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THE
HISTORY OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH, from the birth of Christ to the
18th Century: including the very interesting account of the
Waldenses and Albigenses
By William Jones
First Edition 1812
Fourth Edition 1819
Fifth Edition 1826
London: Printed for the Author by W. Myers, 7, Took’s Court,
Castle Street, Holborn
[Note from the publisher. This valuable out-of-print book was carefully formatted for electronic publication by Way of Life Literature. For a catalog of other books, both current and old, in print and electronic format, contact us at P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061-0368, fbns@wayoflife.org (e-mail), http://www.wayoflife.org (web site).]
[Table of Contents for "A History of the Christian Church" by William Jones]
CHAPTER FIVE -- SECTION 5
SOME ACCOUNT OF THE RISE AND ESTABLISHMENT OF THE INQUISITION, WITH REFLECTIONS ON ITS GENERAL SPIRIT AND OPERATION
The preceding sections will have enabled the reader to form a tolerably correct judgment concerning the religious principles and general character of that denomination of Christians called Catharists, Paterines, Albigenses, or Waldenses; and I should now proceed to a more detailed account of their history, subsequent to the times of Peter Waldo, and especially of the dreadful persecutions and complicated sufferings which came upon them in consequence of their adherence "to the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus;" but it will be proper, in this place, to take a glance at the origin, the establishment, and the operation of that monstrous system of cruelty and oppression, gently called by the Catholics "the holy office," though better known among Protestants by the name of the Inquisition.
[As I shall have occasion, in the subsequent pages of this work to make frequent references to Limborch’s History of the Inquisition, it is proper the reader should be apprised of the degree of credit which is due to that author’s statements. He was a native of Amsterdam, born 1633, a person of great learning and talents, which raised him to the rank of professor of divinity in that city. When his History of the Inquisition first came over to England, it was received with the highest approbation by many of the principal nobility and clergy. In particular Mr. Locke, that incomparable judge of men and books, bestowed the highest eulogiums upon it,--commended it for its method and perspicuity, and the authorities by which it is so abundantly confirmed,--and pronounced it to be a work of its kind absolutely perfect. In a letter to Limborch himself, he tells him, that he had so fully exposed their secret acts of wickedness and cruelty, that if the Papists had any remains of humanity in them they must be ashamed of their horrid tribunals, in which everything that was just and righteous was so monstrously perverted; and that it was proper it should be translated into the vulgar language of every nation, that the meanest people might understand the antichristian practices of that execrable court. The Papists became so alarmed at its publication, that the cardinals, inquisitors general at Rome, condemned it by an edict, and forbade the reading of it, under the severest penalties.]
It was not until about the year 1200, the papal chair being then filled by INNOCENT III that the terms "Inquisition into heresy," and "Inquisitor," were much, if at all, heard of. The bishops, and their vicars, being, in the pope’s apprehension, neither so fit nor so diligent in the discharge of their duty respecting the extirpation of heresy as he thought necessary, two new orders of regulars were at this time instituted, viz. those of St. Dominic and St. Francis, both zealously devoted to the church, and consisting of persons with whom the advancement of Christianity, and the exaltation of the pontifical power, were always synonymous terms. To St. Dominic, indeed, the honor of first suggesting the erection of this extraordinary court is commonly ascribed. It was not, however, at first, on the same footing on which it afterwards settled, and on which it has since continued. The first inquisitors were vested with a double capacity, not very happily conjoined in the same persons; one was that of preachers, to convince the heretics by argument; the other that of persecutors, to instigate magistrates to employ every possible method of extirpating the refractory--that is, all who were so unreasonable as not to be convinced by the profound reasoning of those merciless fanatics and wretched sophisters.
