Chapter IV: Censorship (3)

Although censorship was instituted for the suppression of heresy and for keeping heretical books and propositions from the people, it developed its utility in many directions, more or less connected with its primary object. It was inevitable that it should wage incessant warfare with the countless editions of the Bible with Protestant notes and commentaries, and we have seen how industriously Valdés prepared for his expurgatory Index of the Scriptures in 1554. It was, however, the vernacular versions that caused the greatest anxiety. Prior to the Reformation there was practically no restriction on the circulation of the Bible in the vulgar tongue. It is true that, in the early thirteenth century, the struggle with the Waldenses and the Cathari, who possessed versions of their own, led to prohibitions by Innocent III, in 1199, and by Jaime I of Aragon in 1234, while the Council of Toulouse, in 1229, prohibited the possession by laymen of any portion of the Bible, even in Latin, as well as of the Breviary and Hours of the Virgin in the vernacular, because they contained extracts. The decree of Pope Innocent became embodied in the Corpus Juris and thus remained familiar to canon lawyers; it was adduced in the Repertorium Inquisitorum of 1494, but only in a kind of _obiter dictum_, showing that at that time it was regarded as of no practical moment.[1410] Yet from the thirteenth to the sixteenth century there was no proscription of vernacular Bibles. The temporary causes which had led to their prohibition had passed away, and many translations were made, especially in Germany. One in Catalan, by Bonifacio Ferrer, brother of San Vicente Ferrer, was printed in Valencia, in 1478, under the editorship of the Inquisitor Jaime Borell.[1411]

[Sidenote: _THE SCRIPTURES_]

It was natural that the use made of the Bible by the Reformers should cause the revival of these obsolete prohibitions. Even before the compilation of the Indexes, we find Inquisitor-general Tavera granting to the Duchess of Soma, wife of the Admiral of Naples, a licence to keep and read a Bible in Italian, but the permission is limited to one year, showing how carefully it was guarded.[1412] It was therefore a matter of course that the Index of 1551 should contain a prohibition of the Bible in Spanish or any other vulgar tongue.[1413] This zeal was intensified by the versions which the Spanish refugees--Francisco de Enzinas, Juan Pérez, Cipriano de Valera and Cassiodoro de Reina--perfected and strove to introduce into Spain, but the prohibition was not confined to these. It extended to all fragments and extracts, however orthodox the rendering, as though to keep the unlearned ignorant of the existence of the Bible, or at least to make them understand that it was a wholly forbidden book. The Index of 1559 condemns twenty-two editions of the Hours of the Virgin in Romance, together with all others containing similar superstitions, but the real objection was the passages of Scripture contained in them, and, in 1573, all Hours in Romance were forbidden, as the Council of Toulouse had done in 1229.[1414] The extreme care with which the public was guarded from the Bible is seen in the 1583 Index of Quiroga, which, in forbidding all portions of Scripture in Romance, only excepts the fragments embodied in the canon of the mass, and the texts which Catholic writers may cite and explain, provided they are not printed alone but are in sermons and other works of edification.[1415] So unreasoning was this jealousy that, according to Azpilcueta, there were earnest men who desired to suppress vernacular versions of the Creed, the Paternoster, the Ave Maria and the Salve Regina, a zeal which found practical expression, in 1674, when the Inquisition prohibited a work entitled _Exercicios de Devocion_ because it contained translations of the Miserere, the Magnificat, the Te Deum and the Athanasian Symbol.[1416] The people were to be kept in such profound ignorance that the Sotomayor Index of 1640 prohibits, not only the vernacular Bible and all its parts, but even summaries and compendiums of it and, as though to render it hateful, in the Edicts of Faith, it was classed with the Koran and other Mahometan books, the possession of which was to be denounced to the Inquisition.[1417] It had to watch not only over its Spanish flock, but over its converts in the Indies, when it found that the English Society for the Propagation of the Gospel had caused versions to be made in the Indian tongues and was circulating them in America. This unexpected missionary work called for fresh exertion and, in 1710, we find Clement XI congratulating Inquisitor-general Ibañez on his efforts and urging him to persistent watchfulness.[1418]

This treatment of the Bible seems to have piqued the curiosity of the intelligent for, in 1747, Inquisitor-general Prado y Cuesta complains of the inordinate desire of many persons to have it in the vernacular, but, among the mass of the people it produced the impression desired. In 1791, Villanueva tells us that they, who once sought it, now regard it with horror and detestation; many care nothing for it and more are ignorant of its very existence.[1419] Yet, within a decade of Prado's utterance, the policy of the Church changed. Although, in 1713, Clement XI, in the bull _Unigenitus_, had condemned the use of the Bible by the laity as a Jansenist error, yet, only forty-four years later, the Congregation of the Index, in 1757, conceded the use of vernacular versions, if approved by the Holy See and accompanied with orthodox comments.[1420] This was followed, in 1771, by a version of the Acts of the Apostles by Catenacci, dedicated to Clement XIV and, in 1778, by the brief _In tanta librorum_, in which Pius VI approved of a translation of the whole Bible by Archbishop Martini.[1421] The Spanish Inquisition promptly followed the papal example. In 1782, Inquisitor-general Beltran issued a decree reciting that ample cause had existed for exceeding the Tridentine rule, but these causes had ceased and, in view of the usefulness of the sacred text, the Spanish rule was modified to conform to that of Trent, to the decree of the Congregation of 1757 and to the brief of 1778.[1422] In 1783 the Suprema ordered that the French version of Le Maître de Saci should be freely allowed[1423] and, in 1790, there appeared in Valencia a complete Spanish translation by Scio de San Miguel, which was speedily and repeatedly reprinted. No such evils have followed as were dreaded for two centuries, showing how much wiser would have been the policy of meeting the heretic Scriptures with an orthodox version, fortified with appropriate comments.

