A History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages; volume II

by Henry Charles Lea

To what an extent the University in time replaced the Inquisition in its neglected and forgotten functions is shown in 1498, in the case of the Observantine Franciscan, Jean Vitrier. In the restlessness and insubordination which heralded the Reformation, this obscure friar anticipated Luther even more than did John of Wesel, although in the strictness of his asceticism he taught that a wife might better break her marriage-vow than her fasts. In his preaching at Tournay he counselled the people to drag the concubines and their priests from their houses with shame and derision; he affirmed that it was a mortal sin to listen to the masses of concubinary priests. Pardons and indulgences were the offspring of hell: the faithful ought not to purchase them, for they were not intended for the maintenance of brothels. Even the intercession of the saints was not to be sought. These were old heresies for which any inquisitor would promptly offer the utterer the alternative of abjuration or the stake; but the prelates and magistrates of Tournay referred the matter to the University, which laboriously extracted from Vitrier’s sermons sixteen propositions for condemnation.[154]

Even more significant of the growing authority of the University and the waning power of the Papacy was a decision rendered in 1502. Alexander VI. had levied a tithe on the clergy of France, with the customary excuse of prosecuting the war against the Turks. The clergy, whose consent had not been asked, refused to pay. The pope rejoined by excommunicating them, and they applied to the University to know whether such a papal excommunication was valid, whether it was to be feared, and whether they should consequently abstain from the performance of divine service. On all these points the University replied in the negative, unanimously and without hesitation. Had circumstances permitted the same independence in Germany, a little more progress in this direction would have rendered Luther superfluous.[155]

It is not to be supposed, however, that the Inquisition, though fallen from its former dignity, had ceased to exist or to perform its functions after a fashion. It was to the interest of the popes to maintain it, and the position of inquisitor, though humble in comparison with that which his predecessors enjoyed, was yet a source of influence, and possibly of profit, which led to its being eagerly sought. In 1414 we find two contestants for the post at Toulouse, and in 1424 an unseemly quarrel between two rivals at Carcassonne. The diocese of Geneva was also the subject of contention embittered by the traditional rivalry between the two Mendicant Orders. It will be remembered that in 1290 this, with other French cantons, was included by Nicholas IV. in the inquisitorial province of Besançon, which was Dominican. Geneva belonged, however, ecclesiastically to the metropolis of Vienne, which was under the Franciscan Inquisition of Provence, and Gregory XI. so treated it in 1375. When Pons Feugeyron was commissioned, in 1409, Geneva was not mentioned in the enumeration of the dioceses under him; but when his commission was renewed by Martin V., in 1418, it was included, and he began to exercise his powers there. There at once arose the threat of a most scandalous quarrel between the combative Orders; the Dominicans appealed to Martin, and in 1419 he restored Geneva to them. Yet in 1434, when Eugenius IV. again confirmed Pons Feugeyron’s commission, the name of Geneva once more slipped in. The Dominicans must again have successfully reclaimed it, for in 1472, when there was a sudden resumption of inquisitorial activity under Sixtus IV., in confirming Frère Jean Vaylette as Inquisitor of Provence, with the same powers as Pons Feugeyron, Geneva was omitted in the list of his jurisdictions, while the Dominicans, Victor Rufi and Claude Rufi, were appointed respectively at Geneva and Lausanne; and in 1491 another Dominican, François Granet, was commissioned at Geneva.[156]

Yet the position thus eagerly sought had no legitimate means of support. In the terrible disorders of the times the royal stipends had been withdrawn. Alexander V., in 1409, instructed his legate, the Cardinal of S. Susanna, that some method must be devised of meeting the expenses of the inquisitor, his associate, his notary, and his servant. He suggests either levying three hundred gold florins on the Jews of Avignon; or that each bishop shall defray the cost as the inquisitor moves from one diocese to another; or that each bishop shall contribute ten florins annually out of the legacies for pious uses. Which device was adopted does not appear, but they all seem to have proved fruitless, for in 1418 Martin V. wrote to the Archbishop of Narbonne that he must find some means of supplying the necessary expenses of the Inquisition. Under such circumstances the attraction of the office may, perhaps, be discerned from a petition, in this same year 1418, from the citizens of Avignon in favor of the Jews. The protection afforded by the Avignonese popes to this proscribed class had rendered the city a Jewish centre, and they were found of much utility; but they were constantly molested by the inquisitors, who instituted frivolous prosecutions against them, doubtless not without profit. Martin listened kindly to the appeal, and it proves the degradation of the Inquisition that he gave the Jews a right to appoint an assessor who should sit with the inquisitor in all cases in which they were concerned.[157]

