Full text of "Abdul Baha on divine philosophy"

See other formats

USStftLF

*B S&L S3

• «R<ciie>

-c^im^^'

/is

3 A i'^'i-*

>S"W<PM

Digitized by the Internet Archive

in 2007 with funding from

IVIicrosoft Corporation

http://www.archive.org/details/abdulbahaondivinOOabdurich

PROTESTANT ENDURANCE

UNDER

POPISH CRUELTY

A NAERATIYE OP

THE EEFOEMATION IN SPAIN.

J. C. M'COAN, ESQ.,

OF THE MIDDLE TEMPLE.

LONDON :
BINNS AND GOODWIN, 44, FLEET STREET;

AND 19, CHEAP STREET, BATH.
EDINBURGH : OLIVER AND BOYD. DUBLIN : J. m'gLASHAN.

LOAN STACK

bath: printed by binns and GOODV/1N.

PKEFAOE

The following pages require but little by way of
preface. They were written nearly four years ago, ,
with a view to publication in another form ; but,
although half the period fixed by Horatian prescript
has thus nearly elapsed, they have undergone no
alteration either in arrangement or substance. The
object of the author was, to present a short but
complete outline of the history of Protestantism in
Spain; a subject on which, at that time, only one
book — and that much more comprehensive in its
purpose — was conveniently within the reach of the
English readey. Since then, a translation of De

784

IV PREFACE.

Castro's Historia de hs Protestantes Espanoles has
been published in London, and still more recently
one of another work on the same subject and by
the same author. In neither of them, however, has
the writer of the present volume met with any new
information which could ha.ve materially, if it all,
improved it, had such been in existence at the time
it was written. He need hardly acknowledge his
great obligations to Dr. McCrie's History of the
Reformation in Spain (the work above referred to),
as nothing of any worth could be written on this

.subject, without being more or less indebted to that
accurate and elegant work. The extent of these
obligations is only partially indicated by the refer-
ences made to it in the foot-notes. Its chief use,
however, has been to guide to the original sources
of information, which have been consulted and fol-
lowed in nearly every instance referred to in the
notes, and in many others where acknowledgment
has not been deemed necessary. Whilst avoiding a

. lengthy parade of references, enough have been given
to show that, whatever may be the ^ults or short-

PREFACE. V

comings of the book, they have not arisen from
wilful avoidance of labour on the part of the writer.
Fortunately, however, the facts contained in the nar-
rative possess an intrinsic interest, which cannot be
materially lessened by the other defects which belong
to it, and of which few will discover more than
himself.

London, Sept. 1853.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

PAGE.'
HISTORICAL SKETCH OF SPAIN PREVIOUS TO THE COM-
MENCEMENT OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

Earliest Inhabitants. Spain a Roman Province. The
Visigoths. Saracenic Invasion. Pelago. Kingdoms
of Aragon, Navarre, Portugal, and Castile. Moorish
Kingdom of Granada. Peter the Cruel. Henry II.
John I. Henry III. John II. Henry IV. Ferdi-
nand and Isabella. Conquest of Granada. Colum-
bus. Annexation of Naples to the Spanish Crown.
Charles V. Civil Polity of Spain 1

CHAPTER II.

OUTLINE OF SPANISH ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY PREVIOUS
TO THE REFORMATION.

The Gospel, when and by whom first preached in the
Peninsula. The Early Spanish Church, its Doctrine,
Government, and Worship. First acknowledgment
of Romish Supremacy. The Vaudois. Corruption of
the Spanish Clergy. Reforms attempted by Cardinal
Ximenez 22

VUl CONTENTS.

CHAPTER III,

OBSTACLES TO THE SUCCESS OF THE REFOEMED DOCTRINES
IN SPAIN.

The Inquisition, when and by whom founded. Its
Reform. Its modes of proceeding. Persecution of
the Jews. Establishment of the Holy Office in Cas-
tile. Torquemada. The Bible forbidden. Unsuc-
cessful efforts of the Cortes to suppress the Inquisition.
Other obstacles to the Reformation 44

CHAPTER IV.

COMMENCEMENT OP THE REFORMATION.

Introduction of the Reformed Doctrines. Juan Valdes.
Rodrigo de Valer, Egidio. Vargas. Constantino
Ponce. Arrest and trial of Egidio. His imprison-
ment, liberation, and death. The Reformed Doctrines
in Valladolid. Francisco San Roman. Domingo de
Roxas. Augustin Cazalla. Spanish divines abroad ... 70

CHAPTER V.

CIRCUMSTANCES WHICH FAVOURED THE REFORMATION IN
SPAIN.

Spanish Protestants in Germany and the Netherlands.
The brothers Enzinas. Martyrdom of Jayme in
Rome. Tragedy of Juan Diaz. Translation of the
New Testament by Francisco Enzinas. Juan Perez.
Cassiodoro de Reyna. His translation of the Bible.

• Cypriano de Valera. Juan Lizzarago. Efforts of the
Inquisition to prevent the circulation of the Scrip-

CONTENTS. IX

PAGE.

tures. Effects produced by their circulation. Valla-
dolid and Seville the head-quarters of the Reformed
Movement 101

CHAPTER VI.

PROGRESS OF THE REFORMED DOCTRINES.

Return of Constantine Ponce to Seville. He is ap-
pointed Canon Magistral. His writings. Maria
Gomez. The storm, for a time, warded off. Christo-
bal Losada. Don Juan Ponce de Leon. Domingo
de Guzman. Spread of the Reformed Doctrines
amongst the monasteries. The Convent of St. Isidro
del Campo. Garcia de Arias. Juan de Regla. Fran-
cisco de Villalba. Reasons of Charles for opposing
Protestantism. Extensive spread of the Lutheran
Doctrines around Valladolid. Their progress in
Granada, Murcia, Valencia. In the kingdom of Ara-
gon. The inherent power of Christianity illustrated .. 120

CHAPTER VIL

DISCOVERY OF THE PROTESTANTS, AND SUPPRESSION OP
THE REFORMATION.

Abdication of Charles V. Philip II. His character.
Powers of the Inquisition increased. Papal bulls.
Arrest of Juan Hernandez. The Protestants informed
against in Valladolid and Seville. Preparations.
Wholesale arrests. Misery of the victims. Discovery
of Constantine Ponce's MSS. His sufferings and
death. Family of Fernando Nugnez. Public protest
against Inquisitorial injustice. First auto in Valla-

dohd. The second 137

X CONTENTS.

CHAPTER VIIL

SUPPRESSIVE MEASURES CONTINUED AND COMPLETED.

Few recantations amongst the prisoners in Seville.
The first auto. The second. Two Englishmen
burned. Third auto in Seville. Autos in Toledo.
In Saragossa, Logrono, and Barcelona. Huguenots.
Heterodox horses. Autos in Granada. Protestantism
extinct 168

CHAPTER IX.

SPAIN SINCE THE REFORMATION.

Few escapes. Philip III. The House of Bourbon.
Ignorance and gloom. Don Miguel Solano. His
imprisonment and death. Neglect of education and
religion during the wars. Arrest of Ferdinand VII.
at Bayonne. The Inquisition abolished by the Cortes.
Return of Ferdinand, and re- establishment of the
Holy Office, Death of Ferdinand, and final abolition
of the Inquisition. A spirit of religious inquiry. The
last death by fire. Private executions. Effects of
Inquisitorial despotism. Mr. George Borrow. Print-
ing of the New Testament. Difficulties met with in
its circulation. Opposition from the clergy. Results
of the effort. Spain in 1841. Smugglers. Strange
evangelists. Eagerness for the Bible. Private im-
portations. Conclusion 188

Appendix 209

:ti

crt

•C

I— 1

;>,

cti

bO Q) o

S -^^ '53
o «i_. -d

22 ^ fl

•a ^ h5
'^ -^ §

§ .2 ®

ft -IJ >

cc -^ «d

-^^ ft O
««!=''*
O «^ ««
^ sm O

b ° d

it '^ 2

S eS o

o d ?

QJ d £3

50 .2 ^

o »-' a>

rS SM '73

•^ ^ a

-M © IT

i^.2

T-H(M01lOrHOOOO«00(MOO?00

^ S

■t^»O-rJiO00'O0^'X>X0r-i007-H(Ni>>»0

rK S^

CO^OS^O OO -<:t< (N »0 <© rH i:^ O lO i-H r-l

^ a

t^ (i^<£T^-^T^^^i:o<S^^ Oi

1>^

05kO'«*Cq r-H rHrHi-H

-d &

OOi<NO(M»000>0(?qcOOO>OOr-l

-*(NCOOr-l(NCN?Or-lOG<l^CO

0OGO(N»OrHi— l-«^^00?O-*»OI>-

Oi^

<© C<r i-T rn" r-T

1>^

T— 1

OCN'^O'^OOOOOCNOOO'^OO

(N05«3G<J(M»0-rJ4CNOi-^»0»OOrH

-u

(jqiOlO«OC0G<J00^Oaj000O'X>«O

O (M O i-l (M rH CO r-i G<1 T-H T-H

«5"

r— '

|. a=.2 ^HH ^„•^■

Inq.-gen. Tommaso di
Inq.-gen. Deza ...
Inq.-gen. Ximenez Cis
Inq.-gen. Adriano Flo
Interregnum . . .
Inq.-gen. Alfonso Man
Inq.-gen. Tabera
Charles V., Inq.-gen. '.
in the regency of Phi:
in the reign of Philip
in the reign of Philip
in the reign of Chark
in the reign of Philip
in the reign of Ferdin
in the reign of Charle
in the reign of Charle

ooi>.i:^i— lurskoco oi>''~''^ocooioooo

O O rH (?2 C<l ^ lO 05 (M ?0 O ^ VO CO o

^kOkO^OlOkOlO d^^'»t^i^-t^i:^00

T-< I—I I— 1 J-H I— 1 I— 1 1-H tJOr-H 1— 1 i-H i-H rH irH rH 7— i

ooooooo'Soooooooo

+3+34^+3^+3+3 ;H-t3-;j4j-+34J434J43

i-HOOI^ir^rHlOlO a)C0Ir->-H»OO«50S00

050iOr-J(M(?q^^l005(MOO-^U:500

■^->*ooovou:5+3iQ»ococot-.i>-i>.i^

1— 1 r—l I— 1 I— 1 J— 1 I— 1 I— 1 ^i— 1 rH I— ( fH rH T— ' I— 1 rH

PKOTESTANT ENDUEANCE

UNDER

POPISH CRUELTY.

dajto |trst.

HISTORICAL SKETCH OP SPAIN PREVIOUS TO THE COMMENCEMENT
OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

It may not be uninteresting or unprofitable to the
general reader, if we introduce our short account of
Protestantism in the Peninsula by a slight sketch of
the history of the country down to the time of the
Keformation, when Protestantism, strictly speaking,
first showed itself in Spain.

At what time, or by whom, the Peninsula was
first peopled, is a question on which modern his-
torians profess themselves unable to throw any
certain light. Various hypotheses have been put

2 TRADITIONAL ANTIQUITY OF SPAIN.

forward, but all equally unsupported by satisfactory
evidence. With a few unimportant exceptions,
Spanish writers have claimed for their nation an
antiquity to which but few, if any, others have
made the smallest pretensions. Taking for their
authorities the scattered and hardly intelligible
hints to be gleaned from the old poets and geogra-
phers, and in some degree from the rich stores of
traditionary fiction in the middle ages, they have
at various times endeavoured to establish the exist-
ence of a thriving, and, to a great degree, cultivated
people in the Spanish peninsula, when all the rest of
Europe was either a desert waste, or, at best, over-
run here and there by migratory hordes of barba-
rians. They have laboured hard to prove that
Tubal, the grandson of Noah, colonized the country
2163 years before Christ; and that the patriarch
himself visited the .founder, and helped him in the
great work of building towns and cities, and in
making laws for his people, whose posterity were
governed by a long line of illustrious kings, ages
before history began to record the actions of men.
All this, of course, goes for nothing. We must look
for information from some more reliable and trust-
worthy sources. The Greek and Roman historians,
our only authorities, mention the Iberians as the
earliest inhabitants of Spain. These were disturbed

FIRST INHABITANTS. TRADE. 3

in their possessions* by the Celtae, a nation who
crossed over the Pyrenees from Gaul, or, according
to some, passed over the Straits of Gibraltar from
the opposite coast of Africa. After a time, the two
races amalgamated, and founded one nation, which
we meet with in history under the name of Celtibe-
rians. From the remotest ages, the rich produce
of the mines and fertile soil of the Peninsula had
attracted the attention of the Phoenicians. For
a long time, however, these enterprising navigators
and traders had only a few unimportant settlements
along the coasts of Boetica. From these they
bartered with the inhabitants, giving the rich fabrics
and spices of Asia in exchange for the valuable
mineral productions of Spain. They gradually pene-
trated into the interior, and founded some strong
towns, whence they carried on a still more profitable
trade.

As might be expected, the mercantile success of
the Phoenicians soon attracted the traders of the other
nations of Asia and Eastern Europe. The Phoeni-
cians were not long suffered to enjoy their profitable
monopoly, but were obliged to share their trade with
others whom their successful example stimulated to
pursue the same advantages. Amongst the earliest

* According to the probably extravagant reckoning of
Olcampo, about 1000 years b.c.

4 CARTHAGINIANS, ROMANS,

of these competitors were several from various parts
of Greece, of whom the Ehodians and Phoceans were
the most successful. The object of both Phoenicians
and Greeks was purely commercial, and consequently
they aimed at establishing no more permanent
footing in the country than would enable them
to trade profitably with the inhabitants. They were
followed by the Carthaginians, who took Ghadir
(the modern Cadiz) from the Phoenicians, and thence
successively under their generals Hamilcar, his son-
in-law Hasdrubal, and son Hannibal, penetrated
into the interior with a view to the complete sub-
jugation of the Peninsula. The last-mentioned
general successfully made war against the Olcades,
Vaccseans, and Carpetanians, by whose overthrow
the Carthaginians became masters of Spain as far
as the river Iberus (the modern Ebro), with the
exception of the town of Sargentum, which was
in alliance with Eome. The taking of this town,
by Hannibal, led to the second Punic war between
the two rival republics.

After a series of alternate victories and defeats,
the Carthaginians were driven from the Peninsula
by Scipio Africanus, and Spain became a Roman
province. Several of the native tribes, however,
refused to submit to the Roman yoke, and main-
tained their independence for more than a century.

AND VISIGOTHS, IN SPAIN. 5

Tliey fouglit long and obstinately, but having no
union amongst themselves, they were gradually
subdued, and, by the time of Augustus, the whole
country was brought under the dominion of Rome.

Early in the fifth century, after the colossal empire
had fallen under the weight of its own greatness,
and its sun had set for ever in sanguinary turbulence
and gloom, Spain was overrun by hordes of Visigoths
from the north-west of Europe, under their king
Adolph, who established himself in Catalonia. It
was not, however, till the latter part of the century
that the whole of the Peninsula was brought com-
pletely under the sway of a Gothic king. Its his-
tory, under these monarchs, is a tissue of murders,
usurpations, and all the evils attending an elective
monarchy — as it became — among an uncivilized
people.

About AD. 555, one of these sovereigns, who
had climbed to the throne by the assassination
of his predecessor, purchased the support of Justinian,
the eastern emperor, by consenting to hold his
dominions as a fief of the empire. This vassalage
was not thrown oft' till the time of Leuvigild, one of
the best and greatest of the Gothic kings. Under
his sway, the country became, for a time, quiet and
prosperous, but at his death it relapsed into its
former condition ; the old scenes of bloodshed were

e MOSLEMS IN SPAIN.

re-enacted by the rival candidates for the throne,
to such an extent that, within 117 years from the
death of Leuvigild, Spain had seventeen successive
monarchs. Such a state of things could not but
enfeeble the internal condition of the country, and
render it a ready prey to invaders from without.
Having been free from foreign enemies for so long
a time, military discipline had been neglected, and
under the effeminating influence of the genial clime,
and of the luxurious habits into which they had
fallen, the once hardy and warlike descendants of
Theodoric had become too weak to offer any pro-
tracted or effectual resistance when invaded by the
enthusiastic warriors of Mahomet. These brave and
hardy denizens of the Arabian deserts had already
brought Egypt, Palestine, and Syria, under the sway
of the Prophet and his successors.

During the reign of Roderic, these proselyting
warriors, whose only alternative to the vanquished
was the faith of Islam or the sword, crossed over
the Straits of Gibraltar, under the victorious Tarik
Ibn Zeyad, who, with an army of 12,000 men,
opposed to 80,000, under Roderic, gained the
battle on the banks of the Guadalete, near Xeres,
which decided the fate of the Gothic monarchy in
Spain. The whole country speedily submitted to
the conqueror. Toledo, the Gothic capital, opened

SPEEDY CONQUEST. 7

her gates, stipulating only for freedom of religion
and internal government ; and within almost as
short a time as a traveller could traverse Spain, the
white tents of the victorious Moslems were planted
on the shores of Biscay ; and Spain, after remaining
for nearly three centuries in the possession of the
Visigoths, fell under the yoke of the Saracens in the
year 712. Only a valiant remnant of the Gothg
maintained their independence in the rugged and
inaccessible mountains of Asturia.

It has been well remarked, that the fervid and
irresistible enthusiasm which distinguished the
youthful period of Mahometanism might sufficiently
account for so speedy and remarkable a conquest ;
even if we could not assign as additional causes, the
internal factious which divided the Goths, the resent-
ment of disappointed aspirants after power, and the
temerity which risked the fate of an empire on
the chances of a single battle. The mind of him
who looks to nothing higher than the mere political
consequences of this overthrow of the Gothic mon-
archy, may see in it nothing more than one of those
falsely-called chance vicissitudes in a nation's history,
of which the records of the past furnish so many
examples; but the wise and impartial observer
recognizes in it one of those fore-ordained events
by which the designs of an all-wise Providence,

i THE MOORS BECOME LUXURIOUS,

in reference to His creatures, are accomplished
The Moslems opened up to Spain the learning
and civilization of the East, of which, till then, she
liad been ignorant, and whose beneficial results
spread, in time, over nearly the whole of Europe,
Outliving the long and gloomy night of the middle
ftges, and bursting forth, like the phoenix from her
ashes, with renewed vigour at the revival of literature
in the beginning of the l^th century, preparing
men's minds for the glorious "light and liberty of
the gospel," which Luther, under God, opened up
to them two centuries later. The valiant remnant
of the Goths, already mentioned, not only preserved
their national liberty and name in the northern
mountains, but waged for centuries a successful,
and for the most part oflfensive, warfare against
their conquerors, till the balance was turned in their
favour, and the Moors were compelled, in their turn,
to maintain almost as obstinate and protracted a
struggle for a small portion of the Peninsula, and
were at last driven from it entirely.

But not to anticipate ; the victors, having firmly
established themselves in Spain, gradually, like their
brethren in Syria, fell away from their simple and
self-denying habits of the desert, and lapsed into
luxurious indolence. In the enjoyment of the fruits
of their conquest, they forgot their few but daring

AND ABE CONQUERED BY THE CHRISTIANS.

enemies in the mountainous districts of the north,
and gave themselves up to the cultivation of science,
and the erection of those magnificent mosques and
palaces, the ruins of which have outlived the dynasty
of their founders, and fill even yet the mind of the
traveller with admiration and astonishment, as he
wanders through the echoing halls of the Alhambra,
or traverses the plains of Granada. Feuds soon
broke out in the kingdom of Cordova, which was
speedily dismembered by successful rebels. Taking
advantage of these divisions, Pelago, a Gothic
nobleman, began the attempt to rescue his country
from the yoke of the infidel. He seized on some
towns along the base of the mountains in which he
and his countrymen had taken refuge, defeated the
forces sent against him, and having gradually
enlarged his dominions, founded the small kingdom
of the Asturias, in which he was succeeded by his
son Favila, in 737. This prince, dying shortly
after, was followed by Alfonso, surnamed the
Catholic, who made still more extensive encroach-
ments on the Saracenic dominions.

But the limits to which we must necessarily
confine ourselves in this introductory sketch, will
prevent our tracing in detail the history of these
early struggles for the liberation of their country
from the Moslem yoke. We must content ourselves

10 SPAIN DIVIDED INTO KINGDOMS.

with mentioning the various small kingdoms into
which the gradually recovered territory was divided.
We shall notice them chronologically in the order
of their foundation.

According to the best native historians, Garcia
Ximenes, a Cantabrian noble, was proclaimed king
in 758, by the inhabitants of Soprarbe, which became
in time the foundation of the small kingdoms of
Aragon and Navarre. Half a century later, Winfred,
of the family of the dukes of Aquitaine, aided by
the emperor Charlemagne, founded the county of
Barcelona. For the next century and a half, still
greater encroachments were made upon the territo-
ries of the Cordovan monarchs. The kingdom of
Oviedo, of which Leon became the capital in 914,
was founded, and gradually extended its boundary
to the Douro, and even to the mountains of the
Guadarrama.

Again, in 1005, the province of Old Castile * was
formed into a kingdom by Sancho of Navarre. This
province had belonged to the kingdom of Leon, but
its separation was only temporary, for by the death
of Bermudo III., of Leon, Ferdinand (the son of
Sancho) of Castile, became, in right of marriage with
his sister, master of the united monarchy. Towards

* Or Castella, called so from the numerous castles erected
for its defence by Alfonso I.

FOUK CHRISTIAN AND ONE MAHOMETAN. 11

ttie end of this century, Henry de Besanyon, a knight
of the house of Burgundy, aided by Alfonso of
Castile, whose daughter he had married, laid the
foundation of the kingdom of Portugal, which was
extended by his son and successor Alfonso I.
Shortly before this time (in 1085), Toledo and
the neighbouring districts had been taken from
the Moors by Alfonso III. of Castile, under whom
fought Roderigo de Vivar, the famous Cid, whose
exploits have been so celebrated in the old ballad
poetry of Spain.

During the next century and a half, the Christian
princes continued their encroachments on the Moor-
ish territory, till at last, after having lost Saragossa,
Badajoz, Cordova, and Valencia, the Spanish Moslems
were driven to the mountains of Granada, where a
new kingdom was founded by Mahomet Ibnu-1-ahmar
in 1248.

Having thus very briefly enumerated the several
divisions which were made of the territory recovered
from the Moors, we find the Peninsula divided into
four Christian kingdoms : — Castile, Aragon, Navarre,
and Portugal, and one Mahometan, Granada. Of
these, Castile and Aragon, though occasionally
separated, became at last permanently united, and
formed the chief power in the Peninsula. The little
kingdom of Navarre passed continually by females

12 CIVIL DISSENSIONS.

to the Frencli houses of Bigorre, Champagne,
Evereux, Foix, and Albret. Portugal remained
distinct, and exercised but little influence beyond
the limits of its own territory. For nearly two
centuries, we almost lose sight of Granada. Its
sovereigns, either too weak, or too much engaged
by internal feuds, to make any aggressive attempts
on the territory from which they had been driven,
were compelled to content themselves with the
undisturbed enjoyment of the finest province in
the Peninsula.

The century of Spanish history immediately
following the settlement of the Moors in Granada,
was chiefly occupied by a series of civil dissensions,
occurring too rapidly to be easily remembered, or
even understood. The first, however, of importance
that we meet with, was a rebellion headed by Henry,
Count of Transtamara, against his brother Pedro IV.
of Castile, justly surnamed the Cruel. Aided by a
strong body of mercenary adventurers, under the
command of Bertrand du Guesclin, Henry invaded
Castile to avenge the murder of his brother Don
Fadrique. Pedro was overpowered, and his rival
proclaimed king at Burgos in 1366. The deposed
monarch fled to Bordeaux, at that time the capital
of the English possessions in France, and induced
Edward, the Black Prince, by the promise of Biscay,

SUCCESSIVE MONARCHS. 13

to espouse his cause. Edward entered Spain, and,
at the battle of JSTavarrette, defeated an army of
100,000 men with which Henry met him. Pedro
was reinstated on the throne, and Henry fled over
the Pyrenees ; but Pedro's ingratitude causing the
Black Prince to return to Guienne, Henry again
appeared, and Pedro lost his kingdom and life in
a second contest in 1369.

During nearly the whole of the following half
century, under Henry II., and his successors John I.
and Henry III., the country was tranquil ; but this
golden period ceased at the majority of John II.
A series of conspiracies and civil dissensions, osten-
sibly directed against his favourite Alvaro de Luna,
distracted the kingdom during the latter part of this
prince's reign. The weak and fickle monarch was
easily induced to consent to the death of his minister,
who had exercised an absolute sway over his feeble
master for nearly five and thirty years. Alvaro de
Luna has been compared, by a living historian, to '
our English Strafford, whom he seems to have
strongly resembled in character.

In 1455, John was succeeded by his son Henry
IV., one of the weakest princes, both in mind and
body, that ever ascended a throne. His misrule
soon renewed the disturbances of the last reign j
and, after ten years spent in civil war, Henry wa?

14 ISABELLA AND JOANNA,

deposed by a powerful confederacy of his disaftected
nobles, who placed Alfonso, the king's brother, upon
the throne. On the death of this young prince
three years after, his sister Isabella was proclaimed
queen. She, however, to avoid the odium of a
contest with her brother, agreed to a treaty, by
which the succession would revert to her at his
death. The next step taken by the malcontent
nobility was to secure the marriage of Isabella, who
was soon after betrothed to prince Ferdinand of
Aragon. Henry readily seized upon this, as a
fitting opportunity for revoking his forced dis-
position of the crown, and restoring the direct line
of succession in favour of his daughter Joanna,
whose legitimacy was very generally doubted. On
his death, which occurred five years after, Isabella
was raised to the throne. Her claims were supported
by the majority of the nobles and people, and by the
powerful assistance of Aragon ; whilst those of
Joanna, to whom the kingdom had been willed
by the late king, were maintained by the rest of the
nobles, and by Alfonso V., of Portugal, to whom she
was betrothed. At the battle of Toro, fought in
1476, the Portuguese king and the partisans of
Joanna were defeated, and her rival was placed in
undisputed possession of the throne of Castile. Three
years after, Ferdinand succeeded his father, John II.,

FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. 15

and the two kingdoms of Aragon and Castile became
for ever united.

We now enter upon, politically speaking, one of
the brightest pages in the history of Spain. Under
the wise and vigorous government of Ferdinand
and Isabella, she was raised into the foremost rank
of European nations. With just laws impartially
administered, and freed from the internal dis-
turbances which had so long misdirected the ener-
gies, swallowed up the resources, and opposed the
industry, of her people, she rapidly rose to the
dignity of a first-rate power. The lamp of learning,
which had shone but feebly since the revival of
letters, was now retrimmed, and a new impetus
given to the study of literature and the arts. It
is true that the authority of the crown was much
more despotic than would harmonize with our more
modern and enlightened ideas of liberty ; but it
chiefly operated against the old feudal power of the
nobles, and, in this respect, rather increased, than
curtailed, the real liberties of the people at large.

Ferdinand and Isabella had no sooner quenched
the flames of civil discord in their dominions, than
they resolved to give Europe a proof of the .vigour
which the Spanish monarchy should exhibit under
their administration.

The political jealousies which had for more than

16 COJ^QUEST OF GRANADA.

three centuries counterbalanced the mutual zeal of
the Christian princes for religion and conquest, had
prevented any effective measures being taken for the
overthrow of the only remaining Moorish power
in the Peninsula. The civil wars which rent Granada
at the time of Ferdinand's accession, favoured, if
they did not suggest, his project for its invasion.
But even in the last stage of the Moslem dominion,
and enfeebled by the strife of its contending parties,
one of which took part with the invaders, Granada,
animated by the heroic though expiring spirit of
its founders, held out for more than ten years against
the overwhelming hosts of the foe. Inch by inch
was its territory won ; town slowly followed town,
till at last the city itself was taken in 1492; and
with it fell for ever the Moorish power in Spain.
The conquest of Granada raised the name of Ferdi-
nand to high estimation throughout Europe.

The next important event in this reign, was the
discovery of America by Columbus, who had in vain
sought for aid in his enterprise from his native
city Genoa, and afterwards from Don John of
Portugal.

In addition to the kingdom of Granada, the
dominions of Ferdinand and Isabella were increased
by the counties of Kousillon and Cerdagne, ceded
to them by Charles VIII. of France, who wished

CHARLES V. 17'

thereby to conciliate Ferdinand, and smootli every
impediment to the expedition which he meditated
against Italy. In this, however, he failed ; for
Ferdinand, jealously alive to the ambition of the
French king, sent an army to the aid of his relative
and namesake, Ferdinand I., who at that time
occupied the throne of Naples. Seeing, however,
that Louis XII., who succeeded Charles, was bent
on the conquest of Naples, Ferdinand, more ambi-
tious than just, proposed, on a paltry plea, to divide
that kingdom with the French monarch. This was
done ; in 1501 Naples was conquered, and divided
between the allies. Five years after, the Spanish
general Gonsalvo de Cordova, surnamed El Gran
Capitan, drove the French from Italy, and presented
the Neapolitan crown to his wily master. At this
time Isabella died, and was succeeded in the joint
sovereignty with Ferdinand by their daughter Joanna,
wife of Philip, Archduke of Austria ; and, on the
death of the latter, by her son Charles V., afterwards
Emperor of Germany. Ferdinand survived his queen
only ten years, dying in 1516, having appointed
Cardinal Ximenez regent till the arrival of Charles
in Spain.

Having now reached the reign in which the
history of Protestantism in the Peninsula properly
begins, we shall conclude this introductory outline
C

Id FORMS OF GOVERNMENT

of Spanish history by a very brief sketch of the civil
polity of the country at this time.

The two kingdoms of Aragon and Castile, though
united, were still, in a sense, distinct. The union
which had occasionally existed, and which the mar-
riage of Ferdinand and Isabella had consolidated,
did not so completely blend the two governments
as to alter, in any material degree, the positive and
distinctive prerogatives of their respective sovereigns.
Against this the Castilians had jealously guarded.
Ferdinand interfered but little in the internal affairs
of Castile, and Isabella as little in those of Aragon.
The two kingdoms stood to each other rather in the
relation of allies, than of separate portions of the
same monarchy. This distinction, however, ceased
with the accession of Charles, the common heir of
both sovereigns; and the connection then formed
between them was closely analogous to that which
now subsists politically between England and Scot-
land. Indeed, the Spanish constitution at that time,
and subsequently, very much resembled our own
at the present day. The government consisted of
the King and the Cortes, the former of whom exer-
cised the executive, and the latter the legislative
functions. For several ages the crown had been
elective, within the limits of one royal family ; but
as the choice, of course, generally fell upon the

IN ARAGON AND CASTILE. 19

nearest heir, this custom became in time virtually
obsolete, and the crown descended, with a few
exceptions, in regular order after the eleventh
century, by which time a right of hereditary suc-
cession had been clearly established. Strictly speak-
ing, the monarchy was limited ; the prerogatives of
the crown being explicitly determined by law ; these,
however, would uselessly occupy space in their
enumeration. The primary and most essential
characteristic of such a monarchy, namely, that
money cannot be levied from the people without
the consent of their deputies, was thoroughly es-
tablished.