DOMINIC descended from an illustrious Spanish family of the name of Guzman, was the son of Felix and Joanna, and born at the village of Cabaroga, in the year 1170, in the diocese of Osma. His mother during her pregnancy, is said to have dreamed that she was with child of a pup, carrying in its mouth a lighted torch; that after its birth, it put the world in an uproar by its fierce barkings, and at length set it on fire by the torch which it carried in its mouth. His followers have interpreted this dream, of his doctrine, by which he enlightened the world; while others, if dreams presage any thing, think that the torch was an emblem of that fire and faggot by which an infinite multitude of persons were burnt to ashes. [Limborch’s History of the Inquisition, Volume 1. chapter 10.] He was educated for the priesthood, and grew up the most fiery and the most sanguinary of mortals. Before his time every bishop was a sort of inquisitor in his own diocese; but Dominic contrived to incorporate a body of men, independent of every human being except the pope, for the express purpose of ensnaring and destroying Christians. He was well aware, that however loudly the priests declaimed against heresy, the lords of the soil would not suffer them to butcher their tenants under any such vain pretenses. In Biscay, the priesthood was at a very low ebb, in the eleventh century, and the clergy complained to the king of Navarre that the nobility and gentry treated them very little better than their slaves, employing them chiefly only to breed up and feed their dogs. Nearly a century after that time, in a neighboring state, when the renowned St. Bernard began, in a sermon to a crowded auditory, to inveigh against heresy, the nobility and gentry all rose up and left the church, and the people followed them. The preacher came down and proceeded to the market place, where he attempted to harangue on the same subject; but the populace, wiser than the preacher, refused to hear him, and raised such a clamor as drowned his voice, and compelled him to desist. Only one expedient remained,--Bernard recollected that Jesus had ordered his apostles, in certain cases, to shake off the dust of their feet, and as though he were an apostle and had received the same command, he affected to imitate the example. He left the city, shook his feet, and cursed the inhabitants by exclaiming, "May the Almighty punish this city with a drought." Thus far went the rage of Catholicism at the beginning of the twelfth century, and here its proud waves were stayed; but at the commencement of the thirteenth, about the year 1215, Dominic broke down the dam, and covered Toulouse with a tide of despotism stained with human blood. Posterity will scarcely believe that this enemy of mankind, after forming a race like himself, first called preaching, and then Dominican friars, died in his bed, was canonized for a saint, worshipped as a divinity, and proposed as a model of piety and virtue to succeeding generations. [Robinson’s Ecclesiastical Researches, p. 321.] Never says Dr. Geddes, was there such a rabble in the world as a Spanish saint-roll. The first class of them are ideal beings, or pagans, or enthusiastics; but the last are saints with a vengeance, for all their steps to Paradise are marked with human blood.
The inquisitors, at first had no tribunals; they merely inquired after heretics, their number, strength, and riches. When they had detected them, they informed the bishops, who at that time, had the sole power of judging in ecclesiastical affairs, urging them to anathematize, banish, or otherwise chastise such heretical persons as they brought before them. It is true, says bishop Burnet, adverting to these times, the church pretended that she would shed no blood; but all this was insufferable juggling. For the churchmen declared who were heretics, and the secular arm was required to be always in readiness to execute their sentence. This was not only claimed by the bishops, but it was made a part of their oath at their consecration, "that they should oppose and persecute heretics to the utmost of their power" [Miscellaneous Tracts, volume 1]. Nor were they contented to proceed by the common rules of justice, upon accusations and witnesses; but all forms were superseded, and by virtue of their pastoral authority, as if that had been given them to worry their sheep and not to feed them, they objected articles to their prisoners upon suspicion, requiring them to purge themselves of them by oath. And because bishops were not perhaps all equally zealous and cruel, that bloody man Dominic, took this work to task, and his order has ever since furnished the world with a set of inquisitors, compared to whom all that had ever dealt in tortures, in any former times, were mere bunglers. [Bishop Burnet’s Remarks concerning Persecution, prefixed to his translation of Lanctantius’ Relation of the Deaths of the Primitive Persecutors. Aunst. 1687. p. 34, etc.]
Sometimes they excited princes to arm their subjects against them, and at other times they inflamed the rabble, whom they themselves headed, to take up arms and unite in extirpating them. Such as they could prevail upon to devote themselves to this service, obtained the title of crusaders, and were distinguished by a cross of cloth affixed to their garments. This badge operated like a charm upon the deluded populace, who, if they were inflamed before, now became infuriate, and, as one happily expresses it, were raised to a super-celestial sort of virtue, which defies all the restraints of reason and humanity. Things remained pretty much in this state till about the year 1250; that is, for half a century.
