A History of the Inquisition of Spain; vol. 4

by Henry Charles Lea

Yet the Inquisition imperturbably pursued its way. It did not deny the existence of witchcraft, or modify the penalties of the crime but, as we have seen, it practically rendered proof impossible, thus discouraging formal accusations, while its prohibition of preliminary proceedings by its commissioners and by the local officials, secular and ecclesiastical, was effectual in preventing the outbreak of witchcraft epidemics. So far as the records before me show, cases became very few after the Logroño experience of 1610. Scattering ones occur occasionally, such as those alluded to above but, in the Valladolid record from which they are derived, embracing in all six hundred and sixty-seven cases between 1622 and 1662, there are but five of witchcraft, of which the latest is in 1641.[516] In Toledo, from 1648 to 1794, there is not a single one, nor is there one among the nine hundred and sixty-two cases in the sixty-four autos celebrated by all the tribunals of Spain between 1721 and 1727.[517] It was not that popular belief was eradicated, for this is ineradicable and still exists among all nations, but its deadly effects were prevented. Some fragmentary papers show that, from 1728 to 1735, there was a tolerably active investigation, in Valencia and Castellon de la Plana, into cases of mingled sorcery and witchcraft. There was evidence as to the use of ointments by which persons could transport themselves through the air and pass through walls, and as to people being bewitched and rendered sick, showing that the superstition had as firm a hold as ever on the lower classes.[518] In 1765, at Callosa de Ensarria (Alicante) when some young children disappeared, it was attributed to Angela Piera who had the reputation of a witch, able to fly to Tortosa and back, and who was supposed to have killed them for her incantations.[519] These scattering cases become rarer with time. In a record of all the operations of the Spanish tribunals, from 1780 to 1820, there are but four. In 1781, Isabel Cascar of Malpica was accused as a witch to the tribunal of Saragossa. In 1791, at Barcelona, María Vidal y Decardó of Tamarit, a widow aged 45, accused herself of express pact with the demon, of carnal intercourse with him, of presence four times a week at the aquelarres, where she adored him as a God, and of having trampled on a consecrated host and flung it on a dung-hill—a case which forcibly recalls that of Casilda de Pabanes, in 1622, as an illustration of the hypnotic illusions which aided so greatly in the dissemination of the belief. The latest cases are two, occurring in 1815, of which details are lacking except that they were not brought to trial.[520]

Thus the belief, so persistently affirmed by the Church, continued to exist among theologians. Even one so learned as Fray Maestro Alvarado, in 1813, when defending the Inquisition against the Córtes of Cádiz, told the deputies that Cervantes was better authority in favor of the belief than they were against it, and he instanced a recent case in Llerena, where two women in a church, and in sight of all the people, were carried through the air by demons.[521] Still, so long as the belief was academical and did not lead to the stake, it was comparatively harmless, and the Inquisition deserves full credit for depriving it of its power for evil.

THE ROMAN INQUISITION

In this, there is a remarkable coincidence between the Holy Offices of Spain and of Rome, although the latter was somewhat tardy in the good work. After the organization of the Congregation, in 1542, by Paul III., there was a considerable interval before it asserted exclusive jurisdiction over witchcraft. It is true that, in 1582, in the papal city of Avignon, it relaxed to the secular arm eighteen witches in a single sentence,[522] but the next year, 1583, when the people of the Val Mesolcina found themselves ruined by the numerous witches among them, they applied for relief not to the Inquisition but to their archbishop, San Carlo Borromeo. After a preliminary investigation he came with a group of learned theologians and so worked on the consciences of the culprits that he won nearly all to repentance—more than a hundred and fifty are said to have confessed and abjured at one time. There were, however, twelve pertinacious ones, including the Provost of Roveredo; he was degraded from Orders and all were duly burnt—they of course being negativos who refused to admit their guilt.[523] The Inquisition, in fact, was willing to share its jurisdiction with the bishops, but not with the secular courts, with which, in 1588 and 1589 we find it in controversy. It contended that, as witchcraft infers apostasy, its cognizance is ecclesiastical, residing either in the bishop or the Inquisition, and further that, when a civil court has commenced a prosecution, the inquisitor has the right to inspect the proceedings and decide as to whether or not the case belongs to him. Various decisions and instructions from this time until 1603 indicate the line of action. The jurisdiction is only spiritual, for the heresy and apostasy, and takes no count of alleged murders or other crimes; the penalty is therefore merely penance, usually scourging, and inquisitors are told not to exile witches to places where they were not known, but to settle them where they could be kept under watch. That this leniency did not satisfy the people was shown at Gubbio, in 1633, where a woman undergoing the scourge was set upon by the populace and stoned to death. Nor was the Inquisition itself always consistent for, in 1641, the tribunal of Milan relaxed Anna María Pamolea to the secular arm for witchcraft and homicide.[524]