The Cortes, or parliament, was composed of mem-
bers returned by certain towns which had the right
of representation. In this Aragon differed slightly
from Castile, inasmuch as the nobility had a larger
share in the legislation there than in the latter.
Its civil polity still more closely resembled our own,
and its analogous balance of power was attended
by similarly beneficial results. Indeed, there was
at that time no form of government, in any of the
Continental monarchies, more interesting than that
of Aragon, as a happy temperament of law and
justice with the authority of the crown. In this
respect it had the advantage of Castile in some
degree; but in the main their constitutions were

2U THE ECCLESIASTICAL ELEMENT.

similar. Tn both, during the interval of the Cortes,
the sovereigns acted by the advice of a smaller
council, answering to the king's privy council in
England. Civil and criminal justice was administered
by judges appointed in some instances by the sove-
reign, and in others by the towns in which they
presided.

There is much doubt as to the exact extent to
which the ecclesiastical element entered into the
constitution of the Cortes. Down to the middle
of the 13th century, the prelates seem to have
exercised a considerable influence in its proceedings ;
but at the end of the 15th century their rights, in
this respect, would appear to have been no longer
recognized. Indeed, so early as the year 1295, we
find the Archbishop of Toledo publicly protesting
against the acts of the Cortes, because the bishops
were not regularly admitted to a share in its delibera-
tions. In the following chapters, however, we shall
see how largely and banefully the indirect influence
which they exercised told upon the general govern-
ment of the country, as the power of its priesthood
always does wherever Popery is in the ascendant.

This necessarily rapid sketch of the history and
polity of Spain, will enable the general reader to
form some idea of a country which was destined
to become the stage on which scenes of bloody

ITS EVIL EFFECTS. 21

persecution for the truth's sake were to be enacted
in the name of Him " who came not to destroy, but
to save," by the agents of that Abomination which
degrades the intellect and ruins the souls of its
deluded adherents — scenes which have rarely been
equalled, and never surpassed, in barbarous cruelty,
even in the annals of that blood-stained system.

22 THE SPANISH CHUBCH.

i^lmUx Sm\\)i.

OUTLINE OF SPANISH ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY PREVIOUS TO
THE REFORMATION.

Before entering upon a detailed account of the
introduction of the reformed doctrines into the Penin-
sula, it will be proper, for the sake of having more
accurate and extensive views of the state of religion
in that country, to glance back to the history of the
Spanish Church before the time of the Reformation.
There has been much difference of opinion as to
the time at which Christianity was first introduced
into the Peninsula. The Spanish ecclesiastical his-
torians, almost without a dissentient voice, have
maintained that the gospel was first preached to their
ancestors by the apostle James ; that he traversed
the Peninsula, from Lusitania and Gallicia to the

THE APOSTLES IN SPAIN. Z6

heart of Aragon ; that while at Saragoza, he was
honoured by a visit from the Virgin j and that by her
express command he erected a church on the spot in
her honour ; that after his martyrdom at Jerusalem,
his body was brought from Syria to Iria Flavia
(the modern El Padeon), in Gallicia, and was thence
transferred to Compostella to be worshipped by the
faithful throughout all time. All this, however, has
no firmer foundation than tradition. But if we are
to credit Athanasius, Jerome, and others of the early
Fathers, there is good reason for believing that Paul
visited Spain and preached the gospel to its idolatrous
inhabitants. But whether or not the Apostles pro-
pagated the gospel in the Peninsula, certain it is,
that Spain can produce her martyrs as early as the
second century, and had churches established through-
out various parts of the country during the third.
Of the early state of these churches but little is
known. Coming down, however, to the end of the
fourth century, we reach the period of authentic
history, at which we have firm ground to stand
upon in our efforts to know something of Spanish
Christianity.

The amount of our knowledge of its early state,
may be conveniently arranged under three heads : —
The Doctrine of the ancient Spanish Church — its
Government — and its Worship.

24 DOCTRINES.

T. Shortly after .the planting of the first churches
in the Peninsula, doctrinal sentiments which have been
commonly regarded by all Christians as heretical,
sprang up and widely prevailed in Spain. The
earliest and most important of these, were those
which were disseminated in the fourth century, by
Priscillian, a native of Gallicia, and afterwards
Bishop of Avila. Early in the century the doctrines
of the ancient Gnostics had been introduced into
Spain from Egypt, by one Mark, a native of Mem-
phis. Out of these and the tenets of the Manichseans,
Priscillian constructed a new system, which even in
his own lifetime had many adherents, and subse-
quently became the prevailing creed of the country
for nearly the whole of the two centuries succeeding
his death. Being accused by some bishops before
the Emperor Gratian, Priscillian and his followers
were banished from Spain, but he soon after returned.
He was again accused in 384, and being condemned
along with several of his associates, was executed at
Treves, in Germany, in the year 385. This was the
first instance of death for heresy. The chief char-
acteristic of this system was Arianism.

Having returned to the common faith towards the
close of the sixth century, the Spanish churches lapsed
after a time into the adoption of Nestorianism, and
some other erroneous doctrinal theories of less note.

ADOPTTONISM. — IMAGE WORSHIP. 25

These again were exchanged in the eighth century
for the tenets of the adoptionists, who held that
Christ, though " as God, was by nature and truly the
Son of God, yet, as man, was the Son of God only in
name and by adoption." This doctrine originated
with Felix, Bishop of Urgel in Spain, from whom it
was imbibed and widely disseminated by Elipandus,
Archbishop of Toledo. It maintained itself for a
considerable time, in spite of the decision of several
councils, supported by the learning of Alcuin, and the
authority of his pupil the emperor Charlemagne, by
whom Felix was banished to Lyons, where he died,
in the beginning of the ninth century.

But amidst these errors which so widely prevailed,
there were not wanting Spaniards who held some of
the leading opinions afterwards advocated by the
Protestant Keformers. The worship of images
(which had begun as early as the fourth century),
and the veneration paid to the relics and sepulchres
of the saints, were loudly inveighed against by
Claude, Bishop of Turin, but a Spaniard, who
flourished in this century. Contemporary with
Claude, was his countryman, Galindo Prudentio,
Bishop of Troyes in France. This prelate, who died
in 861, was a man of great piety and extensive
learning. The sentiments which he advocated in
the predestinarian controversy, in opposition to

26 GOVERNMENT.

Hincmar, Archbishop of Eheims, and the noted
school-man, Joannes Scotus, bear a striking resem-
blance to those which the Komish Church has since
anathematized in the writings of the German
Beformers.

Notwithstanding the occasional prevalence of doc-
trinal errors such as those already mentioned, Spain
is generally spoken of as, and may properly be con-
sidered, a catholic country, from the time that she
renounced the Priscillianist or Arian heresy, under
Keccared, towards the end of the sixth century.

II. In the fourth century the Spanish Church
was governed by no other officers than bishops,
presbyters, and deacons. She had neither metro-
politans nor archbishops, subdeacons nor lectors. A
gradual relaxation of her discipline took place, how-
ever, when the government, of the church came to
be formed upon the model of the empire, after
Constantine the Great embraced Christianity. This
change, however, was more slowly introduced into
Spain than into some other countries, for its bishops
imitated the example of the neighbouring Church of
Africa, with which the Spanish was closely allied,
and which jealously guarded the balance of episcopal
power against the encroachments of the metropoli-
tans. The supremacy of the Bishops of Rome was
not acknowledged, nor can it be proved that they

THE BISHOPS OF ROME. 27

exercised any authority in the internal government
of the Spanish church, earlier than the ninth century.
The title of Pope, which they subsequently arrogated,
was at first given to all who were invested with the
episcopal office ; and even when it came to be con-
ferred less promiscuously, it was still given to a num-
ber in common.'^ The chief causes to which we must
trace the subsequent pre-eminence of the Roman
bishops, are to be found in the antiquity of their see,
and the more substantial reasons which, in the
estimation of men, commonly give priority and
greatness. The amplitude and splendour of their
church, the magnitude of their revenues and posses-
sions, the number of their clergy, the weight of their
influence with the people at large, and the sumptuous-
ness and magnificence of their style of living — all
these combined to give them a superior importance
to prelates of less extensive and wealthy sees. It
was customary, in matters which concerned the
cause of religion in general, or in difficult questions
of internal discipline, to ask advice from foreign
churches. On such occasions the bishops of Rome
came to be regularly consulted, owing to the influ-
ence which they gradually acquired from the causes

* In the eighth century the title of Pope, or Patriarch, was
confined to the sees of Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria,
Antioch, and Jerusalem.

28 NON-RECOGNITION

enumerated. But this was not to the exclusion of
other prelates ; nor did they arrogate any right of
supremacy earlier than the latter part of the ninth
century. Gregory the Great, who was Bishop of
Bome at the end of the sixth century, thus declaimed
against the assumption of supremacy by the Bishop
of Constantinople : — " Far from the hearts of Chris-
tians be this name of blasphemy [^.e., Universal
Patriarch], which takes away the honours of the
whole priesthood, while it is madly arrogated by
one ! None of my predecessors would ever consent
to use this profane word, because, if one Patriarch is
called universal, the rest are deprived of the name of
Patriarchs."

In proof of the non-recognition of Roman supre-
macy, we may mention, that a council held at Toledo
in the year 655, determined that appeals in matters of
discipline or doctrine should lie from a bishop to a
metropolitan (or episcopal governor of a province),
and from a metropolitan to the royal audience. Still
further proof of their independence of Rome, is
furnished by the proceedings and language of the
Spanish bishops in 683. In that year, Leo ^11.,
Bishop of Rome, sent the acts, of the sixth ecumen-
ical council, which had been held at Constantinople
three years before, and which had condemned the

OF ROMISH SUPREMACY. 29

Monothellte heresy, to Spain, requesting the bishops
to give them their sanction, and to secure their circu-
lation amongst the Spanish churches. The Arch-
bishop of Toledo was commissioned by his . brother
prelates to transmit a rescript to Rome, intimating
their general approbation of the decision submitted
to them, and stating the sentiments of the Spanish
church on the heresy in question. These- acts were
formally considered at a council held in Toledo the
following year, in such a manner as plainly evinced
the determination of the bishops to maintain the
independence of their church. Finding these acts of
the council of Constantinople to be consonant with
the decisions of the four preceding canonical councils,
particularly that of Chalcedon, held in the middle of
the sixth century, they said : — " Wherefore we agree
that the acts of the said council be reverenced and
received by us, inasmuch as they do not differ from
the foresaid councils, or rather, as thej appear to
coincide with them. We allot to them, therefore,
that place in point of order to which their merit
entitles them. Let them come after the council of
Chalcedon, by whose light they shine." They next
considered the rescript which the Archbishop had
sent by their authority to Rome the year previously,
and declared it to be, "a copious and lucid exposi-

30 THE MONOTHELITE HERESY.

tion of the truth concerning the double will and
operation of Christ,"'^ adding, "wherefore, for the
sake of general instruction, and the benefit of
ecclesiastical discipline, we confirm and sanction it,
as entitled to equal honour and reverence, and to
have the same permanent authority, as the decretal
epistles." When this rescript reached Eome, where
Benedict II. had in the mean time succeeded Leo
in the popedom, it gave much dissatisfaction to that
prelate. Having drawn up certain objections to it,
he transmitted them to Spain, where they were fully
considered in a council held at Toledo in 688, a
brief answer having been, as before, given by the
Archbishop for the rest. In a lengthened vindica-
tion of the opinions at which offence had been
taken,t they replied : — " As we will not be ashamed
to defend the truth, so there are, perhaps, some
persons who will be ashamed at being found ignorant
of the truth. For who knows not that in every
man there are two substances, namely, soul and
body?" After supporting their opinion by quota-
tions from the Fathers, they added : " But if any one
shall be so shameless as not to acquiesce in these

* Which the Monothelites denied.

+ The most objectionable were those in which they had
asserted that there are three substances in Christ ; viz., his
divine nature, human soul, and body.

WORSHIP. 31

sentiments, and acting the part of a haughty in-
quirer, shall ask whence we drew such things, at
least he will yield to the words of the gospel, in
which Christ declares that he possesses three sub-
stances." They then quoted and commented on
such passages of the New Testament as they con-
sidered confirmatory of their opinions, and thus
concluded : " If, after this statement, and the senti-
ments of the Fathers from which it has been taken,
any person shall dissent from us in any thing, we
will have no farther dispute with him, but keeping
steadily in the plain path, and treading in the
footsteps of our predecessors, we are persuaded that
our answer will commend itself to the approbation
of all lovers of truth who are capable of forming
a divine judgment, though we may be charged with
obstinacy by the ignorant and envious."

Thus plainly did a council of the Spanish Church
address the Bishop of Rome towards the close of the
seventh century.

III. The forms of its worship will still further
illustrate the independence of the ancient Spanish
church.

Throughout the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries,
the mode of worship was substantially the same
in the whole Christian church. There were, how-
ever, different liturgies, or forms, in use amongst the

32 VARIOUS LITURGIES.

individual churches composing it. Each bishop
according to his own views, and as the circumstances
of times, places, and persons suggested, prescribed to
his own flock such a form of public worship as he
judged best. The Ambrosian liturgy, used by the
church of Milan, and named from St. Ambrose,
Bishop of Milan, difiered considerably from the
Roman, which was drawn up by Gregory the Great.
In France it continued to be used, till superseded by
the Roman in the time of Charlemagne. In England
the ancient Britons had one liturgy, and the Anglo-
Saxons subsequently another, which they received
from Augustine their apostle, and which differed
materially from that of Gregory. Indeed, not only
were different forms of celebrating divine worship
employed by different nations, but sometimes even
in different parts of the same nation. That this
was the case in Spain down to the year 633, is
proved by the fact, that the fourth council of
Toledo, held in that year, decreed that one uniform
order should be observed in all the churches of the
Peninsula. In consequence of this decree, the Gothic
or Mozarabic liturgy was uniformly adopted. This
liturgy is sometimes called the Isidorian or Ildefon-
sian, from its being revised by Isidore and Ildefonso,
Archbishops of Seville and Toledo, who succeeded to
those sees respectively in the years 595 and 657.

ILDEFONSIAN AND GKEGORIAN. 33

The difference between this ritual and the Eoman
is placed beyond doubt by their disagreement on the
adoptionarian doctrines. During the controversy
which raged in the eighth century on these tenets,
their Spanish advocates appealed to their national
ritual in support of the opinions which they defended.
The opposing council of Frankfort replied : " It is
better to believe the testimony of God the Father
concerning his own Son, than that of your Ildefonso,
who composed for you such prayers, in the solemn
masses, as the universal and holy church of God
knows not, and in which we do not think you will
be heard. And if your Ildefonso in his prayers
called Christ the adopted son of God, our Gregory,
pontiff of the Koman see, and a doctor beloved by
the whole world, does not hesitate in his prayers to
call him always the only-begotten."

We might multiply instances in which the worship
of the ancient Spanish church differed in its forms
from those of the Koman ; but these will be sufficient
to prove that the dissimilarity was considerable.
We shall now proceed to state how she was led to
adopt the usages and recognize the supremacy of the
church of Rome.

As we have seen in the preceding chapter. Chris-
tian Spain was divided, in the eleventh century, into
the three kingdoms of Castile, Aragon, and Navarre,

34 INTRODUCTION OP

the last of which was incorporated with the first two
by Ferdinand in 1512. Alonso I. of Castile, having
married Constance, a daughter of the royal house of
France, towards the close of the eleventh century,
was instigated by that princess to introduce into his
dominions the Roman liturgy, to which she had been
accustomed. This innovation was eagerly supported
by the papal legate, and as warmly opposed by the
Castilian clergy, nobility^ and people at large. After
much controversy, a compromise was made, by which
it was arranged that the old Gothic liturgy should
be used in the six churches of Toledo, which the
Christians had enjoyed under the Moors, whilst the
Roman should be adopted in all the other churches
of the kingdom. The people clung for a while to
their old forms, but, discountenanced by the court
and the superior ecclesiastics, they soon fell into
disrepute, and the Roman were universally em-
ployed.

In Aragon the introduction of the Roman liturgy
had been attempted somewhat earlier than in Castile,
though it was established in both kingdoms about
the same time. The first mass, according to the
Roman form, was celebrated in Aragon in the
monastery of St. Juan de la Pena, on the 21st of
March, 1071 j and in Castile, in the Grand Mosque
of Toledo, on the 25th of October, 1086.

KOMISH AUTHORITY. 35

As was expected by the Bishop of Eome, the
establishment of the Komaii liturgy was soon followed
by the full recognition of his authority in Spain.
Nor was this authority merely ecclesiastical ; it
gradually led to the acknowledgment of the Pope's
civil ownership of the kingdom. It is sufficient
to refer in support of this statement to the subjuga-
tion of the crown and kingdom of Aragon, in the
reign of Don Ramiro I., who, for several years before
his death, in 1063, held his kingdom as a fief of the
Roman see. This vassalao;e was acknowledged again
in 1204, by Don Pedro II., who, eight years after he
had ascended the throne, went to Rome and did
homage to Innocent III. as his sovereign lord.
Against this submission the nobles and people loudly
protested, but in vain ; the papal supremacy being
once established could not be got rid of. The yoke
then imposed, though vainly attempted to be thrown
off by some subsequent monarchs, presses like a
deadly incubus on the country still. The religious
history of Spain during the period we are now
reviewing, was intimately connected with that of
Languedoc and Provence. These provinces were at
that time more properly Aragonese than French.
The viscounts of Narbonne, Beziers, and Carcassone,
did homage to the king of Aragon as Count of
Provence and Avignon, and other cities acknow-

36 THE VAUDOIS.

ledged him as their baronial superior. This close
connection between these provinces and Spain, led
many of the Vaudois to cross the Pyrenees and settle
in the Peninsula, soon after their rise in the south of
France. The history of the persecutions of this
interesting people is too well known to need repeti-
tion here, even if the plan of our sketch required it.
But as their history was intimately connected for
a time with that of evangelical religion in Spain,
it may not be out of place to occupy a few lines
in very briefly noticing it. Most of our readers are,
perhaps, acquainted with the commonly received
opinion that this sect sprung up early in the twelfth
century, and rapidly multiplied in France, whence it
spread into Lombardy and other parts of the Italian
peninsula.* If space permitted, we might give an

* Such, as we have said, is the date commonly assigned
to the rise of the Vaudois ; but there is abundant evidence
to warrant our conviction that they existed at a period much
earlier than the 12th century. There has long been, and
still is, much difference of opinion, not only as to the time
at which the sect originated, but likewise as to the exact
parties to whom the term Vaudois properly belongs. Their
orthodoxy has been the subject of similar dispute. But
though the difficulty of satisfactorily determining these
three questions has been very materially increased by re-
garding the different names by which they w^ere known in
different places, as indicating entirely distinct sects, there is
good reason to believe that the term Vaudois (or Waldenses)

NUMEROUS DESIGNATIONS. 37

interestiDg enumeration of the probable causes to
which their rapid spread may be attributed. The
people amongst whom they [are said to have] origi-
nated, had reached a very high state of civilization
and refinement. Their rich and musical language
had been finely cultivated both in prose and verse.
The Troubadours poured forth in it their lays of
love, and sentiments of a refined gallantry, which
perished with the warrior-poets who gave them shape

included, as a general appellation, all the Christian churches
of Europe who refused to acknowledge the Supremacy of
Rome. Hallam, in his History of the Middle Ages, asserts,
and supports his position by a lengthened but to some
extent one-sided argument, that the Waldenses were essen-
tially distinct, both in doctrine and locality, from the Albi-
genses. The latter he charges with Manichseism, whilst the
former, he admits, were free from it. But Dr. McCrie, in
his lecture on the History of the Waldensian Church (see
Lectures on the Foi^eign Churches, by various divines), main-
tains their identity. He says : — " On the Italian side of the
Alps, we meet with some of them called Berengerians, from
Berenger of Louis, Cathari, Beghards, Paulicians, Paterins,
Subalpines, and Vaudois. On the French side, we have
them denominated Albigenses, from Albi, a town in the
south of France, where they abounded for some time ;
Waldenses, from Peter Waldo of Lyons," &c. The same
opinion is advocated by Perrin, in his Histoire de Vaudois,
and more strongly still by Faber, whpse Vallenses and
Waldenses is a complete refutation of all the charges which
have been brought, even by some Protestant divines, against
the antiquity and orthodoxy of these churches.

38 PERSECUTION OF THE

in song. Mainly by them was instilled into the
minds of the people that love for polite learning
which so honourably distinguished the Provence
from the other provinces of France. Such was not
the most favourable soil for the growth of a blind
faith in the arbitrary dogmas of a bigoted and igno-
rant priesthood. The free and enlightened doctrines
of the new sect were more in harmony with the
genius and intellectual condition of such a people ;
and hence the readiness with which they were
received, and the stedfastness with which they were
adhered to, when once embraced. But, however
interesting the theme, we must not indulge in the
digression.

Those of the Vaudois who had passed over into
Spain, as we have remarked, were for a time per-
mitted to remain undisturbed. But in 1194, Pope
Celestin III. prevailed upon Alfonso II. of Aragon,
to order their expulsion from his territories. This
began their troubles. A similar edict, at the instance
of the Pope, was unwillingly issued by Alfonso's
successor, Peter 11. , three years afterwards^ but it
was not enforced. So far, indeed, was Peter from
being unfavourable to them, that he joined his
brother-in-law. Count Raymond of Toulouse, in
opposing the crusade which was raging against them
in the territories of the latter, and fell fighting in

VAUDOIS IN SPAIN. 39

their defence, at the battle of Muret, in the year
1213.^ The sympathy thus practically expressed,
induced great numbers of the persecuted Christians
to take refuge in the territories of the Spanish king.
In a few years their numbers were increased to such
an extent by fresh immigrants, that they had churches
in most parts of Aragon, Catalonia, Leon, and
Castile. As might be expected, the settlement and
spread of such heretics on the sacred soil of Spain
were not unopposed by the Inquisition. In the year
1237, forty-five were condemned within the diocese of
Urgel alone,* of whom fifteen perished in its fires,
whilst the rest were doomed to perpetual imprison-
ment or other painful penance. Some of them
formed themselves into a religious brotherhood, to
escape the persecution to which they were exposed,
and having modified several of their doctrinal senti-
ments, even received the sanction of Pope Innocent
III., in 1207. But the respite from persecution
which this compromise secured them, was only
temporary. They were still looked upon by the
bishops with a jealous eye, and considered to be
heretics at heart, though outwardly professing con-
siderable conformity to the papal church. The
protection afforded by his Holiness was neither very
practical nor sincere; and, as might be expected,

* Mc.Crie's Reformation in Spain, p. 34.

40 MONKISH ACTIVITY, SUCCESS,

a knowledge of this secured for his letters no better

obedience than he wished them to meet with. The

new order was speedily suppressed, and in a short
time not one of its numerous convents was to be
found on either side of the Pyrenees.

In the mean time, the fires of the Inquisition were
fed by large numbers of the original Vaudois, and
many of the native Spanish whom they had won
over to their doctrines. But its most rigorous
persecution could not drive them out of the country,
or win them back to the orthodox faith. For two
centuries they continued to increase, and successfully
braved the storm everywhere raised against them by
the agents of the Holy Office. But they were at
last forced to seek refuge in the mountains of
Biscay, and the higher districts of Old Castile,
whence they were finally driven down by the troops
of John II., and perished in the flames of the In-
quisition at Valladolid and St. Domingo de la
Calzado. Thus were the Vaudois exterminated in
Spain. A few only escaped, who in after years
supplied a straggling victim for the stake.

Whilst the Vaudois were being thus extirpated
in the Peninsula, the agents of Rome were establish-
ing her power in it with even more than their usual
zeal. Foremost in activity and success were the
Dominican and Franciscan monks. By the apparent

WEALTH, AND LICENTIOUSNESS. 41

self-denial and austerity of their lives, these mendi-
cant friars had gained for themselves a character
of peculiar sanctity, and the corresponding influence
which such a reputation secured. Within a few
years from the time of their institution, their con-
vents were established over nearly the whole of
Spain. But this increase of numbers and power
brought with it many and glaring abuses. Falling
off from the rigorous laws of their founders, and the
habits by which their reputation and influence had
been gained, vows of poverty were forgotten, and
wealth and licentiousness went hand in hand. This
corruption of the monastic institutions became so
general and notorious, that the kings of Spain
attempted their reform time after time, but in vain.
Their efforts were always frustrated by the monks,
and the evils which they strove to correct multiplied
rather than decreased. So glaring had they become
towards the close of the fifteenth century, that
Ferdinand and Isabella, in again attempting their
correction, were obliged to employ force, and even
with its aid would have failed had they not secured
the co-operation of Cardinal Ximenez, who was at
that time Provincial of the Franciscans. This latter
order resisted reform so obstinately, that an order
for their expulsion from the kingdom was issued,
though some time afterwards revoked. On leaving

42 POPISH SUPERSTITION AND ABSURDITY.

Toledo in solemn procession, they carried a crucifix
before them, and chaunted the 114th Psalm, which
begins, " WJwn Israel went out of Egypt,'' &c.
Ximenez succeeded in effecting the reform of many-
superstitious usages which had gradually crept into
the Spanish Church during the dark ages which had
just passed away. He printed an edition of the
Mozarabic liturgy, and caused it to be used in several
of the churches j but as he had incorporated in it many
of the most objectionable peculiarities of the estab-
lished Gregorian, it soon fell into disuse, and the
Roman was again universally employed. From or
shortly before this time, may be dated the reign of
Popery in its worst and most degrading form in Spain.
All the gross superstitions and doctrinal absurdities of
the system were practised and believed. Legends
and lives of saints supplied the place of the forbidden
Bible to the devout, whilst miracles and other absurd
monstrosities were plentifully retailed, and as readily
•believed by the ignorant and credulous vulgar.
Nowhere else in Europe was the true genius of
Popery so thoroughly exemplified, and its practical
tendency to fetter the intellect and debase the soul
so clearly demonstrated. The garment of darkness
in which Rome had robed the nations, was wrapped
round Spain in multiplied and thickened folds.
Nature had lavished its fairest gifts upon her, but

THEIR DEBASING INFLUENCE. 43

superstition and ignorance threw their blighting
influence over the land ; the elements of permanent
greatness which she possessed could not develope
themselves in such an atmosphere, and Spain, comet-
like, shot up, by the inherent force of her old
chivalry, from the darkness of the middle ages into
a temporary glory among the nations of Europe.
But mere chivalry could not keep her there ; other
and more divine forces were needed ; these were shut
out from her, and she fell back almost into her
pristine gloom.

44 THE REFORMATION

C^apte ®^itlr.

OBSTACLES TO THE SUCCESS OF THE REFORMED DOCTRINE
IN SPAIN.

We shall now briefly notice some of the chief hin-
drances which opposed the spread of the Lutheran
doctrines in the Peninsula, and but for which we
should not presently have to record the failure of a
Reformation which, at one point in its brief but
eventful history, bid fair to consume " the Inquisi-
tion, the hierarchy, the papacy, and the despotism by
which they had been reared and were upheld."

Foremost in the ranks of these opposing barriers
stands the terrible institution just mentioned — the
Inquisition. Had it not been, chiefly, for the fearful
efficiency with which this no less than infernal
engine of papal despotism accomplished its work,

AND THE INQUISITION. 45

the thick clouds of religious gloom which even yet
envelope Spain would, long ere now, have been
swept away, and the full light of Gospel blessings
have risen on her enthralled and benighted people.
This dreadful tribunal calls for more than a passing
notice, not merely on account of its intrinsic
character and constitution, but more particularly
because of the fatal influence which it, above all
other causes, has exercised upon the destinies of
Spain.

There has been much difference of opinion, both
as to the founder of the Inquisition, and to the
exact date of its institution. Some go back so far
as the times of the Emperor Theodosius, who lived
in the fourth century, and find, in the laws which he
enacted against the Manichseans, the germ which
subsequently developed itself into the terrible organ-
ization of the Holy Office. But though death was
the penalty attached to the heresy just mentioned,
the crime was still considered a civil offence, to be
dealt with by the civil magistrate, and not by any
ecclesiastical authority whatever. Hence the essen-
tial difference between such a provision against
heresy, and that which was made by the Inquisition
many centuries afterwards. Nor should it be
forgotten, that the laws of the early emperors, which
made heresy a capital offence, contemplated heretics

46 INQUISITORIAL FUNCTIONS

as political factions, which rebelled against the State
and disturbed its peace. Such^ in reality, many
of them were, as may be seen by the letters of
Augustin. In no such light, however, did the
Inquisition primarily regard apostates from the faith
of Kome. The fundamental principle of that odious
institution was not thoroughly recognized sooner than
the twelfth century, towards the end of which, a
commission was sent by Innocent III., consisting
of two legates and some subordinate priests and
officers, to extirpate the Albigensian heresy in the
South of France. One of the most zealous agents
of this commission was Dominic de Guzman, the
founder of the Dominican order of monks. This,
however, was only a temporary and local commis-
sion, which the negligence of the bishops in hunting
out heretics had called for ; and it had no judicial
power to pronounce a definitive sentence on the
accused. But the efficiency with which it performed
the duties assigned to it speedily led to the institu-
tion of similar commissions in all suspected localities.
It was not, however, till the year 1233, that the
Inquisition was erected as a distinct tribunal, armed
with judicial and executive power. In that year,
Pope Gregory IX. committed the task of discovering
and judging heretics to the Dominican friars, who
erected permanent courts, first at Toulouse, and next

COMMITTED TO THE DOMINICANS. 47

at Carcassone and other places, before which were
arraigned not only heretics and those suspected of
heresy, but all who were accused of Judaism, magic,
soothsaying, and similar oflfences. These courts were
gradually extended to every city in which there were
Dominican convents.

No sooner had it received the sanction of the
Pope, and been thus thoroughly organized, than
measures were taken for introducing the Inquisition
into Spain. It was first established in the kingdom
of Aragou, and thence extended to Navarre, but not,
there is reason to believe, to Castile, For though a
papal bull was issued as early as the year ] 236,
authorizing its introduction into that kingdom, there
is no evidence that it ever existed there under its old
form. The law of Las Patridas (which is still the
fundamental code in Spain), promulgated in 1258,
favours this view, by the lenient treatment which it
prescribes for heretics.

The method of proceeding in the courts of the
Inquisition was at first simple, and differed but
slightly from that adopted in the ordinary courts.
But the Dominicans gradually rendered it more
complex. Being wholly ignorant of judicial pro-
ceedings, they regulated their own after the model of
what is called, in the Roman Church, the Tribunal
of Penance, whose usages were entirely different

48 TORTURES m THE INQUISITION.

from those of secular courts. Hence arose that
nefarious system of inquisitorial jurisprudence, whose
principles were founded in the most cruel injustice
and deceit. False witnesses, delusory promises of
pardon to the accused, if they confessed, and a
tortuous course of examination, if they did not,
which were exchanged for bodily tortures of the most
refined cruelty, were the means employed to ensnare
the unhappy objects of their suspicion.*

After this terrible tribunal had existed for two

* The following description of the tortures to which the
unfortunate victims were usually exposed, may well account
for the occasional instances to be met with of their sufferings
leading to recantation :

" Having fixed the day when he is to undergo the tortures,
he, when that dismal day comes, if he does not prevent it,
by such a confession as is expected from him, is led to the
place where the rack is, attended by an inquisitor and a
public notary, who is to write down the answers the prisoner
gives to the questions which shall be put to him by the
inquisitor while he is upon the rack. During the time the
executioner is preparing that engine of unspeakable cruelty,
and is taking off the prisoner's clothes, to his shirt and
drawers, the inquisitor is still exhorting the prisoner to have
compassion both on his body and soul, and, by making a true
and full confession of all his heresies, to prevent his being
tortured. But if the prisoner saith that he will suffer any-
thing, rather than accuse himself or others falsely, the
inquisitor commands the executioner to do his duty, and to
begin the torture; which in the Inquisition is given by
twisting a small cord hard about the prisoner's naked arms,

MODERN OR SPANISH INQUISITION. 49

centuries and a half, it underwent what its defenders
have termed a reform, by which the barbarity and
injustice of its old constitution were very greatly
increased, making it a still more atrocious engine of
persecution than before. After this period, it is
known by the name of the modern, or, more
properly, the Spanish Inquisition, for this develop-
ment originated in Spain, and was subsequently
confined to the Peninsula and its dependencies.
We have already remarked that the first employ-

and hoisting him up from the ground, by an engine to which
the cord is fastened. And, as if the miserable prisoner's
hanging in the air by his arms were not enough, he has
several quassations or shakes given him, which is done
by screwing his body up high, and letting it down again
with a jerk, which disjoints his arms ; and, after that, the
torture is much more exquisite than it was before.