Still the Inquisition was not wholly without evidence of activity in its purposed sphere of duty. We shall see hereafter that Pierre d’Ailly, Bishop of Cambrai, when, in 1411, he prosecuted the Men of Intelligence, duly called in the inquisitor of the province, who was Dominican Prior of St. Quentin in Vermandois, to join in the sentence. In 1430 we hear of a number of heretics who had been burned at Lille by the deputy-inquisitor and the Bishop of Tournay; and in 1431 Philippe le Bon ordered his officials to execute all sentences pronounced by Brother Heinrich Kaleyser, who had been appointed Inquisitor of Cambrai and Lille by the Dominican Provincial of Germany—a manifest invasion of the rights of his colleague of Paris, doubtless due to the political complications of the times. This order of Philippe le Bon, however, shows that the example of supervision set by the Parlement was not lost on the feudatories, for the officials are only instructed to make arrests when there has been a proper preliminary inquest, with observance of all the forms of law. I shall have occasion hereafter to speak of the part played by the Inquisition in the tragedy of Joan of Arc, and need here only allude to the appointment, in 1431, by Eugenius IV., of Frère Jean Graveran to be Inquisitor of Rouen, where he was already exercising the functions of the office, and where he was succeeded in 1433 by Frère Sébastien l’Abbé, who had been papal penitentiary and chaplain—another evidence of the partition of France during the disastrous English war. People were growing more careless about excommunication than ever. About 1415, a number of ecclesiastics of Limoges were prosecuted by the inquisitor, Jean du Puy, as suspect of heresy for this cause; they appealed to the Council of Constance, and in 1418 the matter was referred back to the archbishop. Still the indifference to excommunication grew, and in 1435 Eugenius IV. instructed the Inquisitor of Carcassonne to prosecute all who remained under the censure of the Church for several years without seeking absolution.[158]

With the pacification of France and the final expulsion of the English, Nicholas V. seems to have thought the occasion opportune for reviving and establishing the Inquisition on a firmer and broader basis. A bull of August 1, 1451, to Hugues le Noir, Inquisitor of France, defines his jurisdiction as extending not only over the Kingdom of France, but also over the Duchy of Aquitaine and all Gascony and Languedoc. Thus, with the exception of the eastern provinces, the whole was consolidated into one district, with its principal seat probably in Toulouse. The jurisdiction of the inquisitor was likewise extended over all offences that had hitherto been considered doubtful—blasphemy, sacrilege, divination, even when not savoring of heresy, and unnatural crimes. He was further released from the necessity of episcopal co-operation, and was empowered to carry on all proceedings and render judgment without calling the bishops into consultation. Two centuries earlier these enormous powers would have rendered Hugues almost omnipotent, but now it was too late. The Inquisition had sunk beyond resuscitation. In 1458 the Franciscan Minister of Burgundy represented to Pius II. the deplorable condition of the institution in the extensive territories confided to his Order, comprising the great archiepiscopates of Lyons, Vienne, Arles, Aix, Embrun, and Tarantaise, and covering both sides of the Rhone and a considerable portion of Savoy. In the thirteenth century Clement IV. had placed this region under the control of the Burgundian Minister, but with the lapse of time his supervision had become nominal. Ambitious friars had obtained directly from the popes commissions to act as inquisitors in special districts, and therefore acknowledged no authority but their own. Others had assumed the office without appointment from any one. There was no power to correct their excesses; scandals were numerous, the people were oppressed, and the Order exposed to opprobrium. Pius hastened to put an end to these abuses by renewing the obsolete authority of the minister, with full power of removal, even of those who enjoyed papal commissions.[159]

