[385] The Inquisition may be said to have reached its apogee under Philip IV. We have had ample opportunity to see how that pious monarch yielded to its aggressiveness, until it became a virtually independent organization within the State, obeying the royal mandates or not, as best suited its convenience, and engaged in almost perpetual controversies with the other branches of the government, while the king, with rare exceptions, submitted to its exigencies. It is true that, in his financial distress, he compelled the restitution of a small part of the confiscations and that he asserted the royal prerogative of making and unmaking inquisitors-general and of appointing members of the Suprema but, when once he had exercised the power, his appointees acted in independence. It would not be easy to imagine a more complete assertion of irresponsible authority than the sudden arrest of Villanueva-- of a leading minister in the absence of the sovereign, at a time of the utmost confusion, when nothing would have been risked by delay, save perhaps that the sovereign might have refused assent. Yet not only did Philip condone this but he threw himself into the persecution of his favorite with such ardor that he could scarce restrain himself from risking a rupture with the Holy See in defence of the Holy Office. Under the disastrous regency of Maria Ana of Austria and the reign of Carlos II, the royal authority almost disappeared and, although this gave such men as Nithard and Valladares opportunity to assert still further the independence of the Inquisition, it also enabled Don John of Austria to banish [386] Nithard and the other governmental departments to emulate its disregard of the royal authority. There was an omen of the future when they united, in 1696, in the Junta Magna, to protest against the encroachments of the Inquisition and to demand its withdrawal into its proper limits, although by dextrous management the attempt was baffled.

With the advent of the Bourbon dynasty a new element entered into the political organization of Spain. The absolutism of Louis XIV had embraced the Church as well as the State, and the Gallican theories as to the power of the Holy See were encouraged in order to assure the headship of the crown. It was inevitable that Philip V and his French advisers should entertain very different views as to the relations between the king and the Inquisition from those which had been current for a century. Even at the height of the War of Succession, we have seen how Philip, in the affair of Froilan Diaz, intervened as master and regulated the relations between the inquisitor-general and the Suprema, how he undertook to reform the Inquisition and how, in many ways he curbed its audacity. But for a court intrigue, working through Philip's uxoriousness, Macanaz might have succeeded in his project of rendering the Inquisition wholly subordinate to the crown, and though the vindictiveness of the Holy Office inflicted on him life-long punishment for the attempt, this did not prevent the continued assertion of the royal supremacy, as we have had occasion to see in repeated instances and in many different directions.

Philip's assertion of the royal prerogative, however, by no means implied any lack of zeal for the faith and, as long as the Inquisition confined itself to its duties of exterminating heresy, it had his cordial support. Frequent allusions have been made above to its renewed activity during the period following the close of the War of Succession. Full statistics are lacking, but in sixty-four autos, between 1721 and 1728, there appeared nine hundred and sixty-two culprits and effigies, of whom one hundred and fifty-one were relaxed. ⁽¹⁾ That this met his hearty approbation is [387] manifested by the letter which he addressed, January 14, 1724, to his son Luis, when abdicating in his favor. In this the exhortations breathing a lofty morality are accompanied with earnest injunctions to maintain and protect the Inquisition, as the bulwark of the faith, for to it is attributable the preservation of religion in all its purity in the states of Spain, so that the heresies which have afflicted the other lands of Christendom, causing in them ravages so deplorable and horrible, have never gained a foothold there. ⁽²⁾ Small-pox cut short the reign of Luis to seven months, after which Philip was obliged to resume the weary burden, till death released him, July 9, 1746, and if, during this later portion of his government, the Inquisition was less busy, this may safely be attributed to flagging energies and lack of material and not to any restraint on the part of the sovereign. The punishment which he allowed it to inflict on Belando, for the history of his reign of which he and his queen, after careful scrutiny, had accepted the dedication, shows how untrammelled was its exercise of its recognized functions.

Yet Philip unwittingly started the movement that was ultimately to undermine the foundations on which the Inquisition rested. He brought with him from France the conviction that the king should be the patron of letters and learning, and he had the ambition to rule over a people of culture. He aroused the slumbering intellect of Spain by founding the Academies of Language and of History and of Medicine, the Seminary of the Nobles, and the National Library, and he replaced for Catalonia the University of Lerida by that of Cervera. Notwithstanding the vigilance of the censorship, it was impossible that the awakening intelligence of the nation, thus stimulated, should not eagerly grasp at the forbidden fruit of modern philosophism, all the more attractive in that it had to be enjoyed in secret. Fernando VI, from 1746 to 1759, followed his father's example, in encouraging the spread of culture. Carlos III was even more energetic in urging the enlightenment of his subjects, and thus there was gradually formed a public, few in numbers, it is true, but including the statesmen in power, which had lost the old Spanish conception that purity of faith was the first essential, and regarded the Inquisition as an incumbrance, save in so far as it might be used for political ends. The Inquisition still inspired fear, and the case of Olavide shows that [388] these opinions had to be cherished in secret, but the number who entertained them was indicated when the bonds of society were loosened and the national institutions crumbled in the earthquake of the Napoleonic invasion.

Possibly the diffusion of this modern rationalistic spirit, insensibly affecting even those opposed to it, may partly explain the rapidly diminishing activity of the Inquisition. The great tribunal of Toledo, in the fifty-five years, from 1740 to 1794 inclusive, despatched but fifty-seven cases, or an average of but one a year. ⁽³⁾  This cannot be attributed to a lack of culprits, for bigamy, blasphemy, solicitation, sorcery and similar offences, which furnished so large a portion of the penitents of old, were as rife as ever. The fact is, that the officials were becoming indifferent and careless, except in the matter of drawing their salaries. When, on May 22, 1753, the priest Miguel de Alonso García was to be sentenced in the audience-chamber with closed doors and in the presence of the officials, it happened that there were no witnesses of the solemnity because none of the officials were to be found in the secreto. ⁽⁴⁾

The personnel of the Inquisition was visibly deteriorating and consequently forfeiting the respect of the community. There had long been complaint of the insufficiency of the salaries, which had remained stationary while the purchasing power of money had greatly diminished, and there had been no reduction in the official staffs to correspond with the dwindling business. Thus, in spite of the empleomanía characteristic of the nation, and of the privileges and exemptions attached to official position, it became increasingly difficult to fill the offices properly. As early as 1719, the inquisitors of Barcelona complained to the Suprema of the trouble they experienced getting people to serve, on account of lack of desire for the offices and the absence of advantage accruing from them. ⁽⁵⁾ In 1737 we find that the Toledo tribunal had neither a commissioner nor a notary in Guadalajara, the capital of a province which, in 1787, numbered 112,750 souls. ⁽⁶⁾ In 1750, a writer deplores that the stipend of eight hundred ducats is insufficient to support the dignity of an inquisitor, so that the inquisitor-general is not always able to make fitting nominations. This [389] necessitates the appointment of calificadores to examine the doctrines brought under review, resulting in the indefinite prolongation of cases, and also in lack of vigilance to suppress the errors perpetually propagated in books; when the calificadores are not paid, they are slow in their work and, to escape paying them, many things which ought to be referred to them are passed over. ⁽⁷⁾ That the respect felt for the Inquisition should diminish under these circumstances was inevitable and altogether, at this period, it presents the aspect of an institution which had survived the causes of its creation and was hastening to its end. Yet it had exercised too powerful an influence in moulding the Spanish character for it to disappear when its mission was accomplished, and we shall see how violent were the struggles attendant upon its dissolution.

Meanwhile it dragged on its existence under constantly increasing limitations. Fernando VI, it is true, gave it obstinate support in its quarrel with Benedict XIV over the works of Cardinal Noris, but he dealt a severe blow when, in 1751, he deprived of the fuero the officials of the tribunal of Lima. Carlos III, who succeeded in 1759, came from Naples with the highest ideals of royal supremacy, coupled with less respect for ecclesiastical claims than was current in Spain; he surrounded himself with advisers such as Roda, Campomanes, Aranda and Floridablanca, who were more than suspected of leanings to modern philosophism, and his reign of benevolent despotism was marked with a series of measures designed to diminish or abolish the privileges of inquisitorial officials, to repress abuses and to tame arrogance. The complete control which he assumed over its functions is exhibited in the rules imposed, in 1768, on its censorship and, in 1770 and 1777, on its jurisdiction over bigamy, when he ordered it in future to limit its operations to the suppression of heresy and not to embarrass the royal courts. The theory thus developed of the relations between the crown and the Holy Office is formulated in a consulta of the Council of Castile, November 30, 1768: "The king as patron, founder and endower of the Inquisition, possesses over it the rights inherent in all royal patronage...... As father and protector of his vassals, he can and ought to prevent the commission of violence and extortion on their persons, property and reputation, indicating to ecclesiastical judges, even in their exercise of [390] spiritual jurisdiction, the path pointed out by the canons, so that these may be observed. The regalias of protection and of this indubitable patronage have established solidly the authority of the prince, in issuing the instructions which he has deigned to give to the Holy Office acting as an ecclesiastical tribunal." ⁽⁸⁾ Under such conditions, he was quite content with its existence and, when Roda suggested its suppression and presented various documents to show that this had been discussed under Charles V, Philip II and Philip V, he merely replied " The Spaniards want it and it gives me no trouble." ⁽⁹⁾ In fact, the time had not arrived for such drastic measures. The Abbé Clément reports a conversation with Aranda, October 29, 1768, in which the count warned him that it was necessary to speak of the Inquisition with great reserve, for people imagined that all religion depended on it; it was, in truth, an obstacle to all improvement, but time would be required to deal with it, and he advised Clement to allude to it only to Roda and Campomanes. ⁽¹⁰⁾

With the accession, in 1788, of Carlos IV, there opened for Spain a new and disastrous epoch. Timid, irresolute, indolent, he had fallen completely under the influence of his wife María Luisa, an energetic and self-willed woman. Until 1792 he kept in office Floridablanca, who was succeeded for a short time by Aranda, and then power was grasped by Manuel Godoy, subsequently known as Prince of Peace. Cadet of an obscure family of Badajoz, he had entered the royal body-guard, where he attracted the attention of the queen, whose favored lover he was universally believed to be, as well as the favorite of her husband. He speedily rose to the highest dignities and became omnipotent; although a court intrigue occasioned his dismissal in 1798, he was restored in 1800, remaining arbiter of the destinies of Spain, until the "Tumult of Lackeys," at Aranjuez, in 1808, directed against him, caused the abdication of Carlos in favor of his son Fernando VII. Light-headed, selfish, vain and unscrupulous, he was mainly responsible for the misfortunes which overwhelmed his country and from which it may be said not to have as yet recovered.

The outbreak of the French Revolution gave a new importance to the Inquisition. When the seductive theories of the French [391] philosophers were preached as the foundation of practical politics, overturning thrones and threatening monarchical institutions with the doctrines of the social compact, the sovereignty of the people and the universal brotherhood of man, the Holy Office might claim that, as the foundations of social order were based on religion, its labors were essential for the safety of the State, while the State recognized that it was the most available instrumentality for the suppression and exclusion of the heresies of liberty and equality.