" When the prisoner is first hoisted from the ground, an
hour-glass is turned up, and which, if he does not prevent it
by making such a confession of his heresies as the inquisitor,
that is present all the while, and is continually asking him
questions, expects from him, must run out before he is taken
down ; to promise to make such a confession, if they will
take him off the rack, not being sufficient to procure him
that mercy, no more than his crying out that he shall expire
immediately, if they do not give him some ease ; that, as the
inquisitors tell us, being no more than all that are upon the
rack do think they are ready to do.

" If the prisoner endures the rack without confessing any-
thing, which few, or none, though never so innocent, are able
to do, as soon as the hour-glass is out, he is taken down, and
E

50 TORTURE ON THE RACK.

ment of the Inquisition was against the Albigenses ;
the reform, or augmentation, of its powers was
demanded on the plea of its previous inefficiency to
prevent the increasing relapses of the converted
Jews, or New Christians, as they were termed. This
people had settled early in the Peninsula, and, by
means of their characteristic industry, had, in the
fourteenth century, engrossed the wealth of the
nation, and risen to great influence, both in Aragon
and Castile. Their prosperity had excited the envy

carried back to his prison, where there is a chirurgeon, ready
to put his bones in joint. And though, in all other courts,
the prisoners having endured the rack without confessing
the crimes for which they were tortured, clears them, yet
in the Inquisition, where whatsoever humanity and right
reason have established in favour of the prisoner is left to the
discretion of the judge, it is commonly otherwise; the
prisoner that will not confess anything being usually racked
twice, and if they stand it out, though few of them can do
that, thrice. But if the prisoner makes the confession the
inquisitor expects he should on the rack, it is writ down
word for word by the notary, and is, after the prisoner has
had a day or two's rest, carried to the prisoner, to set his
hand to it, which, if the prisoner does, it puts an end to his
process, the want of suf&cient evidence to have convicted
him being abundantly supplied by this extorted confession,
thus signed by him ; and in case the prisoner, when it is
brought to him, refuseth to sign it, affirming it to be false, and
to have been extorted fx-om him by the extremity of the tor-
ture, he is carried back to the rack a second time, to oblige
him to repeat and sign the same confession." — Qeddes' Tracts.

PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS. 51

of the populace, who were not slow to gratify their
religious prejudices, when the property of their
victims was the reward of their zeal. In the year
1391, more than 5000 Jews are said to have been
thus massacred, in different cities throughout Spain.
Such was the terror with which these wholesale
butcheries inspired these persecuted people, that vast
crowds of those who escaped purchased their personal
safety at the expense of their religion, and submitted
to baptism. Under the force of such compulsory
influences, it is calculated that nearly a million, in
the course of a few years, outwardly renounced
Judaism, and made profession of the Catholic faith.*"
When the storm of popular persecution had sub-
sided, as might be expected, the greater part of these
forced converts relapsed into the religion of their
fathers, and secretly practised its rites, while publicly
professing Christianity. As their sense of safety
grew stronger, their precautions diminished, and
many were, consequently, discovered by the watchful
familiars of the Inquisition, and visited by its
weightiest penalties. In one year (1481), more
than three hundred relapsed Jews thus perished at the
stake j besides whom, seventy-nine were condemned
to perpetual imprisonment, t All these victims were

* Mc. Crie, p. 87.

+ Stebbing's History of the Reformation, vol. i. p. 281.

52 THE SO-CALLED REFORM

drawn from the single city of Seville, where the fires
of the Inquisition were kept so constantly at work,
that the prefect was obliged to construct a solid
scaffold of stoDC, in a field outside the city walls.
Besides these, 2000 underwent a similar fate in various
parts of Andalusia, whilst no less than 17,000 were
subjected to less extreme penalties. To prevent the
entire relapse of these New Christians, a more effective
agency was called for ; and hence the reforTn we
have mentioned. But the jurisdiction of the modern
Inquisition was extended over the Old Christians,
as well as the New j and thus to them, likewise, it
became a more terrible instrument than before for
discovering and punishing waverers in, or wanderers
from, the faith.

This remodelling of the Inquisition occurred in the
reign of Ferdinand, under whom, as we have already
seen, the two kingdoms of Aragon and Castile had
been finally united. The establishment of the Holy
Office in this new and more consolidated and per-
manent form, in the latter kingdom, was first sug-
gested by Alfonso de Hoycda, prior of the Dominican
convent of Seville, and friar Philip de Barberis,
Inquisitor of the kingdom of Sicily, which was at
that time subject to the crown of Aragon. Ferdi-
nand eagerly caught at the suggestion of a plan
by which his cofiers would be filled by the confiscated

OP THE SPANISH INQUISITION. 53

property of the condemned, and his power rendered
still more despotic ; but Isabella, a princess of a
mild and humane character, at first opposed the
introduction of so terrible an engine of injustice and
cruelty. Means, however, were employed to alarm
her conscience, and convince her that the interests
of religion imperatively required her acquiescence
in the proposed scheme.

The superstitious queen yielded, and authorized
her ambassador at Rome to solicit the bull for the
establishment of the Inquisition in her kingdom of
Castile. The bull for this purpose was readily
granted in November, 1478. Isabella, however,
suspended its operations for two years, wishing to
try gentle measures with the relapsed, before having
recourse to the fearful logic of the Holy Ofiice to
convince and win back wanderers from the fold
of the Roman Church. A catechism was expressly
drawn up for their use, embodying the chief argu-
ments against Judaism, but to no purpose ; the
relapses continued, and increased in number. Ac-
cordingly, the powers of the Inquisition were called
into action to stem the torrent which milder agencies
had opposed in vain. In September, 1480, Ferdi-
nand and Isabella, who were then staying at Medina
del Campo, appointed two Dominicans as the first
inquisitors in the kingdom of Castile, with an assessor

54 EFFICIENCY OF THE INQUISITION

and a fiscal attorney, who established their court in
the Dominican convent of St. Paul at Seville, on the
2nd of January, 1481.

In 1483, the two Dominicans were superseded
by the famous Thomas de Torquemada, a friar of
the same order, and prior of Santa Cruz, in Segovia,
a man whose soul was destitute of pity, and who, in
cruelty, might almost pass for an incarnation of the
evil principle.* He was the first Inquisitor- General
of the united kingdoms of Aragon and Castile and
their dependencies, with discretionary powers which
rendered him in a measure independent both of the .
pope and the king. He could refuse obedience to
the papal bulls and decretals of which he did not
approve, alleging, as his excuse, their infringement
on the rights of the Spanish monarchy, whilst he
"might in a similar manner evade the authority of
the king, by falling back upon the ordinances of the
pope, which, under pain of excommunication, forbade
his interference with the secular power.

Shortly after his appointment, Torquemada revised
the laws of the Inquisition, and framed a new code
consisting of twenty-eight articles, based chiefly on
the older Guide foi' Inquisitors, of Eymeric. These
laws, which were promulgated at Seville in 1484,

* History of Spain cmd Portugal (Lardner's Cyclo.), vol. ii.
p. 272.

UNDER TORQUEMADA. 55

are given by Llorente, in the 6th chapter of his
History of the Inquisition, a work of peculiar au-
thority in all that relates to that tribunal, from the
official situation of secretary, held by the author
before the compilation of his book.

Under Torquemada and his successor Valdes, the
Inquisition was brought to the highest pitch of
efficiency, as an instrument for detecting and punish-
ing the smallest religious innovation. Spreading
like one vast net-work over the land, it embraced
all ranks within its terrible web, repressing every
effiart at reformation in matters of faith, and shack-
ling all the powers of the human mind. Its lynx-
eyed familiars were empowered to violate the sanctity
of the domestic circle, and intrude at all hours on
the privacy of every dwelling in the kingdom, from
the baronial castle to the peasant's hut. The feeblest
whisper of a thought that overstepped the prescribed
boundaries of religious doctrine or practice was
caught up, and its incautious author hurried off to
expiate his treason against Eome in a dungeon or
at the stake. And not only was the actual guilt
of heresy visited by such punishment, but failure
to give information of its existence wherever known
or suspected, was considered of equal enormity, and
visited by the heaviest of its penal thunders. On
two Sundays during Lent in each year, an edict was

56 MODES OF procedure;

published, branding concealment as a mortal sin,
worthy of excommunication or death. The father
was commanded to inform against his child, and the
wife against her husband. Private malice and selfish
fears were alike enlisted to secure information, how-
ever false, on which a process could be founded and
a victim ensnared.

With such an organization spreading, like a
great upas-tree, its deadly branches over every corner
of the land, paralyzing its energies and crushing
its feeblest attempt at liberty of thought or ac-
tion, the Avonder is, not that the light of truth
with all its inherent power did not pour its full
tide on that benighted country, but that it ever
dawned at all. That it did so, in spite of such
obstacles as opposed it, is enough to satisfy every
one who is acquainted with the character and opera-
tions of this tribunal, that but for it Spain would
have been behind none of the other nations of
Europe in her adoption of, and adherence to, the
doctrines of the Reformation. But for it, the thick
clouds of error and superstition which blacken her
spiritual sky, had long since been dissipated by the
true Light of Heaven, and her people been en-
lightened and elevated by the saving knowledge
which it reveals to our fallen world. Its repressive
influence on every aspiration after religious know-

FALSE WITNESSES AND TORTURE. 57

ledge, might be still further illustrated and proved
by a passing reference to the mode of process
observed by that dread tribunal. We have already
said that its method of procedure differed widely
from that of the ordinary courts of justice. This
will be at once seen. When the Inquisition dis-
covered a transgressor of their laws, either by report,
by their spies, or by an informer, he was cited three
times to appear before them, and if he did not
appear he was forthwith condemned by default.
The number and watchfulness of their spies rendered
absconding all but impossible. When once in their
hands, the accused was permitted to have no inter-
course with any of his friends. The charges brought
against him, and the parties by whom they had been
preferred, were both concealed from him. He was
allowed to adduce no evidence of his innocence
which the ingenuity of his judges could keep back,
whilst witnesses of the vilest character, and, it might
be, animated by the bitterest enmity towards the
prisoner, were listened to, and their evidence against
him fully and gladly received. If, after the evidence
had been closed, the guilt of the accused were not
made out, even to the satisfaction of tlieir laws,
torture endeavoured to wring forth a confession that
would afford a shade of justification for his consign-
ment to the scaffold or the stake. Of this we have

58 TESTIMONY OF HISTORIANS

already spoken, but hear Llorente, the historian
lately referred to : — " I do not stop," he says, " to
describe the several kinds of torture inflicted on the
accused by order of the Inquisition ; this task having
been executed with sufficient exactness by a great
many historians. On this head, I declare that none
of them can be accused of exaggeration, I have
read many processes which have struck and pierced
me with horror, and I could regard the Inquisitors
who had recourse to such methods in no other light
than that of cold-blooded barbarians. Suffice it to
add, that the council of the Supreme has often been
obliged to forbid the repetition of the torture in the
same process ; but the inquisitors, by an abominable
sophism, have found means to render this prohibition
almost useless, by giving the name of suspension
to that cessation from torture which is imperiously
demanded by the imminent danger to which the
victim is exposed of dying among their hands. My
pen refuses to trace the picture of these horrors, for
I know nothing more opposed to the spirit of charity
and compassion, which Jesus Christ inculcates in the
Gospel, than this conduct of the inquisitors."

During the first thirty-five years of its existence,
from its erection in Castile till the appearance of
Luther in Germany, Llorente reckons that, according
to the most moderate computation, 13,000 persons

BESPECTING THE INQUISITION. 59

were burned alive, 8700 were burned in effigy, and
169,700 were condemned to various penances;
making, in all, 191,400 persons who were condemned
by the Inquisition in Spain during that period.
This estimate is probably below the truth, for other
writers make the numbers much larger. Puigblanch*
reckons that, between 1480 and 1520, the number
of the condemned in Andalusia was 100,000; whilst
in the archbishopric of Seville alone, 45,000 perished
at the stake. It was not, however, merely out of
the actual cruelties of the Inquisition that its terrible
power to arrest the progress of knowledge, and
rivet the chains of religious bondage, arose, but from
the social degradation which gradually attached to
the objects of its condemnation or even suspicion.
Instances of escape, when once within its grasp, did
not average more than one in a thousand ; and that
solitary exception, whom want of evidence might
have saved, returned to society lost for ever in public
opinion, and branded by a conventional infamy,
heavier and blacker than that of the pardoned
murderer, and attaching to his remotest posterity.
Fear of incurring this, operated more crushingly on
the Spanish mind, than dread of the most terrible
physical sufferings which the Inquisition could
inflict. No doubt, at first, these filled the nation

* Inquisition Unmasked, vol. ii. p. 180.

60 THE BIBLE FOEBIDDEN.

with a sense of insecurity and terror ; but, after a
time, such feelings became blunted, and it settled
down upon the country as a great moral nightmare,
that paralyzed every faculty of the mind, and ex-
tinguished every other feeling, but one of crushing
and hopeless oppression.

Under the rigorous administration of Torquemada,
the Holy Office soon extended its operations against
the persons of the heterodox, to the means by which
heresy was promulgated. Animated by the true
genius of Popery, the Bible speedily became the
especial object of its hostility. Not only were
translations into the vernacular penally denounced,
but the study of the original was forbidden, as
heretical and dangerous. In 1490, many copies of
the Hebrew text were burned at Seville, by order of
Torquemada ; and Llorente tells us that, in an
auto-da-fe celebrated about the same time, at Sala-
manca, six thousand volumes were condemned, as
containing Judaism and magic, and, as such, were
committed to the flames. The course thus begun
by Torquem.ada was worthily pursued by his suc-
cessors. The writings of Lebrixa, a learned gram-
marian, were seized by order of Deza, Archbishop of
Seville, who was at that time Inquisitor-General, and
condemned as heretical, because they contained some
grammatical corrections of errors that had crept

LEBRJXA AND THE AECHBISHOP. 61

into the text of the Vulgate. In an apology, subse-
quently drawn up by Lebrixa, in his own defence, he
says : — " The Archbishop's object was to deter me
from writing. He wished to extinguish the know-
ledge of the two languages on which our religion
depends ; and I was condemned for impiety, because,
being no divine, but a mere grammarian, I presumed
to treat of theological subjects. If a person en-
deavour to restore the purity of the sacred text, and
point out the mistakes which have vitiated it, unless
he will retract his opinions, he must be loaded with
infamy, excommunicated, and doomed to an igno-
minious punishment ! Is it not enough that I
submit my judgment to the will of Christ in the
Scriptures ? Must I also reject as false what is as
clear and evident as the light of truth itself? What
tyranny ! To hinder a man, under the most cruel
pains, from saying what he thinks, though he express
himself with the utmost respect for religion — to
forbid him to write in his closet or in the solitude
of a prison, to speak to himself, or even think ! On
what subject shall we employ our thoughts, if we
are prohibited from directing them to those sacred
oracles which have been the delight of the pious in
every age, and on which they have meditated by day
and by night r'

The quickness with which the Inquisition became

62 NATIONAL OPPOSITION.

thus formidably organized, must not lead the reader
to suppose that its establishment was unopposed by
the nation at large. In Aragon, where it had existed
in its old and less oppressive form for two centuries
and a half before its reform and introduction into
Castile, its tyrannical and iniquitous character had
been but slowly developed, and consequently had
not startled public feeling by any immediate exhibi-
tion of its execrable character and tendencies ; but
in the latter kingdom, both were at once evident, as
the tribunal was first presented to the unprepared
Castilians in its remodelled and more terrible form.
The cortes of Castile joined with those of Catalonia
and Aragon, in representing to Ferdinand the
miseries it would be the means of inflicting on the
country, and prayed for its suppression. Failing in
this, they urged for a radical reform in its cruel and
tyrannic laws, but equally in vain. The crafty policy
of that monarch would not readily surrender an
instrument of so much power in crushing the
liberties of his subjects, and firmly establishing his
own despotism on the ruins of Spanish freedom.
Though far from being a tyrant, his ideas of the
kingly prerogative were such as freed him from all
scruples in availing himself of its nefarious aid ; and
to this end he resisted all inducements held forth to
procure even a modification of its oppressive

BRANCH OFFICES. 63

character. In the year 1512, an offer of 600,000
crowns was made by the New Christians, to help
him in carrying on the war in which he subjugated
Navarre, merely on condition that the evidence
given in the Inquisitorial courts should be published ;
but his wily Minister, Cardinal Ximenez, prevented
even this concession, by placing a counter-sum at the
disposal of his wavering master„ And four years
later, when a similar offer was made to Charles V.,
on similar conditions, the Cardinal again interfered,
and saved his favourite organization from suffering
any curtailment of its iniquitous powers.

Not satisfied with this, he extended its benefits to
the colonial dependencies of Spain. Branch tribu-
nals were established in Cuba in America, and in Oran
in Africa, modelled after their blood-stained original
at home. After repeated but abortive attempts to
free themselves from this oppressive yoke, the people
submitted, and in time became reconciled, by habit,
to its proceedings, — not only so, indeed, but, harmo-
nizing as it did ostensibly with the orthodox faith,
the maintenance of whose purity was the avowed
object of its existence, the Inquisition, which had
at first filled every breast with fear, became eventually
the object of the nation's warmest veneration. Yet
this resulted from no good feature which its practical
working brought to light. It was still the same

64 THE SOLITARY DUNGEON.

huge monument of fanaticism, treacliery, and cruelty
— an engine of priestly tyranny charged with destruc-
tion to the religious and civil well-being of Spain.

As we look back on the crimsoned pages of its
history, from the stand-point of light and liberty
which we enjoy, we can but very imperfectly realize
the idea of its essentially atrocious character and
tendencies. The mind may sicken as it pictures to
itself huge buildings, on whose black and furrowed
walls the sun rose and set for long ages, without the
wretched inmates of the damp and noisome dungeons
within receiving one ray of light or comfort from
his beams. The imagination may carry us back, and
enable us to penetrate those sable piles, on which
whole generations looked with terror and dismay,
and show us, in the darkness and pestilential atmo-
sphere of their cells, a husband torn from his wife, a
mother from her agonized children, an only and
beloved child from his heart-broken parents, or a
priest of exemplary piety from his widowed and
attached flock. There, alone and helpless in the
solitary dungeon, more like a huge grave than a
prison, year after year, it might be, passed away ; the
monotony of their confinement being broken in upon
only by the efforts of their tormentors to extort self-
accusation, by the hellish applications of the pulley,
the chafing-dish, or the rack. Hope, like the light

FURTHER OBSTACLES TO THE REFORMATION. 65

of heaven, was shut out ; and the wretched victims^
cut off from all the endearments and companionships
of life^ dragged out their gloomy existence in silence
and despair. Yet to this tremendous empire of terror
was given the superintendence and guardianship of a
religion whose Author was the very incarnation of
meekness, charity, forbearance, and love ! By the
practice of cruelties, at the thoughts of which the
blood almost freezes in one's veins, it professed to
defend and joropagate that Gospel which He exhorted
his disciples to diffuse by inculcating and practising
the precepts which they had learnt from Him, and
seen exemplified in his spotless life. To us it may
seem a wonder, that it was not levelled to the ground
by the rude hand of popular indignation, long cen-
turies before its suppression ; but we forget how
completely it had paralyzed the nation, and deprived
it of all power of resistance.

But the Holy Office, though the chief was not the
only obstacle to the spread of the reformed doctrines
in the Peninsula. Other causes, to which it mainly '
gave birth, contributed to perpetuate the religious
bondage which it had effectually imposed on the
minds of the people. In acceding to its establish-
ment, the crafty Ferdinand had well foreseen how
thoroughly it would crush the civil liberties of the
nation, and place the whole powers of government,
P

66 ORTHODOXY, NATIONAL HONOUR,

without limitation or control, in his own hands.
Tliis it did. The old jealousies, too, existing between
the nobles and the people, were made use of in es-
tablishing the royal despotism over both. The
independent domains of the former had long afforded
secure asylums to the persecuted ; but these privi-
leged enclosures were invaded by Cardinal Ximenez,
when, by flattering the commons, without adding to
their real consequence, he deprived the nobility of
many of their most important immunities. They,
in their turn, sided with the King in his attack on
the liberties of the people, and thus helped to
consummate a despotism which was equally fatal
to the civil and religious freedom of the nation
at large.

The prominence in the defence and propagation
of Catholicism, thus forced upon Spain by the Inqui-
sition and its allied agencies, gradually implanted in
the Spanish mind the notion, that any deviation from
the orthodox faith was a stain upon the nation's
honour. Hence the national pride became enlisted
on the anti-reformation side. A people who looked
upon their contests with Jews, Moors, and Moriscoes,
in their efforts to banish every blemish from their
own cherished orthodoxy, as the noblest achieve-
ments in the annals of their nation's glories, were
not the most likely to embrace doctrines banned by

AND NATIONAL AMBITION. 67

the oracles of their faith as the most damnable of
all heresies. Hence, too, the religious fanaticism
which led to, and in their eyes justified, the cruelties
which they inflicted on the natives of the New
World. Then, as now, with Popery, the end was
considered to sanctify the means. The spread of the
Catholic faith was, in their opinion, the high and
holy commission which their honoured nation had
been chosen to execute ; and so as that was accom-
plished, they were little scrupulous about means. We
cannot doubt that Columbus himself was animated,
to some extent, by such an ambition. He was too
much permeated by the religious zeal of his time, to
be influenced by a passion for nautical discovery
alone, in braving the discouragements and dangers
against which his indomitable spirit so heroically
and successfully contended. Still more evident was
the influence of his proselyting zeal on the conduct
of those who followed him in establishing the Spanish
authority in the New World. But with this they
associated baser motives, from which he had been
free. How unlikely, then, was a nation, that gloried
in its championship of the faith, to permit its own
sacred soil to be polluted by the seeds of heresy !

In addition to these causes which operated against
the success of Protestantism in Spain, it must not be
forgotten how much it was the interest of Charles V.,

6S OPPOSITION OF CHARLES V.

in whose reign the great struggle for emancipation
from reh'gious thraldom began, to cultivate the
friendship of Kome. " The Emperor Charles," said
Luther, a few days after the landing of this prince
at Genoa, "has determined, to show himself more
cruel against us than the Turk himself ; and he has
already uttered the most horrible threats. Behold
the haur of Christ's agony and weakness. Let us
pray for all those who will soon have to endure
captivity and death." Nor were the Reformer's
anticipations groundless. The political interests of
the Emperor, no less than his personal attachment to
the Catholic faith, helped to keep him faithful to his
coronation oath, before Clement VII., at Bologna : —
" I swear to be, with all my powers and resources,
the perpetual defender of the pontifical dignity, and
of the Church of Rome." The spirit of deadly
antipathy to the reformed doctrines, which animated
himself and his soldiers in their wars in Germany,
was transmitted to Spain, and there intensified by
the causes to which reference has been made, as well
as by the subsequent triumph of the Reformation in
the German empire and elsewhere. But it required
the combined operation of all these opposing causes,
to shut out the rays of that sun which had arisen on
Europe with healing on his wings. But for their
united antagonism, the beams of light which forced

TO THE REFORMATION. 69

their way over the Pyrenees, through the ungenial
atmosphere of France, would have dispelled for ever
the spiritual darkness that hung, and still hangs, like
a great plague-cloud, shutting out " life and immor-
tality in the Gospel" from Spain. But even her
thick mists of superstition and ignorance shall yet be
penetrated by its brightness, for the word of our
covenant- keeping God is pledged, that "the know-
ledge of the Lord shall cover the earthy as the waters
cover the sea."

70 HOW THE LUTHERAN DOCTKINES

i,\K^tix imtt\.

COMMENCEMENT OF THE REFORMATION IN SPAIN.

Having in the previous chapters glanced at the
state of Spain, political and ecclesiastical, down to
the time of the Eeformation, and at the chief obsta-
cles against which the reformed doctrines had to
contend, we pass on to notice the means by which
they were introduced into the Peninsula.
. We have seen how unfavourably Spain was situated
for the reception and spread of the doctrines which
Luther and his followers were disseminating so
widely through Germany, at the beginning of the
16th century. A powerful priesthood, with scaffolds
and treasures at its disposal, held the country bound
hand and foot. The least indication of disaffection
asfainst the established faith was visited with its

WERE INTRODUCED INTO SPAIN. 71

speedy and terrible vengeance. The general atten-
tion, too, of the nation was engrossed by the treasures
which Columbus had revealed in the far west, and
heeded not the more enduring and nobler riches
which Luther was bringing to light, and holding up
to men in all their heavenly brightness, freed from
the incrustations of error and superstition with
which Rome had overlaid them. But at the bottom
the Spanish were a religiously disposed race. In
the early ages of the Church's history they had clung
stedfastly to the simple faith of the Gospel, and
Popery, with all its debasing and stupefying in-
fluences, cojild not destroy the essential nobility in
their national character. Now and then it showed
that it still lived, fettered and partially corrupted
though it had been.

The introduction of the reformed opinions into
Spain might be looked for as a natural consequence
of the intimate connection between that country and
Germany at the time when the Reformation began.
This connection produced a frequency of communica-
tion, for political purposes, which opened up an easy
way for the extension of the Lutheran doctrines to
the Peninsula. Several of the Reformers' works
were, at an early period of the religious movement
in Germany, transmitted to Spain, and were there
translated into the vernacular and extensively cir-

72 BELIGIOUS FREEDOM.

culated amongst the common people. The corres-
pondence with their friends at home of many men
of ability and learning, who had crossed the Pyrenees
and gone to the Netherlands or Germany, for pur-
poses of commerce or as attendants of the imperial
court, served to make the proceedings in the latter
country still more generally known, and to excite
amongst the Spaniards a spirit of inquiry as to the
nature and progress of the dispute in which Luther
was then engaged with the Church of Rome. But,
besides curiosity, there were other and more weighty
reasons why they should feel a deep interest in the
Reformation. Suffering as they were from the
odious tyranny of the Inquisition, they would
eagerly catch at any chance of emancipation from
its thraldom ; and any information, consequently,
which was given them respecting the daring attack
on the domination of the Romish hierarchy, would
inspire all who were possessed of any freedom of
thought with a wish to join in the struggle for
religious liberty. Spain could boast of many
such persons at the time we write of — men who
were anxious to enlighten their ignorant and
deluded countrymen, and, if need be, to do battle
for the faith which was once delivered to the saints.

Foremost in this honourable band of men who
became acquainted with the truth, and laboured to

JUAN VALDES. 73

make it known in Spain, stands the name of Juan
Valdes.

There is reason to believe that this good man and
true patriot was the first convert to the Protestant
doctrines in the Peninsula. Some have thought
that they were embraced first by some members
of the order of Franciscans, because the General of
that brotherhood obtained from the Pope (Clement
VII.) in 1526, power to absolve such of the brethren
as had imbibed the reformed opinions, and were
willing to recant. This, however, must be con-
sidered rather as a prospective privilege, exempting
the Franciscans from the authority of the Inquisi-
tion, whose officers belonged to the rival order of
Dominicans.

Valdes was descended from a good family, and
had received a liberal education at the University
of Alcala. Having attached himself to the imperial
court, he left Spain in the year 1535, in company
with the Emperor, by whom he was sent to act as
secretary to the Viceroy of Naples, which kingdom,
as we have already noticed in the first chapter,
belonged at that time to Spain. Before leaving his
native land, however, Valdes had embraced many of
the Lutheran doctrines, from the books which, as
we have remarked, had been largely though privately
circulated in the Peninsula. He had been one of

74 HERETICAL PROPOSITIONS.

the earliest of those into whose hands these books
had fallen, and had no sooner become a convert
to the doctrines which they inculcated, than he
laboured hard, and not unsuccessfully, to promote
their circulation amongst his countrymen. That he
had been thus early imbued with the reformed
opinions, appears from a treatise drawn up by him,
and called Advice on the Interpreters of Sacred
Scripture. This tract was originally written in the
form of a letter to his friend Bartolom6 Carranza,
afterwards Archbishop of Toledo, and subsequently
the victim of a painful and protracted persecution
by the Inquisition for the freedom of his opinions.*
Being found amongst his papers, this treatise formed
one of the heaviest articles of charge against him.
It contained, amongst others, the following proposi-
tions : — First, " that in order to understand the Sacred
Scriptures, we must not rely on the interpretation of
the Fathers." Second, "that we are justified by a
lively faith in the sufferings and death of our Sa-
viour." And third, " that we may attain to certainty
concerning our justification." But this " advice,"
though containing most of the essential doctrines of
the Protestant creed, is not without traces of the
transcendental divinity of John Tauler, a distin-
guished German ecclesiastic of the Hth century.

* See the Appendix.

HODRIGO DE VALER. 75

Tauler belonged to the class of divines usually called
Mystics, who, disgusted with the dry and abstruse
theology of the scholastic divines, ran into the oppo-
site extreme, and resolved religion into contempla-
tion and meditation, and dwelt mainly on the love
of God and the sufferings of Christ, without incul-
cating the necessity of clear and distinct views of
divine truth. Luther himself, at an early period of
his life, had been greatly attached to the writings
of Tauler, and had republished part of them under
the title of German Theology,

Though absent from Spain, Valdes contributed
greatly to the spread of the reformed doctrines by
his writings, which were published in Spanish, and
widely circulated amongst his countrymen. He
published a commentary on the Epistle to the
Romans, and another on the First Epistle to the
Corinthians, both of which did good service as
testimonies to the truth in Spain.

