When Charles II. married Maria Louisa de Bourbon in 1680, the taste of the nation was so depraved, that a grand auto-da-fé, composed of a hundred and eighteen victims, was considered as a proper and flattering homage to the new queen; nineteen persons were burnt, with thirty-four effigies. None of the cases were remarkable, and may therefore be passed over in silence, together with another auto-da-fé which was celebrated in the church of the convent of the nuns of St. Dominic. Some manuscript notes indicate that some of the condemned avoided the fate which awaited them, by bribing the inferior officers of the tribunal; I am persuaded that this assertion is incorrect, because the subalterns had very little influence after the criminals were arrested.
The most celebrated trial of the Inquisition in this reign is that of Fray Froilan Diaz, bishop elect of Avila, and confessor to the king. The habitual weakness of Charles II., and the failure of an heir, created a suspicion that he was bewitched. The Cardinal Portocarrero and the inquisitor-general Rocaberti believed in sorcery, and after persuading the king that he was bewitched, they entreated him to suffer himself to be exorcised according to the formulary of the church. Charles consented, and was exorcised by his confessor. The novelty of this proceeding occasioned many remarks, and Froilan was informed that another monk was at that time exorcising a nun at Cangas de Tineo, in order to free her from the demons, which, she said, tormented her. Froilan and the inquisitor-general charged the exorcist of the demoniac to command the demon, by the formula of the ritual, to declare if Charles II. was bewitched or not, and if he replied in the affirmative, to make him reveal the nature of the sorcery; if it was permanent; if it was attached to anything that the king had eaten or drank, to images or other objects; in what place it might be found; and lastly, if there were any natural means of preventing its effects: the confessor added several other questions, and desired the exorcist to urge them with all the zeal which the interest of the king and the state required.
The monk at first refused to question the demon, because it is forbidden by the church; but on being assured by the inquisitor-general that it would not be sinful in the present circumstances, he faithfully performed all that had been requested of him. The demon declared by the mouth of the demoniac, that a spell had been put upon the king by a person who was named. According to the private notes of that time, the criminal was an agent of the Court of Vienna; but Cardinal Portocarrero and the confessor Diaz were the partisans of France for the succession of Spain.
Diaz was very much alarmed at this information, and redoubled his conjurations until he learned some method of destroying the enchantment. Before this operation was concluded, Rocaberti died, and was succeeded by Don Balthazar de Mendoza, who was of the Austrian party; he signified to the king that all that had taken place had arisen from the imprudent zeal of his confessor, and that he must be removed. The king followed his advice, and made Froilan Bishop of Avila; but the new inquisitor-general, not contented with preventing the expedition of the bulls, prosecuted him for having made use of demons to discover hidden things.
Mendoza directed this attack in concert with Torres Palmosa, the king's confessor, who was as eager for the ruin of Froilan Diaz as himself; this man communicated to Mendoza the letters which Diaz had received from Cangas, which were found among his papers.
Mendoza examined witnesses, and after combining their declarations with the contents of the letters, he gave them to five qualifiers who were devoted to him, and made Don Juan Arcemendi, a counsellor of the Inquisition, and Don Dominic de la Cantolla, official of the secretaryship of the Supreme Council, their president and secretary. However, the five qualifiers declared that the trial offered no fact or proposition worthy of theological censure.
This decision was very displeasing to Mendoza; but relying on his influence in the council, he proposed that Diaz should be arrested: the councillors refused, because the measure was unjust, and contrary to the laws of the holy office, according to the decision of the five qualifiers. This resistance irritated the inquisitor-general, who caused the decree to be drawn up, signed it, and sent it to the council, with an order to register it with the ordinary forms. The councillors replied that they could not perform a ceremony which they considered illegal, because the resolution had not been adopted by a majority of votes.
During these transactions, Diaz made his escape to Rome: Mendoza, who could depend upon the king's confessor, induced him to persuade the king that this was an offence against the rights of the crown, and obtained a letter from him to the Duke de Uzeda, his ambassador at Rome, commanding him to seize the person of Diaz, and send him under an escort to Carthagena.
The anonymous author of Anecdotes of the Court of Rome says, that Diaz went thither to show to the Pope the will of Charles II., by which Philip de Bourbon was called to the throne of Spain; and that his return as a prisoner was occasioned by a court intrigue; but there is no evidence to prove this assertion. The inquisitor-general sent Froilan Diaz to the prison of the Inquisition of Murcia, and commanded the inquisitors to begin his trial. They appointed as qualifiers nine of the most learned theologians of the diocese, who unanimously gave the same answer as those of the Supreme Council: the inquisitors consequently declared that there was no cause for the arrest. The inquisitor-general then caused Diaz to be transferred to Madrid. Mendoza afterwards charged the fiscal of the Inquisition to accuse him as a dogmatizing arch-heretic, for having said that an intercourse with the demon might be permitted, in order to learn the art of curing the sick.
Charles II. died about this time, and Philip was at first too much engaged with the war against the Archduke Charles of Austria, to discover the intrigues and artifices of Mendoza. He at last submitted the affair to the Council of Castile, on the 24th of December, 1703, which decided that the arrest of Diaz was contrary to the common laws, and those of the holy office. The Supreme Council then decreed that Diaz should be set at liberty and acquitted.