Don Pedro de la Roca, a Spaniard, and a knight of Malta, killed the first alguazil of the Sicilian Inquisition in the city of Messina. He was arrested and conducted to the secret prisons of the holy office. The grand-master claimed his knight, as he alone had a right to try him. The council being consulted, commanded the inquisitors to condemn and punish the accused as an homicide. The inquisitor-general communicated this resolution to Philip II., who wrote to the grand-master to terminate the dispute.
The quarrels between the secular powers and the Inquisition were not less violent in Sicily: in 1580 and 1597 attempts were made to appease them, but without success; and in 1606 the Sicilians had the mortification of seeing their viceroy, the Duke de Frias, constable of Castile, prosecuted and subjected to their censures.
In 1592 the Duke of Alva, who was then viceroy, endeavoured by indirect means to repress the insolence of the inquisitors. Perceiving that the nobility of all classes were enrolled among the familiars of the holy office, in order to enjoy its privileges, and to keep the people in greater order, he represented to the king that the power of the sovereign and the authority of his lieutenant were almost null, and would be entirely so in time, if these different classes continued to enjoy privileges which had the effect of neutralizing the measures of government. Charles II. acknowledged that this state of things was contrary to the dignity of his crown; and he decreed that no person employed by the king should possess those prerogatives, even if he was a familiar or officer of the Inquisition. The people then began to feel less respect for the tribunal; and this was the commencement of its decline.
In 1713, Sicily no longer formed a part of the Spanish dominions, and Charles de Bourbon in 1739 obtained a bull, which created an inquisitor-general for that country, independent of Spain; and in 1782, Ferdinand IV., who succeeded Charles, suppressed this odious tribunal. During the two hundred and seventy-nine years of its existence, the solemn and general autos-da-fé were celebrated of which Munter speaks, and several others which were performed in the hall of the tribunal.
In the year 1546, which corresponds with the administration of Cardinal Loaisa, the number of condemned in the fifteen Spanish tribunals amounted to seven hundred and eighty individuals.
CHAPTER XVIII.
OF IMPORTANT EVENTS DURING THE FIRST YEARS OF THE ADMINISTRATION OF THE EIGHTH INQUISITOR-GENERAL; RELIGION OF CHARLES V. DURING THE LAST YEARS OF HIS LIFE.
Trials during the first years of the ministry of Valdés.
Don Ferdinand Valdes was the successor of Cardinal Loaisa in the archbishopric of Seville, and the office of inquisitor-general. At the time of his appointment he was bishop of Siguenza, and president of the royal Council of Castile, after having been successively a member of the grand College of St. Bartholomew de Salamanca, of the Council of Administration for the archbishopric of Toledo, for the Cardinal Ximenez de Cisneros, visitor of the Inquisition of Cuença and of the Royal Council of Navarre, a member of the Council of State, canon of the metropolitan church of Santiago de Galicia, counsellor of the Supreme Inquisition, bishop of Elna, Orensa, Oviedo and Leon, and president of the Royal Chancery of Valladolid. So many honours could not render him insensible to the mortification of not being a cardinal like his predecessors, and of seeing Bartholomew Carranza elevated to the see of Toledo. This was the true cause of his cruel persecution of Carranza.
The Pope approved the nomination of Valdés in January, 1547, and he took possession of his office in the following month. Valdés displayed an almost sanguinary disposition during his administration. It led him to demand from the Pope the power of condemning Lutherans to be burnt, even though they had not relapsed, and had desired to be reconciled. I shall here make known the most illustrious of the victims sacrificed before the abdication of Charles V., as it is necessary to make a separate article for the events of that nature under the reign of Philip II.
Among the condemned persons who appeared in the auto-da-fé of Seville in 1552, was Juan Gil, a native of Olvera, in Aragon, and a canon in the metropolitan church of that city; he is better known by the name of Doctor Egidius. He was first condemned, as violently suspected, to abjure the Lutheran heresy, and to be subjected to a penance; but four years after his death, in 1556, he was condemned, and, as having relapsed, his body was disinterred, and burnt with his effigy; his memory was declared infamous, and his property confiscated, for having died as a Lutheran. Raymond Gonzales de Montes was his companion in prison, but succeeded in escaping, and was burnt in effigy. In a work written on the Spanish Inquisition, he has introduced several particulars relating to the life of Juan Gil. He informs us that Egidius studied theology at Alcala de Henares, and there obtained the title of Doctor. He acquired so great a reputation, that he was compared to Peter Lombard, to St. Thomas d'Aquinas, to John Scott, and other theologians of the greatest merit. His talents induced the chapter of Seville to offer him unanimously the office of preacher to the cathedral. Egidius had very little talent for preaching, and the canons soon repented of having appointed him.