But it required a more daring spirit than that
of Yaldes to unfurl and defend the banner of the
Cross in the land of the Inquisition, and that spirit
was raised up. The seed which the writings of Juan
Valdes had sown, bore fruit under the fearless and
unflinching culture of Rodrigo de Valer. Like Valdes,
De Valer had sprung from a noble family. He was
born at Lebrixa, about thirty miles from the city

76 "the entrance of thy word

of Seville, and, like others of his rank, had been
reared amid the gaieties and dissipations which pre-
vailed amongst the wealthy and luxurious grandees
of Spain. In Seville, where he chiefly resided, he
was foremost in every scene of fashionable amuse-
ment and gallantry, outvying his companions in the
splendour of his equipage and the costly extrava-
gance of his dress. But a change came over the
spirit of his mind, as complete as it was sudden.
His usual haunts of pleasure were abandoned, and
his dissipated companions forsaken for ever. The
leader of fashion was found no longer in his former
place. Shut up in the retirement of his closet, he
had withdrawn himself for a time from the outward
world, to give himself up to meditation and prayer.
By some happy accident, he had fallen in with and
perused some of the Lutheran books which Valdes
and others had introduced into Spain ; led by them
to view religion as he had never done before, he
procured a copy of the Scriptures, and studied it
prayerfully in the retirement of his home. The only
copy he could procure was the Vulgate ; he studied
Latin, with which he had been previously slightly
acquainted, and mastered its contents, and was led
by the knowledge thus given him, to see the vile
superstitions and soul-destroying character of Popery.
And when this grand revelation had been made to

GIVETH LIGHT." 77

his mind, he did not selfishly conceal it in the privacy
of his own bosom, but in the true spirit of every
one who has felt its regenerating powers, sought
to make known to others that truth which had sav-
ingly dawned upon his own mind. He returned to
society, but another spirit was upon him. He was
a new man. His life had a high and holy purpose,
and manfully he wrought it out. Seeking the
society of the monks and friars, he set before them,
at first gently and afterwards more severely, the sad
corruption of the Church, both in faith and practice ;
he exhorted them to attempt its reform, and to set
before the people, both by precept and example, a
living picture of pure and primitive Christianity.
Amongst his friends and acquaintances he intro-
duced similar topics, and appealed to the sacred
writings as the only rule of life and conduct for
man. The efforts thus made to spread a knowledge
of the truth, were not without their beneficial effects.
His hearers became more numerous and attentive.
The Lutheran books, which he scrupled not openly
to recommend, were eagerly sought for and carefully
studied, and thus many were brought to the know-
ledge of salvation.

But the [nquisition was not unobservant of his
proceedings. The results which we have mentioned
were accomplished in a very short space of time.

78 CONFISCATION AND IMPRISONMENT.

The ever-watchful familiars soon cut short his in-
structions. He was brought before the Inquisitors,
and at his examination openly avowed and defended
the doctrines which he had publicly taught. His
fate would have been sure and speedy, had it not
been for the influence of some powerful individuals,
who had secretly imbibed his doctrines, and exerted
themselves on his behalf. This, joined to the purity
of his descent and the exalted rank of his family,
procured for him on the ground of reported insanity,
a milder sentence than so open and dangerous a
heretic would otherwise have received ; his property
was confiscated and himself set at liberty.

But the dauntless Valer was not to be deterred.
He felt that he had received a commission, and he
was resolved to fulfil it. Neither loss of property
nor threats of severer punishment, could induce
him to be silent on his great theme. Again was
his voice raised to denounce the errors of Popery,
and make known to a people perishing for lack of
knowledge, the pure and simple truths of the ever-
lasting Gospel. But it was soon silenced in the
dungeons of the Inquisition, whence he was speedily
transferred, in the year 1541, as a prisoner for life,
to a monastery belonging to San Lucar, a town near
the mouth of the Guadalquivir, where he died about
the age of fifty. The sanbenito, or cloak of infamy,

DR. EGIDIO. 79

which he had been compelled to wear, was hung up
in the Cathedral of Seville, with this inscription : —
Eodrigo Valer, a citizen of Lebrixa and Seville, an
apostate and false apostle, who pretended to be sent
of God."

De Valer had not worked in vain. He left behind
him followers able and willing to carry on the work
which he had begun. The man whom we next meet
with labouring in the same cause was Juan Gil,
usually called Dr. Egidio. This worthy disciple
and successor of De Valer, was born at Olvera, a
Town in Aragon, and educated at the same univer-
sity as Valdes, where he gained great distinctioya for
his profound acquaintance with scholastic theology.
On leaving Alcala, he was appointed to the chair
of divinity at Siguenza, and soon after was chosen
Canon Magistral in the metropolitan church of
Seville. But, though a profound theologian, he
proved an unpopular preacher, and soon felt the
consciousness of this so keenly that he became
anxious to resign his office. At this juncture he
became acquainted with De Valer. The secret of
his unpopularity was soon discovered, and the de-
fect which had rendered his discourses so dry and
unprofitable, was remedied by a diligent and prayer-
ful perusal of the word of God. Henceforth a
new spirit animated his sermons ; no longer cold

80 CAUTION OF EGIDTO.

and abstruse, he tenderly but powerfully appealed
to the hearts and consciences of his hearers, and
became as popular as he had been previously dis-
liked. But this change in his preaching had
higher and more valuable results than mere empty
fame. He opened up to his audience the grand
truths of the Gospel, showed them its complete
adaptation to meet all the wants and longings of the
human heart, and warned them to place no confi-
dence in mere rites and ceremonies, but in the
method of salvation made known in the Gospel.
But, thoroughly alive to the perilous position which
he occupied, he made known these truths with such
prudential caution as screened him from the dan-
gerous notice which would otherwise have been
taken of his teaching. By this watchful and neces-
sary prudence, he was enabled to continue undis-
turbed and unsuspected his work of enlightenment
in Seville. De Montes, one of his own converts,
thus describes the character and effect of his instruc-
tions : — "Among the other gifts divinely bestowed
on this holy man, was the singular faculty which
he had of kindling in the breast of those who
listened to his teaching a sacred flame which ani-
mated them in all the exercises of piety, internal
and external, and made them not only willing to
take up the Cross, but cheerful, in the prospect of

VARGAS AND CONST ANTINE. 81

the sufferings of which they stood in jeopardy every
hour ; a clear proof that the Master whom he served
was present with him, by His Spirit, engraving the
doctrine which he taught on the hearts of his
hearers." *

But Egidio was not alone in his efforts to spread
abroad a knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus.
Besides those who, like himself, had been brought
to it by the instructions of De Valer, he was him-
self honoured to make converts who should carry
on the work of God in benighted Spain. The
most distinguished of these were Doctor Vargas and
Constantino Ponce de la Fuente, who had been his
fellow-students at Alcala. In concert with these
friends, Egidio carried on the dissemination of the
reformed doctrines more widely than his own un-
aided efforts enabled him previously to effect. Still,
the same wise caution was observed, and nothing
so said or done that could fairly expose them to
the suspicion of heresy. Their zeal, however, had
the effect of calling forth the counter-diligence of the
clergy, who inculcated with renewed energy the
necessity of all the religious observances, prayers,
fastings, and penances, which the church of Rome
insists on as necessary to salvation. For a time
their long acknowledged authority swayed the great

* Inquidtionis Hispanicce Artes Detects, p. 231.
G

8'2 CONSTANCY OF EGIDIO

mass of the people, but the perseverance of Egidio
and his friends, added to their prudence, acknow-
ledged piety, and purity of life, gradually subdued
the prejudices which their opponents had succeeded
in raising against them. During the day, their
time was profitably occupied in the public discharge
of their clerical duties, and their evenings were gene-
rally spent in planning those measures which would
be most conducive to the furtherance of the great
work in which they were engaged. By this means
they soon obtained large and attentive audiences, to
whom they made known the glad tidings which the
Gospel reveals to man. From Seville, as a centre,
these salutary influences spread into the surrounding
country, and there rested, as bread cast upon the
waters, which was to appear after many days. Their
increasing popularity at length aroused the sus-
picions of the Holy Office, whose detective agencies
were soon put into operation. At this juncture the
friends were separated ; Vargas died, and Constan-
tine was removed to the Low Countries. Thus
stripped of his allies, the noble Egidio was left to
bear the weight of the gathering storm. But he
quailed not ; his trust was in Him whose glory he
was endeavouring to promote, and he feared not
what man could do unto him. The resentment of
his enemies was still further inflamed at this time

WHEN SEIZED BY THE INQUISITION. 83

by his nomination, by the Emperor, to the vacant
bishopric of Tortosa, one of the richest sees in Spain.
They resolved to prevent his obtaining it, and, to
this end, at once denounced him as a heretic to
the Inquisition. He was seized and thrown into
its dungeons, notwithstanding the influence which
Charles exerted on his behalf. He was charged with
maintaining and publicly teaching the doctrine of
salvation by faith, and condemning the Popish doc-
trines of the sufficiency of good works, purgatory,
auricular confession, and the worship of images and
saints. The defence which he drew up, contained
a full statement of his views on justification, and
the grounds on which he held them. The frankness
which this document displayed, gave a handle to his
foes, which they were not slow in making use of.
His situation now became eminently dangerous, and
justly excited the alarm of his friends. All their
influence was employed on his behalf. The Emperor
wrote in his favour to the Inquisitor-General, whose
clemency was likewise supplicated by the Chapter
of Seville, with whom Egidio had been unusually
popular. This, added to the exertions of many of
the nobility on behalf of their favourite preacher,
led the Inquisitors to adopt a more moderate course
than they would otherwise have pursued. The
charges against him were allowed to be submitted

84 TREACHERY OF SOTO.

to two special arbiters, chosen, one by the accused,
and the other by the Holy Office. Egidio chose
Domingo de Soto, a Dominican friar, and professor
at Salamanca, who was his professed friend, and had
privately declared his attachment to the reformed
doctrine. It was agreed between the prisoner and
his arbiter, that both should draw up a paper con-
taining his own views on the disputed doctrine of
justification, and that these should be read before
the Inquisitors. On the day of trial, Egidio and
Soto were placed at considerable distance from each
other, in the cathedral of Seville, where, by a special
deviation from the usual custom, the arguments were
to be heard, Soto read first, and, at the end of each
proposition, looked to Egidio for approval of what
he had advanced. In full reliance on the honesty of
his supposed friend, this was given ; though the dis-
tance prevented his distinctly making out what was
being read. This was in direct contradiction of what
Egidio next gave forth as his sentiments on the doc-
trines at issue. The two declarations thus clashing,
judgment was at once pronounced on the accused,
as guilty of the Lutheran heresy. The influence
already exerted on his behalf saved him from the
stake, but he was condemned "to abjure the pro-
positions imputed to him, to be imprisoned for three
years, to abstain from writing or teaching for ten

CONSEQUENT CONDEMNATION OF EGIDIO. 85

years, and not to leave the kingdom during that
period, under pain of being punished as a formal or
relapsed lieretic," in other words, of being burned
alive. It was not till after his return to prison, that
he learned the baseness of the treacherous Soto.

This account of the trial is given by De Montes,
who received his information from Egidio himself in
prison. The condemnation of the bishop-elect was
the signal for a rush of hungry candidates for the
rich see of Tortosa. The most fulsome flattery was
poured in, from all side3, on Cardinal Granville,
who was at that time bishop of Anas, and prime
minister of Spain. A specimen or two of the appli-
cations will give the reader an idea of the disin-
terested zeal with which the holy fathers urged their
respective claims and fitness for the office sought for.
One writes to the Cardinal thus : — " I shall be in-
finitely obliged to you to think of me — the least of
your servants — provided his lordship of Elna shall
be translated to the bishopric of Tortosa, now
vacant." This applicant was a modest monk, who
desired promotion "only for the good of the Church."
" His lordship of Elna," referred to, in seeking for
translation, surpassed his less exalted rival in the
humility of his application. Addressing the Car-
dinal, without at first mentioning his object, he begs
him, as a preparative, to command him "as the

86 SAMPLES OF SPANISH CLERGY

meanest domestic of his household," and then en-
larging on the many and rare excellencies of his
eminence, which had everywhere gained him such
profound affection and respect, he winds up by as-
suring the Cardinal, that he constantly remembered
him "in his poor sacrifices, the fittest time to make
mention of one's master." Waxing more courageous
in his second letter, the disinterested bishop, fully
conscious of his own imperfections, acknowledges
that the duties of the Tortosan see were " too heavy
a burden for his weak shoulders," but declares that
his pious exercises would be less interrupted in it
than in Roussillon, where he was constantly dis-
turbed by the din of war, which opposed his " strong
desire to end his days in tending his infirm sheep in
the peace of God." Failing in his application, the
persevering prelate renewed it during the following
year, and tried another line of argument. He re-
minded the Cardinal, that his majesty had certain
dues in Valencia which were largely in arrear, as
would be seen by the lists which he, having the
king's interests deeply at heart, had drawn up and
now sent to the premier, whom he disinterestedly
'assured that he would see that these arrears should
be paid up if he were installed in the vacant see, as
he should then "have it in his power to serve God
and the king at the same time." His lordship of

IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. 87

Algerl, in Sardinia, which then belonged to Spain,
in wishing to be transferred to the peninsular
bishopric, " was not influenced by avarice in making
his request," but was only anxious to be in a posi-
tion in which he would be " at more liberty to serve
God, and pray for the life of the king and his
minister" the Cardinal.* Ah his disce omnes.

Such were the Spanish clergy in the 16th cen-
tury. With such guardians, religion might well
degenerate into superstition, even had they not
brought to bear upon it, in addition, the corrupting
influences of full-blown Popery. Well might the
broad shadows of spiritual night hang thick and
heavy over the most magnificent country in the
world — the fertile land of the vine and olive !

After lingering for some months in the dungeons
of the Inquisition, Egidio was brought forth amongst
the criminals who were condemned to penance, in
an auto-da-fe (act of faith) celebrated in Seville in
the year 1552.t Having fulfilled the term of his

* Geddes' Miscellaneoits Tracts, p. 461.

i- The interest of the following description of an auto-da-
fe, by an eye-witness, will excuse the length of the quota-
tion : —

" In the morning of the day, the prisoners are all brought
into a great hall, where they have the habits put on they
are to wear in the procession, which begins to come out of
the Inquisition about 9 o'clock in the morning. The first

88 GEDDES' DESCRIPTION

imprisonment, he was liberated in 15 5 (\. But the
damp dungeons, and other cruelties to which he had

in the procession are the Dominicans, who carry the standard
of the Inquisition, wiiich on one side hath their founder
Dominick's picture, and on the other side the cross, betwixt
an olive tree and a sword, with this motto, Justitia et Mis-
ericordia [Justice and Mercy]. Next after the Dominicans
come the penitents, some with benitoes and some without,
according to the nature of their crime. They are all in
black coats without sleeves, and barefooted, with a wax
candle in their hands. Next come the penitents who have
narrowly escaped being burned, who over their black coats
have flames painted, with their points turned downwards,
to signify their having been saved, but so as by fire ; this
habit is called by the Portuguese feugo revolto. Next come
the negative and the relapsed, that are to be burnt, with
flames on their habits pointing upwards. Next come those
who profess doctrines contrary to the faith of the Roman
Church, and who, besides flames on their habits pointing
upward, have their picture, which is drawn two or three
days before, upon their breasts, with dogs, serpents, and
devils, all with open mouths, painted about it. Pregna,
a famous Spanish Inquisitor, calls this procession, ' Horren-
dum ac tremendum spectaculum' [a horrid and frightful
sight] ; and so it is in truth, there being something in the
looks of all the prisoners, besides those that are to be
burnt, that is ghastly and disconsolate beyond what can
be imagined; and in the eyes and countenances of those
that are to be burnt, there is something that looks fierce
and eager. The prisoners that are to be burnt alive, besides
a familiar which all the rest have, have a Jesuit on each
side of them, who are continually preaching them to abjure
their heresies ; but if they offer to speak anything in defence

OF AN AUTO-DA-FE. 89

been subjected, had ruined his constitution, and
rendered him unfit even to attempt a renewal of

of the doctrines they are going to suffer death for professing,
they are immediately gagged, and not suffered to speak a
word more. This I saw done to a prisoner presently after
he came out of the gates of the Inquisition, upon his having
looked up to the sun, which he had not seen before in
several years, and cried out in rapture, ' How is it possible
for people that behold that glorious body to worship any
being but Him that created if?' After the prisoners comes
a troop of familiars on horseback, and after them the In-
quisitors and other officers of the court upon mules ; and
last of all comes the Inquisitor-General, upon a white horse
led by two men, with a black hat and a green hatband, and
attended by all the nobles that are not employed as familiars
in the procession. In the Zimeiro de Paco, which may be
as far from the Inquisition as Whitehall is from Temple Bar,
there is a scaffold erected, which may hold 2000 or 8000
people ; at the one end sit the Inquisitors, and at the other
end the prisoners, and in the same order as they walked
in the procession, those that are to be burnt being seated
on the highest benches behind the rest, which may be ten
feet above the floor of the scaffold.

"The prisoners are no sooner in the hands of the civil
magistrate, than they are loaded with chains before the eyes
of the Inquisitors, and being carried first to the secular gaol,
are, within an hour or two, brought from thence before the
Lord Chief Justice, who, without knowing anything of
their particular crimes, or of the evidence that was against
them, asks them one by one in what religion they do intend
to die. If they answer that they will die in the communion
of the Church of Rome, they are condemned by him to
be carried forthwith to the place of execution, and there to

90 PRIESTLY CONSOLATION

his labour in the cause of truth The hand of death
was upon him. But he had "fought a good fight,"
and looked forward with a well-grounded confidence
to the " cro wn of righteousness " which was laid up
as his reward. He visited Valladolid, and found

be strangled, and afterwards burnt to ashes. But if they
say they will die in the Protestant or in any other faith that
is contrary to the Roman, they are then sentenced to be
carried forthwith to the place of execution and there to be
burnt alive. At the place of execution, which at Lisbon is
the Ribera, there are so many stakes set up as there are
prisoners to be burnt, with a good quantity of dry furze
about them. The stakes of the professed, as the Inquisitors
call them, may be about four yards high, and have a small
board, whereon the prisoner is to be seated, within half
a yard of the top. The negative and relapsed being first
strangled and burnt, the professed go up a ladder betwixt
the two Jesuits which have attended them all day; and
when they have come even with the forementioned board,
they turn about to the people, and the Jesuits spend a
quarter of an hour in exhorting the professed to be reconciled
to the Church of Rome; which if they refuse to be, the
Jesuits come down, and the executioner ascends ; and having
turned the professed off the ladder upon the seat, and
chained their bodies close to the stake, he leaves them;
and the Jesuits go up to them a second time to renew their
exhortation to them; and at parting tell them that they
leave them to the devil, who is standing at their elbow
to receive their souls, and carry them with him into the
flames of hell-fire, so soon as they are out of their bodies.
Upon this there is a great shout, and as soon as the Jesuits
are off the ladder, the cry is, " Let the dogs' beards, let the

AT THE STAKE. 91

that the good work had been begun there too. On
his return to Seville he was seized with a fever,
which cut him off in a few days, but not till the
cause, which his imprisonment had greatly tended
to discourage, had been revived by the return of his
old friend Constantino from the Netherlands. After

dogs' beards be made;" wbich is done by thrusting flaming
furze, fastened to a pole, against their faces. And this
inhumanity is commonly continued till their faces are burnt
to a coal, and is always accompanied with such loud ac-
clamations of joy as are not to be heard on any other
occasion; a bull-feast or a farce being dull entertainments
to the using a professed heretic thus inhumanly. The
professed beards being thus made or trimmed, as they call
it in jollity, fire is set to the furze, which are at the bottom
of the stake, and above which the professed are chained so
high, that the top of the flame seldom reaches higher than
the seat they rest on ; and if there happens to be a wind, to
which that place is much exposed, it seldom reaches so high
as their knees; so that though if there be a calm, the
professed are commonly dead in about half an hour after
the furze is set on fire ; yet, if the weather prove windy,
they are not dead after that in an hour and a half or two
hours, and so are really roasted and not burnt to death.
But though out of hell, there cannot possibly be a more
lamentable spectacle than this, being joined with the
sufferers' crying out (so long as they are able to speak),
" Misericordia por amour de Dios" [Mercy for the love of God],
yet it is beheld by people of both sexes and all ages, with
such transports of joy and satisfaction as are not on any
other occasion to be met with." — Geddes' Miscellaneous
Tracts.

92 THE REFORMED DOCTRINES

his death, Montanus tells us the bones of Egidio
were taken from the grave and burned, and his
memory declared infamous by a sentence of the
Inquisition, when they found he had died in the
Lutheran faith. *

Next to Seville, the reformed doctrines had made
more progress in Valladolid than in any other city
in Spain. The circumstances attending their in-
troduction were hardly less extraordinary than those
which led to their reception in Seville. A painfully
interesting account of the persecution to which the
adherents to the truth were there and elsewhere
exposed, is given in Clarke's Martyrology, a book
which furnishes, perhaps, the AiUest historical account
to be met with of the persecution of Protestants
throughout all the countries of Europe. From it
we take, substantially, the following episode in the
history of the reformed religion in Valladolid. t In
1540, a young merchant, named Francisco San-
Roman, a native of Burgos, in Spain, was sent by
his employers from Antwerp, where he conducted
their affairs, to Bremen, to transact some mercantile
business. Some time before this, the Lutheran
doctrines had been introduced into Bremen, and

* For further particulars of his life and persecution, see
Cla/rke's Mwrtyrology, p. 167.
t Page 159.

IN VALLADOLID. 93

the youDg merchant, anxious to know something
about opinions which had been so much decried and
anathematized in Spain, went into one of the re-
formed churches to hear them for himself. The
preacher was James Spreng, formerly an Augustan
monk, and one of the first who had embraced the
reformed religion in the Low Countries. The young
Spaniard was so much impressed with what he heard,
that he called on the preacher after the sermon to
converse upon the disputed doctrines of the Romish
and Reformed creeds. Spreng was much pleased
with the candour and earnestness of the inquirer,
and introduced him to several of his friends. Under
the influence of their instructions, he soon became
a zealous convert to the truth, and longed to make
it known in all its fulness and purity to his be-
nighted countrymen at home. Spreng, alive to the
danger of such an attempt, counselled his enthusiastic
convert not to expose himself to peril, but his burn-
ing zeal could not be controlled. He wrote to
Antwerp to his employers, and informed them of
his conversion to the Lutheran faith, stating at the
same time his determination to return to Spain to
proclaim its doctrines there. As might be expected,
he was seized and thrown into prison on his return
to Antwerp, when once more within the jurisdiction
of Rome.

94 FRANCISCO SAN-ROM AN'S

After an imprisonment of eight months, he was
released through the influence of his friends, who
engaged that he should be sent to Spain, and
there carefully watched. At Louvain he met with
Francisco Enzinas, likewise a native of Burgos, and
whom we shall again meet with, who advised him
to exercise a prudential caution, as any rash or
indiscreet expression of his opinions would efiectually
deprive him of all power to promote the cause he
had at heart. This he promised to observe, but
having gone to the diet of Eatisbon, at which the
Reformers and their opponents were then discussing
the doctrines at issue between them, San-Roman
forgot his prudent resolves. Having obtained an
introduction to the Emperor, who was present at
the diet, he implored him to put an end to the
Inquisition, and encourage the introduction of the
reformed religion into Spain. The crafty Charles,
who was then anxious to conciliate the Protestants
of Germany, with a view of securing their aid in
an anticipated war with France, as well as against
the Turks in Hungary, gave apparent encouragement
to San-Roman to begin the work of enlightening his
countrymen. Emboldened by this, he renewed his
application, but with worse success. At the command
of Charles, he was quietly confined in chains, and
reserved for trial before the Inquisition of Valladolid.

HEROIC LIFE AND DEATH. 95

After the return of the Emperor to Spain, San-
Eoman was delivered over to the Holy Office. At
his trial he openly avowed his adherence to the
reformed religion, and entire rejection of all the
errors of Popery. No promises of pardon could
induce him to recant. A long and painful imprison-
ment failed to break down his dauntless spirit or
overcome his unbending resolution. Finding him
proof alike against threats and promises, the In-
quisitors doomed him to the stake as an obstinate
heretic. At the place of execution, the offer of
pardon was again renewed, but rejected on the
proposed conditions of recantation. The pile was
lighted, and his spirit mounted up on its chariot
of fire to the reward of its faithfulness above. This
occurred in 1544.

Instead of suppressing the new doctrines, as was
expected, the martyrdom of San- Roman imparted a
fresh energy to the infant cause in Valladolid, and
helped to bind together its adherents in a firmer
and closer alliance for the propagation of the truth.
Up to this time they had concealed their attach-
ment to the reformed religion, but now the most
timid became brave, and prepared themselves, if need
be, to evince a zeal and magnanimity on its behalf
equal to that which had been displayed by San-
Roman. Hitherto they had been scattered over

96 DOMINGO DE ROXAS.

Valladolid, in many instances unknown to eacli
other, but they now formed themselves into a
church, and met regularly for the purposes of mutual
instruction and of worship, according to the rites of
the Lutheran Church.

Their first pastor was Domingo de Roxas, son of
Don Juan, first Marquis de Poza. He had been edu-
cated under Bartolom^ de Carranza for the church,
and at an early age had entered into the order of
Dominicans. From Carranza he had imbibed reli-
gious opinions much more liberal than those which
were commonly current amongst the Spanish clergy ;
and, less timid than his instructor, Roxas was bolder
in his speculations, and less reserved in avowing
them. Yet whilst openly advocating doctrines closely
allied to those against which the ban of his church
had been conderaningly set, he cautiously accom-
panied his innovations with explanatory remarks in-
tended to preserve his reputed orthodoxy. By such
a prudential course he was enabled to instil a large
amount of evangelical truth into the minds of his
hearers, and undermine their belief in most of the
peculiar heresies of Rome. He managed to circulate
the works of the German Reformers, and published
several of his own, better fitted as initiatives for
the prejudiced and ignorant minds of his country-
men. In this way he gradually increased the num-

DR. AUGUSTIN CAZALLA. 97

ler of adherents to the reformed faith, and largely
added to the church in Valladolid.

About the year 1555, Roxas obtained a valuable
coadjutor in Doctor Augustin Cazalla. Less coura-
geous in the avowal of his opinions, this learned
man surpassed Koxas in talents and reputation.
Educated, likewise, by Carranza, he had been ad-
mitted a canon of Salamanca about the year 1535,
and soon gave promise of unusual abilities as a
preacher.

In 1545 he was chosen preacher and almoner to
the Emperor, whom he accompanied in the following
year to Germany. Whilst opposing Lutheranism in
that country, he became himself a convert to its
doctrines, but for prudential reasons concealed his
change of opinions. His case was not a solitary
one ; many of the most learned divines of the
Spanish Church became similarly converted to the
new doctrines which they had left Spain to confute
in Germany. Indeed, to this circumstance the tem-
porary success of the reformed religion in Spain was
in no small degree owing. To this Illescas bears
witness in his Pontifical History,* w^iere he says : —
"Formerly, such Lutheran heretics as were appre-
hended and committed to the flames, were almost all
either strangers, — Germans, Flemings, and English,
* Vol. ii. f. 337, b.
H

98 ADVOCATES OF ROMANISM

or, if Spaniards, they were mean people and of a
bad race ; but in these late years we have seen the
prisons, scaffolds, and stakes, crowded with persons
of noble birth, and, what is still more to be de-
plored, with persons illustrious, in the opinion of
the world, for letters and piety. The cause of this
and many other evils was the affection which our
Catholic princes cherished for Germany, England,
and other countries without the pale of the Church,
which induced them to send learned men and
preachers from Spain to these places, in the hope
that by their sermons they would be brought back
to the path of truth. But, unhappily, this measure
was productive of little good fruit ; for of those who
went abroad to give light to others, some returned
home blind themselves, and, being deceived, or puffed
up with ambition or a desire to be thought vastly
learned and improved by their residence in foreign
countries, they followed the example of the heretics
with whom they had disputed." This fact is further
confirmed in reference to the Spanish clergy who
accompanied Philip II. to England on the occasion
of his marriage with Mary. Bishop Pilkington
says : — " It is much more notable that we have seen
come to pass in our days, that the Spaniards sent
into the realm [of England] on purpose to suppress
the Gospel, as soon as they were returned home,

CONVERTED TO PROTESTANTISM. 99

replenished many parts of their country with the
same truth of religion to which before they were
utter enemies." * Such were the cases in Germany
of Constantino Ponce de la Fuente, already men-
tioned, and Cazalla, of whom we are now treating.

In 1552 he returned to Spain, and settled in
Salamanca for three years, during which he carried
on a correspondence with the Protestants of Seville.
The caution with which he acted, however, preserved
his orthodoxy from suspicion, and enabled him to
continue in his office of royal chaplain. It was in
the discharge of its duties that he visited Valladolid,
and became acquainted with Roxas and his fellow
Protestants there. He was induced to remove from
Salamanca and settle in Valladolid, where he soon
became a firm and valuable adherent to the reformed
Church. His position gave him many and peculiar
opportunities of intercourse with those who could
not otherwise have been readily reached by the
Lutheran doctrines, and on such he very judiciously
brought his influence to bear in giving them correct
notions of divine truth. But for a time, as we shall
see, he cautiously concealed his sentiments in the
discharge of his public duties, wisely avoiding what-
ever would have subjected him to suspicion. By
proceeding thus wisely he was enabled to be of

* See Strype's Memorials of Cranmer, p. 246.

100 LUTHERAN DOCTRINES FAIRLY INTRODUCED.

essential benefit to the reformed faith, and save him-
self from the fate which would speedily have fallen
upon so distinguished an apostate from the Romish
Church.

By means of the individuals now mentioned, and
of some of whom we shall make mention in the
following chapter, the introduction of the Lutheran
doctrines was now fairly, though secretly, accom-
plished, and they were left to work their silent way
in the minds of the people. How they did so, and
how they were suppressed, would require a volume
larger than ours to describe, but we shall in the
succeeding pages take a sufficiently extensive glance
at their brief but interesting history to give the
reader a tolerably correct idea of the life-struggles of
Protestantism in Spain.

SPANISH PKOTESTANTS ABROAD. 101

€lmttt |ift|.

CIRCUMSTANCES WHICH FAVOURED THE REFOEMATION
IN SPAIN.

Whilst the friends of Protestantism were thus suc-
cessfully labouring in Spain, they were not without
valuable aid from Germany and the Low Countries.
Many of their countrymen, whom commerce or other
business had brought to the home of the Eeforma-
tion, had embraced its doctrines, and were labouring
hard to aid their reception and establishment in
their fatherland. We shall occupy this chapter with
a cursory account of the most active of these Spanish
Protestants abroad, and of the means which they
employed to promote the spread of the reformed
doctrine at home.

In the same year (1540) in which San-Roman left
Antwerp for Bremen, three of his fellow-townsmen

102 THE THREE BROTHERS ENZINAS.

left Burgos to study at the University of Louvain
in the Netherlands. Louvain was at that time a
favourite place of education for Spanish youths ;
elegant literature and freedom of religious opinion
had been cultivated in it to a greater extent than in
almost any other of the continental universities, not
excepting even the famed University of Paris. The
young men whom we are now to follow thither were
brothers, and their family name was Enzinas ; their
Christian names being respectively, Jayme, Fran-
cisco, and Juan. Whilst at Louvain they became
intimate with the celebrated Cassander,"' from whom
they acquired a knowledge of the Lutheran doc-
trines. They were not satisfied, however, in resting
in the compromises of this learned divine, but en-
tirely renounced the authority and creed of the
Eomish Church, and gave themselves up to the faith
of the Reformation. In all three the change was
complete.

Having gone through the usual period of study at
Louvain, the eldest and youngest of the three bro-
thers left j Jayme for Paris, and Juan for Marburg
in Germany, where he became a professor of medi-

* George Cassander was a native of Cassand, near Bruges.
He was a modest and ingenuous Roman Catholic divine,
who vainly endeavoured to reconcile the popish and re-
formed churches, and gained the ill-will of both. He died
in 1566.