In this tumultuous breaking down of the standards of thought and belief, in this emergence of a new order on the ruins of the old, the functions of the Inquisition adapted themselves to the exigencies of the times, in other ways besides the increased sharpness and vigilance of its censorship. I have frequently had occasion above to refer to an alphabetical list of all the persons denounced to the various tribunals, from 1780 to 1820, some five thousand in all, and this, taken as a whole, affords us an insight into the change in the objects of inquisitorial activity. Judaism and Islam and Protestantism no more claim its attention. The Church is no longer threatened by enemies from without; what it has to dread is revolt among its own children. Three-fifths of the denunciations are for "propositions," largely among the cultured classes, including a fair proportion of ecclesiastics. Their precise errors are not stated, but doubtless many were Jansenistic and more were hostile to the claims of the Church Militant and to the absolutism of the monarchy. There is also a large class of cases, virtually unknown a century earlier, significant of a vital change in the intellectual tendencies of the nation, calling for the special vigilance of the Inquisition. Popular indifferentism is revealed in the numerous prosecutions for inobservance or contempt of church observances. Even more noteworthy are those for outrages on images of Christ, the Virgin and the saints, and even for sacrilegious treatment of the Venerable Sacrament. In many other ways was manifested the weakening of the profound and unquestioning veneration which, for three centuries, had been the peculiar boast of the Spanish race. On the other hand it is not a little remarkable that there are very few cases of offences against the Inquisition, for, in all these forty years, there are but nine that can in any way be included in this class. ⁽¹¹⁾

[392] At the same time, when we recall the old-time punctilious enforcement of profound respect, it argues no little decline in popular awe when, in 1791, a simple parish priest, Dr. Joseph Gines of Polop (Alicante) dared to address the Valencia tribunal in terms of violent indignation at the conduct of its secretary, Dr. Pasqual Pérez, when on a mission to collect testimony. He tells the tribunal that, if it does not dismiss Pérez it will sink greatly in his estimation, and his whole epistle breathes a spirit of independence and equality wholly impossible at an earlier time. ⁽¹²⁾ It was not without reason that, in 1793, the tribunal, in appealing for increase of salaries, complained of the decline in popular respect for its officials, which it attributed to their meagre pay and the curtailment of their privileges. ⁽¹³⁾ How completely the tribunals had lost their former energy is indicated by the abandonment, about this time, as we have seen (Vol. II, p. 98) of the publication of the Edict of Faith, which of old had been so impressively solemnized and had proved at once so fruitful a source of denunciations and so powerful a means of maintaining popular awe.

Coincident with this, and as though the Inquisition felt that it was on trial before the people, there was a marked tendency towards amelioration of procedure, coupled with benignity in treatment of culprits. Allusion has been made above to the introduction of the audiencia de cargos, through which the accused was afforded an opportunity of knowing what was alleged against him, and frequently of clearing himself without the disgrace of arrest and trial. There is a very suggestive instance of merciful consideration, in 1791, in the case of Josef Casals, a weaver, charged before the Barcelona tribunal with the utterance of shocking blasphemies in the church of Santa Catalina. A century earlier he would have been arrested and, on proof of the offence, he would have been sentenced to scourging or the galleys. In place of this Padre Miguel Alberch was instructed to report secretly as to the character of the accused, which he did to the effect that Casals had regular certificates of confession, but was of quick temper and occasionally broke out in curses. Then a commission was issued to Alberch to summon Casals and to represent to him the gravity of his offence and of the punishment incurred, and the mercy shown by the tribunal, which would keep a watch on him. [393] In pursuance of this the good priest reported that Casals was deeply repentant and desired to be heard in confession, which he had permitted. ⁽¹⁴⁾ The case is trivial, but of such was the bulk of inquisitorial business, and the temper in which it was conducted was of no little import to the people at large.

Partly this may be attributable to the modern softening of manners, partly to a growing sense of insecurity, and partly to the inertia which led the officials to shun all avoidable labor. It was becoming more and more a political machine and neglectful of the objects of its creation. During the inquisitor-generalship of Manuel Abad y la Sierra, from 1792 to 1794, we are told that, in all Spain, there were but sixteen condemnations to public penance. Abad was an enlightened man; he thought of assimilating the inquisitorial procedure to that of other courts of justice, and consulted with Llorente as to the formula for such a reform, but conservatism, however relaxed in practice, was not ready for total abandonment of the old methods. His design became known: he was forced to resign and was relegated to the Benedictine monastery of Sopetran, under a charge, as we have seen of Jansenism. ⁽¹⁵⁾

In fact, an absolute renunciation of the old procedure would have largely deprived the Inquisition of its usefulness in its new political functions, to which its established methods were peculiarly adapted. When, in 1796, a powerful intrigue was formed for the overthrow of Godoy, the Inquisition was naturally selected as the only weapon with which to strike at the favorite. Three friars were found to denounce him, because for eight years he had avoided confession and communion, and because of his scandalous relations with women. Had Inquisitor-general Lorenzana been resolute, Godoy's fate might have been that of Olavide, but he was timid. Archbishop Despuig of Seville and Bishop Muzquiz, then of Avila, who were the leaders of the plot, vainly assured him that Godoy's arrest would insure success; he refused to act except under orders from Pius VI. Despuig then prevailed upon his [394] friend Cardinal Vincenti to induce the pope to write to Lorenzana reproaching him with his indifference to a scandal so hurtful to religion. It chanced that Vincenti's letter, inclosing that of Pius, was intercepted at Genoa by Napoleon who, to ingratiate himself with Godoy, forwarded to him the correspondence. Godoy assured his position and took a mild revenge, which does credit to his sense of humor, by sending Lorenzana, Despuig and Muzquiz into honorable exile as special envoys to condole with the pope on the occupation of his territories by the French. ⁽¹⁶⁾ In fact, Capmany describes the Inquisition of the period as devoted to the unholy work of an Inquisition of State, in order to preserve its imperilled existence, and its ministers as trembling at the sight of the infamous favorite, when they had the honor of joining the crowd of his flatterers. ⁽¹⁷⁾

Inquisitors might reasonably feel anxious as to their position, for projects of reform were in the air. Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos, the most conspicuous Spaniard of his time for intellectual ability and rectitude, had been exiled from the court, in 1790, and had betaken himself to his native Gijon, where for years he labored in founding the Instituto Asturiense. Desiring to endow it with a library of scientific works, he applied, in 1795, to Lorenzana for licence to import them, but Lorenzana refused on the ground that there were good Spanish writers, rendering recourse to foreigners unnecessary, especially as foreign books had corrupted the professors and students in various universities--a process of reasoning applied to works on physics and mineralogy, which Jovellanos characterized as a monumento de barbarie. The attention thus drawn to his library aroused the suspicions of the commissioner of the Inquisition, Francisco López Gil, priest of Somió, who secretly entered it one day while the owner was taking his siesta. Word was brought to him and he hastened thither, finding Gil examining a volume of Locke. Jovellanos turned him out, telling him that his office rendered him an object of suspicion and forbidding him to enter the building without permission. Gil became a spy and was probably the author of a denunciation which cost Jovellanos years of captivity. ⁽¹⁸⁾

[395] He was suddenly recalled from his exile, November 23, 1797, to assume the position of minister of Gracia y Justicia, where he speedily gave the Inquisition abundant cause to dread him. A competencia had arisen between the Seville tribunal and the episcopal authorities over a confessional which it had ordered to be closed. The matter came before Carlos, who instructed Jovellanos to obtain the opinion of Tavira, Bishop of Osma, which he duly transmitted to the king, February 15, 1798, with a Representation arguing that the time had come to restore to the bishops their old jurisdiction in matters of faith; the object for which the Inquisition was established had been attained; its processes were cumbrous and inefficient, and its members were ignorant. The jurisdiction of the bishops could alone furnish an effective remedy for existing evils--a jurisdiction more natural, more authoritative, more grateful to the people, and fuller of humanity and gentleness, as emanating from the power granted to them by the Holy Ghost, wherefore the authority that had been usurped from them should be restored. Moreover he took into consideration the condition of the Holy See, deprived of its temporalities by the French Republic. Everything, he said, pointed to a fearful schism at the death of Pius VI, in which case each nation must gather itself under its own pastors. The papacy would endeavor to retain the cumbrous and costly organization of the curia, by increasing its exactions, and it would have to be reduced to the functions exercised during the first eight centuries. ⁽¹⁹⁾

Jovellanos was a sincere Catholic, but after utterances so hardy it was not difficult for his enemies to convince the king that he was inclined to heresy and atheism. Godoy had grown alarmed at the ascendancy which he was acquiring over Carlos; his fellow-minister Caballero conspired with the Inquisition, and on August 15th the king signed the dismissal of his minister, whose official life had endured but eight months. A fortnight later a royal carta orden declared it to be his unalterable will that the Holy Office should permanently enjoy its jurisdiction and prerogatives without modification. ⁽²⁰⁾ Jovellanos returned to Gijon where he lived in dignified retirement for two years and a half. His [396] offence however had been too great for pardon and his influence was still dreaded. An anonymous denunciation of the flimsiest character was laid before Carlos, describing him as having abandoned all religion and as being at the head of a highly dangerous party, engaged in schemes for the overthrow of Catholicism and the monarchy. The pusillanimous king adopted the course suggested to him by the secret accuser. Before day-break of March 13, 1801, the house of Jovellanos was surrounded by a troop of horse; he was aroused from sleep, his papers were seized and transmitted to the ministry of State; he was kept in his house incomunicado for twenty-four hours, then thrust into a coach and carried, still incomunicado, across Spain to Barcelona and thence to Majorca, where he lay in prison until the abdication of Carlos, in 1808, and the consequent troubles effected his release. ⁽²¹⁾

A case nearly parallel was that of Mariano Luis de Urquijo, who followed Jovellanos in the ministry of Gracia y Justicia. He had no cause to love the Inquisition. Among his youthful indiscretions was a translation of Voltaire's Mort de César, which led the Inquisition to make secret investigations, resulting in the conviction that he was dangerously infected with philosophism. He was about to be arrested when Aranda, who recognized his merit, recommended him to the king and, in 1792, he was appointed to a position in Aranda's office. The Inquisition had learned respect for royal officials and substituted for a decree of arrest a summons to an audiencia de cargos, ending in a sentence of light suspicion of sharing philosophic errors, absolution ad cautelam, some secret penances and the suppression of his book, though his name was considerately omitted in the edict of prohibition. His official promotion was rapid and, at the age of thirty, he found himself a minister, employing his power, possibly with more zeal than discretion, in encouraging enlightenment and all humanizing influences. On the death of Pius VI he incurred Ultramontane hostility by inducing the king to sign the decree of September 5, 1799, restoring to the bishops the right of issuing dispensations-- a measure which provoked long and bitter discussion. This was followed, as we have seen above (Vol. Ill, p. 504) October 11th by a sharp rebuke to the Inquisition, ordering it to confine itself to its proper duties and, soon afterwards, he presented to Carlos [397] for signature, a decree suppressing the institution and applying its property to purposes of charity and public utility. This was too bold a measure; the king shrank from the responsibility and Urquijo only succeeded in concentrating upon himself clerical hostility, which was reinforced by the enmity of First Consul Bonaparte, whose policy he had opposed. Godoy, who commenced to fear him as a rival, and who was irritated by some imprudent jests, withdrew his support. A triple prosecution was commenced against him by three inquisitors and he fell in December, 1801. He was sent to Pampeluna, to the cell which had been occupied by Floridablanca, and there he lay for a year or two, deprived of fire, lights, books and writing materials. He was liberated under surveillance; in 1808 he refused to accompany Carlos and Fernando to Bayonne, but he attended the so-called Junta of Notables there, accepted the French domination, served as secretary of State and, with the other Afrancesados, sought refuge in France in 1813, dying in Paris in 1817. ⁽²²⁾

It is evident from all this that the opposition to the Inquisition was gathering strength and boldness, but that its foundations were too deep and solid to be overthrown without an upheaval that should shatter the social fabric. A well-intentioned, but somewhat absurd, attempt was made by Grégoire, Constitutional Bishop of Blois, whose fervent Catholicism, combined with equally fervent liberalism, was of service so essential in piloting the Church of France through the storms of the Revolution. In 1798, he addressed a letter to the Spanish inquisitor-general, urging the suppression of the Inquisition and universal toleration, as a preliminary to the redemption of Spain from despotism, and to enabling it to take its place among the nations which had recovered their rights. This was translated into Spanish and some thousands of copies were circulated; it may have made some secret converts but the only visible result was to elicit several replies. One of these, by Pedro Luis Blanco, told Grégoire, with more or less courtesy, to mind his own business; assured him that, if the Inquisition was suppressed, Spain would remain as intolerant as ever, and asserted that no Spaniard had ever imagined that coercion could be employed to obtain conversion. It was probably this, mingled with some skilful adulation of the king [398] and his ministers, that procured for the author, in 1800, the episcopate of Leon. ⁽²³⁾ There was also an anonymous "Discurso historico-legal," evidently by a well-informed inquisitor, probably Riesco of Llerena. It was the most rational history of the Inquisition that had as yet appeared, although it assures us that experience showed that penitents were most grateful for the benevolence shown to them, and that it was a tribunal full of gentleness, the centre of benignity, compassion and mercy, but also of justice. ⁽²⁴⁾

A third was by Lorenzo Villanueva, a calificador of the Valencia tribunal, whose defence of the reading of Scripture has been alluded to above. It was published under the transparent pseudonym of Lorenzo Astengo, his maternal name. In view of his subsequent career it is not without interest to see his indignation at the advocacy of toleration and his dithyrambic denunciation of the horrors to which philosophism has led in the assertion of human liberty. The first portion of his work is an impassioned and rhetorical defence of persecution, supported by ample learning. Vigorous is his denunciation of the modern theories of philosophism and the rights of man--since original sin, he asks, what rights has man save to slavery, to punishment, to ruin? So he combats at length the doctrine of the sovereignty of the people, which he stigmatizes as a delirium, a dream and a deception. Yet he admits that the Inquisition is not perfect--that it has committed errors through imprudence, through ignorance, through excessive zeal, and through human frailty, and that it has prevented the development of some things which would aid the prosperity of the nation. ⁽²⁵⁾ If, as has been asserted, he expected a bishopric in reward for this, he was disappointed.