During this period the efforts of the inquisitors were greatly assisted by the emperor of the Romans, FREDERICK II who in the year 1224, promulgated, from Padua, four edicts against heretics, of the most ferocious and sanguinary description, addressed to his beloved princes, the venerable archbishops, bishops, and other prelates of the church; to the dukes, marquises, earls, barons, governors, judges, ministers, officials, and all other his faithful subjects throughout the empire. In these edicts he takes the inquisitors under his protection, imposes on obstinate heretics the punishment of being burnt to death, and of perpetual imprisonment on the penitent, committing the cognizance of the crime to the ecclesiastical, and the condemnation of the criminals, as well as the infliction of the punishment, to the secular judges. As the object of all these bloody edicts was chiefly to destroy the Waldenses or Albigenses, it may not be foreign to our purpose to give a specimen of the spirit that breathes throughout the whole of them.
"The care of the imperial government," says his Majesty, "committed to us from heaven, and over which we preside, demands the material sword, which is given to us separately from the priesthood, against the enemies of the faith, and for the extirpation of heretical pravity, that we should pursue with judgment and justice those vipers and perfidious children who insult the Lord and his church, as though they would tear out the very bowels of their mother. We shall not suffer these wretches to live who infect the world by their seducing doctrines, and who, being themselves corrupted, more grievously taint the flock of the faithful." He then proceeds to pronounce the most dreadful sentence against all persons convicted of heresy, against all who may be employed as advocates for them, and against all who may be detected in receiving and abetting them, condemning their persons, disinheriting their children, and confiscating their property.
The second edict, though not less sanguinary, was more definite in its object, since it professes to have directly in view the destruction of the sect of the Paterines, of whom, it will be recollected, a particular account has been given in a former section. The reader shall have a specimen.
"The heretics are endeavoring to rend the seamless coat of our God, and raging with deceitful words, strive to divide the unity of the invisible faith itself, and to separate the sheep from the care of St. Peter, to whom they were committed by the Good Shepherd, to be fed. These are the ravenous wolves within, who put on the meekness of the sheep, that they may the better enter into the Lord’s sheepfold. These are the worst angels--the sons of naughtiness, of the father of wickedness--appointed to deceive simple souls. These are adders who deceive the doves--serpents which crawl in private, and under the sweetness of honey, vomit poison; so that whilst they pretend to administer the food of life, they sting with their tail, and mingle the most bitter poison into the cup of death.--They call themselves PATERINES, after the example of the martyrs.* These miserable Paterines, who do not believe the eternal Trinity, by their complicated wickedness offend against three, viz. God, their neighbor, and themselves. Against God, because they do not acknowledge the Son and the true faith--they deceive their neighbors, whilst under the pretense of spiritual food, they minister the delights of heretical pravity--but their cruelty to themselves is yet more savage, since, besides the loss of their immortal souls, they expose their bodies to a cruel death, being prodigal of their lives and fearless of destruction, which by acknowledging the true faith they might escape, and, which is horrible to express, their survivors are not terrified by their example. Against such enemies to God and man we cannot contain our indignation, nor refuse to punish them with the sword of just vengeance, but shall pursue them with so much the greater vigor, as they appear to spread wider the crimes of their superstition, to the most evident injury of the Christian faith, and of the church of Rome, which is adjudged to be the head of all other churches."
[* "Paterines, after the example of the martyrs." Notwithstanding the obscurity which rests upon the etymology of this name, does it not appear evident from this Imperial Edict, that it was then understood to have been conferred on these people on account of the sufferings to which they were exposed--and if so, may it not be derived from the Latin verb Pati, " to suffer?"]