JAYME IN PARIS. 103

cine in the university, and wrote several eminent
treatises on medicine and astronomy, which gained
him a very honourable reputation. In Paris Jayme
became confirmed in his attachment to the reformed
faith, and laboured successfully in commending its
doctrines to several of his countrymen who were
then studying at the university in that city. The
persecutions,* however^ to which the Protestants
were even then subjected, filled him with the deepest
horror, and induced him to leave a place where
bigotry and barbarism prevailed, and return to rejoin
his brother Francisco at Louvain. Eemaining there
for a time, he occupied himself busily in compiling
a catechism of the reformed doctrines, which he had
drawn up in Spanish for the use of his countrymen,
and which he subsequently printed at Antwerp.
Whilst there he received orders from his father, de-
siring him to go to Rome, for the purpose of study-
ing theology, as he was intended for the Church.
Much against his inclination, and contrary to the
advice of his Protestant friends, he obeyed the
behest of his father, and left the Netherlands, as the
result proved, never to visit them again. On reach-

* Before being burned, condemned heretics were subjected
to the most cruel tortures. Their tongues were torn out by
the executioner, with pincers, and the victims beaten with
them in the face. — See Histolre des Martyrs.

104 MARTYRDOM OF JAYME ENZINAS.

iiig Italy he soon found how dangerous was his
position.

The jealous watchfulness of the priests had
been keenly excited by their recent discovery
that the Lutheran doctrines had penetrated even to
the eternal city, and prevailed extensively throughout
many parts of Italy. Seeing that no good end
could be answered by the avowal of his sentiments,
but on the contrary much useless danger incurred,
Jayme Enzinas managed to save himself from sus-
picion for a few years in Eome, at the end of which
he resolved, though in opposition to the wishes of
his father, to return to Germany. But he was never
to look on it again. On the eve of setting out
from Rome he was denounced to the Inquisition by
one of his own countrymen, whom he had laboured
hard, and as he thought successfully, to win over to
the reformed faith. His process was short. When
brought to trial, at which most of the chief bishops
attended, he openly avowed his attachment to the
doctrines of the Reformation, and challenged his
judges to refute them. He was at once condemned
to the stake, though a subsequent offer of pardon,
on conditions of recantation and penance, was made,
but rejected on such terms. The sentence was
carried into execution, and he died a martyr to
the truth in 1546. Thus perished Jayme Enzinas,

JUAN DIAZ. 105

the first Spanish martyr in Italy of whom we have
any account.

About the time of his death, a still more fearful
tragedy occurred in Germany, of which one of his
converts there was the victim. This man was Juan
Diaz, likewise a Spaniard, who had studied in the
University of Paris, and whilst there had become
the intimate friend of Enzinas, whose opinions he
soon embraced. After the departure of the latter
from Paris, Diaz left it too, for a similar reason,
in company with two Protestants, named John
Crespin and Matthew Bude, and settled for a time
at Geneva. From thence he removed, in 1546,
to Strasburg, where he cultivated the acquaintance
of Martin Bucer, with whom he subsequently went
as a deputation in defence of the reformed doctrines
to a conference at Ratisbon. Whilst there, he met
with his countryman Pedro Malvenda, who was to
defend the doctrines of the Bomish Church. En-
raged at finding Diaz a convert to the Lutheran
faith, Malvenda, after endeavouring in vain to re-
claim him, consulted with, the chaplain of the
Emperor, who was then at Batisbon. The result
of the consultation was, that a messenger was dis-
patched to Bome to acquaint Dr. Alfonso Diaz with
his brother's apostasy. The bigoted advocate in the
sacred Bota no sooner received this galling in-

106 A SNARE FOR A BROTHER'S LIFE.

formation, than he set out for Germany, accom-
panied by a ready instrument of his pleasure, and
resolved to wipe off or avenge the stain which had
been cast on the honour of his family, by such a
defection from the faith of Kome. On reaching
Germany, Alfonso followed his brother to Neuburg,
a town in Bavaria, whither he had gone by the
advice of Bucer and his other Protestant friends.
Finding him irreclaimable, Alfonso at length pre-
tended that his brother's arguments in favour of
the new doctrines had wrought a change in his own
sentiments. The bait took. His delighted brother
was thrown off his guard, and agreed to accompany
Alfonso back to Italy, for the purpose of propagating
them in that country, if his friends on being con-
sulted should acquiesce in the plan. They at once
saw through the snare, and strongly urged Juan
to remain where he was. Foiled in this, Alfonso
endeavoured to persuade his brother to accompany
him as far as Augsburg, which he would have done
but for the timely arrival of Bucer and two other
friends. The cunning .doctor concealed his chagrin,
and parted from his brother with many expressions
of affectionate regret, and thanks for the spiritual
benefit which he professed to have received from his
instructions. He went as far as Augsburg, but
returned secretly next day, followed by the man

DIAZ MURDERED BY HIS BROTHER. 107

who had accompanied him, and passed the night
in a small village near Neuburg. Before sunrise
next morning, they went to the house in which
his brother lodged, and knocked loudly at the gate.
The man entered, leaving his master outside, and
requested to see Juan, with a letter from his brother.
He was shown into his bedroom. Juan had not
risen, but hearing of a letter from his brother, he
leaped out of bed and went to the window to read
it, when the assassin, creeping behind his unsuspect-
ing victim, clove his scull with an axe which he had
hid for the purpose beneath his cloak. Leaving the
murdered man weltering in his blood, he rejoined
the inhuman brother, who stood below ready to give
assistance if needed. The murder was soon dis-
covered, and its perpetrators hotly pursued. They
were overtaken in Inspruck, and lodged in prison.
As the crime had been committed in Bavaria, Otho
Henry, Count-palatine of the Bhine and Duke of
Bavaria, speedily arranged for the trial. The rent
and bloody night-cap of the murdered man, together
with the axe and letter of Alfonso, were sent from
Neuburg; but, through the influence of the Cardinals
of Trent and Augsburg, the trial was suspended
from time to time, till at length the Emperor forbad
the judges to proceed with the process, and ordered
the matter to be reserved for the judgment of his

108 CRIME SANCTIONED BY KOME.

brother Ferdinand, king of the Romans, as nominal
sovereign of the accused. At the subsequent diet
of Ratisbon, the Protestant princes in vain demanded
of Charles, and afterward of Ferdinand, that justice
should be done. Evasions of various kinds were
employed, and, in the long run, the murderers
escaped untried and unpunished, through the influ-
ence of Rome, to which place they were welcomed back
and honoured, as having performed a meritorious
deed. Such was the spirit of Popery, and such it
remains unaltered still. In all ages of its history,
the service of the church has led its votaries to
outrage the tenderest affections of the human breast,
and perpetrate deeds at which humanity shudders.
The blind fanatical zeal which it inculcates and
fosters, stops short at no enormity, however black,
which will promote its interests, while the church
approves and sanctifies the crime !

Such, substantially, is the account given of this
tragedy by Claude Senarcle, who was a personal
friend of Juan Diaz, had accompanied him since
he left Paris, and slept in the same bed with him
the night before his death. Its accuracy has not
been called in question ; on the contrary, the Roman
Catholics applauded the deed, and, as we remarked
already, heaped honour on its perpetrators. It is,
then, a true exemplification of the spirit of Popery ;

FRANCISCO ENZINAS. 109

only one, however, and not the greatest of her many
atrocities, performed under the outraged name of
religion.

As we have before observed, Francisco Enzinas,
the second of the three, had continued to reside at
Louvain, after his brothers had gone to Paris and
Marburg. His situation, however, was far from
being either pleasant or safe. He was surrounded on
all hands by those who would gladly have seized on
anything that savoured of a leaning to the reformed
doctrines, and consigned the ofiender to the dun-
geons of the Inquisition, and thence to the stake.
But he was in some degree compensated for the
irksomeness of his position, by an intimate corre-
spondence with Albert Hardenberg, a friend of
Melanchthon, and preacher to the Cistercian monas-
tery of Adwert. By him he was introduced to
John ^ Lasco, one of the most eminent of the
reformed clergy of Poland. In a letter to the latter,
Enzinas says, in reference to the course he intended
to pursue : — " All the world will, I know, be in
arms against me on account of the resolution which,
in opposition to the advice of some worthy men, I
have now formed, to devote myself to literary pur-
suits. * But I will not suffer myself, from respect
to the favour of men, to hold the truth in un-

* He had been intended by his parents for the army.

110 ENZINAS' TRANSLATION

righteousness, or to treat unbecomingly those gifts
which God in His free mercy has been pleased to
confer on me, unworthy as T am. On the contrary,
it shall be my endeavour, according to my ability,
to propagate divine truth. That I may do this by
the grace of God, I find that it will be necessary for
me, in the first place, to fly from the Babylonian
captivity, and to retire to a place in which I shall
be at liberty to cultivate undefiled religion and true
Christianity, along with liberal studies. Tt is, there-
fore, my purpose to repair to Wittenberg, because
that city contains an abundance of learned professors
in all the sciences ; and I entertain so high an es-
teem for the learning, judgment, and dexterity in
teaching, possessed by Philip Melanchthon in par-
ticular, that I would go to the end of the world to
enjoy the company and instruction of such men.
I, therefore, earnestly beg that, as your name has
great weight, you will have the goodness to favour
me with letters of introduction to Luther, Philip
[Melanchthon], and other learned men in that city."
After going, in accordance with this resolution,
to Wittenberg, he remained there but a short time,
being encouraged by the Eeformers to return to the
Low Countries, and engage in a work which had
long occupied his thoughts — the translation of the
New Testament into Spanish, for the use of his

OP THE NEW TESTAMENT. 1 ] 1

countrymen at home. Like many of these at the
time, and since, he seems to have been ignorant that
such a translation had ever been made before. As
early, however, as the 12th or 1 3th century, various
parts of the Old and New Testament had been
translated into the 8panish language ; for we find
Juan I. of Aragon, as early as 1233, publicly pro-
hibiting the use of the Scriptures in the vernacular,
and ordering all copies of them to be given up to
the clergy to be burned, on pain of their holders
being suspected of heresy. Some years later, how-
ever, Alfonso X. of Castile caused a translation to
be made into the Castilian dialect for the use of his
subjects. Other versions were subsequently made
by various translators, but they were all suppressed
and gradually destroyed by the Inquisition ; so that
for more than half a century before the time of
Enzinas, Spain was entirely destitute of the Scrip-
tures in the vulgar tongue. The translation which
he now undertook was that of the New Testament
into the dialect of Castile. On its completion, he
submitted the work to the Divines of Louvain.
They refrained from either censuring or approving
it, on the grounds of their ignorance of Spanish,
but expressed their general opinion that such a work
would tend to promote heresy, by introducing the
vulgar and unlearned to a knowledge of doctrines

112 THE TESTAMENT DECLARED DANGEROUS.

which it was the especial province of the church
to explain. For such discouragement, however, he
was prepared, and he did not, therefore, allow it
to prevent the carrying out of his design. It was
printed in 1543 at Antwerp, under the title of "The
New Testament, that is, the New Covenant of our
only Redeemer and Saviour Jesus Christ, translated
from Greek into the Castilian language."'' The
short-sighted censors to whom it had to be sub-
mitted, objected to the introduction of "the new
covenant," as savouring of Lutheranism, and accord-
ingly insisted on the title-page being cancelled, and
a new one, free from the obnoxious sentence, being
substituted in its stead. The next phrase to which
objection was taken were the words "our only
Redeemer." The particle was expunged, and the
work of pruning went on. But finding that the
objections of his critics would amount to a virtual
veto upon his book, Enzinas, on his own re-
sponsibility, proceeded with its publication.

Soon after this, the Emperor visited Brussels, and
was presented with a copy of the work by the
translator, who requested permission to circulate
it in Spain. This was granted, on condition that
it was found, on further examination, to contain
nothing contrary to the faith. The royal chaplain,
to whom it was submitted for examination, speedily

IMPBISONMENT AND ESCAPE OP ENZINAS. 113

condemned it as dangerous in the highest degree,
and upbraided Enzinas as a double-dyed heretic.

He was at once denounced to the Inquisition,
and charged with the additional crimes of having
translated one of Luther's works, and of having
lived on terms of intimacy with the " arch-heretic "
Melanchthon. As no charge of heresy, however,
could be substantiated, his escape, after an imprison-
ment of fifteen months, was connived at, and he
fled to Wittenberg to his old friends. After his
escape, he was formally condemned by default, and
sentence registered against him, as we learn from
a letter of Melanchthon to a friend.* After men-
tioning this, the Reformer goes on to say : — " He
sets out for your town to ascertain the fact, and
to learn if there are any letters for him from that
quarter. I have given him a letter to you, both
that I may acquaint you of the cause of his journey,
and because I know you feel for the calamities of
all good men. He evinces great fortitude, though
he evidently sees that his return to his parents and
native country is now cut off. The thought of the
anguish which this will give to his parents distresses
him. These Inquisitors are as cruel to us as the
thirty tyrants were of old to their fellow-citizens at
Athens ; but God will preserve the remnant of his

* Melanchihonis Epis., col. 858 ; cited by Dr. Mc Crie.

114 VARIOUS TRANSLATIONS

church, and provide an asylum for the truth some-
where."

In 1548 Francisco came to England, where he
was warmly received by Edward VI. and Cranmer ;
" but returning soon after to the Continent, he resided
sometimes at Strasburg and sometimes at Basle,
where he spent his time in literary pursuits, and
in the society of the wise and good."

Besides Enzinas' translation of the New Testa-
ment, other versions of various parts of the Old
were made shortly after his work appeared. They
were printed in the Low Countries, and smuggled
into Spain. Amongst these detached portions of
the Bible, were the seven penitential Psalms, the
Song of Solomon, the Lamentations of Jeremiah,
and the book of Job. In addition to these, the
Jews appear to have had early translations of the
Old Testament in the Spanish language. Two
editions were printed at Venice, soon after the
appearance of Enzinas' New Testament. This latter,
however, was one of the chief aids to the spread
of the reformed religion in the Peninsula.

But, besides Enzinas, there were other Spanish
Protestants abroad, who did much to disseminate a
knowledge of the Scriptures and the Lutheran doc-
trines amongst their countrymen at home. Among
these truly patriotic men were Juan Perez, Cassiodoro

OF THE SCRIPTURES. 11^

de Eeyna, and Cypriano de Valera. The first of
these was a native of Montilla, in Andalusia. In
Id 27 he was sent to Eome as envoy by the Emperor,
and succeeded in procuring a suspension of the de-
cree by which the writings of Erasmus had been
condemned by the Spanish divines. On his return,
he became head of the College of Doctrine at Seville,
where he first became acquainted with Egidio and
the other Protestants of that city. His orthodoxy
soon became suspected, and he was obliged to leave
Spain to escape the fangs of the Inquisition. Whilst
abroad, in Geneva and various parts of Germany,
he translated the New Testament and the Psalms
into Spanish, in addition to which he drew up a
catechism and summary of Christian doctrine in the
same language, all of which appeared about the year
1557, and were printed at Venice. He died at Paris
not long after, and bequeathed the whole of his for-
tune to the printing of the Bible, for the use of his
countrymen, in their own language. After his death,
Cassiodoro de Keyna finished the translation of the
whole Bible, and had it printed at Basle in 1569.
This version was revised and corrected by Cypriano
de Valera, who published an edition of the New
Testament in London in 15D6, and one of the whole
at Amsterdam in 1602. Besides these, the New
Testament was translated into Basque by Juan Liz-

116 EFFORTS OF THE INQUISITION

zarago, in 1571. Though these three versions last
mentioned did not appear till after the suppression
of the Eeformation in Spain, they were of much
service to many who still clung privately to its doc-
trines, and a re- issue of De Val era's edition at a
recent period led the Spanish clergy to make a
translation of their own — a step which they would
have been the last to take, if not forced to it by
the extensive circulation of these more faithful ver-
sions.

Enzinas' version of the New Testament had been
suppressed in the Netherlands soon after its publica-
tion, but a large number of copies of it had been
already conveyed into Spain, and extensively cir-
culated. But for the help given to the Eeformation in
Spain by the translations of the Scriptures by Perez
and Enzinas, its doctrines would have made but
little progress in that country merely by the efforts
of individual teachers. Introduced at once to the
fountain-head of religious knowledge, those amongst
whom the Bible was circulated soon discovered the
glaring contradiction of the Eomish tenets to the
pure and simple doctrines of Scripture, and were
thus prepared to profit by the instructions of De la
Fuente and his fellow-labourers in the cause of
truth.

If the Inquisition had had to contend only with

TO SUPPRESS THE SCRIPTURES. Il7

these single heralds of the reformed faith, its ter-
rible machinery would have speedily crushed every
effort they could have put forth ; but, secret and
wide-spread as was the agency it employed, the
silent but powerful pioneers of Protestantism, sent
forth by these translators to do their enlightening
work amongst the benighted population, set at
nought its all but omnipotent powers of detection,
and prepared the way for the teachers of the Lutheran
faith. The Inquisitors were more than suspicious
that such books were in circulation and extensively
read, but were unable to crush an agency so much
dreaded. In vain did they enjoin upon all con-
fessors to threaten their penitents with the most
terrible thunders of the Church, if they read thje
Bible in the vulgar tongue, or knew of its being
read, or even possessed, without giving information
to the clergy. To no purpose did they issue pro-
clamations, declaring that such as did so would, if
discovered, be held suspected of heresy, and treated
accordingly. The Bible was read, and the Reforma-
tion prospered, in spite of all their efforts to prevent
it. Those who, like De la Fuente, conducted the
Protestant movement, knew well the dangers to
which they were exposed, and the kind of enemies
with whom they had to contend, and, accordingly,
proceeded with all possible caution. In this way

118 THIRST FOR RELIGIOUS KNOWLEDGE.

they baffled the efforts of their opponents^ and con-
tinued to labour successfully in spreading amongst
the people that knowledge which makes wise unto
salvation. In Spain it would not have been possible
to print translations of the Scriptures, even if they
could have been safely made ; but abroad, in coun-
tries where the Reformation was befriended by the
public authorities, as in many of the German States,
it was easily accomplished. This once done, the im-
portation of these, and of other books written by the
Reformers, was the chief difficulty to be overcome. ,
But, animated by a zeal which no superable obsta-
cles could resist, the Spanish Protestants abroad
managed to have them largely circulated amongst
their countrymen at home, and thus promoted the
great cause of truth more effectually than they could
have done had they been present to aid it by their
individual efforts. The thirst for religious know-
ledge which the introduction of the Bible produced
was irresistible. Valladolid and Seville, the two
most important cities in the kingdom, were the
great fountains whence flowed to the country, through
the surrounding towns and villages, as so many
branch streams, the instruction sought for. The
churches in them were centres, from which all action
primarily emanated, and to which the scattered
friends of the reformed faith looked for direction

HOW SUPPLIED. 119

and support. To them were the books, imported
from Germany and the Low Countries, consigned,
and by them were they circulated far and wide
through the country. At all the seaports of the
kingdom, and at the land-passes of the Pyrenees,
officers were placed, to examine every traveller and
every package entering the Peninsula ; but to little
purpose. Notwithstanding their utmost vigilance,
the prohibited works were introduced, and thus the
work of the Reformation went silently but steadily
on.

120 CONST ANTINE PONCE.

€\n^ttt Bk%

PROGRESS OF THE REFORMED DOCTRINES.

CoNSTANTiNE PoNCE had returned from the Low
Countries,* and occupied the post left vacant by the
condemnation and death of Egidio, at the period
at which we digressed in our narrative of the
progress of the reformed doctrines in Seville.
Under his fostering care and wise superintendence,
the drooping cause recovered from the shock which
it had received, and put forth fresh effort for the
spread of evangelical religion in the surrounding
country. In his office of divinity professor in the
College of Doctrine, to which he had been appointed

* He had been previously appointed one of the royal
chaplains, and had been sent to the Netherlands to accom-
pany prince Philip.

CANON MAGISTRAL. 121

on his return from Flanders in 1555, he delivered
a course of lectures on the Scriptures, which had the
effect of opening the minds of many of the young
men who heard him to the truth. He was appointed,
about the same time, to preach every alternate day
during Lent in the Cathedral Church, where his
fervid eloquence gathered overflowing congregations,
to whom he imparted much valuable scriptural in-
struction, given, however, so judiciously as to excite
no suspicion as to his soundness in the Eomish
faith. His growing popularity as a preacher had
led the Chapter to fix their eyes upon him as the
person best fitted for the place of Canon Magistral,
which was then vacant through the death of Egidio,
its last possessor. For these canonries, of which
there are three in every episcopal church in Spain,
it was necessary that the candidates should go
through literary trials. From this competition
Egidio had been exempted, but his great un-
popularity immediately after his induction, and
before the change in his preaching, which we have
attributed to the influence exerted by De Valer, had
led the Canons to record a resolution that for the
future it should be gone through in the case of
every candidate for the office.

Constantine refused to submit to the trial,
ridiculing such tests as absurd and puerile ; but

122 PREACHER

at last, when the day was fixed on which it was
to be held, he yielded to the solicitations of his
friends, and consented to offer himself as a candidate
on the usual conditions. The knowledge of this
prevented the appearance of any but two rivals, one
of whom afterwards declined to enter the lists with
an opponent of such profound and varied learning ;
but the other, spurred on by the enemies of Con-
stantine, engaged in the literary battle. Failing to
overthrow his competitor by polemical skill, he
altered his tactics, and fell back upon personal
charges and insinuations, in which he accused his
rival of having been married before he had taken
orders, and of other irregularities of conduct sub-
sequently. To these were added an unsupported
and unsuccessful charge of heresy, which Constantine
triumphantly repelled to the satisfaction of all but
his defeated and chagrined enemies. He carried the
election, and entered upon the duties of his new and
influential office with increased popularity and use-
fulness.

To his labours in the pulpit, Constantine super-
added effort to disseminate scriptural knowledge
throughout the country by means of the press. His
writings were characterized by great simplicity and
earnestness of style, and were thus fitted for impart-
ing instruction to minds of the humblest capacity.

AND AUTHOR. 123

Among tliese were a catecliisin of elementary in-
struction on scriptural subjects j a treatise on Chris-
tian doctrine, drawn up in the form of a dialogue
between a teacher and his pupil ; an exposition of
the first Psalm, in four sermons j the confession of
a sinner, in which the simple doctrines of the Gospel,
"poured forth from a contrite and humbled spirit,
assume the form of the most edifying and devotional
piety." In his summary of Christian doctrine, which
was printed at Antwerp, and to which was appended
" the Sermon of Christ our Eedeemer on the Mount,
translated, with explanations, by the same author,"
he employed a style more fitted for educated readers
than he had done in his other writings, without,
however, rendering the work above the easy compre-
hension of all. It was divided into two parts, in
the first of which he discussed the articles of faith,
proposing to reserve the more peculiar doctrines of
Catholicism for examination in the second. This
last, however, he thought it neither prudent nor safe
to publish at the time, preferring to reserve it for
a time when there would be less certainty of its
own suppression and of its author's condemnation.
That period he never lived to see, and consequently
the second part of his treatise was never given to
the world. The opinions which he broached in the
first part, though expressed with all the caution

124 NARROW ESCAPE

which the time and circumstances called for, and
relating only to the cardinal truths of the Gospel,
without touching upon any of the distinctive tenets
of the Reformers, were sufficiently obnoxious to the
ruling clergy to have very nearly led to his being
denounced to the Inquisition. From this, however,
his great popularity for a time preserved him.

De Montes* relates an incident which occurred
shortly after the return of Constantine from Flanders,
and which nearly brought about the discovery and
apprehension of the adherents of the reformed faith
in and around Seville. As an illustration of the
precarious tenure of their safety, we may transcribe
it. One Maria Gomez, a domestic of Francisco
Zafra, a doctor of laws, and who, though vicar of the
church of San Vincente, was secretly attached to the
Protestant doctrine, became deranged in mind. Like
her master, she had been, prior to her insanity, a
constant and devoted attendant on the private
meetings of the Protestants, and had in this way
become well acquainted with them all. No sooner
had her intellect become disordered, than she con-
ceived a most violent antipathy to her former fellow-
worshippers, and called out in her ravings for
vengeance upon them as heretics. Escaping from
the confinement to which it had been found necessary

* Inquu. Ei»p. Artes. Detec, pp. 294, 295.

OF THE REFORMERS. 125

to subject her, she sought out the Inquisitors, and
upbraided them with criminal negligence in defend-
ing the purity of the faith against heretics, of whom
she declared Seville to be full. Though her derange-
ment was evident, the Inquisitors fancied that her
charges had, at least, some foundation, and therefore
readily took down the names of those whom she
denounced as converts to the reformed faith. Zafra,
her master, was sent for, and very wisely obeyed the
summons. With much presence of mind, he ridi-
culed her accusation against himself, and requested
the judges to pay no attention to the ravings of an
insane woman. Having succeeded in convincing
them of her lunacy, he allayed the supicions which
her statements had at first excited, and satisfied them
that the charges which she had made were merely
the visionary workings of her disordered brain. She
was given up to her master, and placed in closer con-
finement than before. Thus, by the prudent cool-
ness of Zafra — or rather, by the watchful providence
of Him who warded off the blow which had nearly
fallen on His infant Church — the danger was averted,
and the Protestants saved.

Shortly before this narrow escape, the friends of
the reformed faith in Seville had formed themselves
into a Church, and chosen Christobal Losada, a
doctor of medicine, for their pastor. They met

126 REFORM IN THE CONVENTS.

regularly for worship, in the house of Isabella de
Baena, a lady of distinguished rank. Besides her,
many of the Sevillian nobility had secretly joined
themselves with the Church, and laboured zealously
to promote its interests. Amongst the most distin-
guished were Don Juan Ponce de Leon and Domingo
de Guzman. Don Juan was a younger son of Don
Rodrigo, Count de Baylen, cousin-german of the
Duke d'Arcos, and closely allied to many of the
chief nobility of Spain. Domingo de Guzman was
a son of the Duke de Medina Sidonia, and belonged
to the order of the Dominicans. Both he and Don
Juan laboured hard to disseminate a knowledge of
the Lutheran doctrines. Besides these, many of the
clergy had become secretly attached t-o the cause of
truth, and successfully endeavoured to introduce the
Protestant tenets into several of the religious insti-
tutions in Seville. Of these, we may mention the
Dominican Monastery of St. Paul j the convent
of St. Elizabeth ; and more particularly still, the
Hieronymite Convent of St. Isidro del Campo, about
two miles from Seville. In this last, the new
doctrines had especially progressed. The man by
whom they had been introduced was Garcia de Arias
— from the whiteness of his hair, commonly called
Dr. Blanco. This singular individual deserves a
passing notice. He has been well described as

DR. BLANCO. 127

having possessed " an acute mind and extensive
information ; but he was undecided and vacillating
in his conduct, partly from timidity, and partly from
caution and excess of refinement. He belonged to
that class of subtle politicians, who, without being
destitute of conscience, are wary in committing
themselves, forfeit the good opinion of both parties,
by failing to yield a consistent support to either, and
trusting to their address and dexterity to extricate
themselves from difficulties, are sometimes caught in
the toils of their own intricate management."

Though secretly attached to the reformed cause, he
was the public champion of the orthodox faith, and
was looked to by the clergy as an authority in all
matters of disputed doctrine or discipline in the
Church. Soon after his reception of the Lutheran
tenets, he began to introduce them gradually, but
with characteristic caution, into the convent to which
he belonged, by impressing on his brother-monks, in
his sermons and private conversations, that true
religion did not consist in chanting vespers and
matins, or in the performance of any of the empty
ceremonies with which their time was generally
occupied, but in the devotional study of the word of
God, and in the discharge of the duties which it
inculcates. He thus, by degrees, instilled into their
minds a longing for a purer and more spiritual piety,

128 DISCONTINUANCE OF INDULGENCES.

than the monotonous devotions to which they had
been accustomed. But, true to the description of
his vacillating character, which we have quoted, he
suddenly changed, and became as zealous in recom-
mending, as he had been previously in deprecating,
the bodily mortifications and other monastic observ-
ances of his order. This sudden and unaccountable
change in one to whom they had looked up as their
example and guide, led the monks to suspect the
soundness of his judgment, or the sincerity of his
purpose in thus altering his course. In their per-
plexity, they consulted Egidio, and by his instruc-
tions and advice, were confirmed in their attachment
to the doctrines against which Arias now so zealously
inveighed. In 1557, they received a large supply
of the Scriptures in the Spanish language, the study
of which contributed to build them up still more
strongly in the faith of the GospeJ. A complete
reformation of the internal policy of the convent
was effected ; the absurd practices which had long
been established were abandoned ; papal indulgences
and pardons, which had previously been a source of
much profit, were discontinued j and the debasing
habits of monachism were superseded by strict
attention to the duties of a spiritual religion.
Though compelled to shield themselves, by continu-
ing to use the monastic dress, and to celebrate mass,

JUAN DE REGLA. 129

everything else was changed, and the convent re-
sembled a Christian family, more than a fraternity
of superstitious monks.

Nor were the effects of this salutary change con-
fined to the monastery of St. Isidro. The monks
became industrious propagators of the reformed
doctrines in the surrounding country, and succeeded
in introducing them into other monasteries of their
own order, several of whose most distinguished
members incurred the suspicion of heresy. Of
these, we may mention Juan de Eegla, prior of
Santa Fe, and provincial of the Hieronymite order
in Spain. This eminent scholar and divine had
taken part in the proceedings of the Council of Trent,
at its second meeting, where he was a strenuous
defender of the Romish Church. But havincr subse-
quently embraced some of the reformed doctrines, he
was denounced to the Inquisition of Saragossa, and
condemned to do penance, and abjure the doctrines
against which objection had been taken. After his
recantation, he became one of the most violent
opponents of Lutheranism in Spain, and was subse-
quently appointed chaplain to the Emperor, and,
after his abdication, to Philip II. Besides De Regla,
another distinguished Hieronymite, Francisco de
Villalba, was charged with adoption of Lutheran
doctrines, and tried before the Inquisition of Toledo.

130 REASONS WHY THE EMPEBOR

Failing to establish the charge at first, they remanded
him, till further evidence could be obtained to justify
a conviction ; but before that could be procured, he
sunk under the hardships of his imprisonment, and
escaped a more cruel though less lingering death.

From these facts, the reader will be able to form
some idea of the extent to which Protestantism had
spread in this part of the Peninsula. Its adherents,
it will have been seen, were not confined to the
lower ranks, but numbered amongst them not a few
of the most distinguished of the nobility and clergy.
In spite of the jealous vigilance of the Inquisition,
the new doctrines were gradually leavening the popu-
lation, and preparing for themselves such a general
adoption, as would speedily have constituted a power
that might successfully have braved even its formid-
able hostility. Charles, though devotedly attached
to the Romish Church, and a bitter enemy of the
reformed doctrines, was engaged in that series of
brilliant campaigns, which had established his power
over Milan, NapleSj Sicily, and the Netherlands ; and
though doing his utmost to crush the Reformation
in the land of its birth, he paid but little attention
to the spread of its doctrines in his paternal domin-
ions, trusting to the Inquisition to protect Spain
from the contamination of heresy. He had enough
of the religious element in his character to make

OPPOSED THE REFORMATION. 131

him zealous in the service of the Church ; but
political ambition was too preponderating a feature,
to allow spiritual affairs to hold any but a secondary-
place in his thoughts. He opposed Luther and the
Protestant princes of Germany, not so much because
they opposed Eome, but because they were erecting a
barrier against the accomplishment of his own
cherished designs of universal dominion in Europe.
By the aid of the Papacy, he had succeeded in
crushing the liberties of Spain, and substituting in
their stead an iron despotism ; and by the help of
the same power, he sought to establish his absolute
sway, not only over the States of Germany, but over
nearly all the nations of the Continent. His first
objection to Protestantism in his home dominions
would have arisen out of its tendency to indispose
the people to submit to the despotic authority which
he exercised ; and then, doubtless, his educational
attachment to Popery would have led him to maintain
its rule unimpaired, and to oppose everything calcu-
lated to weaken its power over the minds of his
people. His absence, however, in Germany, relieved
the Spanish Protestants from the additional obstacles
which his presence would have thrown in the way
of the spread of their doctrines ; and they were
not slow in making the most of the prolonged
opportunity.