Thus, at this period the Inquisition was inert and its very existence seemed to be threatened, but its potentiality of evil was undiminished. It was still an object of terror to all inclined to liberal opinions, and it was regarded by the Conservatives as the bulwark protecting the land from the deluge of modern thought. [399] Feeble though it might be in appearance we shall see how prolonged and stubborn was the contest required for its final suppression.

This summary of the situation is necessary to an understanding of the position of the Inquisition. Whatever may have been the views of some of the local tribunals, the central body accepted the intrusive domination and was afrancesado--a term which, to the patriots, became one of the bitterest contempt. The Constitution of Bayonne provided that, in Spanish territories, no religion save Roman Catholicism should be tolerated. Raimundo Ethenard, Dean of the Suprema, was a member of the Córtes and, when he took the oath of allegiance to Joseph, the latter assured him that Spain was fortunate in that the true faith alone was there honored. When the Constitution was under consideration, two members, Pablo Arribas and José Gómez Hermosilla, advocated the suppression of the Inquisition, but Ethenard and his colleagues of the Inquisition, Galarza, Hevia Noriega and Amarillas, successfully opposed it, although they admitted that, in conformity with public opinion, its procedure should be made to conform to that of the spiritual courts in criminal cases. ⁽²⁶⁾

The Inquisition thus deemed itself safe and earnestly supported the Napoleonic government. After the sanguinary suppression of the Madrid rising on May 2d, it made haste to counteract the impression produced and, on the 6th, the Suprema addressed a circular letter to the tribunals, describing the affair as a scandalous attack by the lowest mob on the troops of a friendly nation, who had given no offence and had observed the strictest order and discipline. Such demonstrations, it said, could only result in turbulence and in destroying the confidence due to the government, which was the only one that could advantageously direct patriotic energies. The tribunals were therefore instructed to impress on their subordinates, and the commissioners and familiars in their districts, the urgent necessity of unanimously contributing to the preservation of public tranquillity. This communication was received by the Valencia tribunal on May 9th and, on the llth, it was read to the assembled officials, calificadores, notaries and familiars of the city, with exhortations to comply strictly with [401] its commands--action which was doubtless taken by the other tribunals. ⁽²⁷⁾

The Inquisition thus remained in Madrid under the protection of the French arms, but its freedom of action was curtailed. The Abate Marchena, a fine classical scholar, but revolutionary and tinctured with atheism, had abandoned Spain early in the French Revolution and had barely escaped the guillotine during the Terror, He returned, in 1808, as Murat's secretary, when the Inquisition thought fit to arrest him, but Murat sent a file of grenadiers and forcibly released him. ⁽²⁸⁾ When Napoleon reached Madrid, December 4, 1808, the capitulation granted to the city provided that no religion but Catholicism should be tolerated but, on the same day, he issued a decree which suppressed the Inquisition, as contrary to sovereignty and to civil authority, and confiscated its property to the crown. ⁽²⁹⁾ The Inquisitor Francisco Riesco stated, during the debate in the Córtes of Cádiz, that this sudden decree was motived by the refusal of the members of the Suprema to take the oath of allegiance to the new dynasty, but this is evidently incorrect, as most of them had already done so at Bayonne, and Arce y Reynoso, who resigned his inquisitor-generalship, adhered to the French and accompanied them on the final evacuation. Riesco further asserts that Napoleon ordered them to be imprisoned, but they escaped and scattered to places of safety. ⁽³⁰⁾ The Inquisition was thus left in an anomalous position and without a head, for correspondence with Pius VII was cut off, and neither his acceptance of Arce's resignation nor his delegation of powers to a successor could be had. The Junta Central, which was striving to govern the country, attempted to fill the vacancy with Pedro de Quevedo y Quintano, Bishop of Orense, but he could obtain no papal authorization and made no attempt to act. It was argued that during a vacancy the jurisdiction continued with the Suprema, but this was denied and it remained an open question. ⁽³¹⁾

[402] During the period which followed, the tribunals maintained their . organization and exercised their functions after a fashion, when not  prevented by the French occupation. Thus when the invaders ;' reached Seville, February 1, 1810, the Inquisition was suppressed, but its members took refuge in Ceuta. Valencia remained in operation until the city was captured by Suchet, in 1811, while Barcelona at one time transferred itself to Tarragona. Activity was intermittent and, in the excitement of that stirring time, there was little energy for the prosecution of heresy while, even when the enemy had withdrawn, in many cases the buildings had been ruined. The Valencia record shows that the total number of cases brought before all the tribunals in 1808 was 67; in 1809, 22; in 1810, 17; in 1811, 25; in 1812, 1; in 1813, 6. Probably few of these cases were regularly heard, if we may judge from that of Don Vicente Valdés, captain of volunteers who, in 1810, was denounced to the Valencia tribunal for blasphemous propositions. October 27th it was ordered that, in view of the circumstances, a fitting occasion should be awaited for the audiencia de cargos demanded by the fiscal--a postponement which proved to be protracted for it was not until 1816 that he was tried. ⁽³²⁾ Still, where the Inquisition itself was concerned it could act swiftly and effectively. In 1809 the French took possession of Santiago. Felipe Sobrino Taboada, professor of civil law in the university, was acting as police-magistrate and, by order of the director-general of police, he issued a proclamation exhorting the people to lay down their arms and praising the suppression of the Inquisition. When the French retired, the university refused to readmit him to his chair. He obtained a decision of the tribunal of Public Safety of Coruña re-establishing him and then the Inquisition arrested him, without the prescribed preliminary formalities, and kept him for five months in the secret prison. Afterwards he was allowed to keep his house as a prison and, when finally the bounds were enlarged to the province of Galicia, it was with the condition that he would accept no public office. ⁽³³⁾

The Junta Central, which had endeavored to govern, amid much opposition from the particularist tendencies of the provincial juntas, retired to Cádiz when the French occupied Andalusia. [403] On January 1, 1810, it issued a convocation for the assembling of Córtes, and on the 31st it dissolved, after appointing a Regency and imposing on it the duty of convoking the Córtes by March 1st. The Regency delayed until, forced by the pressure of public opinion, on June 18th it published a decree ordering elections where they had not been held, and summoning the deputies to meet in August in Isla de León, now San Fernando, near Cádiz. Suffrage was virtually universal and, in the letters of convocation, the nation was called upon to assemble in general Córtes "to establish and improve the fundamental constitution of the monarchy," while the commissions of the delegates empowered them to decide all points contained in the letters and all others, without exception or limitation. ⁽³⁴⁾ The Córtes accordingly assumed the title of Majesty, as embodying the will of the people and occupying the throne of the absent sovereign. When they were opened, September 24th, about a hundred deputies were present, two-thirds of whom were elected by the provinces not occupied by the French armies, and the rest selected in Cádiz from among natives of the unrepresented districts, including the colonies, then more or less in open revolt, while, as the vicissitudes of the war permitted, deputies came straggling in from districts unrepresented at first. As a whole, the body fairly reflected existing public opinion. The Liberals numbered forty-five, and the majority consisted of ecclesiastics, men of the privileged classes and government employees. ⁽³⁵⁾ It was an unavoidably hazardous experiment, this sudden wrenching of Spain from the old moorings and launching it on the tempestuous waters of modern ideas, under the conduct of men without training or experience in self-government. Grave mistakes were inevitable and their constructive work was idealistic and doomed to failure--a failure bound to result in blood and misery. At the moment, however, there were no misgivings and the Córtes were regarded as the salvation of the nation. ⁽³⁶⁾

[404] The oath administered to the members bound them to maintain Catholicism as the exclusive religion of Spain and to preserve for their beloved monarch Fernando VII all his dominions. Their first act was to adopt a series of five resolutions, offered by an ecclesiastic, Diego Muñoz Torrero, rector of the University of Salamanca, of which one provided that the Regency should be continued as the executive power, on taking an oath recognizing the sovereignty of the nation as embodied in the Córtes and promising obedience to their enactments. Rather than do this, the Regency proposed to break up the Córtes, but the threatening aspect of the people and the army caused a change of heart, and that same night they took the oath, except the implacable conservative Quevedo Bishop of Orense, who resigned both from the Regency and the Córtes. His resignations were accepted but he was forced to take the oath required of all prelates and officials before he was allowed to retire to his diocese. It was evident that the Córtes and the Regency could not pull together; on October 28th, the latter was dismissed, its membership was reduced from five to three and a new Regency was installed with which the Córtes could work in harmony. ⁽³⁷⁾

After settling relations with the other departments of the State, the first attention of the Córtes was given to the freedom of the press. Two days after the opening session the subject was introduced and referred to a committee; no time was lost, a decree was reported October 8th, and on the 18th, in spite of the reclamations  of the opposition, it was passed by a vote of 68 to 32. This was regarded as a preliminary attack on the Inquisition, which was thus deprived by implication of the function of censorship. Some members desired this to be explicitly stated, giving rise to a hot debate in which Inquisitor Riesco, a member of the Córtes, pleaded in vain for some honorable mention of the Holy Office. There was also indignation excited by the provision subjecting prohibition by the bishops to revision by the secular power, which was subversive of the imprescriptible rights of the Church, whose judgements are final. ⁽³⁸⁾ If this was really the first move in a campaign against the Inquisition, it was not unskilful, for it set at liberty the pens which had hitherto been restrained. "At once [405] there arose a crowd of pamphleteers and journalists, not only in Cádiz but throughout Spain, who attacked the institution unsparingly, raising a clamor which showed how severe had been the repression. Sturdy defenders were not lacking and the wordy war was vigorously waged. The two most prominent champions on either side were Antonio Puigblanch, who, under the pseudonym of Natanael Jomtob, issued a series of pamphlets, collected under the title of "La Inquisicion sin Máscara" or "The Inquisition unmasked," and Padre Maestro Fray Francisco Alvarado, a Dominican of high repute for learning and eloquence, whose letters under the name of El Filósofo Rancio or Antiquated Philosopher, continued for two years to keep up the struggle against all the innovations of the Liberals. ⁽³⁹⁾

Puigblanch was no exception to the general rule that those who attacked the Inquisition were careful to profess the highest veneration for the faith and in no way to advocate toleration. His work commences with an eloquent description of religion as the foundation of all civil constitutions and Catholicism as the noblest adornment of enlightenment and liberty, the only question being whether the Inquisition is the fitting institution for its protection. He is careful to maintain to the last his abhorrence of heresy and his desire for its suppression, which he proposes to effect by reviving episcopal jurisdiction under certain limitations. ⁽⁴⁰⁾ With all this his denunciation of the Inquisition was unsparing, and he had ample store of atrocities with which to justify his attacks, although there was unfairness in attributing to it, in the nineteenth century, the cruelties which had stained its previous career.

Alvarado was a man of extensive learning, but of little claim to the title of philosopher, whether antiquated or modern. Though his methods were not such as to make converts, they were well adapted to stimulate those of his own side, for he was an effective partizan writer, fluent, sarcastic, often coarse, vulgar and vituperative, using assertion for argument and indifferent as to truth. The chief value of his letters is the flood of light which they shed on the conservative attitude of the time, which explains much in the [406] subsequent vicissitudes of Spain. Philosophers, he says, are wolves, robbers and devils, monsters who cannot be regarded without horror, enlighteners who are nothing but ignoramuses and cheats and emissaries sent by hell. To seek to undermine popular confidence in the priesthood he holds to be a crime greater than the crucifixion of Christ. The ferocity of his intolerance shows how little Spanish churchmen had changed since the days of Torquemada. As to the relations of religion and the State, he assumes that the only function of the civil power is to punish him who offends the faith; the Catholic religion is as intolerant as light is of darkness, or as truth is of falsehood, and this intolerance distinguishes it from all religions invented by man. Repeatedly and savagely he proclaims that burning is the proper remedy for unbelief, and he tells his adversaries that, if they wish free thought, they may go to England or to the United States, but in Spain what they had to expect was the quemadero. ⁽⁴¹⁾ Such advocacy could only render the Liberals more eager to accomplish their work.