The edict then proceeds to denounce every one convicted of belonging to the sect of the Paterines, as guilty of the crime of high treason--to be punished with the loss of life and of goods, and their memory rendered infamous. It enjoins that strict inquiry be made by the officials, after all such as commit those crimes, and wherever the smallest suspicion exists, that such be examined by the ecclesiastics and prelates, and if found to err in one point from the Catholic faith, they are, in case of obstinacy, by that edict condemned to suffer death,--to be committed to the punishment of the flames, and to be burned alive in public view--forbidding any, on pain of incurring the imperial indignation, to intercede for such persons.
The third law is as follows:
"We condemn the receivers, accomplices, and abettors of the Paterines, to forfeiture of their goods, and perpetual banishment, who by their care to save others, have no fear or regard for themselves. Let not their children be in any wise admitted to honors, but always accounted infamous, nor let them be allowed as witnesses in any causes in which infamous persons are refused. But if the children of those who favor the Paterines shall discover any one of them, so that he shall be convicted, let them, as the reward of their acknowledgment of the faith, be entirely restored by our imperial favor, to their forfeited honor and estate."
In the fourth edict his Imperial Majesty is pleased thus to proceed, "We condemn to perpetual infamy, withdraw our protection from, and put under our ban, [for the meaning of this, the reader may revert to volume 1, chapter 4] the Puritans, Paterines, Leonists, Arnoldists, Passignes, Josephines, Albigenses, Waldenses, etc. and all other heretics of both sexes, and of whatsoever name; and ordain that their goods may be so confiscated as that their children may never inherit them, since it is much more heinous to offend the eternal than the temporal majesty." It then proceeds to condemn all suspected persons, as heretics, if they do not purge themselves within a year--commands the officials to exterminate heretics from all places subject to them--orders that the lands of the barons shall be seized by the Catholics, if they do not purge them from heretics, within a year after proper admonition, and ordains various punishments against all the favorers of heretics--thus closing the dreadful catalogue: "Furthermore, we put under our ban those who believe, receive, defend, and favor heretics; ordaining that if any person shall refuse to give satisfaction within a year after his excommunication, he shall be, ipso jure, infamous, and not admitted to any kind of public offices--let him be intestable, and let him not have the power of making a will, nor of receiving any thing by succession or inheritance. Moreover, let no one answer for him in any affair, but let him be obliged to answer others. If he should be a judge, let his sentence be of no affect, nor any causes be heard before him. If an advocate, let him never be admitted to plead in any one’s defense. If a notary, let no instruments made by him be valid. We add, that an heretic may be convicted by an heretic, and that the houses of the Paterines their abettors and favorers, either where they have taught, or where they have laid hands on others, shall be destroyed, never to be rebuilt." --Dated at Padua, February 22, 1224. [The reader will find these Edicts entire in the first volume of Limborch’s History of the Inquisition, chapter 12.]
Any thing more infamous than these edicts, in the way of spiritual tyranny, it would be difficult to imagine; and although, by reason of the circumstances of the times, and the differences which soon arose between the pope and the emperor, they had not all that effect which might have been expected, it is, nevertheless, certain that the inquisition was greatly promoted by them. They were approved and confirmed by the pope, and inserted in his bulls, and in process of time, the persecuting spirit which pervades them, came gradually to be incorporated into the laws of almost every country in Europe.
After the death of Frederick, which happened about the middle of the century, POPE INNOCENT IV remaining sole arbiter of the affairs of Lombardy and other parts of Italy, set himself diligently to extirpate heresy, which of late had exceedingly increased; and considering the labor which had been employed in his service by the Franciscan and Dominican friars, whose zeal, unrestrained by either respect of persons or the fear of dangers--by any regard to justice or the feelings of humanity, had recommended them highly to the pontiff, he cheerfully availed himself of their ardor to second his efforts. Preaching was found of little avail, and even the enlisting of crusaders and inflicting military execution was suspended for the sake of erecting in different countries standing tribunals armed with tremendous authority, but charged solely with the purgation of heretical pravity. [The phrase "heretical pravity," will sound rather uncouth to modern ears that have not been accustomed to the jargon of the catholic writers, but the reader should be told that it is the usual slang of those writers for denoting the wickedness of thinking differently from the church of Rome.]