132 EXTENSION OF THE REFORMATION

Whilst Protestantism was spreading as we have
seen, in and around Seville, its adherents in Valla-
dolid were neither idle nor unsuccessful in propa-
gating the reformed doctrines in the city and the
adjacent country. The Church, under Domingo de
Koxas, had largely increased, and reckoned amongst
its members, as in Seville, several of the clergy and
nobility. Not a few of the monasteries were
leavened by the Lutheran tenets, and had secretly
abandoned many of the peculiar institutions of
Popery. From Valladolid the new doctrines spread
widely through the ancient kingdom of Leon. In
the cities of Toro, Zamora, Aldea del Palo, and
Pedeosa, and throughout the diocese of Palencia, it
had many converts, and amongst them not a small
number of the resident clergy. Spreading further
through Old Castile to Soria, in the diocese of Osma,
it reached Logrono, on the borders of Navarre, in
which last-named town its adherents were very
numerous. This extensive diffusion of the reformed
opinions was largely owing to the efforts of Don
Carlos de Soso, a nobleman of distinguished learning
and rank. In Toro, of which he was mayor, in
Zamora, and the episcopal city of Palencia, he
afforded valuable aid to the reformed cause, by circu-
lating Lutheran books, and by his personal instruc-
tions. In New Castile, the Reformation was less

FAVOURED IN VARIOUS COUNTRIES. 133

successful, although it had many friends in Toledo,
and other parts of that country. In the provinces
of Granada, Murcia, and Valencia, it had made con-
siderable progress ; but in the kingdom of Aragon
it had been especially prosperous. In Saragossa,
Huesca, Balbastro, and in many other towns, churches
had been formed, and a vigorous agency organized,
for the diffusion of the new doctrines in the sur-
rounding districts.

How powerfully does this success of the Protestant
opinions, in such a country as Spain, illustrate the
inherent excellence and energy of Christianity ! In
the face of the unparalleled diflBculties against which
the Reformation had to contend, it spread and
gained ground rapidly. In no other country had
it such obstacles to overcome. In Germany, many
of the princes had embraced its doctrines, and
were exerting their influence on its behalf. Its
adherents were protected and favoured ; the Bible
was freely circulated in the vernacular tongue, and
its doctrines explained and enforced from almost
every pulpit. In Scotland, its advantages were
almost equally great. In England, the quarrel which
led Henry VIII. to throw off submission to the Pope,
resulted in similar blessings to the people, as regarded
their religious liberty. And even in France, and
several of the Italian States, there were many checks

134 PECULIAR OBSTACLES

on persecution, which afforded a kind of protection
to those who embraced the reformed doctrines. But
in Spain, not one of these advantages existed.
Everything that could fetter the intellect, and crush
the earliest tendency to dissent from the faith of
Rome, was brought to bear upon the people. The
Inquisition had its police in every corner of the
land ; the feeblest expression of sympathy with the
forbidden doctrines marked its author as their lawful
prey, and secured for him a dungeon or the stake.
National prejudice was fostered and intensified ;
social disgrace was attached to the crime of apostasy,
not only, as we have elsewhere remarked, to the party
condemned, but to his latest posterity. To them the
heirloom of infamy descended, without losing a
particle of its original blackness. How great
must have been the essential power of the Gospel, to
surmount such difficulties, and gain for itself so wide
a reception ! Nothing short of " the power of God "
could have borne down such opposing barriers, and
have subdued so many enemies, by its gentle yet
powerful influence, exerted silently and without
parade, on the minds of a people so unlikely to
embrace and hold fast its truths. It would have
spread like sunlight through the darkened land, had
these obstacles to its progress been removed. One
of its bitterest enemies admits, that "had not the

IN SPAIN. 135

Inquisition taken care in time to put a stop to tbese
preachers, the Protestant religion would have spread
throughout Spain like wild-fire ; people of all ranks,
and of both sexes, having been wonderfully disposed
to receive it."* Another of its enemies makes a
similar confession : — " All the prisoners in the In-
quisitions of Valladolid, Seville, and Toledo, were
persons abundantly well qualified. I shall here pass
over their names in silence, that I may not, by their
bad fame, stain the honour of their ancestors, and
the nobility of the several illustrious families which
were infected with this poison. And as these pri-
soners were persons thus qualified, so their number
was so great, that had the stop put to that evil been
delayed two or three months longer, I am persuaded
all Spain would have been set in a flame of fire by
them." t A late Protestant writer (already quoted)
on this period of Spanish ecclesiastical history says
to the same effect. " So powerful," remarks Dr.
Geddes, " were the doctrines of the Keformation in
those days, that no prejudices nor interests were any-
where strong enough to hinder piously- disposed
minds, after they became thoroughly to understand
them, from embracing them. And that the same
doctrines have not still the same divine force, is

* Paramo, His. Inquisitionis.
+ lUescas, His. Pontifical, torn. ii. f. 451, a.

136 THREE GREAT DOCTRINES.

neither owing to their being grown older, nor to
Popery's not being so gross, nor to any change in
people's natural dispositions, but is owing purely to
the want of the same zeal for those doctrines in their
professors, and especially for the three great doctrines
of the Reformation, which the following martyrs
sealed with their blood ; which were, that the Pope
is Antichrist j that the worship of the Church of
Rome is idolatrous ; and that a sinner is justified in
the sight of God by faith, and through Christ's, and
not through his own, merits."*

Amongst a people so disposed to embrace and hold
fast the pure doctrines of the Gospel, it needed re-
pressive measures of no common violence to put
down the Reformation.

* Miscellaneous Tracts, vol. i. p. 450 [preface to Spanish
Martyrology].

CHANGE OF SOVEREIGNS, 137

^^ttt Mm%

DISCOVERT OF THE PRO PEST ANTS, AND SUPPRESSION OF THE
REFORMATION.

Whilst the Eeformation was thus gradually pro-
gressing, Spain had changed sovereigns. In 1556,
the Emperor Charles, vt^orn out by military toils and
the ravages of the gout, carried into execution his
long- meditated project of retiring from the world?
to spend the last years of his life in monastic devo-
tions. Having assembled the States of the How
Countries at Brussels, he seated himself for the last
time in the chair of state, and there, surrounded by
a splendid retinue of the princes of the empire and
grandees of Spain, amidst the most imposing solem-
nity ever witnessed since the days of the Eoman

13S EESIGNATION OF EOYAL POWER

Caesars, he surrendered to his son Philip all his
territories, jurisdiction, and authority, in the Nether-
lauds.

In his address to the kneeling prince, he said, —
"It is in your power, by a wise and virtuous ad-
ministration, to justify the extraordinary proof which
I give this day of my paternal affection, and to
demonstrate that you are worthy of the extraordinary
confidence which I repose in you. Preserve an in-
violable regard for religion ; maintain the Catholic
faith in its purity ; let the laws of your country be
sacred in your eyes ; encroach not on the rights of
your people ; and, if the time should ever come when
you shall wish to enjoy the tranquillity of private
life, may you have a son to whom you can resign
your sceptre with as much satisfaction as I give up
mine to you." In recounting to his deeply affected
audience the many great schemes which he had
planned and carried out, he observed — " Either in a
hostile or pacific manner, I have visited Germany
nine times, Spain six times, France four times, Italy
seven times, the Low Countries ten times, England
twice, Africa as often j and while my health per-
mitted me to discharge the duty of sovereign, and
the vigour of my constitution was equal in any
degree to the arduous office of governing such ex-
tensive dominions, I never shunned labour nor

BY CHARLES V. 139

repined under fatigue ; but now, when my health
is broken, and my vigour exhausted by the rage of
an incurable distemper, my growing infirmities ad-
monish me to retire ; nor am I so fond of reigning,
as to retain the sceptre in an impotent hand which
is no longer able to protect my subjects. Instead
of a sovereign, worn out with diseases and scarce
half alive, I give you one in the prime of life,
already accustomed to govern,* and who adds to the
vigour of youth all the attention and sagacity of
maturer years."

In a few weeks afterwards, he resigned with equal
solemnity, and in an assembly no less splendid, the
crown of Spain and its dependent territories, re-
serving only a pension of 100,000 crowns, to defray
the expense of his few attendants, and afford him a
small sum for acts of benevolence and charity. The
place which he chose for his retreat was the monas-
tery of St. Juste, one of the most secluded and
delightful situations in the province of Estremadura.
There, in silence and solitude, burying the vast
schemes of military glory and political dominion,
which, for half a century, had filled with terror all
the nations of Europe, he spent the evening of his
life in practising the most rigid and self-denying

* He had already resigned his Italian dominions to Philip,
on the occasion of his marriage.

140 PHILIP, THE NEW SOVEREIGN,

devotions of his religion, and died on the 21st of
September, 1558. Thus ended the life of the most
powerful sovereign Europe had seen since the days
of Charlemagne and the Empire of the West;

Philip differed much from his father. A gloomy,
cruel, and vindictive bigot from his youth, he proved
himself the determined and unrelenting enemy both
of civil and religious freedom. The blind tool of
Rome, he stopped short at no injustice or cruelty to
establish its authority and promote its most nefa-
rious designs, as well amongst his own subjects as
wherever else his influence extended. From such
a sovereign the Spanish Protestants had little mercy
to expect. The history of Protestantism in the
Peninsula, from the beginning of his reign till the
suppression of the Reformation, is little more than a
martyrology of its adherents. With this painful
subject this and the following chapter will be mainly
taken up.

Shortly after the accession of Philip, he applied to
Pope Paul IV, for the increase of the powers of the
Inquisition. The request was readily complied with
by the Pontijff, and bulls, ad lihitum, were issued,
enlarging the authority of the Holy Office to any
required extent. All the decisions of previous coun-
cils and popes, against heretics and schismatics, were
renewed, and Valdes, the Inquisitor-General, was

EXTENDS THE INQUISITION. 141

charged to put forth increased effort for the dis-
covery and punishment of all such offenders,
" whether they were bishops, archbishops, patriarchs,
cardinals or legates, barons, counts, marquises, dukes,
princes, kings, or emperors." Agreeably to these
instructions, Valdes issued orders to all the tribu-
nals of the Inquisition throughout the country, to
search for heretical books, and to make a public
auto-da-fe of all such as they should discover, and
at the same time to make increased effort for the
discovery of heretics themselves.

Simultaneously with these directions from the
Inquisitor-General, Philip published a law by which
death, with confiscation of property, was the punish-
ment to be inflicted on all who sold, bought, read,
or possessed any of the forbidden books. In the
following year the Pope issued a bull, enjoining all
confessors to examine their penitents on this point,
and to charge them, under pain of excommunication,
to denounce all whom they knew, or had solid reason
to suspect, to be guilty of this offence ; by the same
bull, neglect of this duty by the confessors subjected
themselves to the pains and penalties threatened
against their penitents. The Pontiff further autho-
rized the Inquisitor-General to hold, during two
years from the day on which the order was given,
an investigation into the orthodoxy of all bishops,

142 INCREASED POWER OF THE INQUISITION,

archbishops, patriarchs, and primates in Spain ; inas-
much as he had reason to suspect that not a few of
these dignitaries were favourably inclined to the
reformed faith.

In addition to these measures, a further stimulus
was given to informers by a renewal of the royal
ordinance, which had fallen into disuse, and by which
a fourth of the property of those condemned for
heresy should be given to the individuals by whom
they had been denounced. But even these barbarous
and unjust decrees were not considered sufficient to
accomplish the extinction of the dreaded Reforma-
tion. And in 1559, the Pope issued another brief,
by which the Inquisitors were ordered to deliver
over to the secular arm — in other words, to execu-
tion— all who had been, or should be, convicted of
having taught the reformed opinions, even though
they had not relapsed and should be willing to
abjure their errors. What magnified the atrocious
injustice of this law was, that it was intended to
operate against those who had offended prior to its
enactment, and thus apply to the prisoners who were
then within the dungeons of the Holy Office.

The publication of these and other similar pontifi-
cal ordinances so increased the functions of the In-
quisition, that it was thought necessary to appoint
additional agents. To support these, the Pope

HOW SUPPORTED. 143

authorized the Inquisitors to appropriate certain
ecclesiastical revenues ; besides which, they were
empowered to raise an extraordinary subsidy of a
hundred thousand ducats of gold to be paid by the
clergy. This heavy tax upon the income of the
holy fathers tested the sincerity of their zeal against
heresy. The wisdom and justice of the other pon-
tifical decrees had not been questioned ; but, on the
contrary, every injunction they contained, however
iniquitous, had met with their ready obedience.
Not so with this last, however ; it required the
exercise of the secular power to enforce compliance
with its provisions.

The Council of the Supreme had been led to
apply for these additional powers from the king and
Pope, by information which they received at the
close of the year 1557, of the importation of a large
quantity of Bibles and Lutheran books from Germany
and the Netherlands, and likewise of the fact that
the adherents to the Protestant doctrines were
rapidly multiplying throughout the country, not-
withstanding all the efforts which had been made
for the suppression of heresy. Koused by this in-
formation, they resolved to call into action more
prompt and vigorous instruments than they had
yet employed. They reorganised the Inquisitorial
police, and adopted an improved system of detective

144 FAITHFULNESS AND TREACHERY.

agencies, which speedily resulted in the wished-for
discoveries. The first of these led to the arrest of
Julian Hernandez, a native of Villaverda in the
district of Campos, and the man by whom the
proscribed books had been introduced into Spain.
Hernandez had shown a copy of the New Testament
to a smith, who denounced him to the Inquisition
as a zealous propagator of the new doctrines.
Having at the first examination before the Inquisi-
torial tribunal refused to inform against his associates,
he was put to the torture. He endured it heroically,
and refused to give any clue by which his fellow-
Protestants could be discovered ; at the same time
openly confessing his own attachment to the re-
formed cause, and glorying in having been the
instrument in supplying his ignorant and misguided
countrymen with such treasures as Bibles in their
own tongue. Promises, threats, and tortures, were
alike useless j he would inculpate none.

Failing to elicit any information from Hernandez,
they had recourse to other and more successful
measures. By means of the confessional, they in-
duced the wife of one Juan Garcia, a member of
the Protestant church in Valladolid, to inform against
her husband, and to disclose the place in which the
friends of the reformed faith were accustomed to
meet for worship. Her treachery was rewarded by

AN INQUISITORIAL COUP-DE-MAIN. 14o

a pension for life, paid from the public funds. Just
about the same time at which the Inquisitors made
this discovery in Valladolid, the members of the
Holy Office in Seville succeeded in obtaining similar
information about the members of the Lutheran
church in that city.

Thus furnished with the knowledge which they
had so long endeavoured to procure, the Inquisitors
determined " at once to crush the viper's nest " by
simultaneous action of all their tribunals throughout
the country. Instructions were sent to all their
agents to be ready to co-operate with the chief
institutions in Valladolid and Seville, when the
signal for action should be given. Having made
these arrangements, and taken care to provide
against the escape of the victims from the meshes
of the net spread for them, they began the arrests
on the same day throughout the various localities
about which information had been received. In
one day two hundred were seized in Seville, a
number which speedily increased to eight hundred.
In Valladolid eighty were apprehended, whilst the
number of arrests by the other tribunals throughout
the country was proportionate.

This unexpected coup-de-main of the Inquisition
filled the panic-stricken Protestants with the wildest
alarm, and deprived them for the time of the cool

146 WHOLESALE ARRESTS

self-possession on which alone their safety depended.
Thrown into disorder by the apprehension of those
who could control and advise them, many brought
upon themselves, by their imprudent precipitancy,
the fate from which they were endeavouring to
escape. Under the influence of the sudden terror
which the unsuspected blow had inspired, some
surrendered themselves to the Inquisition, and
confessed their connection with the reformed church,
vainly hoping to purchase clemency by self-accusa-
tion j whilst others attempted to cross the Pyrenees
or escape by sea, but were followed and overtaken.
Others, again, who succeeded in reaching a Protes-
tant country, were entrapped by the agents of the
Inquisition, and brought back into Spain, to expiate
their heresy and flight by the endurance of multiplied
cruelties. The number of the arrested was so great
in Seville, that all the prisons and convents, besides
several private houses, were crowded with the objects
of Inquisitorial vengeance.

Amongst those who succeeded in making good
their retreat, were twelve of the Hieronymite monks
of the Convent of San Isidro del Campo, already
mentioned. They left Spain separately, and by
difierent routes, and met in Geneva, after wander-
ing through various parts of the Continent for
twelve months. Their flight was speedily known

AND PROLONGED IMPRISONMENTS. 147

by the Inquisition, and drew down its most violent
persecution on those of their order who remained
behind. This death-blow to Protestantism in Spain
was given in the beginning of the year 1558.

Having thus secured their victims, the next object
with the Inquisition was to dispose of them in such
a manner as would most effectually strike terror into
the minds of the whole nation. They were anxious
to render the closing scene in the terrible tragedy
which they contemplated, as great a triumph to
their church as possible ; and, for this purpose,
delayed the vengeance which they had in store for the
imprisoned Protestants for nearly two years. During
that period they endeavoured to secure as many
recantations as false promises of mercy, which they
inwardly resolved to extend to none, could induce
their captives to make. But, though lavish in
assurances of pardon to all who would abjure their
heresies, or inform against any who had not been
denounced, they succeeded in gaining but few
penitents out of the vast numbers arrested.

In the mean time the unhappy victims, subjected
to every hardship and cruelty which Inquisitorial
ingenuity could invent, endured all the misery which
the severity of their imprisonment, and the uncer-
tainty of the fate which awaited them, could not
fail to produce. Amongst those whose health broke

148 SUFFERINGS OF CONSTANTINE.

down under these protracted sufferings, was Con-
stantine Ponce de la Fuente. He had been one of
the first whom the eager Inquisitors had pounced
upon. They had long suspected his attachment to
the reformed faith, but had failed, through the
extreme caution with which he acted and spoke, in
procuring any evidence of his heresy that could
justify the arrest of a man so much in favour with
the Emperor, and so universally beloved by the
people. It was not to be expected, however, that
want of satisfactory evidence would save a man
whose popularity they had so long viewed with a
jealous eye, when they were vested with the power
of almost indiscriminate arrest. When brought
before the tribunal of the Inquisition, he maintained
his innocence, and repelled the charges which had
been brought against him, so successfully as to
baffle all their efforts to convict him of holding any
opinions opposed to the established creed. As there
had been little beyond suspicion of heresy to justify
his arrest at the first, he would, in all probability,
have succeeded in escaping, had not an unforeseen
occurrence given them proof of his heterodoxy
which it was useless to attempt to disprove.

Amongst those who had been apprehended at the
same time as himself, was Dona Isabella Martinia,
a widow lady of high respectability. Before the

DISCOVERY OF MSS. 149

usual inventory of the property of tlie accused had
been taken, her son, Francisco Bertran, had managed
to conceal his mother's jewels from the agents of the
Holy Office. A treacherous servant, however, had
watched him, and some time after gave information
to the Inquisitors. An alguazil was immediately
despatched to demand the surrender of the hidden
valuables. As soon as the officer reached the house,
the alarmed youth, without waiting to hear the
object of his visit, declared his readiness to deliver
up what the alguazil had come for. Leading him
to a concealed recess, separated from the main
chamber by a thin panelling, Bertran disclosed a
large number of Lutheran books and several works
in manuscript, which Constantine had entrusted to
his mother for greater security a short time before
the storm had burst upon the reformed cause in
Seville. The surprised alguazil concealed his delight
at this unexpected discovery, and intimated his
desire to have the concealed jewels likewise given
up. Valuable as were the latter, the Inquisitors
prized the books even more highly, since they fur-
nished the evidence which the holy fathers had so
long sought for in vain. Amongst the manuscripts
was the second part of Constantine's Suinmary of
Christian Doctrine, already noticed, in which he
treated of the main points in dispute between the

150 CONVICTION OF DE LA FUENTE,

Romish and Reformed Churches ; discussing at
great length the doctrines of justification by faith,
good works, the sacraments, purgatory, and other
questions at issue between the contending parties.
Constantine at once acknowledged himself to be the
author of the volume, and declared his firm belief
in all the sentiments it contained, adding, " It is
unnecessary for you to produce further evidence ;
you have there a candid and full confession of my
belief. I am in your hands ; do with me as seemeth
to you good."

Having convicted Constantine, they next en-
deavoured to elicit from him information against his
friends, but in vain ; no means which they could
employ could induce him to disclose anything by
which any of his fellow- prisoners might be injured.
After the death of the Emperor, he was removed
from the apartment in which he had been till then
confined, to a damp and noisome dungeon, to
which neither air nor light had access. This increase
to the previous rigours of his imprisonment in a
short time brought on dysentery, of which he died,
after having been confined for nearly two years.
So great were the cruelties to which he had been
exposed, that he was heard to exclaim, a short time
before his death : — " O my God ! are there no
Scythians in the world, no cannibals, more fierce

AND PROHIBITION OF HIS WORKS. 151

and cruel than Scythians, into whose hands thou
canst throw me, so that I may but escape the talons
of these wretches ? " Having thus been spared the
fate his enemies had in store for him, they endea-
voured to compensate themselves for the loss by
circulating the report that he had committed suicide
in his prison. This calumny, though repeated by
some subsequent Romish historians, was abundantly
disproved by the evidence of a young monk of
San Isidro, who had been confined in the same
dungeon with Constantine, and attended him in his
last moments.

It was customary after the condemnation of any
one who had written books, to prohibit them. In
the case of Constantine's works there was a peculiar
difficulty which presented itself, inasmuch as they
had been already published with the approbation
of the Inquisitors, who were now thoroughly puzzled
as to how they should act in the matter. After
much consideration, they at last resolved to forbid
their circulation ; " not," they said, " because they
had found anything in them worthy of condemnation,
but because it was not fit that any honourable memo-
rial of a man doomed to infamy should be transmitted
to posterity."

Besides Constantine, Olmedo, a man almost
equally distinguished for his learning and piety,

152 UNPARALLELED CRUELTY AND PERJURY

sunk under the horrors to which the captive Protes-
tants were subjected in the dungeons of the Inquisi-
tion. Nor was he the only additional victim ; many
whose names have not come down to us, perished
either on the rack or amid the poisoned atmosphere
and filth of their overcrowded cells. Of the vast
numbers imprisoned, one only had recourse to the
fearful remedy of suicide. The unhappy being who
thus, in a fit of distraction, put an end to her life,
was one Juana Sanchez, a heata, or kind of secular
nun. Havinor obtained the knowledo^e of her con-
demnation, she anticipated the dreadful consequence
by cutting her throat with a pair of scissors, and
after lingering a few days, died of the wound. The
wonder is that more of her fellow-prisoners were
not driven to end their sufferings by the same
desperate means.

Not the least of the cruelties to which they were
exposed, were those practised by the Inquisitors for
the purpose of obtaining evidence from some of the
prisoners by which others of their number might be
convicted. One instance will be sufficient to give
the reader an idea of the means employed for this
purpose. Amongst those who had been arrested in
Seville on suspicion of heresy, were the widow and
three daughters of Fernando Nugnez, a native of
Lepe. They were all put to the torture to elicit

TO EXTORT CONFESSION. 153

a confession, but in vain. Failing in this, one of
the Inquisitors sent for the youngest daughter, and
pretending to sympathize with her and pity her
sufferings, bound himself by an oath not to betray
her if she would confess to him, and that he would
save her mother, her sisters, and herself. Trusting
to his oath, and ensnared by the specious promises
of liberty which he held out, she revealed all the
tenets which they had embraced ; whereupon the
perjured wretch, having thus atrociously gained his
end, immediately ordered her to be put to the rack
a second time. She was at once brought back to
the torture-chamber, and then, in presence of the
judges, was compelled tO repeat the confession which
she had made in reliance upon the oath of her
deceiver. Under this second infliction of the
torture, she let fall expressions which supplemented
her previous admissions, and led to the arrest and
ultimate condemnation of several of the other ad-
herents to the reformed faith.

So notoriously cruel and unjust were the means
employed to extort evidence from the prisoners
against each other, during this period, that a public
investigation into the Inquisitorial proceedings was
called for, and to some extent obtained, by several
individuals of high rank in the church. Puigblanch
tells us that about the year 1560, Senor Enriquez,

154 A CHARGE LAID AGAINST THE INQUISITION.

Abbot of the then Collegiate Church of Valladolid,
laid a remonstrance before Philip II. against the
Inquisition of that city, in which he speaks of the
arbitrariness and avarice of its ministers, and how
extremely advisable it would be for magistrates of
the Crown to take part in its trials. In proof of
its designing conduct, he asserts that in the cause
of Canon Cazalla, the officers had allowed the nuns,
who, like him, were imprisoned on the plea of
Lutheranism, to converse with each other, in order
that by confirming themselves the stronger in their
errors, they might be enabled to condemn them.
As an additional proof of this, and of the vice
having extended to other tribunals, he adds that,
having himself entered, in company with the Bishop
of Palencia, into the prisons of the Inquisition of
Toledo, and reduced a Flemish prisoner to penance
who had not relapsed, the Inquisitors refused to
grant him the pardon of his life, owing to the Auto
of the faith being already proclaimed, whereas,
according to practice, he had not lost his right to
receive pardon till his sentence was read on the
platform. As a testimony of their avarice, he affirms
that the Inquisitors of Valladolid had a shameful
dispute among themselves respecting the distribu-
tion of the confiscated money belonging to the
unfortunate Cazalla.*

* Inquisition Unmasked, vol. ii. pp. 273, 274.

A GRAND AUTO ON TEINITY SUNDAY. 155

Having now spent nearly two years in hunting
out victims, and in torturing those whom they had
taken, for the purposes we have mentioned, the
Holy Office resolved to signalize its triumphs by the
celebration of autos-da-fe throughout the kingdom.

The first of these dreadful exhibitions occurred at
Valladolid, on Trinity Sunday, May 21, 1559. To
render the occasion more solemn, and to increase
the dignity of the Inquisition in the eyes of the
people, Don Carlos, the heir apparent, and his aunt
Juana, queen dowager of Portugal, and regent of
the kingdom during the absence of Philip in the
Netherlands, made their appearance in the midst of
the assembly, seated on a throne erected for them on
one side of the grand Square between the Church
of St. Francis and the house of the Consistory,
where the execution was to take place.

Before the ceremony began, an oath was ad-
ministered to them, in which they pledged them-
selves to support the Inquisition, and to reveal
faithfully and promptly whatever they might discover
which threatened any danger to the faith. Don
Carlos, who was at that time only fourteen years
of age, is said to have inwardly vowed from that
moment an eternal enmity to the infamous insti-
tution which thus sought to fetter his understanding,
and establish a power of control over his future

156 PENITENTS OF NOTE,

course. Besides the prince and his aunt, most of
the principal nobility of Spain were present to
witness the performance of the fearful tragedy.

The execution, and the various ceremonies attend-
ing it, lasted from six o'clock in the morning till
two in the afternoon, a period which was hardly
long enough to satiate the morbid curiosity of the
assembled crowds. When the usual sermon had
been preached at the commencement of the pro-
ceedings, by Melchior Cano, Bishop of the Canaries
and one of the most celebrated of the divines
present, the prisoners were brought forward to
undergo their respective sentences. They were
thirty in number, of whom sixteen were penitents ;
of the remaining fourteen, two were burnt alive,
whilst the rest were first strangled and then com-
mitted to the flames.

Amongst the penitents who appeared at this auto,
were several individuals of high rank. Of these
we may mention Don Pedro Sarmiento de Rojas,
son of the first Marquis de Poza. This nobleman
was stripped of his decorations as chevalier of the
order of St. James, and condemned to wear a
perpetual sanbenito, to be imprisoned for life, and
at death to have his memory declared infamous.
Dona Maria de Figueroa, his wife, was likewise
sentenced to perpetual imprisonment, and to wear

PUNISHED AT THE AUTO-DA-FE. 157

the sanbenito and coroza.* His nepliew, Don Luis
de Rojas, eldest son of the second Marquis de Poza,
and grandson of the Marquis d' Alcaguizes, was
banished from Madrid, Yalladolid, and Palencia, yet
forbidden to leave the kingdom ; and deprived of
his right of succession to the titles and estates of
his father. Don Luis' aunt, Dona Ana Henriquez
de Eojas,t wife of Don Juan Alonso de Fonesca
Merxia, appeared in the sanbenito, and was con-
demned to be separated from her husband, and to be
confined for the remainder of her life in a monastery.
Don Juan de Ulloa Pereira, brother of the Marquis
de la Mota, was Hkewise sentenced to wear the
sanbenito and to be imprisoned for life, with loss of
all his honours as Commander of the Order of
St. John of Jerusalem ; but, having subsequently
appealed to the Pope, he was restored to his rank,
and exempted from the punishment to which he
had been condemned. Juan de Vibero Cazalla, an
inhabitant of Valladolid, his wife, Dona Silva de
Bibera, his sister. Dona Constanza, widow of an
officer in the royal household, Maria de Saavedra,
widow of Juan Cisueros de Soto, and Leonora de

* A coronet made of pasteboard, and worn by those upon
whom any punishment was inflicted by the Inquisition.

+ Llorente calls this lady a nun of the convent of St.
Cataline, in Valladolid.

158 TIMIDITY OF CAZALLA.

Cisneros* (whose husband, Antonio Herezuelo, an
advocate, was burned alive) together with four other
individuals of inferior rank, were condemned to wear
the sanbenito, have their property confiscated, and be
imprisoned for life.

Of the fourteen who suffered death on this
occasion, the greater part were persons of high
respectability, and some of them held offices of
importance in the Church. Amongst the latter
was Dr. Augustin Cazalla, whose zeal for the re-
formed faith we have already noticed, t When the
storm burst upon the Protestants, he and his
mother. Dona Leonora de Vivera, his three brothers,
and two sisters, were amongst the first of those who
were consigned to the dungeons of the Inquisition.
Though equally attached to the Lutheran doctrines,
this divine, whom a Popish historian J acknowledges
to have been "a most eloquent preacher," was
inferior in courage to many of his fellow-prisoners.
When brought before the judges, he denied most
explicitly that he had ever preached the reformed
doctrines, though he confessed that he had privately
embraced them. He expected by this declaration,
and by the submission with which he received the

*She was subsequently burnt, after several years' im-
prisonment.

t Supra, p. 62. Ij: Paramo.