While this controversy was contributing to the greater enlightenment or obscuration of public opinion, the Córtes were engaged in framing a Constitution. The committee entrusted with this task had a majority of conservatives, including several ecclesiastics, but these were quite willing to circumscribe the royal power, while seeking to extend the privileges of the Church, and all the members signed the project as presented. ⁽⁴²⁾ It commenced by asserting the sovereignty of the nation, which had the exclusive right to establish its fundamental laws, and could never be the patrimony of any person or family, and it affirmed that the religion of the nation was, and always forever would be the Catholic, Apostolic, Roman, the only true one, which the nation protects by wise and just laws, and prohibits the exercise of any other. ⁽⁴³⁾ This apparent concession to intolerance was denounced, when too late, as a trap, for it placed in the hands of the representatives of the nation the power of deciding what the wise and just laws should be for the protection of religion. Be this as it may, the Córtes were resolved that there should be no refusal to accept the new [407] framework of government. In secret session of March 16,1812, it was decreed that whosoever should refuse to swear to it should be declared an unworthy Spaniard and be driven from Spain, and measures were taken to have it read in every parish church, where the assembled people should swear to obey it and to be faithful to the king. As the French armies were driven back, the Spanish commanders made it their first duty to see this ceremony performed, and where there was opposition, chiefly arising from the priests, force was employed. A priest of the Cádiz cathedral who alluded to it slightingly as a libelo, or little book, was prosecuted, and the irreconcileable Bishop of Orense, who refused to take the oath, was exiled and declared to be an unworthy Spaniard. As a whole, however, it was enthusiastically accepted as the dawn of a new era, though we may well question how many of those who took the oath comprehended the purport of its three hundred and eighty-four articles, covering all the complicated minutiae of institutions based on an entirely new conception of the relations between the Government and the governed. ⁽⁴⁴⁾

It was inevitable that, in the effort to create a new Spain, the fate of the Inquisition should be involved, especially as its disabled condition invited attack. That a struggle was impending had long been evident to all parties, and that this was felt to be decisive as to the character of the future institutions of Spain is seen in the tenacity with which it was fought. The Inquisition was the conservative stronghold, to be defended to the last, after all the outer defences had been abandoned, and the deep roots which it had established are manifested by the tactics required for its overthrow, and by the fact that the contest was the bitterest and the most prolonged in the career of the Córtes, which had so unceremoniously converted Spain from absolutism to liberal constitutionalism.

Some preparation had been made for the struggle by the conservatives. The first Regency had endeavored to reconstitute all the old Councils of the monarchy and, on June 10, 1810, Ethenard, the Dean of the Suprema, addressed to it a memorial requesting it to order the reassembling of the Suprema, to which it responded, August 1st, by issuing such an order. The scattering of the members precluded this, but, when the early acts of the Córtes foreshadowed what was to come, on December 18th, Ethenard and [408] Amarillas asked the new Regency to appoint as a member the fiscal Ibar Navarro and as fiscal the Madrid inquisitor, Galarza, thus enabling the body to resume its functions. As no attention was paid to this, an old member, Alejo Jimenez de Castro, who had been exiled to Murcia by Godoy, was brought from his retreat to Cádiz, so as to have material for a quorum present. The occasion to utilize this offered itself in January, 1811. The freedom of the press enabled Don Manuel Alzaibar to start "La Triple Alianza," a frankly irreligious journal, in the second number of which there appeared an article ridiculing the immortality of the soul and suffrages for the dead. On January 28th advantage was taken of this to ask the Córtes to refer it to the Inquisition for censure, il which was carried in spite of opposition. The next day the editors asked that the action be rescinded, leading to a three days' debate in which the Inquisition was denounced as a mysterious, cruel and antichristian tribunal and, for the first time, its suppression was openly advocated. President Dou ruled that the inculpated journal must be passed to the Junta de Censura, for he understood that the Inquisition was not organized, when he was told that there were three members of the Suprema in Cádiz, and that the Seville tribunal was in Ceuta. This raised larger questions and the whole matter was referred to a committee so composed that it was expected to report against re-establishment, but it withheld its report for a long time and meanwhile there were other moves in the game. ⁽⁴⁵⁾

On May 16th, the members of the Suprema notified the Regency that they were prepared to act, in response to which the minister of Gracia y Justicia expressed his surprise that they should meet as a tribunal, without awaiting the decision of the questions submitted to the Córtes, and forbade them from forming a Council until they should have express authorization. ⁽⁴⁶⁾ The matter was brought before the Córtes and Inquisitor Riesco vainly argued in favor of the Inquisition; his motion was referred to the committee, [409] where it lay buried in spite of repeated calls for a report. The Liberals insisted that a National Council would be a more suitable body for the mature consideration of such questions; their object was solely to gain time, which was fighting on their side, but the idea was seriously entertained, even by the clericals. The committee on the external discipline of the clergy reported, August 22d, in favor of the project, with a list of matters to be submitted to the Council; on August 28th the Córtes ordered it to be convoked, but postponed consideration of the details. Other matters supervened and no further action was taken, which Archbishop Vélez assures us saved Spain from a schism, or at least from a scandal for, under the proposed program, it would have proved a second Synod of Pistoja. In fact, the journals naturally took a lively interest in the matter; thousands of pamphlets, we are told, appeared everywhere, pointing out the abuses and relaxed morals of the clergy and demanding a reform that was assumed to be necessary. It is easy to imagine that the ecclesiastical authorities were willing to let the project drop. ⁽⁴⁷⁾

The position of the Liberals was greatly strengthened by the adoption of the Constitution, in March 1812, as was abundantly shown in the next debate on the Inquisition. This was provoked by the publication, in April 1812, of the "Diccionario crítico-burlesco" of Gallardo, librarian of the Córtes, in which all that the mass of the population held sacred was treated with ridicule, neither refined nor witty. It created an immense sensation and was brought before the Córtes, which enabled Riesco, on April 22d, to call for the immediate presentation of the report of the committee on the Inquisition, for which the Córtes had been waiting for more than a year. The committee, in fact, had reached a decision, in July 1811, in favor of the Inquisition, and we are not told why it had been held back, for four members had concurred in it and only Muñoz Torrero had dissented. The report was accordingly presented, re-establishing the Suprema in its functions, with certain limitations as to political action; the debate was hot, but the Liberals had taken precautions to avoid a direct vote on the question. In a decree of March 25th, creating a supreme court of justice, they had introduced an article suppressing the tribunals known by the name of councils, and they pointed out that this embraced the Suprema, which gave abundant opportunity [410] for discussion. Even more important was a decision of the Córtes, adroitly planned for this especial purpose, December 13, 1811, during the discussion on the Constitution, that no propositions bearing on the fundamental law should be admitted to debate without previous examination by the committee on the Constitution, to see that it was not in opposition to the articles thereof. It was notorious that inquisitorial procedure was in direct contravention of the constitutional provisions to secure justice in criminal prosecutions and, after an exciting struggle and a postponement, the report was referred to the committee on the Constitution. The Conservatives were so exasperated that they proposed to dissolve the Córtes, and have a new election under the Constitution, to which the Liberals agreed, except that the new body should meet October 1, 1813, and the existing one should remain in session until then. Archbishop Vélez tells us that the policy of the Liberals was to gain time, for their personal safety was at stake if the Inquisition was re-established, nor does he recognize how monstrous was the admission involved in this, for an institution that could prosecute and punish legislators for their official acts was virtually the despot of the land. Doubtless the deputies felt this, and that the struggle was one for life or death. ⁽⁴⁸⁾

The flank of the enemy was thus skilfully turned. The committee on the Constitution was in no haste to report and occupied itself with collecting documentary material from the archives wherever accessible. Its conclusion was that the Inquisition was incompatible with the fundamental law and, on November 13th, it voted on a project for establishing "Tribunales protectores de la fe" in compliance with the constitutional requirements. Finally, on December 8th two reports were presented. That of the minority by Antonio Joaquín Pérez, who had been an inquisitor in Mexico, argued that the abuses of the Inquisition were not inherent; that its procedure conflicted with the Constitution and should therefore be modified accordingly. ⁽⁴⁹⁾

The majority report was a very elaborate document, tracing the treatment of heresy from the earliest times, and pointing out the irreconcileable incompatibility of the Inquisition with the constitutional provisions securing to the citizen the right of open trial and opportunities for defence. It concluded with the draft of a decree "Sobre Tribunales protectores de la fe," in which such caution [411] was deemed necessary that the Inquisition was nowhere mentioned. It appealed to the national pride, by simply reviving a law of the Partidas concerning the prosecution of heretics by bishops, it prescribed the form and procedure of the episcopal tribunals, the punishment by lay judges of those pronounced guilty, and it provided for appeals as well as for the suppression of writings contrary to religion. The reports were duly received and January 4, 1813, was appointed for the opening of debate. ⁽⁵⁰⁾

Probably no measure before the Córtes provoked so bitter and prolonged a debate. The Liberals had secured the advantage of position, and the Conservatives felt that the issue involved the whole future relations of Church and State. There was a preliminary skirmish on December 29th, when Sánchez de Ocaña asked for a postponement until the bishops and chapters could be consulted, on the ground that the Church was an independent body. ⁽⁵¹⁾ This was voted down and the debate was opened on the designated day, January 4, 1813. The friends of the Inquisition had not been idle; the Church organization was in good working order, and the Córtes were bombarded with memorials from bishops, chapters, ayuntamientos, military officers, towns and provinces, showing how active the canvass had been during the two years in which the subject had been mooted. Yet the Conservatives could only procure, out of the fifty-nine sees existing in Spain, protests from two archbishops and twenty-four bishops, the authorities of three vacant sees, and four chapters of those occupied by the French; while the number from officers of the army was not large, those from towns were but a small fraction of the municipalities, and only two provinces--Álava and Galicia--spoke through their authorities. Muñoz Torrero declared, January 10th, that every mail brought him mountains of letters in favor of the Inquisition and Torrero spoke of the reclamations that came in, showing how the signers of protests had been coerced. ⁽⁵²⁾

[412] The debate was vigorous and eloquent on both sides but, while it took the widest range, embracing the history of the Church from apostolic times and the career of the Inquisition from the thirteenth century, the parliamentary question in reality turned upon the power of the Córtes to intrude in the sphere of ecclesiastical jurisdiction. After discussion lasting until January 22d on the preliminary propositions, the decree itself was taken up, article by article and strenuously fought over; amendments were presented and accepted or rejected, as they strengthened or weakened the measure, and hot resistance was offered to the clauses allowing appeals from the judgements of the bishops, which the Liberals supported on the ground that all the members who opposed the Inquisition had been denounced throughout Spain as heretics, and the safety of the citizen demanded that episcopal definition of heresy should not be final. The debate was prolonged until February 5th, when the last article was agreed to, and the decree in its final shape did not differ essentially from that proposed by the Committee. There was no formal suppression of the Inquisition ; it was simply declared to be incompatible with the Constitution and the law of the Partidas was revived. This latter had been agreed to on January 26th by a vote of 92 to 30, and that date was assumed as determining the extinction of the Inquisition, regulating the disposition of its property. It is not worth while to recapitulate the details of the episcopal tribunals and the provisions for censorship, as the bishops took little interest in the exercise of their restored jurisdiction, though there are traces of their action in one or two cases--that of Joaquín Ramírez, priest of Moscardón and of Doña Antonia de la Torre of Seville. ⁽⁵³⁾ During the seventeen months that elapsed until the re-establishment of the Inquisition, we are told that, although the land was full of Freemasons and other anticatholics, the bishops had no occasion to arrest any one, for no informers or accusers came forward-- doubtless because they realized that their names would be known. ⁽⁵⁴⁾

[413] In the debate several ecclesiastics distinguished themselves by their able advocacy of the measure, among whom were preeminent Muñoz Torrero, who had borne a leading part in drafting the decree; Lorenzo Villanueva, who had defended the Inquisition against Bishop Grégoire, and Ruyz Padron, parish priest of Valdeorras in Galicia and formerly of the Canaries. How they fared in consequence we shall see hereafter. On the other side one of the most vehement was Pedro Inguanzo, who was rewarded with the see of Zamora, and ultimately with the archbishopric of Toledo.

