mute as to worse excesses but, as six of his penitents were required to repeat to another confessor all the confessions specified in the evidence, it follows that sins must have been committed for which he absolved them. For this perversion of so many young lives he was only sentenced to a year’s reclusion in a monastery, thirty days’ spiritual exercises, deprivation of the faculty of confession, perpetual exile from Yepes and eight years’ exile from some other places—penalties which, although severe under the mild inquisitorial standard, were wholly inadequate to his offences.[241]
A considerable portion of the cases in the later years of the Inquisition are characterized as “solicitante y flagelante” and many of them illustrate the easy transition from Illuminism to solicitation. As early as 1651 we meet the case of the Dominican Fray Gerónimo de las Herreras, condemned by the Toledo tribunal to deprivation of the faculty of confession and three years’ reclusion in a convent, as an “alumbrado y solicitante,” convicted of repeated practices of obscenity with many women. When Molinism came to the front, those who taught it with its debauching consequences were more severely dealt with, as in the case of Buenaventura Frutos, cura of Mocejon, who, in 1722, was pronounced by the Toledo tribunal to be a formal heretic and dogmatizer, a contumacious solicitor and seducer. As such his sentence was read with open doors, he appeared in a sanbenitode dos aspas, was reconciled, verbally degraded and recluded irremissibly for life in a convent where, for two years he was shut up in a cell, under instruction.[242]Similar cases continued to occur occasionally, but more numerous in the later period were those in which solicitation is conjoined withmala doctrina, showing that the evil teaching was of a less dangerous character than fully developed Molinism—a mere soothing of the conscience of the penitent with assurances that what her confessor desired was not mortal sin—but even this was regarded as increasing the suspicion of heresy and requiring severer punishment.[243]
PROCEDURE
It is perhaps not without interest to note the advanced age towhich some of these soliciting confessors retained the ardor which impelled them to the offence. Cases of septuagenarians are by no means rare. The Dominican, Fray Antonio de Aragon, sentenced, July 24, 1734, at Toledo, was 78 and the Observantine, Fray Miguel Granado, denounced, in 1786, to the Cuenca tribunal, was 80. In the former case the punishment was mitigated in consideration of his years, though a less sympathizing court would have heightened its rigor, in view of the evil which such a sinner must have wrought during so prolonged a career.[244]
When, in 1561, the Inquisition obtained jurisdiction over solicitation, it had no precedents on which to frame its procedure or to regulate the penalties. The episcopal courts had been inert and merciful, and the fact that the offence had been transferred from them inferred that the new jurisdiction was expected to be vigorous and rigorous. Its first care, however, was to preserve secrecy and avert scandal, so that no layman should be admitted to knowledge of clerical delinquencies. The earliest utterance is a carta acordada of 1562, prescribing that, when the denunciation affords conclusive evidence, it shall be considered by the inquisitors and Ordinary, without calling in the usual consultors, and the arrest shall be made with the utmost circumspection; the accused is to be admitted to bail; when the case is concluded, if he is a fraile he is to be confined in his convent with orders not to preach or hear confessions, or to have active and passive voice; if he is a secular priest, he is to be confined somewhere else than where the offence was committed, he is not to exercise his functions and the final disposition of the case is to rest with the Suprema.[245]In 1572, consultors were admitted to examine the evidence before arrest, but they were to be exclusively clerics, and the result was to be submitted to the Suprema before action. It made little difference that the heinousness of the offence was emphasized, and the necessity of exemplary punishment, when the culprit was treated with this exceptional tenderness.[246]In 1600, even the Ordinary was excluded from the preliminary deliberations and the Suprema was to be consulted before any action was taken.[247]The same precautionsas to publicity were to be observed with regard to the sentences, which were to be read in the audience-chamber with closed doors, the only witnesses present being a prescribed number of the brethren of the culprit—members of his Order if he was a fraile, or curas and rectors, if a secular priest.[248]The care taken to avert attention from these delinquencies is illustrated in the case of Fray Antonio de la Portería, in 1818; he was resident in the convent of Mondonedo, and the guardian was ordered to send him on some pretext to the house of the Order at Santiago, where he was duly tried.[249]
PROCEDURE