VICTIMS STRANGLED AND BURNED. 159

rebukes of the Inquisitors, to escape any further
punishment than that which was usually inflicted
on reconciled penitents. But on the evening before
the auto-da-fe, he was visited by one of the fathers,
who acquainted him with his sentence. At the
place of execution he was granted the poor favour
of being strangled before he was thrown into the
flames. Though this was the boon usually granted
to relapsed penitents, there is no reason to believe
that he became reconciled to the Church of Kome
before his death. This report was spread by the
Inquisitors, but if he had done so, " why," says the
author of the Miscellaneous Tracts, "did they burn
him, having never relapsed 1 And would it not
have been more for their interest to have suffered
him to live, and to have obliged him to have preached
to his converts to follow his example, than to have
burnt him out of the way ? "

The same fate was shared by Cazalla's sister. Dona
Beatrice de Yibero ; by Dr. Alonso Perez, " a priest
of great learning and exemplary piety, and a most
fervent preacher ;" by Don Christobal de Olcampo,
chevalier of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, and
almoner to the grand prior of Castile ; by Don Chris-
tobal de Padilla ; Dona Catalina de Ortega, daughter-
in-law to the fiscal of the royal council of Castile ;
and six others, all of whom were Protestants, ex-

160 BURNED ALIVE,

cept Gonzales Baez, a relapsed Jew. Cazalla's
mother, Dona Leonora de Vivera, having died be-
fore the celebration of this auto, her bones were dug
up, and, together with her effigy, were committed to
the same flames which destroyed the bodies of her
children. Her house, in which the Protestants had
been accustomed to meet for worship, was razed to
the ground, its site was sown with salt, and a pillar
was erected on the spot, with an inscription, stating
the cause of its demolition. This last monument of
Inquisitorial fanaticism and impotent revenge re-
mained standing till removed by the French, during
their temporary occupation of Spain in 1800.

The two individuals who were burned alive on
this occasion, were Francisco de Yibero Cazalla,
brother of Dr. Augustin, and parish priest of Hor-
migos, in the bishopric of Palencia, and Antonio
Herezuelo, the advocate. Llorente inclines to the
opinion, that the former when under the torture
recanted, and begged to be reconciled to the com-
munion of the Romish Church ; but whether this
be the case or not, it is certain that he manifested
no such wishes on the day of his execution, but
heroically refused to purchase strangulation on the
usual terms. Herezuelo endured his fate with a
courage worthy of the cause for which he suffered.
The only thing that affected him was, the sight of

FORTITUDE OF HEREZUELO. 161

his wife amongst the penitents instead of being at
the stake. Kefusing to pay attention to the two
monks who accompanied him to the place of execu-
tion, he was addressed by Dr. Cazalla, who sought
thus unworthily to purchase clemency for himself.

In his account of this auto-da-fe, the popish his-
torian, Illescas, thus describes the admirable courage
with which he endured the horrors of the stake : —
"The bachelor Herezuelo suffered himself to be
burned alive with unparalleled hardihood. I stood
so near him, that I had a complete view of his per-
son, and observed all his motions and gestures. He
could not speak, for his mouth was gagged, on
account of the blasphemies which he had uttered j
but his whole behaviour showed him to be a most
resolute and hardened person, who, rather than yield
to believe with his companions, was determined to
die in the flames. Though I marked him narrowly,
I could not observe the least symptom of fear, or
expression of pain ; only there was a sadness on his
countenance beyond anything I had ever seen. It
was frightful to look on his face, when one considered
that in a moment he would be in hell, with his
associate and master, Luther." "He perished in
silence," says Llorente.

On the return of Philip from the Netherlands,
where he had left the Duchess of Parma as regent
M

162 COMPARATIVE ESTIMATE

during his absence, the Holy Office, on the 8th of
October in the same year, again led its victims to
the grand square of the city of Valladolid. Philip
attended, in company with his son, his sister Juana,
the prince of Parma, three ambassadors from France,
and a large and brilliant assemblage of the nobility
and clergy of the kingdom.

This second batch of victims consisted of twenty-
nine persons, sixteen of whom were penitents, the
remaining thirteen being destined for the flames.
The case of one of the former affords a striking
illustration of the indifference of the Inquisitors to
the worst of crimes, so as they tended to further
the accomplishment of their own designs.

Amongst the penitents was one Antonio Sanchez,
a native of Salamanca, who had been found guilty
of falsely accusing a Jewish Christian of circumcising
a child, for which supposed violation of the law, the
accused convert was condemned to be burnt to death.
The perjury of Sanchez was clearly proved, and
though not merely natural justice, but the circum-
stances under which the Holy Office acted, demanded
that such crimes should be visited with the weightiest
penalties, as an example to others ; he was sentenced
to endure no more severe punishment than 200
lashes of the whip, and to be condemned to the
galleys for five years ; while, on the very same occa-

OF CRIME. 163

sion, they condemned a poor barber — one Pedro
d'Aguilar — to receive 400 lashes, and to be sent to
the galleys yor life, for no greater offence than playing
some tricks in the assumed character of a familiar of
the Inquisition ! Such was the comparative esti-
mate formed by the holy fathers of meditated mur-
der and the personation of one of their own alguazils.
The most distinguished of the other penitents were
three nuns of the order of Belen, Dona Francisca
Zuniga de Baeza, a heata of Valladolid, Dona Isabella
de Castilla, wife of Don Carlos de Soso, and her
niece^ Dona Catalina. Don Carlos himself was
amongst those who perished in the flames. He had
been arrested in Logrono, in which city and the
surrounding districts we have seen how zealously
and successfully he laboured in the cause of evan-
gelical truth. During a long and painful imprison-
ment, he bore with unshaken firmness and constancy
the cruelties to which he was subjected, and resisted
equally every effort of his tormentors to induce him
to inform against others, or to abjure the faith which
he had embraced. Instead of seeking to secure his
own safety by any compromise, he boldly avowed,
when brought before the judges, his devoted attach-
ment to the doctrines of the reformed creed, and
denounced the Romish Church as alike fatal to the
temporal and spiritual well-being of men. When

164 HEROIC DEATHS

informed of his sentence on the evening before his
execution, he asked for writing materials, and wrote
out a confession of his faith, which was entirely
Lutheran ; he said that this doctrine, and not that
taught by the Romish Church, which had been cor-
rupted for several centuries, was the true faith of
the Gospel ; that he would die in that belief, and
that he offered himself to God in memory of the
passion of Jesus Christ. "It would be difficult,"
says the secretary of the Inquisition, "to express
the vigour and energy of his writing, which filled
two sheets of paper." On the morning of his execu-
tion he was gagged, to prevent his addressing the
other prisoners; when he arrived at the stake the
gag was removed, and the attendant friars renewed
their efforts to induce him to recant, but in vain.
His reply was, "If I had time, I would convince
you that you are lost, by not following my example.
Hasten to light the wood which is to consume me."
He died without a struggle or a groan.

Pedro de Cazalla, a second brother of Dr. Augustin
Cazalla, was another of the victims on this occasion.
He was arrested on the 23rd of April, 1558, and,
on being brought before the tribunal of the Holy
Office, admitted his attachment to the Lutheran
faith. Some time after, he expressed his willing-
ness to return to the communion of the Romish

OF VARIOUS MARTYRS. 165

Church, but his request was not complied with,
because he had preached the heretical doctrines. On
the day preceding the auto, he was asked to confess,
but refused ; the horrors of the stake, however, over-
came him. As the flames were about to be lighted,
he asked for a confessor, after which he was strangled
and then cast into the flames.

Dominic Sanchez, a priest of Villamediana, who
had been converted by De Soso, shared the same fate
as Cazalla.

Domingo de Roxas, son of the Marquis de Poza,
had been arrested in the garb of a layman at Cala-
horra, on his way to Flanders. He made his first
declaration before the Inquisition, on the 13th of
May, 1558, on which and some subsequent appear-
ances, he let fall some expressions which led the
judges to order him to be tortured, with a view to
elicit fuller information. Having entreated that
he might be spared the horrors of the question, as
he dreaded it more than death, the order was re-
voked, on condition that he would reveal all he
knew. He then begged to be reconciled, but refused
to give any information that could injure his fellow-
prisoners. On the night before his death, he seems
to have recovered his firmness, for he refused the
services of the priest who had been sent to confess
him, and declared his determination to die in the

166 DONA MAKINA DE GUEVARA.

reformed faith. TKis declaration he renewed in
presence of the king on the following day, but
coupled it with an appeal to the royal mercy on
behalf of himself and his fellow-sufferers. Philip,
sternly ordering the guards to move him on to the
stake, replied, "I would carry wood to burn my
own son, were he such a wretch as thou." When
fastened to the stake, his courage again failed j he
demanded a confessor, received absolution, was
strangled, and then burned.

Juan Sanchez, a servant of Pedro de Cazalla, had
been arrested at Turlingen and sent back to Valla-
dolid, whence he had endeavoured to escape, under
the assumed name of Juan de Vibar, when the
storm first broke out. He resisted all attempts to
induce him to recant, both during his confinement
and at the stake. When the cords which bound
him were burned through, he darted to the top of
the scaffold, seeing from whence the firmness with
which Don Carlos de Soso endured his sufferings, he
returned to the stake, and, calling for more fuel,
perished without a struggle.

Dona Euphrosyne Rios, a nun of the order of
St. Clara, had been convicted of heresy by twenty-
two witnesses ; when fastened to the stake, she
called for a confessor, and having received absolution
was strangled and afterwards burned.

HER CONSTANCY. 167

Of the others who suffered death on this occasion,
we shall mention only Dona Marina de Guevara, a
nun of St. Helen, in Valladolid. When arrested,
she had at first confessed her defection from the
established faith, and expressed her willingness to
recant. This, however, did not save her ; she was
condemned to expiate her heresy at the stake. Her
cousin; Valdes, the Inquisitor-General, used all his
influence on her behalf, but the ordinary judges
resisted his interference as an encroachment upon
their authority, and refused to revoke their sentence.
He then commissioned Don Alphonso Tellez Giron
and the Duke of Osma to visit the accused, and
try to obtain such a recantation as would save her
life. The attempt failed. Instead of complying,
she expressed her regret at the partial recantation
which she had already made, and declared her entire
belief of the Lutheran tenets. Don Alphonso was
sent a second time, accompanied by one of the
Inquisitors, but with no better success than at first.
The only favour Valdes could obtain for her was
that she should be strangled before being committed
to the flames.

Such were the two famous autos-da-fe of Valla-
dolid. In the next chapter we shall give an account
of those which were celebrated in Seville and other
parts of the kingdom.

168 THE FIRST AITTO

€|iifto iig^t|.

SUPPRESSIVE MEASURES CONTINUED AND COMPLETED.

The reader will have noticed how comparatively
large a proportion of the Protestant captives in
Valladolid had purchased life, or a less protracted
kind of death, by a profession of penitence. It was
for this reason that Valladolid was preferred to
Seville, as the scene on which the Holy Office was
to celebrate its first triumphs over heresy; for,
although Seville contained by far the greatest num-
ber of prisoners, the efforts of the Inquisitors in
that city had been much less successful in gaining
back converts to the faith than in Valladolid. A
tolerably correct estimate of the probable sincerity
of these recantations may be formed from what has
been said j yet they afforded the holy fathers an

AT SEVILLE. 169

opportunity, which they highly prized, of exhibiting,
before the sovereign and the people at large, an
array of triumphs which they could not boast of
in any other city in the kingdom.

The fires of the Inquisition in Seville were lighted
for the first time on the 24th of September, 1559.
The place chosen for the celebration of this auto
was the square of St. Francis, in which was a large
and brilliant assemblage of the nobility and superior
clergy, besides vast crowds of the populace, whom
the same bigotry and morbid curiosity had brought
together. Four bishops were present, the coadjutor
of Seville, those of Largo, the Canaries, and Tarra-
zona, the last-mentioned prelate being the resident
Vice-Inquisitor- General in Seville.

One hundred and one prisoners appeared on this
occasion, of whom twenty- one suffered death, and
eighty were condemned to various kinds of severe
penance. The most distinguished person amongst
the former was Don Juan Ponce de Leon, cousin
to the Duke d'Arcos, and related to the Duchess
de Bejar, both of whom were present at his execu-
tion. A short time after his arrest, he had been
induced by the false promises of liberty for himself
and his friends, which had been as plentifully given
in Seville as in Yalladolid, to plead guilty to the
indictment which had been drawn up against him ;

170 GONZALEZ AND HIS SISTERS.

but hardly had he done so, when he perceived the
deception which had been practised, and recalled the
partial expression of penitence with which his con-
fession had been accompanied. From that time till
the day of his execution, he stedfastly adhered to
his declaration of attachment to the Lutheran faith,
and refused to purchase his life at the expense of
his religion. At the stake he maintained the same
unwavering resolution, and proved his constancy by
his death as he had done by his life.

The same dignified and resolute demeanour was
exhibited by Don Juan Gonzalez and his two sisters,
who perished with him. Don Juan was a priest of
Seville, and one of the most celebrated preachers
in Andalusia. At twelve years of age he had been
imprisoned on suspicion of Mahometanism, because
he was descended of Moorish ancestors, but was
afterwards liberated. When urged to recant his
Lutheran errors, he refused, affirming that his
opinions were founded on the holy Scriptures, and
therefore could not be erroneous. As he entered
the square of St. Francis, he sung the 109th Psalm,
and then turned to encourage his sisters, whom the
awfulness of the scene was beginning to depress.
At the stake, the attendant friars urged his sisters,
in repeating the creed, to insert the word Roman
in the clause relating to the " CathoUc Church," but

GARCIA DE ARIAS. 171

they professed their resolution strictly to imitate
the example of their brother, and Juan persisting in
his refusal to alter the confession which he had
already made, they were strangled, and he hurled
alive into the flames.

It would be impossible to record, in the space
at our disposal, all the instances of constancy on
the one side, and barbarity on the other, to be met
with in the history of this auto-da-fe; but these
martyrs of Seville exhibited, almost without an
exception, a heroism worthy of the cause for which
they died, and such as was equalled only in in-
dividual cases by those who suffered elsewhere.

Thus did the once wavering and inconstant Garcia
de Arias meet his fate. A thorough revolution had
gradually taken place in his character, some time
before the flight of his brother monks of San Isidro
and the arrest of the Protestants in Seville. He
had laid aside the equivocal caution by which his
leanings towards Lutheranism had been concealed,
and was amongst the earliest of those who were
consigned to the dungeons of the Triana. During
his imprisonment, he manifested a firmness of at-
tachment to the reformed cause, which neither
torture nor promises of life and liberty could shake.
He ascended the scaffold, leaning on his staff", but
went to the stake manifesting a spirit of unflinching

172 MARIA DE BOHORQUES.

fortitude, and rejoicing that God had thought him
worthy to suffer for so good a cause. Three of his
brother-monks suffered with him.

Another conspicuous sufferer was Christobal de
Losada, pastor of the Protestant church in Seville.
When he arrived at the stake, the friars who attended
the ceremony importuned him to renounce his errors,
but he replied by entering into a connected and
well-sustained argument in defence of the Lutheran
doctrines ; when the friars, perceiving that the
spectators listened eagerly to what he advanced,
began to speak in Latin, in which language he
continued his defence with the same ease and ele-
gance as he had done in Spanish.

In addition to these instances of constancy and
fortitude which have been noticed, we must not
omit to mention the case of Maria de Bohorques..
She was one of those remarkable women who some-
times become distinguished for proficiency in
branches of learning which are without the usual
circle of female studies. The natural daughter of
one of the highest grandees in the kingdom, she
had been educated under the most celebrated masters,
and at an early age could read the Latin version of
the Scriptures and the Commentators. Whilst a
pupil of Dr. Egidio, she had received from him the
elements of a sound scriptural education, which pre-

HER TALENTS AND HEROISM. 173

disposed her the more to that freedom of thought
upon matters of doctrine which subsequently led her
to examine and embrace the Lutheran opinions.
Egidio used to say that " none could discourse with
her of Divine matters (and she did not care to talk
of any other) without being made both wiser and
better by her." She was not twenty-one years of
age when arrested as a Lutheran ; and when brought
before the Inquisitors, she avowed her entire belief
in the doctrines of the reformed religion, and de-
clared them to be the truths of the Bible which
Luther and his associates had freed from the in-
crustments of error and superstition. On being put
to the torture, she let fall some expressions which
were soon after made the foundation of a charge
against her sister Juana, but refused to abjure any
of the opinions she had embraced. In vain was it
that deputation after deputation was sent to per-
suade her to recant ; they returned each time with
increased admiration of the extraordinary learning
and talents which she displayed in defence of the
reformed doctrines. On the night before her exe-
cution, a last effort was made to induce her to return
to the Romish Communion, but she told the friars
by whom it was made, that any previous doubts
which she might have had about the Lutheran doc-
trines were now removed, since their opponents had

^174 OTHER LADIES OF DISTINCTION.

been able to advance no argument for which she
had not been prepared with a solid and conclusive
answer. She appeared at the stake with a cheerful
countenance, and exhorted her fellow -sufferers to
bear their trial with hope and resignation. When
importuned by the friars to confess and be recon-
ciled, she turned away, remarking that the time for
disputation was past, and that the few minutes she
had to live would be spent in meditating on the
passion and death of Christ, to reanimate the faith
by which she was to be justified and saved. Pity
for her youth, and admiration of her surprising
talents, led some of the monks who stood by to
make one more effort to save her ; they begged her
to repeat the creed, which she did without hesitation,
but immediately began to explain its articles accord-
ing to the Lutheran sense. Her exposition was
cut short by a signal to the executioner, who placed
the fatal collar upon her neck, and in an instant she
had ceased to breathe. Her body was then thrown
into the flames.

Besides Maria de Bohorques, three other ladies of
distinction suffered death on this occasion : Dona
Isabella de Baena, at whose house the Protestants of
Seville had been accustomed to meet for worship;
Dona Maria de Vinces, and Dona Maria Cornel. After
describing the death-scenes of some of those whom

SECOND AUTO AT SEVILLE. 175

we have now mentioned, Dr. Geddes says, "The
blessed saints I have here named, though they were
the leaders, were for numbers but a small part of that
glorious army of Spanish Protestant Martyrs burnt
at this time by the Inquisition ; and who, for the
exemplary piety of their lives, and the admirable
patience and courage wherewith they triumphed over
death, in the most terrible of all its shapes, were
nothing inferior to the martyrs of any other nation
or age." *

Little more than a year was suffered to elapse
before the Inquisitors of Seville thought another
auto necessary to clear the religious atmosphere of
the noxious vapours of heresy, and for this purpose
once more prepared the machinery of death. This
second grand auto-da-fe took place on the 22nd of
December, 1560. Fourteen individuals were burned
in person, and three in eflSgy ; thirty-four were sub-
jected to penances, and the reconciliation of three
others was read before the commencement of the
ceremonies. The effigies were those of Egidio, Con-
stantine Ponce, and Juan Perez.

Julian Hernandez, who had advanced the reformed
cause so much by importing Bibles into the Penin-
sula, was one of those who sealed their fidelity by
their death. During his imprisonment he bore the
* Miscellaneous Tracts, vol. i. p. 473.

176 TWO ENGLISHMEN BURNED.

torture, to which he was frequently subjected, with
a fortitude far above his physical strength, and
remained faithful to the cause which he had espoused.
When brought to the place of execution, he turned
to his fellow-prisoners, and exhorted them not to
give way, saying, "this is the hour in which we
must show ourselves valiant soldiers of Jesus Christ.
Let us now bear faithful testimony to his truth
before men, and within a few hours we shall receive
the testimony of his approbation before angels, and
triumph with him in heaven." When the pile was
lighted, he showed no symptoms of fear, but called
upon the executioners to heap up the wood around
him. The guards cut short his sufferings by plunging
their lances into his half-burnt body.

Three foreigners, of whom two were Englishmen,
were amongst the sufferers on this occasion^ One
of the Englishmen was named William Burton ; he
was a London merchant, and had visited Spain with
a vessel laden with goods, with which he intended
trading at various Spanish ports. The only offence
of which he had been guilty, was that of speaking
too freely of the Inquisition and the superstitions of
the country. On the case of this sufferer the late
secretary of the Holy Office remarks, — "Let it be
granted, that Burton was guilty of an imprudence,
by posting up his religious sentiments at San Lucar

THE CASE OF WILLIAM BURTON. 177

de Barrameda, and at Seville, in contempt of the
faith of the Spaniards ; it is no less true that both
charity and justice required, that in the case of a
stranger who had not fixed his abode in Spain, they
should have contented themselves with warning him
to abstain from all marks of disrespect to the religion
and laws of the country, and threatening him with
punishment if he repeated the offence. The Holy
Office had nothing to do with his private sentiments ;
having been established, not for strangers, but solely
for the people of Spain."

Not content with the condemnation of Burton,
they seized his vessel, and were about to appropriate
its valuable cargo. Information, however, had been
privately sent to England respecting the arrest of
Burton, and the other merchants, to whom the ship
in part belonged, immediately despatched a person
named John Frampton, to demand the restitution of
their property. Finding that the documents which
he bore furnished unanswerable proofs of the justice
of his claims, they managed to delay the process as
long as possible, but at last, when they could no
longer equivocate, they had recourse to a charge of
heresy, on which Frampton was arrested, and thrown
into the dungeons of the Inquisition. He appeared
at this auto-da-fe amongst the penitents, and was

178 MAEIA GOMEZ.

subsequently imprisoned for a year, with loss of the
property which he had been sent to recover.

On this additional act of cruelty and gross in-
justice, Llorente remarks : — " This is a remarkable
proof of the mischief produced by the secresy of the
Inquisitorial proceedings. If the affair of John
Fronton [Frampton] had been made public, any
lawyer would have shown the nullity and falsehood
of the inst't'uction. Yet there are Englishmen who
defend the tribunal of the Holy Office as a useful
institution, and I have heard an English Catholic
priest speak in its defence."

Two other foreigners shared the fate of Burton.
One of them was William Brook, a Southampton
sailor, who had been condemned for an offence
similar to that alleged against his countryman ; the
other was a Frenchman, of Bayonne, named Fabi-
anne, who was likewise a merchant.

The reader will remember the case of Maria
Gomez, whose denunciation of her fellow-Protestants
during an attack of mental derangement, had nearly
brought ruin upon the reformed cause in Seville.
After her recovery, she had been received back into
Protestant fellowship, and continued till the time of
the general arrest, a consistent and useful member
of the Lutheran church. At the period mentioned,
she and four female relatives fell into the hands of

GASPARD DE BENAVICES. 179

the Inquisition: a three years' imprisonment was
unable to shake her constancy, and she now appeared
on the scaffold, in company with her relatives,
evincing a composure of mind which proved the
sincerity and earnestness of her religious convic-
tions.

Amongst the penitents was one Gaspard de Bena-
vides, an alcalde of the Inquisition at Seville.
There was hardly any species of cruelty or injustice
of which this wretch had not been guilty towards
the prisoners. He had kept up a system of pecu-
lation, by which he had deprived them of part of
their scanty allowance of provisions, which he after-
wards sold them at an exorbitant price. If any of
them ventured to complain, he removed them to a
dark and filthy dungeon, where he confined them for
a fortnight at a time, to punish them for murmur-
ing. His cruelties at last led to a riot, which ended
in the discovery of his guilt. Yet, he was merely
charged with "having failed in zeal and attention
to his charge ; " and was deprived of his situation,
condemned to appear at the auto with a torch
in his hand, and to be banished from Seville j whilst
Maria Gonzalez, his servant, was condemned to
receive two hundred stripes, and to be banished for
ten years, because she had treated the prisoners with
kindness, and permitted them occasionally to see

180 JUANA DE BOHORQUES.

and converse with each other. Such was another
specimen of Inquisitorial justice !

The case of Dona Juana de Bohorques affords
another striking illustration of their cold and reck-
less barbarity. She was the daughter of Don Pedro
Garcia de Xeres y Bohorques, and wife of Don
Francisco de Vargas, the lord Higuera. The words
which had fallen from her sister Maria while under
torture, had been sufficient to cause her arrest. She
was at that time in the sixth month of her preg-
nancy, and was consequently treated with somewhat
less severity than usual, though subjected to all the
trying examinations of an ordinary heretic. The
partial forbearance which had been exercised towards
her, ceased immediately after her delivery. Only
eight days were allowed to pass, till her infant was
taken from her, and she was subjected to all the
horrors of the torture-chamber. The cords that
bound her to the wheel cut her feeble limbs to the
bone, and in the convulsions brought on by the
dreadful agonies which she endured, her whole frame
was bruised and lacerated. Thus mutilated, she
was carried back to her dungeon in a dying state,
and expired a few days after. But the worst is
hardly told. This martyred victim of Inquisitorial
injustice and barbarity was publicly declared, at this
auto-da-fe., to have been innocent of the charges for

TWELVE AUTOS ANNUALLY. 181

which she had suffered such inhuman treatment !
"Well might the author of the Annals — himself a
Catholic — exclaim, "Under what an overwhelming
responsibility will these monsters appear before the
tribunal of the Almighty ! "

Such is a brief description of the two autos-da-fe
which were celebrated in Seville. A third was
solemnized in the same city on the 10th of July,
1563, but it was inferior to the two former, both
as regarded the number of prisoners brought for-
ward, and in the pomp attending its celebration.
Six individuals only perished on that occasion.

But Valladolid and Seville were not the only
cities whose prisons sent forth sufferers for the truth.
One aiuto, at least, took place annually in each of the
twelve provincial cities in which tribunals of the
Inquisition were established, from 1560 to 1570.
On the 25th of February, 1560, the Inquisitors of
Toledo celebrated an auto-da-fe for the entertain-
ment of their young queen, Elizabeth de Valois,
daughter of Henry II. of France. To enhance the
solemnity of the occasion, a general assembly of the
Cortes of the kingdom was held there at the same
time, to take the oath of allegiance to Don Carlos,
the heir-apparent ; so that this auto, with the ex-
ception of the number of victims, was as solemn as
any of those in Valladolid. Amongst those who

183 AUTOS AT TOLEDO.

suffered death was one of the servants of the Duke
of Brunswick, whom his master had delivered up to
the Inquisition, to testify his hatred of the reformed
cause, and to strike terror into the minds of the
Germans, Flemings, and French, who were present,
and were strongly suspected of being favourable to
the reformed religion.

In 1561 another auto-(ia-/e was celebrated in the
same city : four Lutherans were burned, and eigh-
teen reconciled ; amongst the latter was one of the
king's pages, a native of Brussels, named Don Charles
Estrect, but the young queen Elizabeth procured his
exemption from the penance to which he was con-
demned.

On the 17th of June, 1565, an auto of forty-five
persons was celebrated by the same Inquisition :
eleven were burned, and thirty-four condemned to
penances. The greater number of the prisoners on
this occasion were Jews : amongst those designated
as Protestants, some were called Lutherans, others
the faithful, whilst a third class were termed ffu-
guenaos, or Huguenots.

It was not, however, till 1571 that any person of
distinction suffered at Toledo. In that year an auto-
da-fe was celebrated, in which two individuals were
burned alive, and three in effigy, whilst thirty-one
were condemned to undergo severe penances. One

DR. SIGISMOND ARCHEL. 183

of the two who perished in the flames was Doctor
Sigismond Archel, a native of Cagliari, in Sardinia.
He had been arrested in Madrid in 1562, as a dog-
matizing Lutheran, and after remaining for several
years in the prisons of Toledo, contrived to make
liis escape ; but descriptions of his person having
been sent to all parts of the frontier, he was again
arrested, and delivered once more into the hands of
his judges. At his trial he persisted in denying the
facts imputed, until the publication of the evidence,
when he confessed, but maintained, that so far from
being a heretic, he was a better Catholic than the
Papists. He derided the ignorance of the priests
who were sent to convert him, in consequence of
which he was gagged until fastened to the stake ;
and the archefs, enraged by the firmness with which
he endured the flames, pierced his body with their
lances whilst the executioners were piling up fresh
wood around the stake.

But those of the provincial tribunals which took
the most prominent part in the suppression of the
Reformation were the Inquisitions of Saragossa,
Logrono, and Barcelona. The greater part of the
victims who perished in the first-mentioned of these
cities were Huguenots, who had quitted Beam, and
settled as merchants in Saragossa, Huesca, Barbastro,
and other cities. The progress which their Cal-

184 EXPORTATION OP HORSES

vinistic doctrines had made in the Peninsula is
proved by an ordinance of the Supreme Council,
which says, that " Don Luis de Benegas, the Spanish
ambassador at Vienna, informed the Inquisitor-Gene-
ral, on the 14th of April, 1568, that he had learned
from particular reports that the Calvinists congra-
tulated each other on the peace signed between
France and Spain, and that they hoped that their
religion would make as much progress in Spain as
in England, Flanders, and other countries, because
the great numbers of Spaniards who had secretly
adopted it might easily hold communication with
the Protestants of Beam, through Aragon." *

These, and other reports, induced the Council to
recommend additional vigilance to the Inquisitors
in the eastern provinces, especially in .searching for
and seizing heretical books, of which large numbers
were smuggled through the passes of the Pyrenees.
In addition to these duties, it was made the duty
of these eastern tribunals to prevent the exportation
of horses from Spain. Since the reign of Alphonso
XI., in the fourteenth century, this had been pro-
hibited, on pain of death and confiscation ; but for
a long time the law had become practically obsolete.
But when the civil wars broke out between the
Catholics and Protestants in France, Philip, finding
* Llorente, His. Inquis. p. 271.

FORBIDDEN BY PHILIP. 185

that Spanish horses were largely employed by the
latter, obtained a bull from the Pope, which de-
clared all to be suspected of heresy who should
furnish horses, arms, or other instruments of war,
to the heretics. By the provisions of the bull, he
was authorized to commission the Inquisitions of
Logrono, Saragossa, and Barcelona, to take cogni-
zance of all such offences. Besides this, in 1569,
the Council of the Supreme added a clause to the
annual edict of denunciations, which obliged every
Spanish Catholic Christian to denounce any who
should violate the revived law.

At Logrono the agents of the Holy Office were
not less active than those in Saragossa, in their
efforts to suppress the new doctrines. The labours
of De Soso had been productive of much good ;
he had left many behind him who carried on the
work with vigour and success, notwithstanding the
utmost vigilance of the Inquisitors. Being in-
formed of this, the Council of the Supreme wrote
to its agents in Logrono, in 1568, enjoining them to
redouble their watchfulness, inasmuch as Don Diego
de Guzman, the ambassador to England, had written
that the Protestants of that country boasted that
their doctrines were gaining ground in Spain,
especially in Navarre.

The largest number of prisoners brought forward

186 EXTINCTION OF PROTESTANTISM

at this tribunal, appeared at the annual auto-da-fe
in 1593, when forty-nine persons were condemned,
five to be burned alive, and the rest to undergo
various kinds of penance.

In Granada and Valencia, several Protestants
suffered death, although the majority of those who
appeared at the autos in those cities were Jews or
Mahometans. At the grand auto-da-fe which was
celebrated in Granada on the 27th of May, 1593,
five individuals were burned in person, and five in
effigy, whilst eighty-seven were condemned to pen-
ances. The only Protestant of distinction amongst
these was Dona Inez Alvarez, the wife of Thomas
Martinez, alguazil to the Royal Chancery. But the
suppression of Protestantism in Spain had been
virtually accomplished long before this. The av^s
which were celebrated by the various tribunals
throughout the country from 1560 to 1570, had
removed all the friends of the Reformation, whose
influence or personal effort had been attended by
such hopeful results, and left only a few unimpor-
tant and secret adherents to the Lutheran faith.
Enough, however, has been shown to prove that the
extinction of Spanish Protestantism was not caused
by the imprudence or cowardice of its leading
friends. The painful history of the cruelties in-
flicted on the friends of the reformed cause in the

AND OF RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. 187

Peninsula, furnishes instances of Christian en-
lightenment and heroism hardly surpassed by any
to be met with in the annals of the Christian
Church. If ardent love for the truth, and patient
endurance of suffering in its defence, had been able
to accomplish the religious emancipation of Spain,
the thick and pestilential vapours of Popery would,
long ere now, have been swept away, and the bless-
ings of religious and civil liberty, which the Re-
formation brought to other lands, would now be
enjoyed by her people.