The Liberals had won their victory by unexpectedly large majorities, indicating how great had been the advance in public opinion. No measure had created such intensity of feeling on either side; the rejoicing of the Liberals was extravagant, and the anger of the clerical party may be gauged by the declamation of Archbishop Vélez, who is as vehement as though the whole fate of Christianity was at stake--the abomination of desolation, he declares, seemed to have established its throne in the very house of God. ⁽⁵⁵⁾ The clergy had already been alienated by various measures adverse to their interests--the appropriation of a portion of the tithes to the support of the armies, the escheating of the property of convents destroyed by the invaders, or having less than twelve inmates, and the abrogation of the Voto de Santiago, a tax on the agriculturists of some provinces based on a fraudulent tradition of a vow made by Ramiro I, when, by the aid of St. James, he won the suppositious victory of Clavijo. ⁽⁵⁶⁾ The debate on the Inquisition had heightened the reputation of the Córtes as an irreligious body, and it was not wise to inflame still further the hostility of a class wielding such preponderating influence, but the Liberals, intoxicated by their victory, proceeded to render the measure as offensive as possible to the defeated clericals.

On February 5th, after the final vote, the committee on the Constitution was instructed to prepare a manifesto setting forth the reasons for the suppression of the Inquisition which, together with the decree, should be read in all parish churches for three consecutive Sundays, before the offertory of the mass; that in all churches the insignia of those condemned and penanced should be removed, and that a report should be made as to the disposition [414] of the archives of the tribunals. The preparation of the manifesto delayed the publication of the decree until February 22d, for it was a long and wordy document, in which the decadence of Spain was attributed to the abuses of the Inquisition; the ancient laws had therefore been revived, restoring their jurisdiction to the bishops, in whose hands the Catholic faith and its sublime morals would be secure; Religion would flourish, prosperity would return, and perchance this change might some day lead to the religious brotherhood of all the nations. ⁽⁵⁷⁾

It was not long before the imprudence of this step manifested itself, for it gave the Church a battle-ground on which to contest, not only the reading of the manifesto but the execution of the decree itself and, if defeated, of occupying the advantageous position of martyrdom. Opposition had for some time been in preparation. As early as December 12, 1812, the six bishops of Lérida, Tortosa, Barcelona, Urgel, Teruel and Pampeluna, in the safe refuge of Majorca, had prepared a manifesto widely circulated in private, representing the Church as outraged in its ministers, oppressed in its immunities, and combated in its doctrines, while the Jansenist members of the Córtes were described as adherents of the Council of Pistoja. ⁽⁵⁸⁾ No sooner was the decisive vote of February 5th taken than the chapter of the vacant see of Cádiz prepared for a contest over the reading of the decree and manifesto. It had already appointed a committee of three with full powers, and it now instructed the committee to communicate secretly with refugee bishops in Cádiz, and with chapters elsewhere, with a view to common action. Letters were sent to the chapters of Seville, Málaga, Jaen and Córdova, representing that the Cádiz chapter was ready to be the victim, but would be strengthened by the union of others. Seville replied with promises to do the same; the rest more cautiously, for they felt that they were treading on dangerous ground.

This dampened somewhat the ardor of the fiery Cádiz chapter and it sought for other support. On February 23d the parish priests and army chaplains of Cádiz were assembled and addressed the chapter at great length. To read the decree and manifesto would be a profanation and a degrading servility. The papal constitutions creating the Inquisition were binding on the consciences of the faithful, until revoked by the same authority, and [415] from this obligation the secular power could not relieve them. To obey would be to incur the risk of a dreadful sacrilege, and the penalties for impeding the Inquisition imposed by Julius III and Sixtus V; it was better to fall into the hands of man than into those of God, and they were ready to endure whatever fate might befall them. This was rank rebellion, slightly moderated by the expression of a desire to learn the opinions of the holy prelates who were in Cádiz. The chapter duly transmitted this address to the prelates--the Bishops of Calahorra, Plasencia, San Marcos de Leon, Sigüenza and Albarracin (Calahorra and San Marcos were deputies in the Córtes and had signed the Constitution)--stating that it entertained the same sentiments and repeated the request for their opinion. The bishops replied cautiously, and in substance advised that representations be made to the Government, which might be induced to modify its decrees. ⁽⁵⁹⁾

Time was growing short, for March 7th had been designated as the first Sunday for reading the decree and manifesto. On March 3d a capitular meeting was assembled, in which it was unanimously resolved to obey, but to make use of the provisions which authorize citizens to obey without executing and to represent reverentially the reasons for suspending action until further determination. ⁽⁶⁰⁾ This was the first step in the development of a somewhat formidable plot which was organizing. On March 5th the papal nuncio, Pedro Gravina, Archbishop of Nicæa, addressed to the Regency a very significant protest against the decree itself. The abolition of the Inquisition, he said, was contrary to the primacy of the Holy See; he protested against this and he asked the Regency to induce the Córtes to suspend its publication and execution until happier times might secure the consent of the pope or of the National Council. On the same day he was guilty of the indiscretion of writing to the Bishop of Jaen and to the chapters of Málaga and Granada, under strict injunctions of secrecy, advising them of the proposed resistance of the Cádiz chapter and inviting their coöperation. ⁽⁶¹⁾ The next day, March 6th, the chapter sent to the Regency the address of the priests and chaplains of Cádiz, with a communication setting forth the reasons which not only [416] prevented the execution of the mandate of the Córtes, but imperiously required the secular power to protect the Church and relieve it from an act in contravention of its honor and sanctity. The Chapter, it argued, could not be accused of disobedience for insisting on the spiritual law which was more binding than the temporal. ⁽⁶²⁾

The Regency evidently was participating in the plot to overthrow the Córtes for the purpose of saving the Inquisition. The legislative and executive branches of the Government had become estranged. There had been dissension in the matter of the suppression of the convents, and an investigation made by the Córtes into the affairs of the Regency had led to a damaging report on February 7th. The Liberals were convinced that it was planning a coup d'etat when, on the night of Saturday, March 6th the rumor spread that it had dismissed the Governor of Cádiz, D. Cayetano Valdés, and had replaced him with D. José María Alós. Sunday passed without the reading of the decree and manifesto in the churches and, on Monday, the minister of Gracia y Justicia sent to the Córtes the communications of the chapter to the Regency. A permanent session was at once declared; the Córtes dismissed the regents and replaced them with the three senior members of the Council of State, Cardinal Luis de Bourbon, Archbishop of Toledo, D. Pedro Agar and D. Gabriel Ciscar, who forthwith took the oaths and at 9 P.M. assumed possession of their office, the dismissed regents offering no resistance. ⁽⁶³⁾

Harmony between the legislature and the executive being thus restored, on March 9th the Córtes ordered the Regency to compel obedience. Under threats of measures to be taken, the chapter yielded at 10 P.M. and promised that the next morning, and on the two following Sundays, the decree and manifesto should be duly read. It was obliged to furnish authentic copies of all papers and correspondence, on the basis of which a sharp reprimand was addressed to the Seville chapter and, on April 24th, prosecution was commenced against the Cádiz capitular vicar and the three members of the committee, for treasonable conspiracy. Their temporalities were seized and for six weeks they were imprisoned, incomunicado. The trial dragged on until the restoration of Fernando VII rendered acquittal a matter of course and enabled them, in their defence, to declare that to destroy the Inquisition [417] or to impede its action in matters of faith was the same as prohibiting the jurisdiction of the Roman Pontiff, thus trampling under foot a dogma established by Jesus Christ. ⁽⁶⁴⁾

The documents thus obtained showed that Nuncio Gravina had been active in furthering the plot of resistance. Now that it had been crushed, policy would have dictated dropping the matter but, on April 22d, the minister of Gracia y Justicia addressed him a sharp letter, expressing the confidence of the Regency that he would in future observe the limits of his office, as otherwise it would be obliged to exercise all its authority. To this he of course replied defiantly; whenever ecclesiastical matters were concerned he might find himself obliged to follow the same course, and the Regency could do as it pleased. Some further correspondence followed in the same vein and then, after an interval, his passports were sent to him, his temporalities were seized, and he was informed that the frigate Sabina was at his disposal to transport him whither he desired. ⁽⁶⁵⁾ He declined the proffered frigate and established himself in Portugal, near the border, whence he continued busily to stir up disaffection, assuming that he still retained his functions as nuncio. On July 24th he addressed a protest to the Government and sent a circular to the bishops inviting them to apply to him in cases requiring his aid. This led to a lively controversy, in which the Government charged him with deceit and he retorted by accusing it of falsehood and challenging it to publish the documents. ⁽⁶⁶⁾

This was by no means the only trouble excited by the enforced reading of the decree and manifesto. Recalcitrant priests were found in many places, whose cases caused infinite annoyance and bad blood and the Bishop of Oviedo was recluded in a convent for refusing obedience. ⁽⁶⁷⁾ The Government triumphed, but it was a Pyrrhic victory, multiplying its enemies, heightening its reputation for irreligion, and weakening its influence. ⁽⁶⁸⁾

The result was seen in the elections for the new Córtes ordinarias, when the deputies returned were largely reactionary, owing to clerical influence. There were many vacancies, however, which were filled by the old members for the corresponding places, and thus the parties were evenly balanced. The new Córtes met, September 26th and, on November 29th adjourned to meet in Madrid, January 15, 1814; the Regency transferred itself to Madrid, January 5th. ⁽⁶⁹⁾ By that time the French were virtually expelled from Spain; Wellington was following Soult into France, and Suchet was barely holding his own against Copons in Catalonia.

The, return of Fernando el Deseado was evidently at hand and was eagerly expected. The reaction following the prolonged excitement of the war was beginning to be felt. There was widespread misery in the devastated provinces, the relief of which was slow and difficult and was aggravated by a decree of the Córtes requiring those which had been subjugated to pay the arrears of the war contributions. Dissatisfaction with the Córtes was aroused by what were regarded as their sins both of commission and omission--the lowering of the value of French money caused great suffering and trouble; all who had served under the intruso were ejected from office; the parish priests were reinstated in their old cures, which turned into the streets the new incumbents; people began to grumble at the preponderance of the Liberals in the Córtes--in short, there was no lack of subjects of complaint. ⁽⁷⁰⁾ Exhaustion and poverty, the inevitable consequences of so prolonged and desperate a struggle, produced discontent, and it was natural that those who had guided the nation through its tribulations should be held responsible, while their services should be forgotten. The military also were dissatisfied at finding that, at the close of a successful war, they had not the importance that they considered to be their due, while the clergy were outspoken in opposition and, through two widely circulated journals, "El Procurador de la Nacion y del Rey" and "La Atalaya de la Mancha," attacked the Government furiously. ⁽⁷¹⁾

During all this period, Fernando's existence at Valençay had been as agreeable as was consistent with his safe-keeping. The only restriction on his movements was a prohibition to ride on [419] horseback; Napoleon is said to have kept him supplied with women to satisfy his strongly developed sensuality, and he manifested his characteristic baseness in letters to his captor congratulating him on his victories and soliciting the honor of a matrimonial alliance with his family. After the battle of Liepzig, Napoleon, striving to save what he could from the wreck, represented to Fernando that the English were seeking to convert Spain into a Jacobin republic; Fernando was ready to agree to any terms and, on December 11, 1813, there was signed what was known as the Treaty of Valengay, under which peace was declared between France and Spain, the English and French troops were to be withdrawn, the Afrancesados, who had taken refuge in France, were to be restored to their property and functions, and Fernando was to make a yearly allowance of 30,000,000 reales to his father and mother. ⁽⁷²⁾

Fernando sent the Duke of San Carlos with the treaty to Madrid for ratification, instructing him that, if he found the Córtes and Regency infected with Jacobinism, he was to insist on ratification pure and simple; if he found them loyal, he was to say that the king desired ratification, with the understanding that he would subsequently declare it invalid. The treaty excited general indignation. As early as January 1, 1811, the Córtes had decreed that they would recognize no treaty made by the king in captivity, and that he should not be considered free until he was surrounded by his faithful subjects in Córtes. Now the Córtes responded to Fernando's message with a decree of February 2, 1814, reissuing the former one and adding that obedience should not be rendered to him until he should, in the Córtes, take an oath to the Constitution ; on his arrival at the frontier this decree was to be handed to him, with a copy of the Constitution that he might read and understand it; he was to follow a route prescribed by the Regency and, on reaching the capital, he was to come directly to the Córtes, take the oath, and the government would then be solemnly made over to him. All this was agreed to with virtual unanimity; it was signed by all the deputies and was published with a manifesto denouncing the treaty and expressing the warmest devotion to the king. The publication aroused general indignation at the treaty and the manifesto elicited universal applause. ⁽⁷³⁾

[420] To Fernando, trained in the traditions of absolutism, the Treaty of Valençay was vastly preferable to the reception prepared for him, but he uttered no word of dissent when, after Napoleon had liberated him without conditions on March 7th, he was transferred by Suchet, on the banks of the Fluviá, March 24th, to Copons, the Captain-general of Catalonia. He exercised volition however in deviating from the route laid down by the Regency, and made a detour to Saragossa on the road to Valencia, but he preserved absolute silence as to his intentions. Everywhere he was received with delirious enthusiasm; the people idealized him as the symbol of the nationality for which they had struggled through five years of pitiless war, and there were no bounds to their exuberance of loyalty.