To the establishment of these novel tribunals there were, however, two objections started. The first that it was an encroachment on the authority of the ordinary bishop of the place, and the second that it was unprecedented to exclude the civil magistrate from the trial and punishment of heretics, on whom it had hitherto devolved. To remove the first of these difficulties, an expedient was soon devised--the pope enacted that the tribunal should consist of the inquisitor, with the bishop of the place also, but so managing the affair, at the same time, that the inquisitor was not only to be the principal, but, in reality, everything, and leaving the bishop little more than the name of a judge. To remedy the second inconvenience, and to give at least the appearance of authority to the secular powers, they were allowed to appoint the subordinate officers to the inquisition, yet still subject to the approbation of the inquisitors; they were also allowed to send with the inquisitor, when he should go into the country, one of their assessors, whom the inquisitors should choose. Of all the property belonging to heretics which they should be enabled to confiscate, a third part was to go to the community, in return for which, the community was to defray the whole expense of keeping the prisons, and supporting the prisoners. The infliction of the legal punishment was also vested in the magistrate, after trial and condemnation by the inquisitors; but that was a matter so much of course, and which he well knew he could not avoid executing, without incurring the vengeance of the church, that, in fact, it only converted him into a spiritual judge’s executioner: and thus, to use the language of Dr. Jortin, "the priest was the judge, and the king was the hangman" [Remarks, volume 3, p. 303].
Such was the footing on which "the holy office" was placed in the year 1251, in the ecclesiastical states of Italy, which were under the pope’s immediate inspection. It was afterwards extended to more distant provinces, and every where entrusted to the management of Dominican friars. Thirty-one rules or articles, defining their jurisdiction and powers, and regulating the procedure of this spiritual court of judicature, were devised; and all rulers and magistrates were commanded, by a papal bull, issued for the purpose, to give, under pain of excommunication, the most punctual obedience, and every possible assistance to this holy court. It should, however, be remarked, that the attempts which were made to introduce the inquisition, did not prove equally successful in all Roman catholic states, nor even in the greater part of them. It was never in the power of the pope to obtain the establishment of this tribunal in many of the most populous countries that were subject to the See of Rome. In France it was early introduced, but soon afterwards expelled, in such a manner, as effectually to preclude a renewal of the attempt. The difficulties arose partly from the conduct of the inquisitors--their inordinate severity, their unbounded extortion and avarice, and the propensity they showed, on every occasion, to extend beyond measure, their own authority; insomuch that they were making rapid strides to engross, under one pretext or another, all the criminal jurisdiction of the magistrate; for under the head of heresy, they insisted, were included, infidelity, blasphemy, perjury, sorcery, poisoning, bigamy, usury! Another reason was, that the tribunal was found to be so expensive, that the community refused to sustain the burden of it. Nor has it been alike severe in every place into which it has been introduced. In Spain and Portugal this scourge and disgrace to humanity has for centuries glared, monster like, with its most frightful aspect--in Rome it has been much more tolerable. Papal avarice has served to counterbalance papal tyranny.
The wealth of modern Rome has arisen very much from the constant resort of strangers from all countries and of all denominations, and chiefly those of the higher ranks. Nothing could have more effectually checked that resort, and of course the influx of riches into that capital, than such a horrid tribunal as that which existed at Lisbon and Madrid, and which diffused a terror that was felt to the utmost confines of those unhappy kingdoms.
Exclusive of the cruel punishments inflicted by the holy office, says a late writer, it may be truly affirmed, that the inquisition is a school of vice. There the artful judge, grown old in habits of subtlety, along with the sly secretary, practices his cunning in interrogating a prisoner to fix a charge of heresy. Now he fawns, and then he frowns; now soothes, and then looks dark and angry; sometimes affects to pity and to pray, at other times insults and bullies, and talks of racks and dungeons, flames, and the damnation of hell. One while he lays his hand upon his heart, and sheds tears, and promises and protests he desires not the death of a sinner, but would rather that he would turn and live; and all that he can do he will do for the discharge, aye, for the preferment of his imprisoned brother. Another while he discovers himself deaf as a rock, false as the wind, and cruel as the poison of asps. [Robinson’s Ecclesiastical Researches, p. 277]
In no country has the operation of this dreadful court of spiritual despotism been more strikingly exemplified than in Spain. The subject has been placed in the most instructive point of view by two accurate and elegant modern historians, [Watson’s History of Philip II king of Spain, and in Robertson’s History of Charles V.] and their reflections upon it are so just and natural, that as it cannot be unacceptable to the reader, I shall give the substance of what they have said.