Even greater favoritism was manifested in the matter of evidence. We have seen that, in ordinary trials, while two witnesses were required as to each fact yet, in practice, a single witness sufficed, not only for arrest but for torture and that the testimony of the vilest persons was welcomed without discrimination. In solicitation, it was self-evident that there could be but one witness to each specific act, so that perforce the tribunals were instructed that they must be content with “singular” witnesses. A single denunciation however, did not suffice for arrest, but in 1571, and again in 1576, they were allowed to deliberate on it and consult the Suprema. Even this was thought to be too harsh and, in 1577, the rule was adopted that there must be two separate and independent denunciations before arrest and trial—a rule fraught, as we shall see, with far-reaching consequences for, when it was so difficult to induce women to accuse their seducers, innumerable culprits escaped because two of their victims did not happen to act independently.[250]Similar exceptional consideration was shown with regard to the character of the witnesses, repeated instructions being issued that this was to be carefully investigated, and the results be noted upon the record and reported to the Suprema, so that due weight be given to it, both in ordering arrest and apportioning penalties—precautions eminently commendable, but deplorably lacking in trials for other offences.[251]Justification for this solicitude was sought in the customary monkish abuse of women in general. It was a misfortune that their evidence was to be received at all but, from the nature of the crime, this was unavoidable, andPáramo tells us that by nature they are lying, deceitful, perjurers, crafty, changeable, frail, mutable and corruptible—a daily curse, the gate of the devil, the tail of the scorpion, a whitened sepulchre, an incurable sore, but they are the only witnesses to be had and two of them, if of good character, must suffice for full proof.[252]Such tirades show the different temper in which inquisitors approached the consideration of these cases and those of Jews or Protestants.
After arrest the culprit could be committed to the secret prison, but this was exceptional, the custom being to remand regulars to houses of their Order, and to admit seculars to bail, with the city as prison, in a manner to attract as little attention as possible. The trial took the usual course, interrogation being made as to intention and belief in the sacrament of penitence, on which inquisitorial jurisdiction was based. Of course all heretical tendencies were disclaimed, but, in the possible case of error and pertinacity, there was provision for confinement in the secret prison with sequestration of property and seizure of papers.[253]
In the Spanish Inquisition, solicitation uncomplicated by Illuminism or Molinism, inferred only light suspicion of heresy, requiring merely abjurationde levi. Consequently the accused was not exposed to torture. It is true that, academically speaking, though he could not be tortured as to intention and belief, he might be subjected to it if he denied facts, but in practice it was never employed, although the formal accusation contained theotrosidemanding it.[254]Yet, when there wasmala doctrinaor Illuminism torture was employed without scruple, as in the case, in 1725, of Manuel Madrigal, in Toledo, accused as “solicitante, Molinista y flagelante.”[255]In the Roman Inquisition, however, after the brief of Gregory XV, the suspicion of heresy was vehement, the abjuration wasde vehementiand there was no exception to the general rule of torturing on intention. The testimony of one woman of good character, supported by indications such as the evil repute ofthe confessor, or that of two women unsupported, sufficed. In every way Rome treated the offence with less charity than did Spain.[256]
The instructions as to the examination of accusers offer a strong contrast to the negligence habitual in trials for formal heresy, of which the penalties were so much more severe. Tribunals were warned that it required special attention and the utmost exactitude; the woman must declare precisely the spot and the time, whether confession was real or simulated, and she must repeat in full detail the words and acts of the confessor without omission. If any one was near enough to see or to hear, she must state who it was; if she had spoken to any one, the name must be given, and the inquisitor was urged to exercise his ingenuity according to the circumstances of the case. If she had subsequently confessed to the same priest, she must give her reasons and state whether he had absolved her. Special inquiry was to be made as to any cause of enmity on her part or that of her kindred; whether she had heard of his doing the same with other women; what she thought or knew as to his character, and whether any other confessor had told her that she was not bound to denounce him.[257]All these were salutary precautions which, if general and not exceptional, would have prevented much injustice.