The Inquisition was thus reorganized, but its time had passed. To so low an ebb had it fallen that in this same year, 1458, Frère Bérard Tremoux, Inquisitor of Lyons, who had aroused general hostility by the rigor with which he exercised his office, was thrown in prison through the efforts of the citizens, and it required the active interposition of Pius II. and his legate, Cardinal Alano, to effect his release. The venality and corruption of the papal curia, moreover, was so ineradicable that no reform was possible in anything subject to its control. But three years after Pius had placed the whole district under the Minister of Burgundy we find him renewing the old abuses by a special appointment of Brother Bartholomäus of Eger as Inquisitor of Grenoble. That such commissions were sold, or conferred as a matter of favor, there can be no reasonable doubt, and the appointees were turned loose upon their districts to wring what miserable gains they could from the fears of the people. Only this can explain a form of appointment which became common as “inquisitor in the Kingdom of France,” “without prejudice to other inquisitors authorized by us or by others”—a sort of letter-of-marque to cruise at large and make what the appointees could from the faithful. Similarly significant is the appointment of Frère Pierre Cordrat, confessor of Jean, Duke of Bourbon, in 1478, to be Inquisitor of Bourges, thus wholly disregarding the consolidation of the kingdom by Nicholas V. It is hardly necessary to extend the list further. Inquisitors were appointed by the popes in constant succession, either for the kingdom of France or for special districts, as though the institution were at the height of its power and activity. That something was to be gained by all this there can be no question, but there is little risk in assuming that the gainer was not religion.[160]

Several cases occurring about this period are interesting as illustrations of the spread of the spirit of inquiry and independence, and of the subordinate position to which the Inquisition had sunk. In 1459, at Lille, there was burned a heretic known as Alphonse of Portugal, who led an austere life as an anchorite and frequented the churches assiduously, but who declared that since Gregory the Great there had been no true pope, and consequently no valid administration of the sacraments. In the account which has reached us of his trial and execution there is no allusion to the intervention of the Holy Office. Still more significant is the case, in 1484, of Jean Laillier, a priest in Paris, a theological licentiate, and an applicant for the doctorate in theology. In his sermons he had been singularly free-spoken. He denied the validity of the rule of celibacy; he quoted Wickliff as a great doctor; he rejected the supremacy of Rome and the binding force of tradition and decretal; John XXII., he said, had had no power to condemn Jean de Poilly; so far from St. Francis occupying the vacant throne of Lucifer in heaven, he was rather with Lucifer in hell; since the time of Silvester the Holy See had been the church of avarice and of imperial power, where canonization could be obtained for money. So weak had become the traditional hold of the Church on the consciences of men that this revolutionary preaching seems to have aroused no opposition, even on the part of the Inquisition; but Laillier, not content with simple toleration, applied to the University for the doctorate, and was refused admission to the preliminary disputations unless he should purge himself, undergo penance, and obtain the assent of the Holy See. Laillier thereupon boldly applied to the Parlement, now by tacit assent clothed with supreme jurisdiction in ecclesiastical matters, asking it to compel the University to admit him. The Parlement entertained no doubts as to its own competence, but decided the case in a manner not looked for by the hardy priest. It ordered Louis, Bishop of Paris, in conjunction with the inquisitor and four doctors selected by the University, to prosecute Laillier to due punishment. The bishop and inquisitor agreed to proceed separately and communicate their processes to each other; but Laillier must have had powerful backers, for Bishop Louis, without conferring with his colleague or the experts, allowed Laillier to make a partial recantation and a public abjuration couched in the most free and easy terms, absolved him, June 23, 1486, pronounced him free from suspicion of heresy, restored him to his functions, and declared him capable of promotion to all grades and honors. Frère Jean Cossart, the inquisitor, who had been diligently collecting evidence of many scandalous doctrines of Laillier’s and vainly communicating them to the bishop, was forced to swallow this affront in silence, but the University felt its honor engaged and was not inclined to submit. November 6, 1486, it issued a formal protest against the action of the bishop, appealed to the pope, and demanded “Apostoli.” Innocent VIII. promptly came to the rescue. He annulled the decision of the bishop and ordered the inquisitor, in conjunction with the Archbishop of Sens and the Bishop of Meaux, to throw Laillier into prison, while they should investigate the unrecanted heresies and send the papers to Rome for decision. Very suggestive of the strong influences supporting Laillier is the pope’s expression of fear lest the pressure brought to bear on the University should have forced it to admit him to the doctorate; if so, such action is pronounced void, and all engaged in the attempt are ordered to desist under pain of incurring suspicion of heresy. It is not a little singular that the Bishop of Meaux, who was thus selected to sit in judgment on Laillier, was at this very time under censure by the University for reviving the Donatist heresy of the insufficiency of the sacraments in polluted hands—the Eucharist of a fornicating priest was of no more account, he said, than the barking of a dog. Many an unfortunate Waldensian had been burned for less than this, but the inquisitor had not dared to hold him to account. Nor do we hear of his intervention in the case of Jean Langlois, priest of St. Crispin, who, when celebrating mass, June 3, 1491, horrified his flock by casting on the floor and trampling the consecrated wine and host. On his arrest he gave as his reason that the body and blood of Christ were not in the elements, and as he stubbornly refused to recant, he expiated his error at the stake. Similar was the fate of Aymon Picard, who, at the feast of St. Louis in the Sainte-Chapelle, August 25, 1503, snatched the host from the celebrant and cast it in pieces on the floor, and obstinately declined to abjure. All this was significant of the time coming when the Inquisition would be more necessary than ever.[161]