[Sidenote: _EXTENSION OF JURISDICTION_]

The same jealousy of admitting the vulgar to too great a familiarity with spiritual things showed itself with regard to works of devotion and edification. In 1570 a consulta of the Suprema to the inquisitor-general recommended that the catechism should not be printed in Romance.[1424] In the Preface to the Index of 1583, the prohibition of works by men of the highest Christian repute, such as Fisher of Rochester, Thomas More, Gerónimo Osorio, Francisco de Borja, Luis de Granada, Juan de Avila and others is explained, partly by books having been falsely attributed to them, partly by occasional incautious passages, and partly by their not being fitted for circulation in the vulgar tongue. The case of the _Obras del Cristiano_ of St. Francisco de Borja is illustrative. In the Index of 1559 it is simply prohibited. After his death, in 1572, as General of the Society of Jesus, Quiroga, in the Index of 1583, added "only in Romance or other vulgar tongue." He was beatified in 1624, but the canonization proceedings were delayed in consequence of his book being in the Spanish Index and, in 1662, the Jesuit Procurator-general applied to the Inquisition to rubricate the leaves of a copy and send it to the Congregation of Rites, so as to remove the impediment, but it was not until 1671 that he was finally enrolled in the catalogue of saints.[1425] The effort to suppress mysticism manifested itself, about 1620, in numerous edicts to suppress books of mystic devotion and lives of men and women who evidently were mystics.

Books of ritual were scrutinized with the same captiousness. June 15, 1568, the Pontificals printed in Dueñas and Valladolid were ordered to be seized. In 1583 some pernicious errors were discovered in the Breviary printed in Salamanca, in 1575. Even books so elementary as _cartillas_, or primers, could not escape. A carta acordada of November 6, 1577, alludes to a previous one of June 14th, ordering the suppression of cartillas containing an article entitled "Castigo y doctrina de Caton." Since then, it goes on to say, there have been found in other cartillas various matters pernicious and contrary to the teaching of the Church, especially in those printed by Juan de la Plaza in Toledo, wherefore all cartillas of every kind are to be seized, in the shops and in the hands of children going to school, and orders are consequently given that no one, under pains and censures, shall hold, read, or sell them.[1426]

There was little, indeed, to which the Inquisition could not extend the jurisdiction of its censorship. The fifth Council of Lateran had alluded to the danger to the public peace arising from libellous attacks on individuals, as one of the reasons for the examination and licensing of books before printing, but this was a purely secular matter, and the faculties conferred on the inquisitor-general looked solely to the suppression of heresy. Clement VIII, however, in his Index of 1596, included, as subjects of condemnation, defamatory memorials against religion or princes, and this opened the way to much else. It is true that an experienced writer assures us that, although such writing can be suppressed by edict, it cannot be under pain of excommunication, but only as a command under pain of mortal sin, and that the Inquisition cannot proceed against the author unless the faith is involved.[1427] These limitations, however, were easily overpassed. We have seen (Vol. I, p. 488) how Inquisitor-general Pacheco, in 1623, condemned some legal arguments in defence of the Chancellery of Granada and commenced prosecutions of the counsel who had drawn them up. His successor Zapata, in 1627, was a trifle more cautious in a conflict wherein the Inquisition was not concerned. The Universities of Salamanca, Valladolid and Alcalá united in an attack on the Jesuits and their new college, when the Inquisition ordered the paper suppressed on the ground that it was anonymous and harsh in style. Then Salamanca came forward and acknowledged the authorship; the Jesuit procurator still asked for its suppression, but the Inquisition decided that it had not the _calidad de oficio_ and withdrew the prohibition, but still assumed authority to require the removal of asperities. Philip IV was dissatisfied, as he favored the Jesuits, and asked in what this case differed from others in which Pacheco had suppressed similar papers.[1428]

In 1687, the tribunal of Toledo, in a quarrel with the Carthusian house of el Paular, suppressed four memorials of its adversaries to the king, and punished the printer, Lucas Antonio Bedmar with four years' exile from Toledo and Madrid; the grounds alleged were that they were scandalous, insulting, untrue and defamatory of those mentioned in them; there was no assumption that the faith was in any way involved and it was simply an expeditious way of putting an opponent out of court.[1429] Other similar cases will come before us presently and meanwhile we may observe that there was even no scruple in prosecuting individuals, in matters with which the Inquisition seemingly had no concern or jurisdiction, as in the case of Fray Bonifaz de San Pablo, tried in 1791, by the Barcelona tribunal, for attempting to print a satirical paper on his own Carmelite Order, and in that of Josefa and Jacinto López, prosecuted by Toledo, in 1797, on suspicion of having posted some pasquinades, characterized as "infamatorios y hereticales."[1430] The powers of the Inquisition were so elastic that they included the privilege of self-definition; none dared to call them in question, and it seems have been invoked to supply any deficiency in the ordinary machinery of justice--or of injustice.