TWO DENUNCIATIONS REQUIRED
This instruction would appear to require that, in case of consent, the witness should be forced to reveal her shame. Protection from this would seem necessary to overcome reluctance to make denunciation, and the Roman Inquisition, by decree of July 25, 1624, ruled that neither the woman nor the accused was to be questioned as to this and, if the information was volunteered, it was to be omitted from the record, while confessors were ordered to assure penitents that no such inquiries would be made.[258]If such a rule existed in Spain, it was not observed until near the end, for the records of trials show that the examination was pushed to the last point, and the results were fully set forth in the proceedings. As late as the middle of the eighteenth century, instructions to commissioners taking testimony in these cases require them to obtain all details as to words and acts and to write them out fullyand distinctly, no matter how obscene they may be.[259]Soon after this, however, occurs the first intimation as to reticence that I have met, in instructions to a commissioner, January 27, 1759, as to taking testimony from a nun, in which he is told to notify her that, if she volunteers to relate her own ruin, this is not to be stated or included in the testimony.[260]Subsequently this became the rule, as appears by instructions in 1816 and 1819.[261]
The most important discrimination in favor of these delinquents was the requirement of two independent denunciations to justify arrest and trial. This was not reached without some hesitation. The earliest formal instructions that we have on the subject are embodied in a letter to the tribunal of Sardinia, in 1574, when forwarding to it the brief of Pius IV. As the crime is understood to be very prevalent in the island, the inquisitor is ordered to prosecute it with rigor, according to the procedure in cases of heresy, no exception being alluded to as respects single denunciations.[262]Instructions to the tribunal of Peru, about the same time, specify that a single witness suffices for prosecution and that Indian women can be admitted.[263]Then, as we have seen, there is an inclination in favor of the accused, in a carta acordada of March 2, 1576, ordering single accusations to be received, but the Suprema is to be consulted before taking action. This tendency increased, and fuller instructions to Sardinia, in 1577, require two witnesses with conclusive evidence as a condition precedent to arrest.[264]This was repeated in general instructions issued in 1580 and, after some variations, it remained an absolute rule until the end.[265]Even this was regarded by churchmen as too harsh. A Cunha holds that, while two witnesses may suffice for prosecution, there should be at least four for conviction, and he grows eloquent in pointing out the dignity of the priest, the scandal to the Church and the exultation of the heretic. De Sousa likewise considers two witnesses insufficient for conviction, though, if they are of exemplary character, their evidence may justify some moderate penalty.[266]
It is probable that, for awhile, practice was not uniform in all tribunals. In that of Valladolid, in 1621 and 1622, there are several cases in which arrest was voted on the evidence of a single witness and these votes were confirmed by the Suprema.[267]On the other hand, about 1640, an inquisitor tells us that, when the accused denies, conviction requires the evidence of three witnesses whom he has been unable to disable for enmity, low rank of life, or doubtful repute. Some authors, he adds, insist that four are necessary, but he admits that, when there are two whose characters stand thorough investigation and there are supporting indications, conviction may follow.[268]It is impossible not to recognize the charitable motives that prompted this reluctance to punish.
The requirement thus established of two independent denunciations threw serious impediments in the way of suppressing a crime in which it was so notoriously difficult to find accusers. The routine gradually established was, when a denunciation was received, to search the records for a previous one. If none were found, letters were addressed to all the other tribunals requesting a similar examination of their registers and, if this was unsuccessful, the denunciation was filed away to await the chances of another accuser presenting herself, thus giving the accused, if guilty, the opportunity of continuing his profligate career, and leading the woman to believe that the case was too trivial to deserve the attention of the Inquisition. These long intervals of impunity illustrate the difficulty of obtaining denunciations, and the preponderant chances of escape, when prosecution was thus obstructed.