The court of inquisition, which although it was not the parent, has been the nurse and guardian of ignorance and superstition in every kingdom into which it has been admitted, was introduced into SPAIN by FERDINAND AND ISABELLA, and was principally intended to prevent the relapse of the Jews and Moors, who had been converted, or who pretended to be converted, to the faith of the Church of Rome. Its jurisdiction, however, was not confined to the Jews and Moors, but extended to all those who in their practice or opinions differed from the established church. In the united kingdoms of Castile and Arragon, there were eighteen different inquisitorial courts, having each of them its counselors, termed apostolical inquisitors; its secretaries, sergeants, and other officers; and besides these there were twenty thousand familiars dispersed throughout the kingdom, who acted as spies and informers, and were employed to apprehend all suspected persons, and commit them for trial, to the prisons which belonged to the inquisition. By these familiars, persons were seized on bare suspicion, and in contradiction to the established rules of equity, they were put to the torture, tried and condemned by the inquisitors, without being confronted, either with their accusers, or with the witnesses on whose evidence they were condemned. The punishments inflicted were more or less dreadful, according to the caprice and humor of the judges. The unhappy victims were either strangled or committed to the flames, or loaded with chains, and shut up in dungeons during life -- their effects confiscated, and their families stigmatized with infamy.
This institution was, no doubt, well calculated to produce an uniformity of religious profession, but it had a tendency also to destroy the sweets of social life; to banish all freedom of thought and speech; to disturb men’s minds with the most disquieting apprehensions, and to produce the most intolerable slavery, by reducing persons of all ranks in life to a state of abject dependence upon priests; whose integrity, were it even greater than that of other men, as in every false profession of religion it is less, must have been corrupted by the uncontrolled authority which they were allowed to exercise. By this tribunal a visible change was wrought in the temper of the people, and reserve, distrust, and jealousy became the distinguishing characteristics of a Spaniard. It confirmed and perpetuated the reign of ignorance and superstition; inflamed the rage of religious bigotry, and by the cruel spectacles to which, in the execution of its decrees, it familiarized the people, it nourished in them that ferocious spirit, which in the Netherlands and America they manifested by deeds that have fixed an indelible reproach upon the Spanish name. Authors of undoubted credit affirm, and without the least exaggeration, that millions of persons have been ruined by this horrible court. Moors were banished, a million at a time. Six or eight hundred thousand Jews were driven away at once, and their immense riches seized by their accusers, and distributed among their persecutors, while thousands dissembled, and professed themselves Christians only to be harassed in future. Heretics of all ranks and of various denominations were imprisoned and burnt, or fled into other countries. The gloom of despotism overshadowed all Spain. The people at first reasoned, and rebelled, and murdered the inquisitors--the aged murmured and died-- the next generation fluttered and complained, but their successors were completely tamed by education; and the Spaniards are now trained up by the priests to shudder at the thought of thinking for themselves. That honor to his country and of human nature, the late Mr. Howard, says, when he saw the inquisition at Valladolid, "I could not but observe, that even the sight of it struck terror into the common people as they passed." "It is styled," he adds, by a monstrous abuse of words, "the holy apostolical court of inquisition."