[Sidenote: _THE REGALIAS_]

Still less concerned with heresy was an important field in which the censorial functions of the Inquisition were employed by the crown, in its frequent struggles with the Holy See. In the middle ages papal domination encroached in many ways on the prerogatives of the temporal ruler, encroachments submitted to, with more or less resistance, by the loosely organized feudal monarchies. As these, in the sixteenth century, transformed themselves into absolutism, it was natural that they should grow restive, and the Reformation, which divided Europe into two hostile religious camps, gave to those sovereigns who remained faithful to Rome the opportunity of advancing their claims as the price of their support. The Spanish kings had always been distinguished by their resistance to papal pretensions and though, throughout the sixteenth century, they sternly kept their people in the Roman obedience, they were none the less resolute in asserting the _regalías_, or royal prerogatives, which in many ways conflicted with what Rome asserted as its rights. In the struggles thence arising, valuable assistance was derived from the works of legists, learned in the imperial jurisprudence and in the fueros, and these _regalistas_ became especially obnoxious to the Holy See. Rome has never hesitated to use the powerful aid of the Index in support of Ultramontanism, and it took special care to condemn and prohibit the books of the regalistas. It was impossible for a temporal sovereign to allow the suppression of works written in defence of his sovereignty, and the Inquisition, at least for a time, willingly supported the crown in this, not from loyalty, but because it afforded the opportunity of declaring and maintaining its independence of the hated Congregations of the Inquisition and of the Index.

When Melchor Cano, in 1555, at the request of Charles V, drew up a memoir in which he assailed, with the bitterest invective, the pretensions of the curia, and Paul IV summoned him, as a son of perdition, to Rome for trial, the Spanish Inquisition sided with the sovereign and did not put the obnoxious paper in the Index.[1431] Melchor Cano was forgiven, but the causes of dissension remained. One of the chief of these was the jurisdiction exercised by the papal nuncio, bringing in its train a long series of abuses, relief from which was sought by the _recurso de fuerza_, like the French _appel comme d'abus_, admitting appeals to the Council of Castile from all ecclesiastical tribunals. The curia claimed this to be an invasion of clerical liberty, and the struggle over it was long and envenomed. In 1591 Juan de Roa printed, with a dedication to the king and the approbation of an inquisitor, a treatise entitled "Apologia de Juribus principalibus defendendis," arguing in favor of the royal jurisdiction in such cases, which excited no little indignation in Rome, where it was promptly condemned and burnt. Gregory XIV and the Roman Inquisition instructed the Nuncio Millino to induce Philip II to follow this example, and the succeeding Nuncio Caietano was ordered to labor with the utmost zeal to have the very memory of the book obliterated. So far was he from success that the Inquisition did not censure the work, and Philip rewarded the author with presentation to a priory worth fifteen hundred ducats per annum, of which he was promptly deprived by the nuncio, on account of his unspeakable crimes. So bitter was the quarrel that Cardinal Baronius, in his Annals, so far forgot the impartiality of an historian as to introduce an indecent personal attack on Roa in his account of the Priscillianists of the fifth century. This led to a rumor that his volume would be condemned by the Spanish Inquisition, whereat he complained loudly, in a letter to Padre Antonio Talpa, inveighing against the incredible audacity of the Spanish Inquisition, which placed on its Index whatever it chose.[1432]

[Sidenote: _INDEPENDENCE OF ROME_]

It was probably this case that led Clement VIII, in the Rules prefixed to his Index, which have been retained in all succeeding Indexes, to order the expurgation of whatever was contrary to ecclesiastical immunity, liberty and jurisdiction. This did not prevent Spanish legists and theologians from defending the regalías. About 1600, Henrique Henríquez, one of the most learned doctors of his day, produced his "De Clavibus Romani Pontificis" in which, like Roa, he maintained the _recurso de fuerza_. By order of the papal nuncio, this was suppressed and burnt so successfully that only three or four copies have survived.[1433] That an organized government should permit within its territory an antagonistic foreign power to suppress books defending what it claimed to be its rights was an anomaly which could not be patiently endured. Rome was immovable, and a clash was inevitable. In 1613 appeared the "Tractatus de cognitione per viam violentiæ" by Gerónimo de Cevallos and, in 1617, Philip III, on learning that its condemnation was under consideration in Rome, wrote earnestly to his ambassador to prevent it, and declared that such condemnation would not be received or executed in Spain. This may have delayed but did not prevent the adverse decision, which came December 12, 1624, when Philip IV carried out his father's threat. The Spanish Inquisition did not condemn the work, but merely ordered some clauses altered, and its independence in the matter of censorship was tacitly asserted.[1434]

Rome persisted, and independence was definitely asserted. In February, 1627, the Count of Oñate, ambassador to the Holy See, reported the issue of a decree condemning books, some of which were in defence of the regalías. In June, Philip sent this to the Suprema, asking its advice. It replied that, when the decree should come, it would be examined and reported to the king without allowing its publication, for no ecclesiastic or layman in Spain could do so without orders from the Inquisitor-general and Suprema. If such attempts were made, an appropriate remedy would be applied.[1435] The issue promptly came. The decree appeared, April 12, 1628, and one of the books condemned was the "Tractatus de Regia Protectione," by Salgado de Somoza, President of the Royal Council and a vigorous upholder of the regalías. When the decree arrived, the king ordered the inquisitor-general to deliver it to him and wrote to all the bishops forbidding them to publish it.[1436]