TWO DENUNCIATIONS REQUIRED
Numberless cases show how prolonged was often this period of immunity in a career of crime, to say nothing of the yet more frequent instances where the second denunciation never came. Thus at Valencia, on September 22, 1734, María Theresa Terrasa accused Fray Agustin Solves of having taken her, after confession and communion, to a room back of the altar and committed violence on her. This was laid aside for fourteen years when, on November 12, 1748, Sor Vitoria Julian, of the convent of San Julian, appeared and denounced him for having, some fifteen years before, solicited her some twenty times in the confessional of theconvent of which he was the regular confessor, though she had not understood until now the obligation of denunciation. He had meanwhile been removed to the convent of Villajoiosa and had doubtless profited fully by the interval thus afforded.[269]This is by no means an extreme instance. In the list of soliciting confessors, kept by the Madrid tribunal, there occurs, in 1772, the name of Fray Andrés Izquierdo as accused in Valladolid, with a reference back to the years 1751 and 1752. Fray Bartolomé de Montijo appears as denounced in 1740 and again in 1776. Fray Fernando López, ex-provincial of theEscuelas pias, was denounced in 1780 for tampering with the children under his charge, and again in 1795, when he was tried and exiled. The Jesuit Juan Francisco Nieto, was denounced in Toledo in 1708 and again in 1731 in Madrid. Fray Joseph de San Juan was accused in Toledo in 1732 and in Granada in 1772. Fray Pedro de la Madre de Dios was denounced in Barcelona in 1722 and again in 1744. Even two denunciations, in many cases, did not suffice to put an end to these corrupting careers, and it required three or four. Fray Alonso de Arroya was denounced in 1768, 1788 and 1803; Fray Francisco de la Asuncion Torquemada in 1735, 1770 and 1776; Domingo Galindo, rector of Nules, in 1790, 1792, and 1795; Fray Francisco Escriva in 1769, 1775, 1786 and 1787; and Padre Feliciano Martínez, S. J., in 1767, 1771, 1784 and 1800. It is scarce worth while to multiply instances of which the records furnish an abundant supply.[270]
As the majority of offenders were frailes, who had no settled residence, it became necessary, in order to meet the exceptional requirement of two denunciations, to establish communication between the several tribunals. This was felt as early as 1601, when each one was ordered to send to all the rest, information as tosolicitantes, whose cases had been suspended without prosecution. This seems to have received scant obedience, while cases of solicitation were constantly becoming a more important portion of inquisitorial duty, leading to a more comprehensive effort in 1647. The tribunals were required to search their records for thirty years back and make out lists of those charged with solicitation with all necessary details; copies of these lists were to be sent to the Suprema and to all other tribunals, and every year thenew cases were to be similarly circulated. A complete alphabetical list of the whole was to be compiled and copies were to be furnished to all tribunals making application.[271]If this was obeyed at the time, it must soon have fallen into desuetude, for the custom became universal, when a denunciation was received, of addressing all the sister tribunals with the inquiry as to whether the name of the accused appeared on their records. To facilitate these frequent researches, in compiling theLibras Vocandorumand other registers, a separate volume was reserved for solicitation.[272]
When all impediments were overcome and conviction was reached, the penalties inflicted were singularly disproportionate to the gravity of the offence, especially when compared with the severity exercised on those whose guilt consisted in putting on clean linen on Saturdays and avoiding the use of pork. The earliest definition as to punishment occurs in the Sardinia instructions of 1577, where the prescriptions embody the general features of the policy pursued to the end, including the secrecy preserved by reading the sentence in the audience-chamber. The penalties, it is stated, are customarily arbitrary, varying with the character, degree and frequency of the offence but, in all cases, there must be abjurationde leviand perpetual deprivation of the faculty of administering the sacrament of penitence; as to the other sacraments and preaching, or reclusion or exile, it is discretional. For religious there may be discipline in the chapters of their convents, while a notary reads the sentence or, in atrocious cases, a discipline in the audience-chamber; there may also be other penances, such as reclusion and suspension or deprivation of sacerdotal functions, deprivation of active and passive voice, being last in choir and refectory, and penance for heavy sin, discipline, prayers etc. For secular priests, besides the general penalties, there may be reclusion, deprivation or suspension of functions and benefice, fines, secret disciplines, fasts and prayers.[273]
PUNISHMENT
How these general rules were reduced to practice, at this period, may be gathered from a few examples in Toledo, all of whom had of course the regular abjuration de levi and reprimand. In 1578 the Carmelite, Fray Agustin de Cervera, against whom therewere ten witnesses, was sentenced to perpetual deprivation of confession, reclusion for a year in a convent of his Order, where he was to receive a discipline, and Friday fasting on bread and water. The Dominican Fray Domingo de Revisto, against whom there were forty-nine witnesses, besides others who came after the conclusion of the case, was perpetually deprived of confessing and recluded in a desert convent for ten years, during which, for a year, he was deprived of active and passive voice, of preaching and of saying mass. In 1581, Pedro de Villalobos, acting cura of Halía, had many witnesses as to his acts in the confessional and an infinite number as to his general licentiousness, for he kept a concubine, had debauched two sisters and their aunt, and committed much else of the same kind. These latter sins were outside of inquisitorial jurisdiction; for the solicitation he was exiled from Halía for three years, of which the first was to be passed in a monastery with suspension from celebrating, he was perpetually suspended from confessing, and was fined in fifteen thousand maravedís. Fray Juan Romero was accused by five women; he admitted using words of endearment, but innocently, as he claimed to be impotent. Either the claim or the fact seems to have been regarded as an aggravation, for he was deprived of confessing and was recluded for ten years, without active and passive voice, to be last in choir and refectory, with a monthly discipline during the first year, a discipline in the audience-chamber and one in the convent of San Pablo while his sentence was read.[274]
