The recollection of the encyclical letter of the Pope against the doctrines of M. de Lamennais, and the profound wisdom contained therein appropriately presents itself here. That writer maintained that universal toleration, the absolute liberty of worship, is the normal and legitimate state of society,—a state which cannot be changed without injury to the rights of the man and the citizen. M. de Lamennais, combating the encyclical letter, attempted to show that it established new doctrines, and attacked the liberty of nations. No; the Pope, in his encyclical letter, does not maintain any other doctrines than those which have been professed up to this time by the Church—we may say by all governments—with respect to toleration. No government can sustain itself if it is refused the right of repressing doctrines dangerous to social order, whether those doctrines are covered with the mantle of philosophy, or disguised under the veil of religion. The liberty of man is not thereby assailed; for the only liberty which is worthy of the name, is liberty in conformity with reason. The Pope did not say that governments cannot, in certain cases, tolerate different religions; but he did not allow it to be established as a principle, that absolute toleration is an obligation on all governments. This proposition is contrary to sound religious doctrines, to reason, to the practice of all governments, in all times and countries, and the good sense of mankind. The talent and eloquence of the unfortunate author have not availed against this, and the Pope has obtained the most solemn assent of all sensible men of all creeds; while the man of genius, covering his brow with the shades of obstinacy, has not feared to seize upon the ignoble arms of sophistry. Unhappy genius! who scarcely preserves a shadow of himself, who has folded up the splendid wings on which he sailed through the azure sky, and now, like a bird of evil omen, broods over the impure waters of a solitary lake.
When speaking of the Spanish Inquisition, I do not undertake to defend all its acts either in point of justice, or of the public advantage. Without denying the peculiar circumstances in which this institution was placed, I think that it would have done much better, after the example of the Inquisition of Rome, to avoid as much as possible the effusion of blood. It might have perfectly watched over the preservation of the faith, prevented the evils wherewith religion was threatened by the Moors and the Jews, and preserved Spain from Protestantism, without employing that excessive rigor, which drew upon it the severe and deserved reprimands and admonitions of the Sovereign Pontiffs, provoked the complaints of the people, made so many accused and condemned persons appeal to Rome, and furnished the adversaries of Catholicity with a pretext for charging that religion with being sanguinary which has a horror of the effusion of blood. I repeat, that the Catholic religion is not responsible for any of the excesses which have been committed in her name; and when men speak of the Inquisition, they ought not to fix their eyes principally on that of Spain, but on that of Rome. There, where the Sovereign Pontiff resides, and where they best understand how the principle of intolerance should be understood, and what use ought to be made of it, the Inquisition has been mild and indulgent in the extreme. Rome is the part of the world where humanity has suffered the least for the sake of religion; and that, without the exception of any countries, either of those where the Inquisition has existed, or of those where it has been unknown; of those where Catholicity has been predominant, or where Protestantism has triumphed. This fact, which cannot be denied, should suffice to convince every sincere man what is the spirit of Catholicity in this matter.
I make these remarks in order to show my impartiality, to prove that I am not ignorant of evils, and that I do not hesitate to admit them wherever I find them. Notwithstanding this, I am desirous that the facts and the observations contained in the text, as well with respect to the Inquisition itself, and to the different epochs of its duration, as to the policy of the kings who founded and established it, shall not be forgotten. The same desire makes me transcribe here a few documents likely to throw a stronger light upon this important subject. In the first place, I will quote the preamble of the Pragmatic Sanction of the Catholic princes Ferdinand and Isabella, for the expulsion of the Jews; we there find stated in a few words, the outrages which the Jews inflicted on religion, and the dangers with which they threatened the state.
"Book viii. chap. 2, second law of the new Recopilacion. Don Ferdinand and Donna Isabella, at Granada, 30th March, 1492. Pragmatic Sanction.