Having thus established its independence, the Inquisition refused to recognize Roman condemnations of books of all kinds. When one was received, it caused the book to be examined by its own calificadores and voted on their report, either to approve or to condemn; whatever was done was its own act and not that of Rome. Another of the works condemned in the decree of April 1, 1628, was a book of extravagant Mariolatry, entitled _Elucidarium Deiparæ_, by the Jesuit Juan Bautista Poza, which had been current in Spain for a couple of years. Poza wrote two abusive letters to Urban VIII, asserting that the Roman Congregations had no jurisdiction in Spain, where its own Inquisition was supreme, and, in 1632, the Congregation retorted by condemning all his works. The Nuncio Monte made great efforts to have this published, but the Suprema had the books examined and only prohibited them until they should be expurgated. It was not always easy, however, to array the bishops in opposition to the Holy See, and in Valencia the self-willed Archbishop Acevedo claimed the right to publish the papal decree, and the tribunal there was involved in some trouble with the episcopal officials.[1437]

[Sidenote: _INDEPENDENCE OF ROME_]

This was speedily followed by a similar struggle over a vastly more important book--the _Dialogo_ of Galileo, on the Copernecan system.[1438] In a consulta of December 13, 1633, the Suprema represented to Philip that, under the papal delegations, the Inquisition had exclusive control over censorship in Spain. In Rome, prohibitions were issued by the Congregations of Inquisition and Index, which were similar bodies to the Suprema, and it did not recognize them, but only the pope, as its superior. The nuncios were always endeavoring to extend their jurisdiction and required to be watched to avert greater evils. The inquisitors of Cuenca had just written that, by the nuncio's order, the provisor had affixed to the church-doors an edict regarding a book entitled "Galileo Galilei Fiorentino," without having first given notice to the inquisitor-general. The results of allowing the nuncio to do this were foreseen when the Count of Oñate reported from Rome the prohibition of certain books defending the regalías and, as the nuncios were continually endeavoring thus to invade the exclusive jurisdiction of the Inquisition in matters of censorship, the king was asked to sign the accompanying letters to the archbishops and bishops, similar to those despatched in 1627.[1439] Of course the king signed the letters; whether the Suprema had Galileo's book examined or not, we have no means of knowing, but the Inquisition escaped the discredit of condemning him, and the name of the illustrious Florentine appears nowhere in the Spanish Indexes.

In the matter of the regalistas, Philip, in a letter of April 10, 1634, to Cardinal Borja, pointed out the unfairness of suppressing legal works defending his side of the controversy with the Holy See, in which the faith was not concerned, and he ordered urgent representations to be made to Urban VIII, with the intimation that, if Rome continued its course, he would suppress all books supporting the papal claims.[1440] Remonstrance was in vain. In 1640, Salgado de Somoza's "Tractatus de Supplicatione ad Sanctissimum" was condemned; in 1642, Solorzano's "Disputationes de Indiarum Jure" and, in 1646, six or eight similar works, for which the nuncio was instructed to demand similar prohibition in Spain.[1441] Imperious as was this, the act was rendered doubly offensive by causing the condemnation to be published without transmitting it through the Inquisition, thus disregarding the independence claimed by the latter and the courtesy due to a friendly government. Provocation so extreme could scarce have been ventured but for the desperate position of Spain, battling at once with France, with Portugal and with Catalonia. Yet Spain was not sunk so low as to submit. After deliberation in the various councils, Philip, on October 16th, sent to the Suprema three consultas which they had presented and ordered it to advise him. With unusual promptitude it replied, October 20th, expressing its unreserved adhesion to the regalías claimed by the crown, which were founded in rights inseparable from sovereignty, in papal bulls, and in immemorial prescription. The unlawful act of the nuncio was of the highest prejudice; the books condemned had in no way transcended proper limits; their authors were pious Catholics and the works had been circulated in sight of the Inquisition, whose duty it was to watch over such matters. The consulta ended with a promise to suppress the papal decree and to make the fact known everywhere, so as to avert the injury which its publication might have caused.[1442] Thus supported by the indignation of all his advisers, Philip issued a decree in November ordering the papal decree to be suppressed; the nuncio was rebuked and told that the royal indignation would seek other means of expression; the ambassador at Rome was instructed to represent the deep resentment which was felt, and to tell the Holy See that this was not a mere matter of opinion, in which it could interfere and dictate to Spain about rights coeval with the crown and always uninterruptedly enjoyed. Opportunity was also taken to reassert emphatically the independence of the Spanish Inquisition and the nullity, without its approval, of the acts of the Roman Congregations.[1443] Notwithstanding this, the progressive decadence of Spain encouraged the curia to make another attempt, in 1687, when the nuncio sent a decree of the Congregation of the Inquisition to the bishops, with orders to publish it. The Suprema lost no time in presenting two earnest consultas to the king, urging him to take prompt action in repelling this attempt to subject Spain to the Roman Inquisition.[1444]

The persistence of the curia was fruitless. The established custom, resulting from these disputes, as described by an experienced inquisitor, was that, when the nuncio received a brief from the Congregations, he sent it to the Suprema, which ordered the book to be examined by its calificadores and, if they pronounced it objectionable, the Suprema issued a corresponding edict. Twice, he says, the nuncio, in order to evade these rules, caused edicts to be posted in the court-yard of his palace, but the Suprema abrogated them, punished those who did it, and reported to the king in order that he might warn the nuncio to observe the regulations. Sometimes, however, a brief came directly from the pope. Then the matter was in the hands of the king, who retained it and supplicated the pope that it should be published by the Inquisition. In Sicily, no brief was published without receiving the exequatur of the viceroy.[1445]

[Sidenote: _USED AGAINST THE CROWN_]

The Inquisition had thus, by supporting the royal jurisdiction against the papal claims, achieved its independence of Rome, but it was fighting for its own hand and, when its object was attained, its allegiance to the Church outweighed its allegiance to the sovereign. When the question was between its own jurisdiction and that of the crown, its attitude was most decisive. The condemnation by Pacheco of the arguments of Don Luis de Gubiel, in the competencia with the Chancellery of Granada, was not an isolated instance of this. In 1637, there was a bitter controversy between the Seville tribunal and the royal Audiencia, over the banishment of a familiar by the latter, in the course of which the Suprema ordered the suppression of various arguments prepared in support of the royal jurisdiction, and among them one by Juan Pérez de Lara, the fiscal of the Audiencia, written in the strict line of his duty. To this the Council of Castile took exception, in a consulta complaining that it was of great prejudice to the regalías; the paper contained nothing contrary to the faith, rendering it liable to the censure of the Inquisition, wherefore the Council asked that all the documents suppressed should be examined by disinterested persons, and that the Suprema be ordered in future not to suppress any paper in favor of the royal jurisdiction without preliminary notice to the king. To this temperate expostulation the Suprema replied with lofty disdain. The king was told that he should answer all remonstrances as Charles V did, May 17, 1519, to the Diputados of Aragon--"as an affair of the Inquisition, it is not for us to interfere, nor can the fueros of the kingdom impede what the inquisitor-general does, as it is an ecclesiastical case." It was astonished that there should be any question as to the power of the Inquisition, established by papal bulls, decrees of councils and inviolable custom, while the rule of the Index extends this power without limitation, at the discretion of the inquisitors. That the regalías had been threatened was easy of disproof, for the peace and prosperity of the king's dominions were due to the unity of faith procured by the watchful care of the Inquisition. The object of the Council of Castile was to limit the jurisdiction of the Inquisition and to reduce its censorship to a matter of competencias, but the Inquisition alone could decide what belonged to it and what did not belong.[1446]

Such being the temper and spirit of the Holy Office, it is not surprising that, when it had secured its own emancipation from Rome, it should no longer prove an ally of the crown in defence of the regalías. Llorente mentions two authors--Ramos del Manzano and Pedro González de Salcedo, whose works it condemned for defending the royal prerogative.[1447] It could not be depended on for suppressing those which impeached the regalías, and the State, in defending itself, was obliged to resort to its own censorship, as in case of the work entitled "Casos reservados à su Santidad," attributed to Doctor Francisco Barambio, in 1694. It never appeared in the Index, but a royal auto condemned it as subversive of the regalías and prerogatives of the crown, and ordered its suppression under pain of half confiscation and arbitrary penalties.[1448]

[Sidenote: _RESTRICTIONS_]

We have already (Vol. I, pp. 315, 321) seen how, in the eighteenth century, the Inquisition, in the cases of Macanaz and the works of Barclay and Le Vayer, and in that of the Catechism of Mesengui, took sides against the royal prerogative. Although in the former Philip V weakly yielded, Carlos III in the latter, not only temporarily suspended Inquisitor-general Bonifaz, but took steps to protect more thoroughly the crown against papal encroachment, and to limit the censorial powers of the Inquisition. November 27, 1761, he laid down the basis of subsequent legislation in instructions to the Council of State to frame a law adequate to the necessities of the case. In consequence, the _Pragmática del Exequatur_ of January 18, 1762, ordered that no bull, brief or papal letter, addressed to any tribunal, junta, judge or prelate, should be published without having first been presented to the king for his approval by the nuncio, while those for individuals should be submitted to the Royal Council to see whether they affected the Concordat, or prejudiced the regalías or the good customs and usages of the kingdom. This was followed by a cédula of August 18th imposing restrictions on inquisitorial censorship, but both of these were withdrawn by decree of July 15, 1763--a decree obtained by the royal confessor, Padre Eleta, working on the king's superstition by representing the loss of Havana as an evidence of divine wrath.[1449] This respite, however, was not of long duration. At a junta called, in 1768, to consider matters growing out of the expulsion of the Jesuits, the Counts of Floridablanca and Campomanes presented a memorial calling attention to the surreptitious introduction of several papal briefs, and to the disastrous influence of the censorship in flooding the land with ignorance. The result of the discussion was the re-enactment of the _Pragmática del Exequatur_, with more enlarged provisions, and a cédula of June 6th providing that the Inquisition should not prohibit any work by a Catholic of good repute, without giving him a hearing or, if he were a foreigner or dead, without appointing for him an advocate of competent character. The circulation of books was not to be suspended under pretext that they were undergoing examination; in those to be expurgated the objectionable passages were to be speedily designated, so that the current reading of them should not be interrupted, and any special propositions condemned were to be clearly indicated, so that they could be expurgated by the owners. Prohibition was to be confined to errors and superstitions and lax opinions prejudicial to religion and morality, and no edict was to be published until it had been approved by the king.[1450]

These reforms were in the spirit of those by which Benedict XIV, in the bull _Sollicita ac provida_, had endeavored to soften the rigor of the Roman censorship, but they were largely impracticable. They excited lively opposition, especially the provision allowing the circulation of books during the process of examination, and Llorente tells us that, for the most part, the Inquisition eluded their restrictions. It was of course impossible for the king to pass judgement on all the condemnatory edicts which followed each other in rapid succession and were submitted to him without explanation or record of the author having been heard in his defence.[1451] This latter provision however seems to have been observed. In 1775 we find the Suprema sending to Valencia certain conclusions commencing "Sistema phisicum de hominis generatione," together with the papers concerning their condemnation and the cédula of June 16, 1768, so that the party could be heard in defence.[1452] The author, however, was not allowed to print and circulate his defence, though he might have licence for enough copies to supply the members of the Suprema; in a case in which he distributed them through the universities they were called in and suppressed, and if he attacked the witnesses and calificadores, he was liable to the savage penalties of the bull _Si de protegendis_.[1453] Yet to the end the author was entitled to a hearing. In a case occurring at Llerena, in 1816, the Suprema instructs the tribunal to suppress a certain pamphlet in the next edict, but it is to ask the author, Dr. Martin Batincas, whether he desires to defend it; if so to furnish him with the censures, but not the names of the calificadores, when the matter will take its regular course. The provision for a defender in the cases of deceased and foreign authors was similarly maintained. In 1816 the Suprema instructed the Madrid tribunal to take up the case of a book entitled "El Niño instruido," which had been suspended on account of the troubles; now a new edition had appeared, which must be seized and a copy of the censures be furnished to the General of the Barefooted Carmelites; if he should not desire to put forward a defender, the tribunal was to appoint a _defensor de oficio_. So scrupulously was this observed that, in 1817, a single copy of a French book, printed in 1801, entitled "Du Mariage dans ses rapports avec la Religion et avec les lois nouvelles," found in possession of Canon Miguel Cortés, was duly condemned by calificadores when Padre Cento was appointed to defend it and, on his refusal, proceedings appear to have been dropped.[1454]

* * * * *

[Sidenote: _POLITICALLY EMPLOYED_]

During this later period, the Inquisition and the State were in firm alliance, against their common enemy the Revolution, and the State made full use of the Inquisition as a political instrument, although it had its own elaborate and effective censorship. This employment of the Inquisition was a new development, for in the earlier time, the instances in which inquisitorial censorship was called upon for political service are surprisingly few. In the case of Antonio Pérez, it was inevitable that the Inquisition should prohibit his writings and unauthorized accounts of his persecutions. There was less excuse for suppressing, in 1609, Padre Mariana's volume of essays on account of his criticism of the ruinous debasement of the coinage.[1455] There was unworthy complaisance to the Holy See when, in 1606, the Suprema forbade the possession by any one of the papers and memorials issued by Venice, in its quarrel with Paul V, on the pretext of their being scandalous to Christendom, and an even greater misuse of its power when it arrested and prosecuted Francisco de la Cueva, a lawyer whom the Venetian ambassador had employed to write in defence of the Republic.[1456] On the eve of the Catalan revolt, in 1640, the protest of Barcelona to the king was suppressed as coming under the rules of the Expurgatorio, being seditious, insulting and scandalous, and this precedent was followed with all writings on the subject during the revolt.[1457] On the whole, however, throughout the first three centuries of its existence, the political use made of the Inquisition, in this and other ways, was wonderfully small.

It was otherwise when the upheaval came which threatened the stability of all monarchical institutions, and nothing was more dreaded than public opinion, which might develop into action. All the agencies at command of the State were felt to be needed, and Carlos IV hastened to open the way for the Inquisition by declaring, in an edict of 1789, that all which contributed to spread revolutionary principles was heresy, being a doctrinal error, contrary to the teachings of the Apostles Peter and Paul, and this was speedily reduced to practice by an edict of the Inquisition ordering the surrender of all papers coming from France and conveying revolutionary ideas.[1458] Watchfulness on importations, especially from France, by both royal and inquisitorial officials, was redoubled, and for years new methods were constantly devised to keep the population in ignorance of events beyond the Pyrenees.[1459]

It was in vain. French newspapers and books were smuggled across the frontier, and forbidden speculations on the laws of nature and the rights of man were widely disseminated. When the crisis came, with the deportation of the royal family and the Napoleonic invasion, there was a leaven of liberalism sufficient to find expression in the demand for a new order of things. The Extraordinary Córtes, elected by universal suffrage and assembled at Cádiz in 1810, lost no time in framing a law for the freedom of the press. Yet the tradition of the necessity of censorship was so strong that the decree of February 22, 1813, suppressing the Inquisition, transferred to the bishops the jurisdiction over censorship as well as over heresy. The law on the press had provided a control by the State over all printing, and works on religion were subjected to a second episcopal examination, with full power of condemnation and suppression, while elaborate provisions were made for an authoritative Index.[1460]