The present degradation which it shared with the rest of the Church in the constantly growing supremacy of the State is manifested by a commission issued in 1485, by Frère Antoine de Clède, appointing a vicar to act for him in Rodez and Vabres. In this document he styles himself Inquisitor of France, Aquitaine, Gascony, and Languedoc, deputed by the Holy See and the Parlement. The two bodies are thus equal sources of authority, and the appointment by the pope would have been insufficient without the confirmation by the royal court. How contemptible, indeed, the Inquisition had become, even in the eyes of ecclesiastics, is brought instructively before us in a petty quarrel between the Inquisitor Raymond Gozin and his Dominican brethren. When he succeeded Frère Gaillard de la Roche, somewhere about 1516, he found that the house of the Inquisition at Toulouse had been stripped of its furniture and utensils by the friars of the Dominican convent. He made a reclamation, and some of the articles were restored; but the friars subsequently demanded them back, and on his refusal procured from the General Master instructions to the vicar, under which the latter proceeded to extremities with him, wholly disregarding his appeal to the pope, though he finally, in 1520, succeeded in obtaining the intervention of Leo X. Imagination could scarcely furnish a more convincing proof of decadence than this exhibition of the successor of Bernard de Caux and Bernard Gui vainly endeavoring to defend his kitchen gear from the rapacious hands of his brethren.[162]

It is quite probable that this dispute was envenomed by the inevitable jealousy between the main body of the Order and its puritan section known as the Reformed Congregation. Of this latter Raymond Gozin was vicar-general, and his anxiety to regain his furnishings was probably due to the fact that he was altering the house of the Inquisition so as to accommodate within it a Reformed convent. The vast buildings which it had required in the plenitude of its power had become a world too wide for its shrunken needs. The original home of the Dominican Order, before the removal in 1230 through the liberality of Pons de Capdenier, it contained a church with three altars, a refectory, cells (or prison), chambers, guest-rooms, cloisters, and two gardens. In approving of the proposed alterations, Leo X. stipulated that some kind of retiring-room with convenient offices must still be reserved for the use of the Inquisition. This epitomizes the history of the institution. Yet it had by no means wholly lost its power of evil, for in 1521 Johann Bomm, Dominican Prior of Poligny, and inquisitor at Besançon had the satisfaction of despatching two lycanthropists, or wer-wolves.[163]