Very different was her attitude when a criminal of Trujillo, on being hailed for his misdeeds before the royal judges, protested that he had received the tonsure and therefore he should be tried in the ecclesiastical courts. To this plea, a trick to which men who had no intention of taking orders resorted, that they might escape the rigours of the secular law, the judges paid no heed; whereupon some priests, relations of the accused, took up arms in his favour. “The Faith,” they declared, “was in danger of perdition,” and having roused the mob by inflammatory speeches, they attacked the house of the corregidor and the local prison. The criminal was released; but the triumph of ecclesiastical privilege was short-lived; for, some companies of men-at-arms appearing on the scenes in response to the corregidor’s appeal to the Queen, the principal lay rioters were hung. The clerical offenders, saved by their cloth from a like fate, spent the rest of their days in exile, meditating on the long arm of royal justice.
Equally firm was the position maintained by Ferdinand and Isabel in their dealings with the Roman See. From one aspect they were sincerely loyal and devoted to their “Holy Father in Christ,” seeking his sanction for all those actions where orthodoxy demanded papal consent; and informing him, in sure confidence of his blessing, of every success they enjoyed in their struggle with infidels and heretics. The very nature of the war of Granada earned for them a reputation in Europe as special champions of the Faith; and, though the honour was prompted rather by his needs than their deserts, no title could have been more fitting than “Los Reyes Católicos,” “The Catholic Kings,” bestowed on them by Alexander VI. in 1494.
Yet, from another point of view, these same “Catholic Kings” were as staunch opponents of papal encroachments as any imperial Frederick II. or Henry VIII. of England. It might be said that their disputes with the Holy Father savoured rather of the spoilt than the rebellious child. Conscious of their merits as perpetual crusaders and chasteners of the unorthodox, they preferred, instead of making war on the general principle of Roman interference in ecclesiastical matters, to demand exemption as their special right,—the right of those who, with their ancestors, had won back the soil of their native land in conflict with a heathen race.
Their hand was none the less iron that it was discreetly gloved. When in 1491 an appeal to Rome was admitted by the Court of Chancery at Valladolid, in a case falling by law solely within the royal jurisdiction, Isabel in her indignation did not hesitate to remove all the judges who had consented to this step, appointing others in their place.
Still more drastic was the action taken by Ferdinand and herself in 1482, when the question of the extent of Roman patronage came prominently to the fore. Sixtus IV., anxious to provide for a host of needy relatives, had appointed a Cardinal-nephew to the rich see of Cuenca, then vacant. Quite unprepared for the indignation with which this announcement was received in Spain, he was soon disillusioned by the sovereigns, who utterly refused to acknowledge his protégé, declaring that it had always been the custom to appoint natives of the country;—and this, not only as a reward for the services rendered by Spain to Christendom, but as a national safeguard, since the majority of the sees carried with them the control of fortresses and strongholds.
Sixtus replied by alleging his unlimited right to provide incumbents to all and every church in Christendom. In vain ambassadors passed to and fro suggesting compromise. The dispute had reached an impasse that no arguments could remove, when Ferdinand and Isabel, by commanding all their subjects at Rome to leave the Papal dominions without delay, removed the matter to an altogether different plane. Spaniards in the Holy City were less afraid of Papal anger than of the threat that their goods at home would be sequestered, if they failed to obey the royal edict; and Sixtus, witnessing the preparations for their departure, realized the seriousness of the issue. A loss of revenue, a Spanish appeal to a General Council that might depose him, these and many other possible results of his obstinacy floated before his mind; and it was an embassy of conciliation that he next despatched from Rome.
The sovereigns, who were at Medina del Campo, at first received the overture with unbending pride, bidding the ambassador depart as they saw no reason why he should be admitted to their presence. When at length, by the mediation of the Cardinal of Spain, negotiations were once more entertained, the Pope agreed to withdraw his nephew’s claims and to appoint one of the Queen’s chaplains. Henceforth he conceded to the sovereigns the right to petition in favour of candidates, whom they might deem suitable for the episcopate, reserving for himself the actual nomination.
This decision was equivalent to a triumph for the Crown; but it proved only the first of a series of battles, and the instructions issued to Spanish ambassadors at Rome throughout the reign continually pressed the royal prerogative in ecclesiastical matters. In the case of presentment to livings, of which patronage the Pope was peculiarly jealous, Ferdinand and Isabel were often able to achieve their purpose indirectly, by laying an embargo on the rents of the nominee to whom they objected, until he saw his way to complying with their views.
If, in matters of practical administration, the sovereigns accepted their duty of obedience, like certain brides, with reservations, they did not let their enthusiasm for Catholic dogma blind their eyes to the scandals of the Roman Court, and more especially to the evil reputation it acquired during the pontificate of Alexander VI., the notorious Rodrigo Borgia. Conscious of the harm his example wrought in the Church, they sent private ambassadors to petition him that he would send away his children from Rome, “purify his life, reform his house, and cease to allow the sale of benefices and ecclesiastical offices.”
That their motive was a genuine desire to raise the prevalent low standard of morality may be gathered from their rigorous policy of ecclesiastical reform at home. Hitherto all efforts in this direction had proved abortive; and the instructions issued by Alonso Carrillo, Archbishop of Toledo, at the Council of Aranda in 1473 show how deep-seated was the evil. Open immorality of life and more venial habits, such as dicing and the wearing of gaily-coloured clothes are amongst the ordinary offences scheduled; but even the standard recommended for the future scarcely touched a high level. Bishops were not to take money in return for conferring ordination, nor to accept as fitting candidates those unable to speak Latin, the language of the Church. Priests must celebrate Mass at least four times a year and bishops three, while both were strongly urged not to lead a riotous or military life. The latter charge, as emanating from Don Alonso Carrillo, has its humorous aspect, but criticism was disarmed by the grave addition, unless it should be to take service with kings or princes of the blood.