A simple narrative of the proceedings of the inquisition has shocked the world, and the cruelty of it has become proverbial. Nothing ever displayed so fully to the eyes of mankind the spirit and temper of the papal religion. "Christians," says Tertullian, "were often called, not Christiani, but Chrestiani, from the gentleness of their manners, and the sweetness of their tempers. Jesus himself was the essence of mildness. His apostles were gentle, even as a nurse that cherisheth her children. But what an awful contrast is exhibited in this horrid court of papal inquisition." Let us hear the description which Voltaire, a very competent witness, gives of it. "Their form of proceeding," says he, "is an infallible way to destroy whomsoever the inquisitors wish. The prisoners are not confronted with the accuser or informer. Nor is there any informer or witness who is not listened to. A public convict, a notorious malefactor, an infamous person, a common prostitute, a child, are in the holy office, though no where else, credible accusers and witnesses. Even the son may depose against his father, the wife against her husband." The wretched prisoner is no more made acquainted with his crime than with his accusers. His being told the one might possibly lead him to guess the other. To avoid this, he is compelled, by tedious confinement in a noisome dungeon, where he never sees a face but the jailer’s, and is not permitted the use of either books or pen and ink--or should confinement alone not be sufficient, he is compelled, by the most excruciating torture, to inform against himself, to discover and confess the crime laid to his charge, of which he is often ignorant. "This procedure," says our historian, "unheard of till the institution of this court, makes the whole kingdom tremble. Suspicion reigns in every breast. Friendship and quietness are at an end. The brother dreads his brother, the father his son. Hence taciturnity is become the characteristic of a nation, endued with all the vivacity natural to the inhabitants of a warm and fruitful climate. To this tribunal we must likewise impute that profound ignorance of sound philosophy in which Spain lies buried, whilst Germany, England, France, and even Italy, have discovered so many truths, and enlarged the sphere of our knowledge. Never is human nature so debased, as where ignorance is armed with power" [Voltaire’s Univ. Hist. volume 2, chapter 118].
But these melancholy effects of the Inquisition are a trifle when compared with those public sacrifices, called AUTO DE FE, or Acts of Faith, and to the shocking barbarities that precede them. A priest in a white surplice, or a monk who has vowed meekness and humility, causes his fellow creatures to be put to the torture in a dismal dungeon. A stage is erected in the public market place, where the condemned prisoners are conducted to the stake, attended with a train of monks and religious confraternities. They sing psalms, say mass, and butcher mankind. Were a native of Asia to come to Madrid upon a day of an execution of this sort, it would be impossible for him to tell whether it were a rejoicing, a religious feast, a sacrifice, or a massacre; and yet it is all this together! The kings, whose presence alone in other cases is the harbinger of mercy, assist at this spectacle uncovered, seated lower than the inquisitors, and are spectators of their subjects expiring in the flames. The Spaniards reproached Montezuma with immolating his captives to his gods; what would he have said, had he beheld an "Auto de Fe?"
It is but doing justice, however, to many Roman catholic states, and to thousands of individuals belonging to that church, to say, that they abhor this infernal tribunal, almost as much as protestants themselves do. This is sufficiently evinced by the tumults which were excited in several parts of Italy, Milan, and Naples in particular, and afterwards in France, as well as in other Catholic countries, by the attempts that were made to introduce it at first, and by its actual expulsion from some places, where, to all appearance, it was firmly established. It is, indeed, matter of regret that any among the members of that church should have their minds so enslaved by prejudice, as to imagine, for a moment, that a despotism which required for its support such diabolical engines, could possibly be of heavenly origin. There is something in the very constitution of this tribunal so monstrously unjust, so exorbitantly cruel, that it must ever excite one’s astonishment, that the people of any country should have permitted its existence among them. How they could have the inconsistency to acknowledge a power to be from God, which has found it necessary to recur to expedients so manifestly from hell, so subversive of every principle of sound morality and religion, can be regarded only as one of those contradictions, for which human characters, both in individuals and nations, are often so remarkable. The wisdom that is from above is pure, peaceable, gentle, and easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy. But the policy of Rome, as displayed in the inquisition, is so strikingly characterized by that wisdom which is earthly, sensual, and devilish, that the person who needs to be convinced of it, seems to be altogether beyond the power of argument. Never were two systems more diametrically opposed in their spirit, their maxims, and effects, than primitive Christianity, and the religion of modern Rome; nor do heaven and hell, Christ and Belial, exhibit to our view a more glaring contrast. [See Father Paul Sarpi’s History of the Council of Trent; and Dr. G. Campbell’s Lectures on Ecclesiastical History.]