The Moors of Granada, meanwhile, had obtained from Ferdinand a promise that the Inquisition should not be set up in Granada within the following forty years, nor yet any prosecution instituted of Moriscoes (baptized Moslems) for the observance of Mohammedan customs.
The term, however, set too great a strain upon priestly patience. In 1526—long before the expiry of the period marked—the Holy Office crept slyly into Granada upon the pretext that it was requisite to watch the many suspected Marranos who had gone to reside there in the shelter of the immunity enjoyed by the Moriscoes. That it was the merest pretext is shown by the circumstance that already, as early as 1505, the Holy Office of Cordova had been moving in Granada and instituting there, when occasion arose, proceedings against Judaizers.
CHAPTER XXVII
THE LAST “INSTRUCTIONS” OF TORQUEMADA
The expulsion of the Jews may be considered the supreme and crowning work of Torquemada’s life. It marks the high meridian of his achievement. Hereafter his career dwindles gradually in importance in a measure as it sinks slowly to its setting.
In Rome, meanwhile, in that year 1492, a new Pontiff—Roderigo Borgia—had ascended the throne of St. Peter under the title of Alexander VI, and from this Pontiff’s hands Torquemada received his confirmation in the great office which he held—a confirmation which, being couched in the otiose terms of affection not uncommon in papal bulls, seems to have led many to believe that Alexander viewed Torquemada and the Holy Office of Spain with particular fondness. As a matter of fact, this Pope’s attempts to curb the excessive rigour of the Grand Inquisitor were less lethargic—we dare not say more energetic—than those exerted by Sixtus IV and Innocent VIII; and it was Alexander VI who, weary of complaints, finally contrived the retirement of the Prior of Holy Cross.
But that was not yet. Before that came to pass, the scandals of secret absolutions sold and subsequently rescinded by the Holy See were now repeated. Vigorous appeals were made to the Holy Father against the procedure of the Grand Inquisitor, and the Holy Father, acting upon the advice of the Apostolic Court, dispatched his briefs of absolution. Torquemada, incensed once more by this fresh interference with his jurisdiction, made his appeal to the Sovereigns, and jointly with them laid his protests before the Pope, who complacently cancelled the briefs that had been paid for—or rather that part of the absolution which concerned the temporal courts. For the moneys received it could be shown that full value had been given, since these absolutions still held good in the tribunal of conscience. We are familiar by this time with the argument.
Torquemada’s enemies in Spain were increasing now at an alarming rate. But, secure in the royal protection, this old man steadily and ruthlessly advanced along the path of intolerance, undismayed by ill-will. Conscious of the hatred he provoked, he may have gloried in the maledictions hurled against him by the persecuted, conceiving that the malevolence of the infidel would render his deeds the more acceptable in the sight of his God. But whatever the equanimity with which he may have confronted spiritual hostility, he took his measures to secure himself from its temporal manifestations. That he went in dread of attack is evinced not only by the fact that he was never seen abroad without his numerous escort of armed familiars, but further by the circumstance that he never sat down to dine without a horn of unicorn upon his table as a charm against poison.[252]
So arbitrarily and arrogantly did he widen the sphere of autocratic jurisdiction accorded him that soon he was usurping the functions of the civil courts, thereby provoking a still deeper resentment. He conducted the business of the Holy Office in such a manner that all other courts of the kingdom became subservient to it, and where the magistrates, resenting these encroachments, attempted to withstand him, or even to question his authority, they were—as had happened in the case of the Captain-General of Valencia—promptly charged with lack of zeal and even impeached as hinderers of the Holy Office. They were compelled to submit to humiliating penances, which in the case of magistrates entailed a total loss of dignity and prestige. And such was the ascendancy this man had gained by now that complaints or appeals to the Sovereigns were useless.