"Having been informed that there existed in these kingdoms bad Christians, who judaized and apostatized from our holy Catholic faith, whereof the communication between the Jews and Christians was in great part the cause, we ordained, in the Cortes held by us in Toledo, in 1480, that the Jews in all the cities, towns, and other places of our kingdoms and lordships, should be confined in the Juiferies and places appointed for them to live and dwell in, hoping that this separation would serve as a remedy; we also provided and gave orders that an Inquisition should be appointed in our said kingdoms; which Inquisition, as you know, is and has been practised for more than twelve years, and has discovered a great number of delinquents, as is notorious. As we have been informed by the Inquisitors, and many other religious persons, lay and ecclesiastical, it is certain that great injury to the Christians had been and is the result of the participation, intercourse, and communication which they have had, and still have, with the Jews; it has been proved that the latter, by all the means in their power, constantly labor to subvert the faith of Christians, to withdraw them from our holy Catholic faith, to lead them away from it, to attract them, and to pervert them to their own noxious creed and opinions; instructing them in the ceremonies and observances of their own law; holding meetings to teach them what they ought to believe and observe according to that law; taking care to circumcise them and their children, giving them books in order to recite their prayers, teaching them the fasts which they ought to observe, assembling to read with them, teaching them the histories of their laws; notifying to them the Paschal times before they arrive, admonishing them as to what they ought to do and observe during those times; giving them, bringing for them, from their own homes, the bread of azimes, meats killed according to their ceremonies; instructing them as to the things from which they ought to abstain, in order to obey the law, as well in eating as in other things; persuading them, as far as they can, to adopt and keep the Law of Moses, and making them understand that no other law than that is true. All these things are certain from numerous testimonies, from the acknowledgments of the Jews themselves, and of those who have been perverted and deceived by them, which has inflicted great injury, detriment, and dishonor on our holy Catholic faith. Although we were already informed of these things from many quarters, and although we were aware that the real remedy for all these evils and inconveniences was to place an insurmountable barrier to the communication of the Jews with the Christians, and to banish the Jews from our kingdoms, we wished to be satisfied with enjoining them to quit all the cities, towns, and places of Andalusia, where it seemed that they had done the most mischief, believing that that would be enough to hinder those of the other cities, towns, and places of our kingdoms and lordships from doing and committing what has been mentioned. But being informed that this measure, as well as the acts of justice exercised on some of the Jews who were found guilty of these offences and crimes against our holy Catholic faith, do not suffice to remedy the evil thoroughly; for the purpose of obviating and abolishing so great an opprobrium, such an offence against the faith and the Christian religion, since it appears that the same Jews, with a fatal ardor, redouble their perverse attempts wherever they live and associate; wishing to suppress the occasion of offending more against our holy Catholic faith, as well on account of those persons whom it has pleased God up to this time to preserve, as of those who, after having fallen, have repented and returned to our holy mother the Church; wishing to prevent the offences which, on account of the weakness of our human nature, and the suggestions of the devil, which continually make war on us, might easily occur, if the principal cause of the evil were not removed by the expulsion of the Jews from our kingdoms; considering, besides, that when a great and detestable crime has been committed by some members of a college or university, it is reasonable that that college or that university should be dissolved and destroyed, that some may be punished on account of the others, and the lesser number on account of the greater; that those who pervert the good and virtuous mode of life of cities and towns, by a contagion which may injure others, may be banished from those towns; and that if it be allowed to act thus for other slight causes prejudicial to the state, there is still more reason to allow it for the greatest, the most dangerous, the most contagious of crimes, that which is in question: for all these reasons we, having consulted our Council, and taken the advice of some prelates," &c.
We are not now examining whether or not there is any exaggeration in these imputations against the Jews, although, according to all appearances, there must have been a great deal of foundation for them, in consequence of the situation in which the two rival nations were placed. Observe, besides, that if the preamble of the Pragmatic Sanction is silent with respect to a hundred accusations brought against the Jews by the generality of the people, the report of these crimes had not the less weight with the public; consequently, the situation of the Jews was aggravated in an extraordinary degree, and the princes were so much the more inclined to treat them with severity.
With respect to the mistrust with which the Moors and their descendants must have been regarded, besides the facts pointed out above, others might be related which show the disposition of men's minds to see in the presence of these men a permanent conspiracy against the Christians. Almost a century had elapsed since the conquest of Granada, and it was still feared that this kingdom might be the centre of plots contrived by the Moors against the Christians, the source of perfidious projects, and the place whence came the means of maltreating in all ways the defenceless persons upon our coasts.
Thus spoke Philip II. in 1567: