[32] Bleda anxiously claims the credit of the act of expulsion for Fray Thomas de Torquemada, of inquisitorial memory. (Corónica, p. 640.) That eminent personage had, indeed, been dead some years; but this edict was so obviously suggested by that against the Jews, that it may be considered as the result of his principles, if not directly taught by him. Thus it is, "the evil that men do lives after them."
[33] The Castilian writers, especially the dramatic, have not been insensible to the poetical situations afforded by the distresses of the banished Moriscoes. Their sympathy for the exiles, however, is whimsically enough contrasted by an orthodox anxiety to justify the conduct of their own government. The reader may recollect a pertinent example in the story of Sancho's Moorish friend, Ricote. Don Quixote, part. 2, cap. 54.
[34] The spirit of toleration professed by the Moors, indeed, was made a principal argument against them in the archbishop of Valencia's memorial to Philip III. The Mahometans would seem the better Christians of the two. See Geddes, Miscellaneous Tracts, (London, 1702-6,) vol. i. p. 94.
[35] Heeren seems willing to countenance the learned Pluquet in regarding Islamism, in its ancient form, as one of the modifications of Christianity; placing the principal difference between that and Socinianism, for example, in the mere rites of circumcision and baptism. (Essai sur l'Influence des Croisades, traduit par Villers, (Paris, 1808,) p. 175, not.) "The Mussulmans," says Sir William Jones, "are a sort of heterodox Christians, if Locke reasons justly, because they firmly believe the immaculate conception, divine character, and miracles of the Messiah; heterodox in denying vehemently his character of Son, and his equality, as God, with the Father, of whose unity and attributes they entertain and express the most awful ideas." See his Dissertation on the Gods of Greece, Italy, and India; Works, (London, 1799,) vol. i. p. 279.
[36] See the bishop of Orihuela's treatise, "De Bello Sacro," etc., cited by the industrious Clemencin. (Mem. de la Acad. de Hist., tom. vi. Ilust. 15.) The Moors and Jews, of course, stood no chance in this code; the reverend father expresses an opinion, with which Bleda heartily coincides, that the government would be perfectly justified in taking away the life of every Moor in the kingdom, for their shameless infidelity. Ubi supra;— and Bleda, Corónica, p. 995.
[37] The articles of the treaty are detailed at length by Marmol, Rebelion de Moriscos, lib. 1, cap. 19.
[38] Idem, ubi supra.
[39] See the arguments of Ximenes, or of his enthusiastic biographer Fléchier, for it is not always easy to discriminate between them. Hist. de Ximenés, pp. 108, 109.
[40] The duke of Medina Sidonia proposed to Ferdinand and Isabella to be avenged on the Moors, in some way not explained, after their disembarkation in Africa, on the ground that, the term of the royal safe- conduct having elapsed, they might lawfully be treated as enemies. To this proposal, which would have done honor to a college of Jesuits in the sixteenth century, the sovereigns made a reply too creditable not to be transcribed. "El Rei é la Réina. Fernando de Zafra, nuestro secretário. Vimos vuestra letra, en que nos fecistes saber lo que el duque de Medinasidónia tenia pensado que se podia facer contra los Moros de Villaluenga después de desembarcados allende. Decide que le agradecemos y tenemos en servício el buen deseo que tiene de nos servir: pero porqué nuestra, palabra y seguro real así se debe guardar á los infieles como á los Oristianos, y faciéndose lo que él dice pareceria cautela y engaño armado sobre nuestro seguro para no le guardar, que en ninguna, manera se haga eso, ni otra cosa de que pueda parecer que se quebranta nuestro seguro. De Granada véinte y nueve de mayo de quiniéntos y un años.—Yo el Rei.—Yo la Réina—Por mandado del Rei é del Réina, Miguel Perez Almazan." Would that the suggestions of Isabella's own heart, instead of the clergy, had always been the guide of her conduct in these matters! Mem. de la Acad. de Hist., tom. vi. Ilust. 15, from the original in the archives of the family of Medina Sidonia.
[41] A memorial of the archbishop of Valencia to Philip III. affords an example of this moral obliquity, that may make one laugh, or weep, according to the temper of his philosophy. In this precious document he says, "Your Majesty may, without any scruple of conscience, make slaves of all the Moriscoes, and may put them into your own galleys or mines, or sell them to strangers. And as to their children, they may be all sold at good rates here in Spain; which will be so far from being a punishment, that it will be a mercy to them; since by that means they will all become Christians; which they would never have been, had they continued with their parents. By the holy execution of which piece of justice, a great sum of money will flow into your Majesty's treasury." (Geddes, Miscellaneous Tracts, vol. i. p. 71.) "Il n'est point d'hostilité excellente comme la Chrestienne," says old Montaigne; "nostre zele faict merveilles, quand il va secondant nostre pente vers la haine, la cruanté, l'ambition, l'avarice, la detraction, la rebellion. Nostre religion est faicte pour extirper les vices; elle les couvre, les nourrit, les incite." Essais, liv. 2, chap. 12.