These examples will suffice to show the spirit in which aggravated cases were treated. Those of less gravity had concessions in the variable factors, but the deprivation of confessing was perpetual. About 1600, Miguel Calvo summarizes the practice, with a distinct inclination towards greater severity, and adds that, when the culprit has solicited men, the penalties are to be increased.[275]On the other hand, in 1611, a Cunha pleads for moderation, and warns the inquisitor not to drive the culprit to despair, while de Sousa endeavors to argue away the stern penalties prescribed by Gregory XV, and repeats the warning as to despair.[276]
It was wholly superfluous to plead for leniency. The Spanish Inquisition paid no attention to Gregory’s brief, although, in 1629,it ordered the tribunals to follow its prescriptions, for it even began to show an increased tendency towards benignity. The severest sentence I have met at this period concerned a peculiarly scandalous case before the tribunal of Valladolid where, in 1625, the Trinitarian Fray Juan de Ramírez was accused by five youths and one woman, and besides he had once celebrated mass without confessing. He was verbally degraded, deprived perpetually of confessing and condemned to ten years of reclusion, lifelong exile from Burgos and a circular discipline in his convent. This was justice tempered with mercy, but there was much mercy and little justice, in 1637, in the case of the Franciscan Fray Alonso del Valle before the same tribunal. He was accused by two sisters of his Order; there was a vote in discordia and the Suprema ordered suspension of the case, but, before this could be done, there supervened two more witnesses with evidence of the foulest character. The result was a sentence April 14, 1638, of deprivation of confessing women, one year’s reclusion and four years of exile from Toro and Astorga. Equally fortunate was the Dominican Fray Juan Gómez, accused by two women, with one of whom, for fifteen years, he had illicit relations in the chapels used for confession. Some sisters of his Order likewise denounced him and, for all this he was sentenced, February 4, 1638, to be deprived of confessing women and to Friday fasting for six months. Even greater was the benignity shown, in 1642, to the Licenciate Morales, cura of Robadillo, against whom there were two accusers. The vote of the consulta de fe on thesumariawas not unanimous, when the Suprema cut the affair short by ordering suspension, with a private reprimand of the accused in the apartments of the inquisitor.[277]
PUNISHMENT
Evidently the Inquisition was beginning to regard the offence with a compassionate eye, and it would be superfluous to adduce more cases of its tenderness. Still the regular scheme of punishments was nominally held in force, and is duly recapitulated by an old inquisitor about 1640, who includes fines for secular priests and adds that the galleys might be inflicted, and that those who relapsed deserved them. Abjurationde vehementiwas never imposed and, although the papal constitution permitted relaxation, this was never used, though it is well that there is a faculty for it in extreme cases.[278]Even the fines here alluded to were not heavy. Another authority of about the same date says that, if the priest is rich, he may be mulcted in from six to ten thousand maravedís.[279]The heaviest pecuniary penalty that I have met was imposed, in 1744, on Fernández Puyalon, cura of Ciempozuelos, who was fined in half his property, but here solicitation was complicated with heretical propositions, which, as we have seen, greatly enhanced guilt.[280]
As regards the galleys, I have met with but one case of their employment—that of the Licentiate Lorenzo de Eldora, assistant cura in Torre de Beleña, tried in Toledo in 1691. He had already been punished for the same offence in Granada, and had relapsed, which explains the severity of the sentence suspending him from orders and banishing him from a number of places for ten years, of which the first five were to be spent in the galleys.[281]That this punishment was reserved for relapse may be inferred from a case which, about the same time, was occupying the Barcelona tribunal and which certainly deserved it. The Mercenarian Padre Estevan Ramoneda was accused in 1690, but it was not until 1694 that a second denunciation enabled action to be taken. After many evasions, in ignorance of the exact charge, he confessed to much more than was required. Since entering a convent, in 1660, as a boy of fifteen, his life had been one of sexual abominations, almost warranting the belief that the monasteries of the time were outposts of Sodom. The number of women whose testimony was obtained was only eight, but among these were some with whom extraordinary obscenities were practised in church. He had no defence to offer and, in his sentence, September 11,1696, all reference to his unnatural crimes of all kinds was carefully omitted. He was deprived of confession, had a circular discipline in his convent, and was recluded for four years in the house of N. Señora del Olivar, from which he was allowed to return in October 1700.[282]This was considered sufficient punishment for a brute whose life had been spent in corrupting men, women and beasts.