When murders were charged, the rule was that, if a secular court had commenced prosecution, the culprit was returned to it for due punishment, after the spiritual offence had been penanced but, if the Inquisition had been the first to act, it was not to abandon its penitent to the secular arm, except in case of relapse. The practical working of this is seen in a case at Padua, in 1629, where three witches, imprisoned in the public gaol, were handed over to the tribunal, which made them abjure formally, and then returned them, when the magistrates burnt them. That there was considerable scepticism as to the truth of the Sabbat may be assumed from the rule that the evidence of witches about persons seen in these assemblies was not to be received to the prejudice of such persons, as it is all held to be an illusion.[525]

This scepticism increased and there was a desire to train the people to disbelief, as appears from a highly creditable act in 1631. The Inquisitor of Novara reported that his vicar in “Vallis Vigelli” had commenced proceedings for witchcraft against a woman, when she hanged herself in prison, and he asked instructions whether to continue the prosecution against the corpse or whether she had been strangled by the demon or other witches; also whether he should proceed against a girl and her accomplices who had confessed extra-judicially to have been at the Sabbat. In reply the Congregation ordered him to send the proceedings in the case of the suicide and also the deposition of the girl; meanwhile he was to remove the vicar and replace him with a proper person and take pains himself, by means of the parish priests, to instruct the people as to the fallacies of witchcraft. The same spirit was manifested, in 1641, when an affirmative answer was given to the Inquisitor of Mantua, who asked whether he should prosecute those who beat and insulted witches on the pretext of their being witches.[526] The Congregation, however, did not place on the Index the Compendium Maleficarum of Fray Francesco María Guaccio (2^d Edition, Milan, 1626) which taught all the beliefs concerning witches and was adorned with wood cuts representing them as riding on demons through the air and worshipping Satan in the Sabbat.

THE ROMAN INQUISITION

What renders the leniency of the Congregation especially remarkable is that it was in contravention of a decree of Gregory XV, in 1623, sharpening the penalties of those entering into compacts with the demon; if they caused death by sorcery they were to be relaxed to the secular arm, even for a first offence, while, for causing impotence, or infirmity, or injury to harvests or cattle, they were to be imprisoned for life.[527] Without, of course, venturing formally to mitigate the harshness of these penalties, the Congregation could at least elude them practically, by interposing difficulties in the way of conviction, and this it did, in 1657, in a series of instructions to inquisitors. Full belief in the reality of witchcraft was assumed, but there was a hideous enumeration of the abuses through which so many innocent women were condemned. The mode of procedure prescribed was based largely on the Spanish instructions of 1614, and special stress was laid upon moderation in the use of torture, which was never to be employed until all the papers in the case had been submitted to the Congregation and its assent had been obtained, while common fame was not to be considered an indication justifying arrest. The injunction of 1593, which prohibited accepting testimony as to those seen in the Sabbat, was renewed for the reason that these assemblages were mostly an illusion and justice did not demand prosecution of those recognized through illusion.[528]

While thus there was no concession in principle, in practice the persecution of witchcraft became much less deadly. A manual, dating about 1700, states that in these cases the Inquisition is accustomed to move slowly and with the greatest circumspection, for the indications are generally indirect and the corpus delicti most difficult to prove. If the evidence is strong, torture is employed both for the fact and the intention; if apostasy is confessed, formal abjuration is required; if it or evil belief is denied, the abjuration is de vehementi; the accomplices are prosecuted, but not those named as seen in the Sabbat, on account of the illusions of the demon. Relaxation is the penalty for heretical sorcery causing death, but the difficulty of proving this is very great.[529]