This cumbrous scheme never had vitality, and the Restoration of 1814 restored to the Inquisition its jurisdiction over the press. As soon as it could spare time, during the labor of reconstruction, it addressed itself to the suppression of the revolutionary literature of the previous six years. A carta acordada of October 25, 1814, ordered the tribunals, as speedily as possible, to notify the Suprema of all objectionable books, pamphlets and papers that had been written or printed in their districts, with all details as to authorship and place of publication. From this was compiled a list of a hundred and eighty-three prohibited publications, including thirty-five journals, but an edict of July 22, 1815, described this as incomplete; the faithful were referred to the rules of the Index as defining whatever had been omitted, and all such were to be surrendered within six days, under the traditional penalty of excommunication and two hundred ducats; all the old regulations and Indexes were declared to be in force and, on August 3d, each tribunal was ordered to suppress all objectionable matter printed within its district.[1461]

[Sidenote: _POLITICALLY EMPLOYED_]

The correspondence of the Suprema, at this period, shows minute and constant watchfulness over the press, and a large part of the labors of the Inquisition, during its brief resuscitation, was devoted to censorship, mostly of a political character. The Constitutionalist refugees, who had fled from the vengeance of the reaction, were busy, with such slender means as they could command, in propagating their ideas, as the Protestant refugees had been in the sixteenth century, and there was the same anxious vigilance to counteract their efforts, while the danger was greater, for a large part of the population was known to secretly share their views. Thus, in 1818, circulars were received in Madrid, announcing the appearance in London of a weekly entitled _El Español Constitucional_. Immediately the Royal Council sent out orders to the judicial and military authorities to seize all copies, and the Juez de Imprentas did the same to his subordinates, all of which resulted in finding enough of the circulars to show that they had been widely distributed. Then the aid of the Inquisition was invoked and, on August 3d, the Suprema ordered the tribunals not only to seize all copies but to arrest everybody concerned. Then, on September 13th, the king reported that the wicked refugees in London, who had been, through lack of funds, obliged to abandon the project, had recently obtained contributions and had resumed it, wherefore fresh diligence was enjoined. Two days later the Suprema forwarded this to the tribunals, with orders to exert themselves in seizing the circulars and periodical and also the accomplices in the so-called conspiracy. Again, on November 4th, the Suprema called renewed attention to its former letters and enclosed a royal order stating that the London ambassador reported the appearance of the second number of the journal, and insisting on every precaution to prevent its circulation in Spain. There is no trace, however, of any copy of the mysterious periodical being captured by the Inquisition, or of the arrest of any one concerned. Simultaneously with this, on November 5th, the Suprema transmitted another royal order stating that letters intercepted in the mails contained prospectuses of a periodical entitled "Gabinete de Curiosidades politicas y literarias de España y Indias," to be issued in London by Gallardo, former librarian of the Córtes. The Suprema consequently issued instructions enjoining the utmost vigilance in seizing the prospectus and copies of the periodical.[1462] The happy faculty of confusing the spiritual and the temporal, so valuable to the medieval Church, had evidently not been lost to the Spanish monarchy.

* * * * *

Although in general the Inquisition carefully abstained from intrusion in the field of morals, yet in censorship it undertook to guard the public from that which might contaminate virtue as well as from what affected faith. This was justified by the rules of the Tridentine Index as well as of that of Clement VIII, in 1596, where lascivious books and illustrations were to be prohibited or expurgated.[1463] Literature however largely escaped, at least until the later period. The _Celestina_ of Francisco de Rojas, of which more than thirty editions were printed in the sixteenth century, its popularity leading to its use as a schoolbook notwithstanding its somewhat crude indecency, escaped attention, until the Index of 1640 ordered the expurgation of about fifty lines, and it was not prohibited until that of 1790.[1464]

Art attracted earlier attention, especially when its employment in sacred subjects lacked dignity, however stimulating it might be to the piety of the unlettered public. The first allusion I have met to this function of the Inquisition occurs in 1568, when Inquisitor Moral, in reporting his visitation of San Sebastian, mentions penancing Gracia de Caldiere for possessing a _pintura deshonesta_, whereupon the Suprema told him that he should have sent the picture to it--apparently, as a matter of censorship, it reserved the decision to itself.[1465] The next is a carta acordada of 1571, ordering the suppression of some figures on linen of the Crucifixion and the Trinity, in which the calificadores had discovered symbols of Lutheran doctrines, and a series of twelve wood cuts of the Passion, with an epitome on the backs in Latin and French.[1466] This is emphasized in the Expurgatory Index of Quiroga, in 1583, of which the twelfth rule is directed against all representations of sacred persons or objects which savor of irrision or irreverence.[1467] Spanish piety, in fact, occasionally manifested itself in somewhat grotesque form, as in certain images on linen of the Christ-child, in military uniforms, the suppression of which was ordered in 1619.[1468] In 1649, the Suprema was scandalized at the great irreverence and diabolical indecency, with a savor of sacrilege, of ribbons which were called "bowels of angels" or "hearts or entrails of apostles," and, under the customary penalties, it forbade asking for, buying or selling ribbons with such names. A few weeks later it prohibited all razors or knives on the handles of which were engraved images of Christ, the Virgin, the saints or the instruments of the Passion; all found in the shops were to be seized, and the commissioners at the ports were to see that none were imported.[1469]

[Sidenote: _MORALS AND ART_]