There is one feature in these cases which shows how great was the dread of scandal. We frequently find details of the worst excesses committed in the churches. According to the canon law (Cap. 5, Extra, v, xvi) a church thus polluted required to be reconciled, but there is no trace in any of the records of the observance of this rule. It was presumably for the purpose of averting knowledge of such disgraceful occurrences that casuists discovered that pollution occurred only when the act was public and not occult.[283]
It was a favorite device, when a confessor had reason to fear that a denunciation was impending, for him to denounce himself, in the expectation of merciful treatment. Roman practice encouraged this by conferring virtual immunity in such cases, as was experienced by the Minim Hilario Caone of Besançon, who fled from Spain, in 1653, and presented himself before the Roman Inquisition, stating that for ten years he had heard confessions in the church of San Francisco de Paula in Seville, and that he had come in post to confess that he had solicited in confession some forty women, mostly with success. When questioned as to belief and intention, he answered satisfactorily and was only sentenced to abjurede vehementi, to visit the seven privileged altars of St. Peter’s, and for three years to recite weekly the chaplet of the Virgin. This was not exceptional mercy for, in the same year, an equivalent sentence was pronounced on Vincenzo Barzi, who similarly denounced himself, and the existing rule is to impose only spiritual penance on the self-accuser, with advice to avoid in future those whom he has solicited.[284]
SELF-DENUNCIATION
The Spanish Inquisition, at least at first, was not so lenient and it followed its rule withespontaneadosof examining for confirmation those whom the delinquent named as the objects of his solicitations. In the early cases there is little difference in the sentences between those who denounced themselves and those who were accused. In 1582, the Franciscan Fray Sebastian de Hontoria accused himself to the Toledo tribunal for having, as vicar of a nunnery, corrupted several of the nuns under peculiarly aggravating circumstances. On examination they confirmed his confession, and he was sentenced to a circular discipline in the convent of San Juan de los Reyes, to be deprived of confessing, and reclusion in a convent for ten years, without active or passive voice and being last in choir and refectory.[285]He had confessed fully and freely. In another case, in 1589, before the same tribunal, the Franciscan Fray Marcos de Latançon, in accusing himself, suppressed the worst features of his offence. He confessed that, at Orche, he had handled indecently some five or six unmarried and perhaps six or eight married women, but averred that this was without any licentious feeling or intention to induce them to sin. Five of the girls were examined, whose concurrent testimony showed that the confessions were heard in a chamber in which there was a bed. As each one entered he locked the door; when the confession was half through he would interrupt it with the foulest indecencies and violence, after which the confession was resumed and absolution was granted. For this profanation of the sacrament the sentence was the same as in the last case, except that the reclusion was for only four years.[286]
So long as the practice of examining the woman was continued, self-denunciation always had the advantage that they would very frequently, in defence of their honor, deny everything. The result of this, and the prevailing tendency towards leniency, are indicated in rules expressed about 1640, which tell us that, if one witness has already testified against the culprit, self-denunciation ensures a lighter penalty; there is no imprisonment and it is customary to deprive him of confessing women. If he accuses himself before there is any evidence against him, and if the women are numerous and they confirm his statements, the case proceeds to deprivation of confessing; if they deny, the case is suspended,with a warning to him. If there is but one and the case is not grave, he is merely reprimanded.[287]
The custom of examining the women compromised by the self-accuser gradually grew obsolete, doubtless because they mostly protected themselves from exposure by denial. Thus, in 1707, in the Madrid tribunal, when Padre Pablo Delgado, provost of the Casa del Espiritu Santo, accused himself, there seems to have been no examination of the women and his case was promptly suspended, with a monition to abstain for six months from confessing women.[288]So, in the case of the Observantine Fray Gabriel Pantoja, who denounced himself, May 8, 1720, to the Toledo tribunal, for offences committed during the previous ten years, which show him to have lost no opportunity of seducing women, in the confessional or out of it, and of promising absolution if they would yield to his desires, the absence of his name from the record ofautos particularesshows that none of the women were examined and that no action was deemed necessary.