To few men has it been given, as to Fernando, to exercise so profound and so lasting an influence on the destinies of a nation. His ancestor, Henry IV, had a harder task when he undertook to impose harmony on compatriots who, for a generation had been savagely cutting each others' throats. Fernando came to a nation which had been unitedly waging war against a foreign enemy. Differences of opinion had grown up, as to the reception or rejection of modern ideas, and parties had been formed representing the principles of conservatism and innovation; mistakes had been made on both sides and bitterness of temper was rising, but a wise and prudent ruler, coming uncommitted to either side and enthusiastically greeted by both, could have exorcised the demon of faction, could have brought about compromise and conciliation, and could have gradually so trained the nation that it could have traversed in peace the inevitable revolution awaiting it. This was not to be. Unfortunately Fernando was one of the basest and most despicable beings that ever disgraced a throne. Cowardly, treacherous, deceitful, selfish, abandoned to low debauchery, controlled by a camarilla of foul and immoral favorites, his sole object was to secure for himself the untrammelled exercise of arbitrary power and to abuse it for sensual gratification. Cruel he was not, in the sense of wanton shedding of blood, but he was callously indifferent to human suffering, and he earned the name of Tigrekan, by which the Liberals came to designate him. ⁽⁷⁴⁾

[421] When Fernando entered Spain he was naturally undecided as to the immediate attitude to be assumed towards the changes made during his absence, but the enthusiasm of his reception and the influence of the reactionaries who surrounded him emboldened him in the determination to assert his autocracy. Several secret conferences were held during the journey to decide whether he should swear to the Constitution, and the negative opinion prevailed. In fact, to a man of Fernando's character, voluntary obedience to the Constitution was an impossibility. Not only did it declare that sovereignty resided in the nation, with the corresponding right to determine its fundamental laws, but the powers of the crown were limited in many ways; the Córtes reserved the right to exclude unworthy aspirants to the succession, and to set aside the incumbent for any cause rendering him incapable-- clauses susceptible of most dangerous interpretation. At this very time, indeed, the Córtes were deliberating on the appropriation to be made to the king for the maintenance of his court, which implied the right to subject him to the most galling conditions. ⁽⁷⁵⁾

If anything was needed to induce him to assert the full powers enjoyed by his predecessors it was afforded by a manifesto known as the Representation of the Persians, from an absurd allusion to the ancient Persians in the opening sentence. This was signed by sixty-nine deputies to the Córtes; at much length and with turgid rhetoric it set forth the sufferings inflicted on Spain by the Liberals; it argued that all the acts of the Córtes of Cádiz were null and invalid; it pointed out the limitations on the royal power prescribed by the Constitution, and it asserted that absolute monarchy was recognized as the perfection of government. It did not omit to declare that the Inquisition was indispensable to the maintenance of religion, without which no government could exist; it dwelt on the disorders consequent upon its suppression and it reminded Fernando that, from the time of the Gothic kingdom, intolerance of heresy was the permanent law of the nation. Even if the king should think best to swear to the Constitution, the manifesto protested that it was invalid and that its destructive principles must be submitted to the action of Córtes assembled according to the ancient fashion. This paper, dated April 12th, was drawn up and secretly circulated by Bernardo Moza Reales, [422] who carried it to Valencia and presented it to Fernando, receiving as reward the title of Marquis of Mataflorida. ⁽⁷⁶⁾

Fernando reached Valencia April 16th and paused there until May 4th, while secret preparations were made to overthrow the government. The Córtes, unaware of the contemplated treachery, were amusing themselves in arranging the hall for the solemnity of the king's oath and his acknowledgment as sovereign, and took no measures for self-protection. Troops were secretly collected in the vicinity of Madrid, under General Eguia, a violent reactionary, who was made Captain-general of New Castile. On the night of May 10th, when Fernando was nearing the capital, Eguia notified Joaquín Pérez, President of the Córtes, that they were closed; troops took possession of the hall and the archives were sealed, while police-agents were busy making arrests from a list of thirty-eight marked for proscription, including two of the regents, two ministers and all the more prominent liberal deputies. ⁽⁷⁷⁾ No resistance was encountered and the precedent was established which has proved so disastrous to Spain.

In the early dawn of the 11th, there was found posted everywhere a royal manifesto dated at Valencia on the 4th. In this, after a rambling summary of antecedent events, Fernando promised to assemble as soon as possible Córtes of the old fashion and, in conjunction with them, to establish solidly whatever was necessary for the good of the kingdom. He hated despotism; the enlightenment and culture of Europe would never permit it, and his predecessors had never been despots. But the Córtes of Cádiz and the existing body were illegal and all their acts were invalid; he did not intend to swear to the Constitution or to the decrees of the Córtes, but he pronounced them all void and of no effect, and any one supporting them in any manner or endeavoring to impede the execution of this manifesto was declared to be guilty of high treason and subject to the death-penalty. ⁽⁷⁸⁾ It is perhaps [423] needless to say that the promised convocation of Córtes and the salutary legislation never took place. All the modernized institutions framed since 1810 were swept away at a word, the old organization of Government was restored, and Fernando was an absolute despot, disposing at his pleasure of the lives and property of his subjects who had fought so desperately for his restoration.

How he used this power was manifested in the case of the fifty-two prisoners who were arrested at the time of the coup d'etat. Nineteen months were spent in endeavoring to have them condemned by tribunals and commissions formed for the purpose, but no crime could be proved that would not equally affect all who had voted with them, many of whom stood in high favor at court. The last tribunal convened for their trial advised Fernando to sentence them in the exercise of his royal omnipotence, and he did so, December 17, 1815, sending them to distant fortresses, African presidios and convents, with strict orders to allow them to see no one and to send or receive no letters. ⁽⁷⁹⁾ As regards the three specially obnoxious clerical deputies, Villanueva was recluded for six years in the convent of la Salceda, from which we shall see him emerge and again play a brief part on the political stage. Muñoz Torrero was sent to the convent of Erbon, in Galicia. He finally fell into the savage hands of Dom Miguel of Portugal and perished, after severe torture, in 1829. ⁽⁸⁰⁾ Ruiz de Padron was not on the list of the proscribed; he had not been elected to the new Córtes but was detained by sickness in Cadiz. On his return in May to his parish of Valdeorras, his bishop, Manuel Vicente of Astorga, made a crime of his absence from his cure without episcopal licence and prosecuted him for this and for sustaining in the Córtes projects adverse to religion and the throne. On November 2, 1815, he was sentenced to perpetual reclusión in the desert convent of Cabeza de Alba and, to prevent appeal, the bishop sent the process to the Inquisition of Valladolid. Ruiz appealed to the metropolitan, but the bishop refused to allow the appeal. Then a recurso de fuerza to the Chancellery of Valladolid was tried, which thrice demanded the process before the bishop, to escape exposure in a secular court, allowed the appeal. Finally the metropolitan annulled the proceedings and Ruiz was set at liberty, after four years' imprisonment, broken in health and [424] ruined in fortune. This action probably superseded a prosecution against him for printing his speech in the Córtes against the Inquisition, a prosecution commenced by the Madrid tribunal and transferred to Valladolid. ⁽⁸¹⁾
 

It was at first thought that the manifesto of May 4th, by invalidating all the acts of the Córtes, in itself re-established the Inquisition. In fact, Seville, its birth-place, had not waited for this and, on May 6th, a popular tumult restored it. The next day its banner, piously preserved by Don Juan García de Negra, a familiar, was solemnly conducted to the castle of Triana by a procession, at the head of which marched Juan Acisla de Vera, coadministrator of the diocese; the Te Deum was sung in the cathedral, the houses were illuminated and splendidly adorned with tapestries. ⁽⁸²⁾ All this was premature, as likewise were the attempts made by some tribunals to reorganize, for the absence of an inquisitor-general and Suprema rendered irregular the transaction of business. Representations were made to the king by Seville and other towns, by the chapter of Valencia, and by bishops, praying him to take action, and the scruples as to the intervention of the civil power in spiritual affairs vanished. ⁽⁸³⁾ Fernando accordingly, by decree of July 21, 1814, recited the appeals made to him and announced that he deemed it fitting that the Holy Office should resume the exercise of its powers, both the ecclesiastical granted by the popes and the royal, bestowed by his predecessors. In both of these the rules in force in 1808 were to be followed, together with the laws issued at sundry times to restrain abuses and curtail privileges. [425] But, as other reforms might be necessary, he ordered that, as soon as the Suprema should assemble, two of its members, selected by him, and two of the Royal Council should form a junta to investigate the procedure and the methods of censorship and, if they should find anything requiring reform, they should report to him that he might do what was requisite. ⁽⁸⁴⁾ Even the Córtes could not assert more authoritative domination.

The inquisitor-generalship was filled by the appointment of Francisco Xavier de Mier y Campillo, Bishop of Almería, and the vacancies in the Suprema were supplied. The junta of reform was organized and met and consulted. In 1816 we hear of their being still in session, but we are told that they found nothing requiring amendment. ⁽⁸⁵⁾

The Suprema lost no time in getting to work. A circular of August 8th, to the tribunals, enclosed the royal decree and announced that, in virtue of it, the council was that day restored to its authority and functions, which had been interrupted only by the invasion and the so-called Córtes. The tribunals were ordered to proceed, as in former times, with all business that might offer, and the officials were to discharge their accustomed duties, until the Bishop of Almería should receive his bulls. Lists of all officials were to be sent, with statements of their dates of service, and of popular report as to their conduct during the troubles, and whether they had publicly attacked the rights of the sovereign and of the Holy Office. A process of "purification" ensued, investigating the records of all officials, many of whom had bowed to the tempest during the short-lived triumph of Liberalism. April 7, 1815, a circular letter directed that any one who had petitioned the Córtes for the abolition of the Inquisition, or had congratulated them on their action, was no longer to be regarded as in office or entitled to wear the insignia, but considerable tenderness was shown to the erring. Thus Don Manuel Palomino y Lozano, supernumerary secretary of the Madrid tribunal, had signed an address of congratulation to the Córtes, but on his pleading coercion and fear he was allowed to retain office. ⁽⁸⁶⁾

Allusion has already been made (Vol. II, p. 445) to the difficulties experienced in re-constituting an institution which, during [426] five years of war, had been exposed to spoliation and destruction, resulting, in some places, in the wrecking of its buildings, the purloining of its movables and the scattering of its papers. Thus, for instance, in September and October 1815, the Logroño tribunal, which had lost its habitation, "was negotiating with the Marquis of Monasterio for his house, which he offered rent-free, if it would keep the premises in repair and make the necessary alterations; the Suprema instructed it to secure better terms if it could, and to be very economical with the alterations. ⁽⁸⁷⁾ As late as 1817 we chance to learn that Santiago and Valladolid had no prisons and, in 1819, that Llerena was in the same plight. ⁽⁸⁸⁾