After the more serious work of the Inquisition was accomplished, in the elimination of Judaism, Protestantism and Islam, its energies were more actively employed in this direction. In 1787 we find the Valencia tribunal prosecuting Francisca Lazaro for indecent songs. In 1803 the _Caprichos_ of Goya, the leading artist of the period, wounded inquisitorial sensibilities; he was summoned and his prosecution was commenced, but he was saved by the intervention of Carlos IV. Two of the last acts of the Valencia tribunal in 1820 were proceedings against the "Rime e Prose del Doctor Tomaso Crudeli," which it pronounced to be obscene and impious, and the condemnation of a book called _Il Zibaldone_, for lascivious propositions. The theatre also became subject to inquisitorial censorship. In 1817 a tragedy entitled "La Obstinacion de un Padre" was presented on the Valencian stage, October 9th and 10th; it seems to have excited disapproval and, on the 13th, the MS. was presented to the tribunal for its censure. In Madrid, the Suprema acted as a preliminary censor; in 1815 we find it ordering the local tribunal to examine the opera "El hombre de mal genio y buen corazon," and the comedy "El no de las niñas" and, on the report that the fiscal had no objection to their representation, it gave its assent. So, in 1819, the Suprema returns to the Seville tribunal its _calificacion_ of four _saynetes_, or farces, with orders to put it into more intelligible shape, to vote on it and return it for final decision.[1470]

Works of art, however, were the principal objects of inquisitorial Puritanism. In 1793, the Valencia tribunal formed a process concerning a certain snuff-box with a scandalous picture, supposed to be in possession of Don Jacinto de Castro, governor of the _sala del crimen_. Solicitude for the public morals was so acute that, October 2, 1815, the Suprema approved a decree of the Madrid tribunal, ordering all the hairdressers of the city to remove from their windows, or alter to decency, the wax busts which they exhibited as specimens of their art--apparently because they made too exuberant a display of their charms. Artists and dealers in pictures were held to a strict accountability. But a week before the last case, the Suprema had considered a prosecution by the Seville tribunal of Juan Rodríguez and Domingo Alvarez of Cádiz, the former for painting and the latter for exhibiting in his shop a picture called Diana, provocative by its posture and nudity. They were ordered to appear before the commissioner of Cádiz, who should reprimand and absolve them from the excommunication incurred, and warn them that a repetition of the offence would be visited with the penalties provided by Regla <small>XI of the Expurgatorio--banishment and five hundred ducats fine. Six months later, Pasqual Franchini for two _pinturas obscenas_ was fined a hundred ducats and, as he was ordered to be set at liberty, it is evident that he had been imprisoned; he pleaded poverty and his fine was kindly reduced. Three months later, Santiago Schmidt and his son Josef were sentenced, by the Madrid tribunal, for selling to the Prussian ambassador an indecent picture for eight thousand reales; for this they were fined two thousand reales, which the Suprema benignantly reduced to fifty ducats.[1471]

Doubtless in this case ambassadorial privilege saved the purchaser from prosecution, for the possession of objects regarded as immoral was _calidad de oficio_, and the records are full of cases against those who owned snuff-boxes, watches, packs of cards etc., with indecent figures or inscriptions, as well as of pictures, engravings and books with plates that offended the modesty of the censors. No doubt much of what was condemned was thoroughly vicious and disreputable, but the resultant purification scarce compensated for the invasion of private life and the stimulus to the detestable habit of espionage and denunciation, through which alone such matters could come to the knowledge of the tribunals. Much good art, moreover, was undoubtedly sacrificed by ignorant censors, for the objects thus condemned were destroyed. In 1805 at Valencia a painting on copper of the Adultery of Venus was thus ordered to be effaced, and when this was done the sheet of copper was delivered to the alcalde del crimen, to be restored to the owner. Akin to this was the tearing out of objectionable plates from books, which happens to be mentioned, in 1819, in the case of Don Luis Monfort, a captain of artillery.[1472]

* * * * *

[Sidenote: _INFLUENCE_]

Thus the censorship of the Inquisition was all-embracing, from the most dangerous heresies of Luther and Calvin, the popularization of Scripture, the relations between Church and State and the liberalism of the modern era, down to the veriest trifles. It was an engine of immense power, constantly applied for the furtherance of Obscurantism, the repression of thought, the exclusion of foreign ideas, and the obstruction of progress. It was accompanied by a state censorship, based upon the law of 1558, perfected in innumerable successive regulations, of a character most vexatious and embarrassing to authorship, and this duplication of censors exercised a most deplorably depressing influence on literature and culture. Authorship was discouraged by the uncertainty whether works, on which perhaps years of labor had been spent, would secure a licence to print; the business of publication was rendered extra-hazardous by the fact that a book, printed with due licence from the state, might at any moment be prohibited by the Inquisition and the whole edition be seized and destroyed, while purchasers who had bought such a licensed book were liable to be deprived of it without compensation. Thus, between the state and the Inquisition, whether working in unison or at cross-purposes, the intellectual development which, in the sixteenth century, promised to render Spanish literature and learning the most illustrious in Europe, was stunted and starved into atrophy, the arts and sciences were neglected, commercial and industrial progress was rendered impossible, and the character which Spain acquired among the nations was tersely expressed in the current saying that Africa began at the Pyrenees.