[289]Indeed, what chiefly impresses one, in a series of these cases, is the matter of fact way in which every body—priests, penitents and inquisitors—seems to take it for granted that such things were a matter of course and that the confessor should be in pursuit of every woman who came before him. So, in a letter of the Mexican tribunal, May 13, 1719, to its commissioner, in the case of Fray Antonio Domínguez, who had denounced himself, the instructions are that the culprit is to be exhorted to abstain in future and to sunder an illicit connection with a daughter of confession; he is to be absolved sacramentally which, as the rule in all cases of self-denunciation, is to be made known to all confessors in the district “for the solace and comfort of their souls”—thus assuming them to be all guilty of the same offence.[290]
INDIFFERENCE
Still, practice as yet was not uniform. In 1740, the Recollect Fray Joseph Rives accused himself before the Valencia tribunal, when the evidence of two women was taken, showing the beastliness to which such men resorted to inflame the passions of their penitents. A formal trial resulted, ending in his deprivation of confession and three years’ exile from Valencia and the scenes ofhis excesses.[291]This was probably one of the latest cases in which anespontaneadosuffered. A writer shortly afterwards complains of the uncertainty of practice, as the Suprema constantly issued varying decisions under conditions precisely similar, but he states the rule to be that, when a priest accuses himself, the registers are searched and, if nothing is found of record against him, he is discharged with a charitable warning, and a recommendation to abstain from the confessional save when necessary to avert scandal.[292]Complete immunity soon followed for self-accusation. In 1780 the Suprema seems to have desired to introduce uniformity, and enquired of the tribunals whether they were accustomed to makeespontaneadosabjure and then absolve them, or whether they suspended the cases, to which Valencia replied that the custom was to suspend, without abjuration or absolution, unless there was complication ofmala doctrina.[293]When self-denunciation thus secured immunity it naturally was frequent. In a list of a hundred and eight cases in Madrid, between 1670 and 1772, thirty-two, or thirty per cent., areespontaneados.[294]
In fact, during the later period, the whole matter seems to have excited but a languid interest, and to have been treated commonly with indifference. We meet with instances in which accusations are pigeon-holed without even making the prescribed inquiries of other tribunals, or cases are suspended without examining the accuser.[295]So relaxed was discipline that when, in 1806, the Franciscan Fray Francisco de Paula Lozano had been deprived by Córdova of the faculty of confessing, and not only disregarded the inhibition but complicated his offence by opening a letter from the tribunal of Granada to the cura of Salar, he was tried by Granada and merely reprimanded with a warning of what would happen to him if he persisted in his evil courses.[296]
It would be interesting sociologically if complete statistics could be compiled, from the time when jurisdiction was conferred on the Inquisition, but this is impossible, for there are only a fewfragmentary sources of the earlier period, although for the eighteenth century there are satisfactory materials in the special registers kept of this class of cases. In no case, however, do they furnish a standard by which to estimate the frequency of the crime, for the difficulty of inducing women to accuse left the great majority of cases buried in secrecy, in addition to which a marked feature of the records is the disproportion between the accusations and the trials, owing principally to the impediment arising from the requirement of at least two accusations, so that the trials and sentences are comparatively few in number. The working of this is exhibited, as early as 1597, in a report by Inquisitor Heredia of Barcelona of a visitation of part of his district, in which ten cases of solicitation were brought before him. Of these seven are noted as suspended in consequence of there being but one witness, another is suspended because the offender had been already tried and punished, leaving but two in which arrest and trial were ordered. In the visitation the whole number of cases was eighty-eight and the only offences more numerous than solicitation were unnatural lusts, of which there were fifteen, propositions which furnished twelve, the assertion that marriage is better than celibacy which furnished eleven, while blasphemy was on an equality with ten. All, or nearly all, of these latter classes doubtless led to prosecutions, while solicitation resulted in only two trials.[297]