The financial question was even more serious. We have seen how, under Godoy, the tribunals had been obliged to convert all their available securities into Government funds, which of course had become worthless, and how the Córtes, by decree of December 1, 1810, had applied the suppressed prebends to the conduct of the war. It must therefore have been well-nigh starved when suppressed by the Córtes, but there was no disposition to expose individuals to suffering and, when its property was declared to belong to the nation, elaborate provision was made for the payment of salaries and the customary gratifications, though we may safely assume that in the majority of cases, these kindly intentions failed of effect. ⁽⁸⁹⁾

When re-establishment came the task of gathering the salvage from the wreck of the past six years was most disheartening. The royal decree simply called on the Inquisition to resume its functions and said nothing about its property, the restoration of which was evidently taken for granted, under the manifesto invalidating the acts of the Córtes. There was no disposition, however, on the part of the treasury officials to do this and, in response to a consulta of August 11th, the king, on the 18th, issued an order on them to make over to the tribunals all real estate of every kind that had been absorbed by the treasury, the account of rents to be made up to July 21st and apportioned on that basis. This left personal property out of consideration and a further decree was procured, September 3d, ordering the restoration of everything that had passed into the Caja de Consolidación, as well as the fruits of the suppressed prebends, balancing the accounts up to [427] July 21st. ⁽⁹⁰⁾ This was slackly obeyed; the necessities of the tribunals were pressing, and the Suprema presented consultas of October 1st and 23d asking that they should be allowed to collect the revenues, and that restitution should be made of all past collections or, in default of this, that a monthly allowance of eighty thousand reales be made to the Inquisition. To this Fernando replied that the needs of the royal treasury did not permit the repayment of back collections, nor could it meet the proposed monthly allowance, but it was his will that such payments as the General Treasury and the Junta del Crédito Público could spare should be made as a payment on account for the most necessary expenses of the Inquisition. This last was doubtless an empty promise; the royal financiers were determined not to go back of July 21st, and it appears, by a letter of December 16th, that the royal officials were still making collections. The most that the Suprema could accomplish was to procure from the Junta del Crédito Público an order of January 9, 1815, and from the chief of the Treasury one of January 30th, to their subordinates to cease collecting from the property of the Inquisition, under the rigid condition that an account should be kept by the tribunals of their collections, so that whatever they might obtain of arrears due prior to July 21st should enure to the benefit of the Government. ⁽⁹¹⁾ In this, however, there was recognized the justice of a claim for the unpaid back salaries of the officials, and elaborate arrangements were made to ascertain and put these in shape, but it was labor lost. The treasury was at too low an ebb, and the claimants for services rendered during the troubled years of war and revolution were too numerous, for the Inquisition to obtain what it demanded.

The Suprema was also diligent in seeking to recover the amounts which the tribunals had been obliged to invest in Government securities, but this was as fruitless as other attempts to save fragments of the wreck. The last we hear of it is in 1819, when the Suprema was still endeavoring to meet the exigencies of the Treasury in framing lists of the dates and numbers of the bonds. ⁽⁹²⁾

It was difficult to evolve order out of the chaos of destruction, especially where the papers had been scattered, so that evidences of indebtedness and accounts were lost, interfering greatly with efforts to reclaim property. In November, 1814, we find the [428] Valencia tribunal issuing an edict requiring the return of all books and papers and records within fifteen days, under pain of excommunication and two hundred ducats; as to the furniture and other effects, they were to be restored under threat of legal proceedings. Although Valencia had been for two years under French occupation, it seems to have been more prompt than some others in getting its finances into intelligible condition. In November the Suprema calls upon it for a detailed schedule of resources and expenses and, in the latter it is not to omit the contribution required by the Suprema, amounting to 130,896 reales, and meanwhile it is not to pay out anything for salaries or other purposes without awaiting permission. Under this it was allowed, January 21, 1815, to pay salaries up to the end of 1814, and in May to make further payments. Yet in 1816 we find it reduced to seeking a loan wherewith to meet the salaries and a sum of thirteen thousand reales demanded by the Suprema. ⁽⁹³⁾

The Suprema itself, despite the contributions which it sought to levy from the tribunals, was in a condition of penury so absolute that, on July 3, 1815, it announced that it had no funds wherewith to pay the salaries of its officials or the postage on the official communications from the tribunals, which must therefore in future arrange with the Post-Office to prepay the postage and settle monthly or quarterly. This, however, as it explained August 19th, applied only to what was addressed to it as, under a decree of May 19, 1799, letters to the inquisitor-general and other heads of councils were carried free. ⁽⁹⁴⁾

There was gradual improvement, but it was slow. A carta acordada of September 3, 1818, says that the Suprema cannot view with indifference the deplorable financial condition of nearly all the tribunals, whose diminished revenues force them to allow the meagre salaries of their officials to fall into arrears, nor can it close its ears to the clamors of these unfortunates, reduced as they are to the deepest indigence. Seeking for partial remedies, it must insist on the avoidance of all expenses not absolutely indispensable, and the suppression of all superfluous offices. One of these is the notariate of the court of confiscations; when it falls vacant it is not to be filled, and its duties are to be performed by [429] the secretary of sequestrations, whose salary will consequently be raised by fifty ducats. This was a somewhat exiguous conclusion of so solemn an exordium, seeing that the actual work of the tribunals could readily have been performed by less than half the officials who swelled their pay-rolls, but it is not without interest as showing how persistently the old inflated organization was maintained, and was struggling to support itself on the remnants of its once prosperous fortunes. Under such a system, poverty naturally continued to the last. When the Revolution of 1820 broke out, and the Seville tribunal contributed six thousand reales to the committee organized to resist the rising, it had no funds and was obliged to borrow the money on interest. As almost the first act of the successful revolutionists was to suppress the Inquisition, the lenders in this case doubtless found themselves to be involuntary contributors. ⁽⁹⁵⁾ At this time the Seville tribunal had a force of twenty-eight officials, with a pay-roll of 92,300 reales, while the amount of its work may be gathered from the fact that the revolutionists found only three prisoners to release. ⁽⁹⁶⁾

Thus amid difficulties and tribulations the tribunals one by one resumed their functions. In October, 1814, Seville was prosecuting Lt. Colonel Lorenzo del Castillo for propositions; Saragossa was receiving the self-denunciation of Mathias Pintado, priest of Bujanuelo, for heregia mista, and Valencia was suspending the sumaria of the Capuchin Fray Pablo de Altea for mala doctrina, while in December Murcia was prosecuting Don Josef de Zayas, a prominent lieutenant-general of the royal army, for Free-Masonry. ⁽⁹⁷⁾ Business, however, at the first was scanty. In the book of secret votes of the Suprema, there is an interval from December 22, 1814, until February 16, 1815. As the months of 1815 passed on, the breaks grow shorter and, by the summer of 1815, the decrees follow each other closely. Valladolid seems to have been dilatory in getting to work for, although it had three inquisitors drawing salary, no case came up from it until January, 1817, and, from this one it would seem that it had not been in operation until October, 1816. ⁽⁹⁸⁾

The prosecution of such a man as Zayas shows that the [430] reorganized Inquisition did not hesitate to grapple with those in high place, and another early case illustrates this still more forcibly. During the French occupation the Duke and Duchess of Sotomayor and the Countess of Mora had obtained possession of the books and indecent pictures accumulated in the Madrid tribunal. Apparently they refused to surrender them; the tribunal prosecuted them and rendered a sentence, subject to the royal permission, that these objects should be seized, but in such a manner as not to attract attention or to provoke resentment. The Suprema confirmed the sentence, ordering its execution by a single inquisitor, accompanied by a secretary, so as to reconcile the respect due to the parties with the secrecy that was essential. ⁽⁹⁹⁾

A politic act was the issue of a general pardon for all that had "impiously and scandalously" been uttered and done against the Inquisition under the fatal circumstances of the recent troubles. ⁽¹⁰⁰⁾ It could afford to assume this attitude of magnanimity, seeing that the Government was pitilessly avenging it on its most prominent adversaries. When the Government failed in this duty, the Inquisition had no hesitation in nullifying its edict of pardon. We have seen its prosecution of Ruiz de Padron, until it found that the Bishop of Astorga was rendering this superfluous, nor was this by any means an isolated case. In August, 1815, we find the Suprema acting on sumarias from Canaries, in the cases of Mariano Romero, a priest, for a sonnet against the Inquisition, and of Francisco Guerra for a sonnet and an epitaph of the same character. So, in November, 1815, there is a prosecution of the Duke of Parque Castrillo for congratulating the Córtes on the abolition of the Inquisition and for a general order to the troops, December 2,1812. His case dragged on until June 10, 1817, when its suspension was ordered. ⁽¹⁰¹⁾

Yet it was not easy to revive the old-time veneration for an institution that had been so buffeted and roughly handled by the press and the Córtes. A couple of cases in Madrid, in 1814, of women in whose shops scandalous pictures and objects were exhibited, would seem to indicate that its commands were not obeyed with alacrity. ⁽¹⁰²⁾ It was doubtless with a view of overcoming this indifference that Fernando himself assumed the office [431] of an inquisitor, February 3, 1815, when he visited the Suprema, presided over its deliberations and participated in its decisions, examined all the offices and expressed his royal satisfaction with the methods of procedure. By royal permission the Suprema sent its president and three members to return the visit and express its gratitude for a mark of royal favor such as Ferdinand the Catholic nor any of his successors had ever made. A full report was printed in the Gaceta of February 16th, copies of which the Suprema sent to the tribunals with orders to read it to the officials and place it in the archives. ⁽¹⁰³⁾ With the same purpose, he erected, as we have seen, the Congregation of San Pedro Martir to a knightly Order, with a habit and badge and, on April 6th, the feast of St. Peter Martyr, he presided over the Congregation, with his brothers Carlos and Antonio, wearing the insignia. In communicating this to the tribunals, the Suprema rendered it especially impressive by ordering them to commence the payment of salaries earned since July 21st and to continue it monthly. ⁽¹⁰⁴⁾ Noble courtiers doubtless found that assuming office in the Inquisition was an avenue to royal favor, and we speedily see many of them submitting their genealogies for this purpose. The great Duke of Berwick and Alva, Fitzjames Stuart Silva Stolberg y Palafox, thus seeks the office of alguazil mayor of the tribunal of Córdova; the Marquis of Altamira does the same for the position of honorary secretary in that of Madrid, and we happen to hear of the Count of Mazeda, a grandee of the first class, serving as alguazil mayor of the tribunal of Santiago, and the Marquis of Iscar as honorary secretary to the Suprema. ⁽¹⁰⁵⁾

In spite of all this, the Inquisition could not regain its former position. Not only was it not respected but it dared not to enforce respect. Two Edicts of Grace for Free-Masons were issued, January 2d and February 12, 1815, when the Valladolid tribunal sent those for Medina del Campo and its district to its commissioner Victor González to be posted. The vicar-general and Ordinary, Doctor Josef Suárez Talavera, as ecclesiastical judge, demanded that they should pass through his hands, and when they were posted they bore the MS. subscription "Fixese, Doctor Suárez," [432] thus assuming that it was by his permission, and arrogating to himself a jurisdiction superior to that of the Inquisition. When this was reported to the tribunal it ordered González to take them down and replace them with unsullied ones, which he did. Thereupon Suárez sent him word that, but for starting on a journey, he would make him repent and that, had he known of his being in Medina he would have cast him in prison and seen who could get him out. The tribunal meekly swallowed this flagrant insult; it was under instructions to perform no act indicating jurisdiction superior to that of the Ordinaries, so it quietly gathered evidence verifying the facts and sent the papers, September 15th, to the Suprema. ⁽¹⁰⁶⁾

The Inquisition recognized and felt acutely its altered position. In a report to the king on the subject of visitos de navios, made by the Suprema, in 1819, there are repeated confessions of powerlessness; the times are so unfortunate that its regulations fail to effect their object. ⁽¹⁰⁷⁾ The same consciousness of weakness is manifest in the conduct of the occasional competencias which still occurred. In such of these as I have had an opportunity of examining there are a studied courtesy and evident desire to avoid giving offence, without wholly abandoning the claims of the Holy Office.