188 TRIUMPH OF THE INQUISITION.

^^tt^ $ird\.

SPAIN, SINCE THE REFORMATION.

With the ten years' persecutions, from 1560 to
1570, which we have briefly noticed in the last two
chapters, the history of Spanish Protestantism,
strictly speaking, ends. Only a few scattered ad-
herents to the reformed faith escaped ; and they
either quietly lapsed back into the Eomish com-
munion, or cherished in secret sentiments which it
would have been death openly to maintain.

This triumph of the Inquisition, and its conse-
quent suppression of the Keformation, may be dated
from the year 1570. But few Protestants, and the
majority of those foreigners, appeared at the autos
which were celebrated subsequently to that time.
Thus, in the grand auto-da-fe, which was held in

SUBSEQUENT AUTOS. 189

Cuenga, in 1654, only one was charged with
Lutheranism, whilst fifty-seven persons were con-
demned to various punishments. Again, in that
which was celebrated twenty-six years later, in 1680,
in Madrid, in honour of the marriage of Don
Carlos II. with Marie Louise de Bourbon, niece of
Louis XIV. of France, the name of but one Pro-
testant appeared on the list of the prisoners who
were present. It was that of Marcos de Legura, a
native of Villa de Ubrique, in Granada, who had
formerly been arrested on suspicion of heresy, and
been reconciled by the Inquisitors of Llerena, but
having subsequently embraced his former opinions,
he was again thrown into prison, where he died in the
Lutheran faith. His effigy and tones were publicly
burned on this occasion.

In the cmtos solemnized subsequently to the sup-
pression of the reformed doctrines, the victims were,
with the exceptions mentioned, and a few others,
persons charged with Judaism, witchcraft, bigamy,
blasphemy, and some other offences, in no way con-
nected with Lutheranism. The Inquisition had done
its diabolic work too thoroughly, to leave much, if
any, of the heretical seed in the orthodox soil of
Spain, and (in the words of a writer already quoted),
" cursed with success in its war against the truth,
had from thenceforward to content itself with the

190 DEATH OF PHILIP.

meaner triumphs of iniquity, and to be satisfied with
the ruin and misery of men whom it could never
so cordially hate as the promoters of religious
freedom."*

These persecutions, however, require no record
here; we have seen enough of its atrocities in
connection with our own subject. It had effectually
answered the design of its institution, and in doing
so, established for itself a claim upon the undying
abhorrence of all future ages. It had trampled in
the dust the civil and religious liberties of the
Spanish nation, and set up a despotism, whose effects
are yet visible in the spiritual ignorance and political
degradation of a country whose natural advantages
fit her for the first rank of European nations. Spain
was thrown back into her former gloom, and com-
pelled to submit to the priestly usurpation which
was then more firmly established than before.

For the following two centuries and a half, her
religious history presents nothing but a painful
picture of abject submission to the irrational dogmas
and debasing Superstitions of the Church of Ronie —
a long night of darkness, broken in upon by no ray
of light.

Philip II. died on the 13th of September, 1598,
and left the crown to his son, Philip III., whose

* Stebbing's History of the Keformation.

DON MIGUEL SOLANO. 191

education had fitted him more for the mummeries
of a monkish cell, than the government of a great
kingdom. As the passive tool of the priests, he
followed up, at their bidding, the measure's of his
father, by others which were calculated effectually to
prevent the resuscitation of the reforming spirit ;
and thus consummated the spiritual bondage of his
people. The administration of his successors tended
still further to reduce the nation to its present
powerless and degraded condition. Nor did the
accession of the house of Bourbon, in the person
of the fifth Philip, in 1700, bring with it any increase
to the liberties of the Spanish people. The same
old incubus of Popery, with all its resultant evils,
hung smotheringly upon them still.

The beginning of the nineteenth century brought
with it one more instance of Inquisitorial intolerance
and cruelty — the last we have to record in its crim-
soned history. Don Miguel Juan Antonio Solano
was a native of Verdun, in Aragon, and vicar of
Esco, in the diocese of Jaca. He was a man of great
inventive powers of mind, and had acquired an ex-
tensive knowledge of mathematics. His mechanical
inventions were chiefly employed for the benefit of
his parishioners, by draining their land and improving
their agricultural implements. A tedious and pain-
ful illness, however, forced him to withdraw from his

192 AN ARREST IN THE PRESENT CENTURY,

active and benevolent pursuits, and led him to devote
more of his time to the study of theology. In his
retirement, the Bible was his chief text-book, and by
a careful and impartial study of its contents, he was
led to form for himself a system of doctrine which
agreed in all its main points with the Lutheran creed.
Having thus embraced doctrinal views opposed to
the established faith, his candid and honest mind
would not permit him to conceal the change. He
drew up a lengthened statement of his new opinions,
and submitted them to his diocesan ; but, receiving
no answer, he laid them before the theological faculty
of Saragossa. His speedy arrest was the first indi-
cation which he received, of what was to follow the
avowal of his heterodox sentiments. Escaping, by
the help of some friends, from the Inquisitorial dun-
geons of Saragossa, he succeeded in reaching Oleron,
a town on the French border ; but an overweening
sense of duty soon led him to return, and surrender
himself into the hands of the Inquisition. When
brought before the judges, he openly avowed the
sentiments which he had embraced, and denied that
they were unsound, inasmuch as they were the plain
teachings of the inspired volume. Such a defence
weighed but little before such a tribunal. The
Inquisitor-General, Arce, was unwilling that his
period of office should be signalized by an execu-

AND DEATH OF THE VICTIM. 193

tion ; but there was no alternative ; for the offence
of which Solano confessed himself guilty, the Inqui-
sitorial statutes provided no punishment but death.
Every effort was employed to induce the prisoner to
recant, but in vain. A second examination of the
witnesses was held, but nothing could be elicited
which would justify the infliction of a lighter punish-
ment. A last effort was made to save him, by
endeavouring to establish his insanity, but no posi-
tive evidence could be obtained. But a fever, brought
on by his confinement, spared the Holy Office a com-
promise or the infliction of a punishment which had
become so unusual. During his illness, every effort
was redoubled to procure a recantation of the ob-
noxious views, but with no better result than before.
A short time before his death, the attendant phy-
sician warned him of his danger, and exhorted him
to be reconciled to the Church before it was too late.
His dying words, in reply, were, " I am in the hands
of God, and have nothing more to do." Thus died
the vicar of Esco, in 1805. His body was refused
ecclesiastical burial, and was privately interred within
the grounds of the Inquisition, near the banks of the
Ebro. His death stopped all further proceedings,
and saved the Council of the Supreme the unwelcome
necessity of burning him in eSigj.

During the long series of wars in which Spain
o

194 ABOLITION OF THE INQUISITION,

was engaged, during the eighteenth and the early
part of the nineteenth centuries, alternately with
England and France, the national attention was too
much occupied by military affairs to allow education
or religion to be much thought of. The Holy Office
was alike the censor of both ; and under its wither-
ing administration the national literature, once so
rich, languished and declined ; whilst religion sunk
into the grossest superstition, or gave place to the
indifference of infidelity, followed by an almost
universal corruption of the nation's morals. In
1813, after Ferdinand YII. had been entrapped at
Bayonne by Bonaparte, the Cortes refused to ac-
knowledge his forced transfer of the Spanish crown,
and assumed the supreme government. During
their shortlived power, the Inquisition was abolished,
many important ecclesiastical reforms were accom-
plished, the monastic orders were suppressed, and
their revenues appropriated by the State.

Whatever beneficial results these measures might
have led to, were prevented by the return of Fer-
dinand to the throne in the following year. The
Holy Office was restored, and the old regime, with
all its inherent evils, was once more established.
During the remainder of his reign, till 1833, Spain
continued to enjoy the unenviable distinction, which
has long been her own, of presenting to the world

AND COMING EMANCIPATION OF SPAIN. 195

an exemplification of the worst forms and most
fatal results of dominant Popery.

But the days of the Inquisition were numbered.
The offspring of a semi-barbarous age, it could no
longer resist those influences which had emancipated
most of the other nations of Europe from the
thraldom of ignorance and superstition, which
priestcraft had managed to set up during the dreary
night of the Middle Ages. They could no longer
be shut out from Spain.

Human progress and modern enlightenment were
stronger than the Inquisition ; the unequal contest
at last came to an end. Buttressed round, though
it was, by the memories of its former power, that
bulwark of Popish domination in Spain, reared on
the ashes of its myriad victims, was swept away, in
1834, by the onward and resistless tide j and the
minor barriers against light and knowledge with
which its place had been vainly supplied, are already
crumbling before the same mighty power. Since
then, symptoms of Spain's coming emancipation
— civil and religious — are growing both in clearness
and in number. The fabric of papal tyranny totters
on its narrowing base. The spirit of a long-
oppressed nation is showing signs of revival, and
already is the herald-star of Spanish liberty appear-
ing on the dark horizon. Vainly will the thick

196 PUBLIC AUTOS SUCCEEDED BY

clouds of Popery combine their blackness to shut
out the messenger of hope ; a mightier power sends
it forth, and will consummate the freedom whose
advent it tells of.

Since the abolition of the Holy Office, a spirit of
religious inquiry, as yet but badly provided for, has
been gradually showing itself, from which the
Christian philanthropist may confidently augur the
happiest results. So long as that diabolical engine
of civil and religious tyranny continued to exist, it
had exerted the same repressive influence upon the
national mind, almost as badly during the last years
of its reign, as whilst immolating its victims on its
blazing pyres, in the time of the second Philip. For
though the last victim whom it consigned to the
flames perished in 1781,* we must not infer from
that fact that the practice of its secret barbarities had
been proportionately lessened. Its dungeons were
peopled with the wretched objects of its vengeance
to the last, and its torture-chambers echoed the
groans of the agonized and the dying up till the

* " I myself," says Blanco White, " saw the pile on which
the last victim was sacrificed to Roman infallibility. It was
an unhappy woman, whom the Inquisition of Seville com-
mitted to the flames, under the charge of heresy, about forty
years ago. She perished on the spot where thousands had
met the same fate." — Practical and Internal Evidence against
Catholicism, p. 122.

SECRET MURDER. 197

time of its suppression. If the fires of the auto had
ceased to be fed with human fuel, their work was
done by the secret machinery of death.* It did not
suffer the terror which its early cruelties had inspired
to grow less, but ever and anon, for the long ages we
have mentioned, maintained, with unabated vigour,
the spiritual bondage of the Spanish people ; till
an indignant nation, roused and strengthened by

* "The following fact," says Llorente, "shows that the
Inquisitors of our own days do not fall below the standard

of those who followed the fanatic Torquemada. was

present when the Inquisition was thrown open, in 1820, by
the orders of the Cortes of Madrid. Twenty-one prisoners
were found in it, not one of whom knew the city in which
he was : some had been confined three years, some a longer
period, and not one knew perfectly the nature of the crime
of which he was accused. One of these prisoners had been
condemned, and was to have suffered on the following day.
His punishment was to be death by the pendulum. The
method of thus destroying the victim we.s as follows : — The
condemned is fastened in a groove, upon a table, on his
back; suspended above him is a pendulum, the edge of
which is sharp, and is so constructed, as to become longer
with every movement. The wretch sees this implement of
destruction swinging to and fro above him, and every
moment the keen edge approaching nearer and nearer. At
length, it cuts the skin of his nose, and gradually cuts on,
until life is extinct. It may be doubted if the Holy Office,
in its mercy, ever invented a more humane and rapid method
of exterminating heresy, or ensuring confiscation. This, let
it be remembered, was a punishment of the Secret Tribunal,
A.D. 1820 ! ! ! "—Preface to Us History, pp. 19, 20.

198 GEORGE BORROW,

influences from without, burst from the iron bands
which swathed it, and would submit to the crushing
yoke no longer. But that long despotism had
paralyzed the Spanish mind, and deadened that
regard for religion which had characterized Spain
above most of the other Continental nations. From
that paralysis, however, it has begun to show signs
of recovery. Light, though feeble as yet, has dawned
upon the Peninsula : some effort has been put forth
by this country to open up to it the springs of
eternal truth.

In 1835, Mr. George Borrow went to Spain, as
the agent of the British and Foreign Bible Society,
for the purpose of printing and circulating the Scrip-
tures. After some difficulty, he gained the necessary
permission from Isturitz, who was then at the head
of affairs, and printed, at Madrid, an edition of five
thousand New Testaments. The version thus pub-
lished was that made many years before, by Filipe
Scio, confessor of Ferdinand the Seventh. The only
edition of it which had been previously printed was
so encumbered by notes and commentaries, as to be
unfitted for general circulation. In the reprint,
these were omitted, and the inspired word was sent
forth, without note or comment, to disseminate its
saving truths through the darkened land.

The measures adopted by Mr. Borrow to secure

AND THE BIBLE IN SPAIN. 199

the circulation, may be best described in his own
words : — " I had determined," he says, " after de-
positing a certain number of copies in the shops of
the booksellers of Madrid, to ride forth, Testament
in hand, and endeavour to circulate the word of God
amongst the Spaniards^ not only of the towns, but
of the villages — amongst the children, not only of
the plains, but of the hills and mountains. I intended
to visit Old Castile, and to traverse the whole of
Galicia and the Asturias, — to establish Scripture
depots in the principal towns, and to visit the peo-
ple in secret and secluded spots, — to talk to them
of Christ, to explain to them the nature of his book,
and to place that book in the hands of those whom
I should deem capable of deriving benefit from it.
I was aware that such a journey would be attended
with considerable danger, and very possibly the fate
of St. Stephen might overtake me ; but does the
man deserve the name of a follower of Christ, who
would shrink from danger of any kind in the cause
of Him whom he calls Master 1 ^ He who loses his
life for my sake, shall find it,' are the words which
the Lord himself uttered. These words were fraught
with consolation to me, as they doubtless are to
every one engaged in propagating the Gospel, in
sincerity of heart, in savage and barbarian lands."*

* The Bible in Spain, pp. 109, 110.

200 THE CLERGY THE ENEMIES

As might be expected, the circulation of the Scrip-
tures in the vernacular tongue met with violent
opposition from the Komish priests. In the then
unsettled state of Spain, the Government passed and
repassed, at short intervals, into various hands.
Isturitz had been superseded in office by the Count
Ofalia, a warm partizan of the clergy, and, conse-
quently, an enemy to any measures calculated to
interfere with their influence. On his accession to
power, a peremptory prohibition was issued against
the sale of the obnoxious books, notwithstanding the
efforts of the British ambassador to prevent it. Many
of the Testaments were seized at the various depots
throughout the country, and Mr. Borrow himself was
arrested and thrown into prison in Madrid. A strong
remonstrance, however, from the British minister,
procured his liberation, and an apology for the in-
dignity which had been offered him. But the violent
opposition of the priests was continued, and greatly
counteracted his efforts in the cause of truth.
"Throughout my residence in Spain," he remarks,
" the clergy were the party from which I experienced
the strongest opposition ; and it was at their instiga-
tion that the Government originally adopted those
measures which prevented any extensive circulation
of the sacred volume through the land. I shall not
detain the course of my narrative with reflections on

OF THE BIBLE IN SPAIN. 201

the state of a Church, which, though it pretends to
he founded on Scripture, would yet keep the light of
Scripture from all mankind, if possible. * * * Her
agents and minions throughout Spain exerted them-
selves to the utmost to render my labours abortive,
and to vilify the work which I was attempting to
disseminate." *

The efforts thus made for the spiritual enlighten-
ment of Spain, were not without encouraging results.
Comparatively small as was the number of copies
circulated, they served to awaken an interest which
has continued to increase, and which is at this
moment one of those active influences from which
the friend of Spain hopefully predicts, at no distant
period, the dawn of brighter and more prosperous
days for a fallen, but still glorious, nation. An
important change in the religious views and character
of the people has commenced. Misgovernment has,
to a great extent, given way to a more liberal and
enlightened policy, under which the influence of
superstition. and its agents is fast decaying.

The following testimony of a traveller who visited
the Peninsula in 1841, is full of encouragement to
the philanthropist and the Christian, and will furnish
some idea of the religious condition of the country
at that time : — " No one can enter Spain without

* The Bible m Spain, p. 243.

202 PRESENT CONDITION OF SPAIN.

being struck with the discrepancy betwixt his pre-
conceived notions of the superstitious reverence of
the Spanish lower orders for the mummeries of
Komanism, and the actual state of the fact. I am
not acquainted with any part of Europe, in which
Popery is acknowledged, where less reverence or
devotion is to be observed among the common
people in their religious ceremonies ; and it is
notorious that many superstitious observances have
now quite disappeared. Am I gratified with this ?
I acknowledge that I am. Not that I am prepared
to maintain that no religion at all is in itself better
than Popery, but because, while the influence of the
priesthood over the minds of the people remained
unimpaired, the introduction of the Bible generally
into Spain was almost hopeless. A new era in the
religious history of the Peninsula has begun. Spirit-
ual despotism, the most dangerous enemy which the
truth has to encounter, is no more ; and civil
despotism is quite incapable of excluding the Bible
entirely from the land. Now that the anathemas
of the priesthood are disregarded, the people are
eager to receive the Word of God ; and experience
everywhere proves, that where a people are desirous
of welcoming the light, not all the most stringent
regulations of the most bigotted and tyrannical of
despotisms can keep them altogether in darkness.

BIBLES SUPPLIED BY SMUGGLERS. 203

Bibles are at this moment pouring into Spain, in
spite of corregidor, alcalde, and aduanero. The
channel of illumination is indeed a strange one,
but God often employs strange agents for his holy
purposes ; and we observe the worst passions of men,
yea, the very devices of the devil, invented for very
different ends, directly, though unintentionally, work-
ing to promote the glory of the Most High, and
to advance the Redeemer's kingdom. The fierce
and reckless smuggler is at present the instrument
in the hands of the Lord employed for blessing the
coasts of Spain with God's precious Word! A
strange evangelist, but a successful one ! The very
fact that he finds the illicit trade in Bibles a profit-
able one, and capable of repaying the toils and
dangers incident to his desperate profession, is a
fact which speaks volumes for the desire of the
Spanish people to receive the hated and forbidden
book — hated by priests, and forbidden by tyrants —
but, God be thanked, beloved and cherished by all
who know its value, and earnestly sought after by
thousands more, who have a faint and indefinite
conception of the infinite worth and priceless treasure
which they seek. Bless, O Lord, thy holy Word,
even from such unholy hands !" * After a few

* Rev. Wm. Robertson's Journal of a Clergyman during
a visit to the Peninsula in 1841, pp. 186, 187.

204 THE PEOPLE OF SPAIN

remarks upon the then political state of the country,
Mr. Robertson continues : " In this state of things,
and in the present condition of the public mind
in the Peninsula, there is a glorious field for
missionary enterprise opening before us. There
can be little doubt that the people of Spain would
gladly receive the messengers of the truth. This
has been sufficiently proved in the only instance
where it has been attempted, viz., as before men-
tioned, in the case of Mr. Rule at Cadiz.* It is also
a fact worthy of observation that, in various parts of
Spain, vast numbers are strongly prepossessed in
favour of Protestantism, without so much as know-
ing what it is. Many even go so far as to call
themselves Protestants, though all they know of that
name is that it implies something hostile to Popery.
Wherefore, if the eye of the Christian tactician
carefully examines the hitherto impregnable defences
of the *man of sin' in Spain, he will not fail to
perceive that a wide and practicable breach is already
made."

The prohibition complained of in the former of
these extracts, has not yet been repealed, although

* This gentleman had been labouring zealously as a
Wesleyan minister in Gibraltar, whence he went to Cadiz,
and there preached the Gospel, for a time, to crowds of
willing and attentive hearers.

PREPARED FOR PROTESTANTISM. 205

its violation is conuived at by the Spanish Govern-
ment.* Besides those which continue to be im-
ported by the smugglers, large numbers of Bibles
and Testaments are introduced, chiefly from England,
by the liberality and Christian enterprise of private
individuals ; and the eagerness with which they were
received and perused in 1841, has in no wise
diminished; but as for open and tolerated Pro-
testantism, as yet, there is none in Spain, the only
places in which the celebration of Protestant worship
is permitted, being the houses of the foreign Pro-
testant ambassadors and consuls. <

Such is a brief, and, from our limits, necessarily
imperfect sketch of the history of Protestantism in
Spain — imperfect, yet, we trust, copious enough to
give the general reader a sufiiciently extensive and
accurate knowledge of this painful but interesting
subject. Within the brief compass of these pages,
there was room only to narrate facts, and not to
indulge in reflections to which they were calculated
to give rise. But without such reflections, the facts
themselves will sufficiently illustrate the essential
and unchanging spirit of that system of iniquity
which is alike destructive of the temporal and spi-

* The author makes this statement on the authority of a
friend who has lately returned from a lengthened residence
in Spain.

206 POPERY ESSENTIALLY THE SAME,

ritual well-being of man. Yet they form but a
small part of the black catalogue of its crimes which
history has chronicled, and which demonstrate, far
more convincingly than human reasoning or elo-
quence could do, its ruinous tendencies and infernal
origin. Though disarmed of many of its stings, by
the increase of sound and enlightened education
amongst many of the subjects of its former tyranny,
Popery has neither lost nor modified one feature of
its essential wickedness. The history of its past
persecutions, spreading over the long ages since it
first jisurped the government of human consciences,
furnishes the best illustration of its unchanging
character. Victims are no longer immolated on its
blazing shambles; but this proves only the want
of power, and not the extinction of its old per-
secuting spirit. Its principles remain unaltered.
In the words of one who suffered from its intoler-
ance, "The cruel deeds of the Romish Church are
nothing but a republication, in blood, of the articles
of her Faith, stamped in every copy of the decrees
of Trent." * The spirit which consigned the
Spanish martyrs in the sixteenth century to the
flames in Valladolid and Seville, is the same which,
if it dared, would now wreak a similar vengeance on

* Blanco WMte's Poor MmCs Preservative against Popery,
p. 166.

BUT HASTENING TO ITS FALL. 207

the Madiai and their fellow-sufferers for the truth
in the Italian States. But its palmy days of power
have gone by for ever, and its ultimate doom is
accelerated, and predicted anew, by every fresh un-
folding in the world's progressive enlightenment.

APPENDIX

In the preceding pages, the cases of two of the most
distinguished individuals prosecuted by the Spanish
Inquisition, in the 16th century, were omitted, as
having only a collateral, and not a direct, connection
with the narrative of the Reformation — the latter
especially. It would be wrong, however, to pass
them by unnoticed, since the first will furnish to the
reader another instance of proof that the friends of
the reformed doctrines, amongst the Spanish clergy,
were not confined to the lower or middle ranks ;
whilst the second will afford a striking example of
the cruelty and injustice of the Holy Ofiice, as the
unholy instrument of the private vengeance and
malignant enmity of Philip II.

The first case was that of Don Bartolom^ Carranza
p

210 APPENDIX.

de Miranda, Archbishop of Toledo, and one of the
most illustrious victims of the Inquisition, during
the period of its history which has occupied our
attention. He was born at Miranda de Arga, a
small town in the kingdom of Navarre, in the year
1503. At twelve years of age, he was received into
the College of St. Eugenius, an institution dependent
upon the University of Alcala. In 1520, he took
the habit of a Dominican, in the convent of Venalec,
in the Alcarria, whence he removed to the College of
St. Stephen of Salamanca, and soon after to that of
St. Gregory of Valladolid. In 1539, he went to
Rome, to attend a general chapter of his order, and,
whilst there, obtained the degree of Doctor in
Theology, from Pope Paul III. On his return to
Spain, in the following year, he was appointed Bishop
of Cuzco j and in 1545, was sent by the Emperor
Charles Y. to the Council of Trent, where he re-
mained for three years. In 1651, the Council was
again convened, and Carranza was sent to attend it,
furnished with full powers by the Archbishop of
Toledo.

In 1554, the alliance between Philip II. and Mary
of England being settled, Carranza came to this
country, to aid Cardinal Pole in preparing the
kingdom to return to the Eomish faith. During
his residence in England, he took a prominent part

APPENDIX. 211

in the prosecution of those who adhered to the Pro-
testant religion, the most distinguished of those
against whom his hostility was directed being Arch-
bishop Cranmer and Martin Bucer. In 1557, he left
England for the Netherlands, where he was one of
the most violent opponents of the reformed opinions.
.On the death of Cardinal Siliceo, Archbishop of
Toledo, in 1558, Carranza succeeded to the vacant see.
His doctrinal sentiments, however, had been secretly
undergoing a change, the earliest indication of which
was gladly made use of by those whom envy and
jealousy had made his enemies, A few months after
his exaltation to the archiepiscopal throne, he was
denounced to the Inquisition, as secretly holding the
Lutheran doctrines. Besides many objectionable
sentiments in the Christian Catechism, which he had
previously published, the fact that so many of the
leading men amongst the Spanish Protestants had
been educated by him, was taken as strong proof of
his unsoundness in the faith. His accusers, more-
over, alleged that, during his residence in England,
he had publicly taught most dangerous views of the
doctrine of justification, one of them declaring
that "Carranza had preached like Philip Me-
lanchthon."

After a long series of tedious examinations and
intentional delays, spreading over seven years, during

212 APPENDIX.

whicli time the Archbishop was kept a close prisoner
in Valladolid, the cause was transferred to Kome,
whither the accused was sent at the same time.
Pius v., who then occupied the Papal chair, treated
Carranza with much kindness, and examined the
documents which had been sent from Spain with
great fairness, and anxiety to ascertain the truth.
After considerable delay, Pius prepared the definitive
sentence, in which he declared that the accusation
had not been proved, and accordingly acquitted the
prelate. He ordered that the passages in the
Catechismy to which objection had been taken, should
be altered by the author, who was at the same time
enjoined to revise his other works, and to expunge
from them anything that could be considered as
favourable to the Lutheran heresy.

This judgment was alike displeasing to Philip and
to the Inquisitors ; the latter were even suspected
of having poisoned Pius, who died soon after his
sentence had reached Spain. The new Pope was
Gregory XIII. — a man after their own heart The
trial was resumed, and the judgment of the former
Pontiff reversed. Carranza was found violently
suspected of heresy ; the prohibition of his Catechism
was confirmed, and he himself was ordered to abjure
all heresy in general, and sixteen Lutheran proposi-
tions in particular. In addition to this, he was

APPENDIX. 213

sentenced to be suspended for five years from the
exercise of his archiepiscopal functions, and to be
confined during that time in the Dominican convent
of Orvietta, in Tuscany. But death came to his
relief. A few days after the sentence was passed, he
sickened and died, worn out by the hardships and
anxieties of eighteen years' imprisonment, and was
buried in the choir of the convent of Minerva, in
Kome. Comparatively severe as had been the
sentence, it had not satisfied the Inquisitors, who,
had he lived to undergo it, had prepared a fresh
persecution !

The prosecution of Carranza gave rise to several
others. Eight bishops, and several doctors of
theology, many of whom had taken part, as the
champions of orthodoxy, at the Council of Trent,
were compromised by some of the evidence which
had been adduced at the trial of the primate. They
escaped, however, with humiliating recantations, and
the performance of slight penances.

The other case to which we referred was the cele-
brated trial of Antonio Perez, Minister and First
Secretary of State to Philip IP In 1578, Juan de
Escovedo, secretary to Don John of Austria, was
assassinated in Madrid, whither he had been sent to
transact some business for his master. The circum-
stances attending the murder are wrapt in much

214 APPENDIX.

mystery ; but enough is known to brand Philip as
its instigator. Soon after the death of Escovedo,
Perez was arrested, by order of the King, on the
ostensible ground of having hired the assassins. The
real cause of the arrest seems to have been the im-
prudence of Perez, in hinting the implication of
PhiHp in the death of the secretary. This in itself
had been enough to call forth the dark resentment of
the Spanish Nero, had there not been the additional
fact of Antonio's being looked upon with a favour-
able eye by the Princess of Evoli — the object of
the royal affections — to excite his vengeful jealousy.
Some other charges, of slight importance, were
urged against him at the same time, to make the
royal pretext more complete. An investigation was
held, which resulted in his being sentenced to two
years' imprisonment, eight years' exile from the
court, and a heavy fine. Having escaped from the
prison, he succeeded in reaching Aragon, the consti-
tution of which kingdom would afford him, at least,
an impartial trial. Philip issued an order for his
arrest, which took place at Calatayud, whence he was
sent to the royal prison of Saragossa ; notwithstand-
ing his claim, in virtue of the Aragonese laws, to be
confined in the prison of the manifestadoes, and be
tried by the Chief Justice of Aragon. Failing to
procure a conviction, even by the unconstitutional

APPENDIX. 215

means which he adopted, of sending a commission of
his own to try the prisoner, Philip had recourse to his
never-failing ally — the Inquisition. On the pretext
that Perez had corresponded with Catherine, sister
to Henry lY. of France, and a Protestant, the
Inquisitors of Aragon founded a prosecution for
heresy, and had the prisoner transferred to their own
dungeons. Enraged at this breach of privilege and
infraction of the Aragonese constitution, the people
rose, and released Perez by force from the Inquisi-
torial prison. Several lives were lost in the fray.
No sooner did the news of the rescue reach Madrid,
than Philip despatched an army into Aragon, under
Don Alphonso de Vargas. At this second and
greater violation of the national privileges, the Chief
Justice called upon the Aragonese to arm in defence
of their violated constitution ; but the call being
only partially obeyed, the hasty and ill-provided levies
were driven before the royal troops, and the Chief
Justice himself taken and executed. In the midst
of these disturbances, Perez succeeded in escaping
over the Pyrenees, into Bearne. Foiled of their
prey, the Inquisitors gratified their impotent re-
venge, by confiscating his property, devoting his
children and grand-children to infamy, and con-
demning himself to death, as " a formal heretic, a
convicted Huguenot, and an obstinate impenitent,

216 APPENDIX.

to be relaxed [i. e., executed] in person, when he
could be taken, and in the mean time to suffer that
punishment in effigy, with the mitre and sanbehito."
He subsequently visited London, but ultimately
settled in Paris, where he died, in 1611, after a long
series of fruitless efforts to procure the revocation of
his sentence.

RETURN TO the circulation desl< of any
University of Caiifornia Library
or to tf^e
NORTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY
BIdg. 400, Richmond Field Station
University of California
Richmond, CA 94804-4698

ALL BOOKS MAY BE RECALLED AFTER 7 DAYS

• 2-month loans may be renewed by calling
(510)642-6753

• 1 -year loans may be recharged by bringing
books to NRLF

• Renewals and recharges may be made 4
days prior to due date.

DUE AS STAMPED BELOW
SEtitONILL

MAY 1 0 2000

U. C. BERKELEY

^ < '1

♦' : 1!^^ ,^- ^

. v"

f T?

-' "/.-■: ?• ..!: ':

, . r V .tC

Internet Archive Audio

Featured

Top

Images

Featured

Top

Software

Featured

Top

Books

Featured

Top

Video

Featured

Top

Mobile Apps

Browser Extensions

Archive-It Subscription

Save Page Now

Full text of "Abdul Baha on divine philosophy"

See other formats