[36] L. Marineo, Cosas Memorables, fol. 164.—Bernaldez, Reyes Católicos, MS., cap. 44.—Mariana, lib. 24, cap. 17.—Llorente, Hist. de l'Inquisition, ubi supra.—L. Marineo diffuses the 2000 capital executions over several years. He sums up the various severities of the Holy Office in the following gentle terms. "The church, who is the mother of mercy and the fountain of charity, content with the imposition of penances, generously accords life to many who do not deserve it. While those who persist obstinately in their errors, after being imprisoned on the testimony of trust-worthy witnesses, she causes to be put to the torture, and condemned to the flames; some miserably perish, bewailing their errors, and invoking the name of Christ, while others call upon that of Moses. Many again, who sincerely repent, she, notwithstanding the heinousness of their transgressions, merely sentences to perpetual imprisonment"! Such were the tender mercies of the Spanish Inquisition.
[37] Bernaldez states, that guards were posted at the gates of the city of Seville in order to prevent the emigration of the Jewish inhabitants, which indeed was forbidden under pain of death. The tribunal, however, had greater terrors for them, and many succeeded in effecting their escape. Reyes Católicos, MS., cap. 44.
[38] L. Marineo, Cosas Memorables, fol. 164.—Zuñiga, Annales de Sevilla, p. 396.—Pulgar, Reyes Católicos, part. 2, cap. 77.—Garibay, Compendio, tom. ii. lib. 18, cap. 17.—Paramo, De Origine Inquisitionis, lib. 2, tit. 2, cap. 2.—Llorente, Hist. de l'Inquisition, tom. i. pp. 163-173.
[39] Over these subordinate tribunals Ferdinand erected a court of supervision, with appellate jurisdiction, under the name of Council of the Supreme, consisting of the grand inquisitor, as president, and three other ecclesiastics, two of them doctors of law. The principal purpose of this new creation was to secure the interest of the crown in the confiscated property, and to guard against the encroachment of the Inquisition on secular jurisdiction. The expedient, however, wholly failed, because most of the questions brought before this court were determined by the principles of the canon law, of which the grand inquisitor was to be sole interpreter, the others having only, as it was termed, a "consultative voice." Llorente, tom. i. pp. 173, 174.—Zurita, Anales, tom. iv. fol. 324.—Riol, Informe, apud Semanario Erudito, tom. iii. pp. 156 et seq.
[40] Puigblanch, Inquisition Unmasked, vol. i. chap. 4.—Llorente, Hist. de l'Inquisition, tom. i. chap. 6, art. 1; chap. 9, art. 1, 2.—The witnesses were questioned in such general terms, that they were even kept in ignorance of the particular matter respecting which they were expected to testify. Thus, they were asked "if they knew anything which had been said or done contrary to the Catholic faith, and the interests of the tribunal." Their answers often opened a new scent to the judges, and thus, in the language of Montanus, "brought more fishes into the inquisitors' holy angle." See Montanus, Discovery and Playne Declaration of sundry subtill Practises of the Holy Inquisition of Spayne, Eng. trans. (London, 1569,) fol. 14.
[41] Limborch, Inquisition, book 4, chap. 20.—Montanus, Inquisition of Spayne, fol. 6-15.—Llorente, Hist. de l'Inquisition, tom. i. chap. 6. art. 1; chap. 9, art. 4-9.—Puigblanch, Inquisition Unmasked, vol. i. chap. 4.
[42] Llorente, Hist. de l'Inquisition, tom. i. chap. 9, art. 7.—By a subsequent regulation of Philip II., the repetition of torture in the same process was strictly prohibited to the inquisitors. But they, making use of a sophism worthy of the arch-fiend himself, contrived to evade this law, by pretending after each new infliction, of punishment that they had only suspended, and not terminated, the torture!
[43] Montanus, Inquisition of Spayne, fol. 24 et seq.—Limborch, Inquisition, vol. ii. chap. 29.—Puigblanch, Inquisition Unmasked, vol. i. chap. 4.—Llorente, Hist. de l'Inquisition, ubi supra.—I shall spare the reader the description of the various modes of torture, the rack, fire, and pulley, practised by the inquisitors, which have been so often detailed in the doleful narratives of such as have had the fortune to escape with life from the fangs of the tribunal. If we are to believe Llorente, these barbarities have not been decreed for a long time. Yet some recent statements are at variance with this assertion. See, among others, the celebrated adventurer Van Halen's "Narrative of his Imprisonment in the Dungeons of the Inquisition at Madrid, and his Escape in 1817-18."
[44] The prisoner had indeed the right of challenging any witness on the ground of personal enmity. (Llorente, Hist. de l'Inquisition, tom. i. chap. 9, art. 10.) But as he was kept in ignorance of the names of the witnesses employed against him, and as even, if he conjectured right, the degree of enmity, competent to set aside testimony, was to be determined by his judges, it is evident that his privilege of challenge was wholly nugatory.
[45] Confiscation had long been decreed as the punishment of convicted heretics by the statutes of Castile. (Ordenanças Reales, lib. 8, tit. 4.) The avarice of the present system, however, is exemplified by the fact, that those who confessed and sought absolution within the brief term of grace allowed by the inquisitors from the publication of their edict, were liable to arbitrary fines; and those who confessed after that period, escaped with nothing short of confiscation. Llorente, Hist. de l'Inquisition, tom. i. pp. 176, 177.