To the same cause we may, at least partially, ascribe the marked tendency to mitigation of punishment--except in the case of political offenders--and to avoid all unnecessary hardship and humiliation of culprits. When, in March, 1819, the Madrid tribunal pronounced a severe sentence on Teodoro Bachiller, for propositions, the Suprema moderated it greatly in every way, in order, it said, to make him understand its benignity in taking care of his honor and of the comfort of his family. In January, 1817, Lorenzo Ayllon was tried in Seville for abusing a priest while celebrating mass and endeavoring to snatch away the host-- offences for which, of old, he could scarce have escaped the stake, but now he had only absolution ad cautelam, a reprimand, two years of presidio followed by six years of exile, and the Suprema relieved him of the vergüenza which had been included. Even more marked was the case of Diego Blásquez, postmaster of Villanueba de la Serena, who with some others committed the sacrilege of burying a dog with funeral rites. The Llerena tribunal commenced a prosecution and sent the sumaria to the Suprema, which [433] contented itself with ordering a courteous note to be addressed to the secular and ecclesiastical judges, expressing a hope that they would not permit a repetition of such scandals. ⁽¹⁰⁸⁾ It would be easy to multiply similar instances, but these will suffice to show how completely, in dealing with offences against the faith, the spirit of the Inquisition had been tamed, and how factitious was the claim that its existence was essential for the preservation of religion, when there were over half a hundred episcopal tribunals perfectly competent to try such offences and perfectly ready to treat them with greater severity.

Meanwhile Fernando's reign had continued as it commenced. Under the influence of a camarilla of low-caste and ignoble favorites, who pandered to his vices and enriched themselves by trafficking in offices and in contracts and in justice, his government was a compound of brutality and imbecility, and the affairs of the nation fell into complete disorder. All the abuses that had flourished under Godoy were intensified and coupled with persistent cruel persecution of those designated as Liberals, who filled the gaols through constantly recurring lists of proscriptions. De Martignac, who, as royal commissioner, accompanied the Duke of Angouléme in the invasion of 1823, was a thoroughly well-informed and unprejudiced observer, who after a vigorous description of the misgovernment of Fernando sums up by saying "We can conceive the influence of such a regime on the prosperity of the land, and yet it is difficult to realize the extent of disorder, wretchedness and weakness to which it fell. It was necessary to resort to arbitrary taxes, to exorbitant duties which destroyed commerce, to loans raised without credit. It was impossible to provide for the most pressing necessities of the State; everything was neglected or abandoned; the army was unpaid; the navy, destroyed at Trafalgar, remained in ruins; the administration, destitute of all means of action, did nothing and could do nothing to improve conditions, or even to preserve what there was. From this arose the discontent of the people." ⁽¹⁰⁹⁾ It can scarce excite surprise that the crazy enthusiasm of Fernando's welcome in 1814 had evaporated.

During this disastrous period, every year saw an attempt at revolution. In 1814 it was tried at Pampeluna by General Mina, who escaped; in 1815 in Galicia by Porlier, who was executed; in 1816 in Madrid by Richard, who shared the same fate; in 1817 in Catalonia by Lacy, who was shot; in 1818 in Valencia by Vidal, who was put to death. Again in Valencia a plot was formed to break out January 1, 1819, but it was betrayed and thirteen of the conspirators were hanged. O'Donnell, Count of la Bisbal, an able soldier and unscrupulous intriguer, was privy to this, but averted suspicion and was appointed to command an expeditionary force collecting at Cádiz for Buenos Ayres, against the revolted colony. With customary negligence, transports were not provided; the troops lay idle for months, discontent spread and a formidable conspiracy was organized, which counted on la Bisbal's support; he concluded that loyalty was safest and seized the leading plotters, for which he was rewarded with the grand cross of Carlos III., but suspicion arose; he was removed and replaced by the incapable Count of Calderon.

The situation, however, was growing impossible, and revolution was in the air. A portion of the troops were cantoned at las Cabezas de San Juan, a town not far from Cádiz. There, on January 1, 1820, Rafael de Riego, commander of the battalion of Asturias, assembled his men, made an inflammatory harangue, and they all declared for the Constitution. He made a dash for Arcos, where he captured Calderon and three of his generals, effected a junction with the battalions España and Corona, under Colonel Antonio Quiroga, and failed in an attack on Cádiz. Delay and irresolution followed, until January 27th, when Riego, at the head of fifteen hundred men, marched to Algeciras, where he remained until February 7th. Defeated in an attempt on Málaga, he reached Córdova on March 7th, with some five hundred despairing followers. No effort was made to capture them; the garrison and citizens looked on placidly, while Riego refreshed his men and headed for the Sierra Morena; they dropped off during the march and he was left with fifty followers; so far as he was concerned, the movement was a failure.

Still, its preliminary success had aroused the slumbering elements of discontent. On February 21st revolution broke out at [435] Coruña and spread to Ferrol and Vigo, when the Count of San Roman abandoned Galicia without a struggle. Saragossa followed on March 2d, the captain-general and garrison joining the magistrates and people. When the news reached Barcelona, on March 10th the people rose and sacked the Inquisition, but did no injury to the officials. ⁽¹¹⁰⁾ Within a few days Tarragona, Gerona and Mataró followed the example, the garrisons participating in the movement. In Navarre, Mina's account of the rising shows that there was prearrangement, and that the municipal authorities and military officials were fully in accord. When he reached Pampeluna with a large force, gathered on his way from the border, he found that the revolution had already been peacefully accomplished on March 11th. Meanwhile la Bisbal, seeing that the movement promised success, spared no promises to obtain command of the forces concentrating in la Mancha to put down Riego's rising. He received the appointment and, on reaching Ocana, he induced the regiment Alejandro to cry "Viva la Constitucion." The revolution was accomplished and was bloodless, save a hideous massacre at Cadiz of the unarmed multitude, perpetrated in cold blood by Don Manuel Freyre. ⁽¹¹¹⁾

During the two months of this desultory movement, which prompt action could so readily have suppressed, the court was nerveless and incapable. When the news came of the rising in Galicia, Fernando issued, February 28th, a plaintive appeal, promising amendment. His terror increased as evil tidings came pouring in, and on March 3d he published a decree bewailing the state of the kingdom, and announcing that he had ordered the Council of State to prepare a comprehensive scheme of reform. This was followed, March 6th, by another calling an immediate [436] convocation of Córtes. It was too late; he found himself abandoned by all, even by his Royal Guard, which General Ballesteros reported was planning to retire to Buen Retiro and send a deputation asking him to swear to the Constitution. This was decisive and, on the night of the 7th, he issued another decree announcing his intention to do so. This was received, on the 8th, with popular rejoicings, but, as no further action was taken, an impatient mob, on the 9th, surrounded the palace with seditious cries and threats. The guard was impassive; Fernando was deserted and was absolutely alone when the crowd began to mount the stairs to demand that he should swear to the Constitution, but they were restrained on learning that he had ordered the reassembling of the Ayuntamiento of Madrid as it had existed under the Constitution. Its members were got together and proceeded immediately to the palace, where Fernando received them with warm expressions of affection; he took the required oath of his own free will, and ordered Ballesteros to make the army do the same. A general illumination and bell-ringing for three nights were ordered, and the people dispersed, not, however, without first visiting the Inquisition, releasing the prisoners and scattering the archives. Only two or three prisoners were found and these were political. Rodrigo tells us that the mob wanted them to pose as victims of persecution, but they prudently refused, and a neighboring cobbler was persuaded to exhibit himself as the presiding figure of the celebration. ⁽¹¹²⁾

On the same day, March 9th, Fernando issued a decree abolishing the Inquisition. This bore that, as its existence was incompatible with the Constitution of 1812, for which reason it had, after mature deliberation, been suppressed by the Córtes, and in conformity with the opinion of the Junta this day established, he ordered that, from this day, the Suprema and the Inquisition be suppressed throughout the monarchy, setting at liberty all prisoners confined for political or religious opinions, and transferring, to the bishops in their respective dioceses, their cases to be determined in accordance with the decree of the Córtes. ⁽¹¹³⁾ This was followed, March 20th, by a royal order providing for inventories of all property pertaining to the Inquisition, and reviving the decree of February 22, 1813; the Bureau of Public Credit was to [437] take possession of and administer the property, until its destination should be determined by the Córtes shortly to be assembled, while the salaries of officials were to be continued. When the Córtes met, a decree of August 9th included this with other escheated property, to be sold at auction by the Junta nacional de Crédito. ⁽¹¹⁴⁾

During the slow progress of the Revolution, the Inquisition seems to have been watching events with full consciousness of the fate in store for it if the movement should prove successful. A letter of January 19th, from the Seville tribunal to the Suprema, states that it had delayed the arrests of the Trinitarian, Fray Juan Montes, and of Don Tomás Díaz in consequence, at first of the epidemic, and then of the insurrection, to which the Suprema replied, January 24th, that it left future action to the prudence of the tribunal. ⁽¹¹⁵⁾ Considering how feeble at the time was the demonstration of Riego, this shows that its ultimate consequences were fully apprehended. Still the Inquisition continued at work, but the last case acted upon by the Suprema was its confirmation, February 10th, of a sentence rendered January 28th, by the Toledo tribunal, on Manuel de la Peña Palacios, priest of Ontoba. As the last act of the dreaded Holy Office, after a career of three centuries and a half, it has an interest beyond its inherent trivial character, and it will be found in the Appendix.

At least one liberated prisoner gave expression to his delight at his release. Don Antonio Bernabeu, a priest, had been a member of the Córtes of Cádiz and had been arrested with the others in May, 1814, but seems to have been released in about six months. He was a Jansenist of an extreme type and, in 1813, had printed a pamphlet to prove that the State could seize all ecclesiastical property and reduce the overgrown numbers of the clergy, putting those who were left on moderate salaries. The tract was a terrible indictment of the Church for its greed of accumulation, its neglect of duty and its departure from the old standards in concentrating all power in the pope, which he attributed to the Isidorian Decretals. On his release from prison, December 14, 1814, he hastened to denounce himself for this to the Inquisition and was placed in reclusion. In 1816 he denounced himself a second time for matters at first omitted. The fiscal presented the accusation, April 20, 1817, rather cleverly drawn, for it demanded [438] precise definition of his opinions on the wide range of subjects, in which he charged the Church with deviation from primitive times, and specific proofs of his somewhat vague declamation as to abuses. To satisfy this would require the resources of a large library and years of research, while Bernabeu was confined in a convent and was denied even a copy of his offending pamphlet, besides being exposed to all manner of persecutions by his fellow inmates. His trial was still pending when the decree of March 9th liberated him; he was promptly returned as a deputy to the Córtes of 1820, and he celebrated his release by reprinting his pamphlet, with an account of his sufferings and his answers to the charges of the fiscal. ⁽¹¹⁶⁾

It would carry us too far from our subject to recount in detail the extravagancies and follies with which the triumphant Liberals invited the cruel reaction that awaited them. Moderation, perhaps, was scarce to be expected of men, smarting under the persecution of the last six years, and suddenly brought from fortresses and presidios, or from exile, to take charge of the Government, and to frame laws for the nation. That they should in turn persecute their persecutors was natural but impolitic; mutual hatreds were inflamed, and the land was divided into factions between which harmony and forbearance became impossible. The long centuries of despotism and the repression of independent thought and action had rendered the people incapable of the large measure of self-government provided by the Constitution. So-called patriotic societies were rapidly formed--de Lorencini, de San Fernando, la Fontana de Oro, la Cruz de Malta, la Landaburana and others--which in reality were Jacobinical clubs, where the most radical measures were advocated, and the most violent means of effecting them were urged. An unbridled press was busy in adding fuel to the flames and in stimulating the ardor which sought to realize anarchical dreams. Masonry had [439] been busy in preparing the revolution, and with its success Masonry became the avenue to power and place; its lodges multiplied and were rapidly filled. Then, with the progress of advanced ideas, Masonry became too conservative for the exaltados, who left it and established the Comuneros, whose statutes formed a state of revolutionary character within the State. They rivalled the Masons in numbers and influence, and the virulent struggle for supremacy between the two bodies at times paralyzed the Government and neutralized the forces of order. The disorderly element existing in all communitie