Chapter XX: Act 1837: (In re Blewitt, 1880, 5 P.D. 116) (5)

In Germany heresies, especially of a mystical character, were numerous in the middle ages; some of them affected the mass of the people, and led to religious and social movements of no little importance. The repression of heresy went on by fits and starts, and the Inquisition was never exercised so regularly in the Germanic as in certain of the Latin countries. At the outset of the 13th century persecutions of the Waldenses and Ortlibarii (followers of Ortlieb of Strassburg, c. 1200) took place at Strassburg; measures were taken locally until, in 1231, Gregory IX. issued definite instructions to the German prelates with a view to a regular repression of heresy, and gave full powers to execute them to Conrad of Marburg. Certain nobles having offered him resistance, he preached a crusade against them, but died by the hand of an assassin. The council of Mainz (April 1234) dealt gently with Conrad's murderers, but severely with the false witnesses whom he had employed. Shortly before (February 1234), the diet of Frankfort had decided, in spite of the pope's injunctions, that the destruction of heresy should be entrusted to the ordinary magistrates. And besides, thanks to the struggle between the Empire and the papacy, the German prelates always limited the prerogatives of the papal Inquisition. Again, by the municipal laws of the north (_Sachsenspiegel_) the ecclesiastical jurisdiction in the matter of heresy was very much limited, while the _Schwabenspiegel_ (municipal laws for southern Germany) does not seem to be aware of the existence of any inquisitional jurisdiction or procedure. When in the 14th century communities of Beghards developed with extraordinary rapidity, it was the episcopal authority, both at Cologne and Strassburg, which undertook to deal with these groups of sectaries, and at the very height of the conflict between the Empire and the papacy. Marsilius of Padua, the theoretical exponent of the imperial rights, attributes to the secular judge the right and obligation to punish heresy, the priest's rôle being merely advisory. In 1353 Innocent VI. tried to implant the papal Inquisition in Germany once for all; its success was but short, and Urban V.'s attempt in 1362 succeeded little better, in spite of the fact that Charles IV. (edicts of Lucca, June 1369) gave him the support of the secular power. Towards 1372, however, Gregory XI. succeeded in regularizing the exercise of the powers of the papal inquisitors on German soil; and the latter, notably Kerlinger, Hetstede, &c. set to work to destroy the communities of the Beghards, to burn their books, to close those _beguinages_ which were under suspicion, and to check by more or less violent means mystical epidemics such as those of the "flagellants," "dancers," &c. But these measures provoked angry protests from the people, the secular magistrates and even the bishops, so that Gregory XI., perceiving that he was face to face with the popular party, invited the bishops to control the inquiries of his own envoys. At the end of the 15th century the two inquisitions were acting concurrently.

Bohemia.

In Bohemia and the provinces subject to it the Waldenses had found their chosen country, and by the middle of the 13th century their propaganda was very flourishing. In 1245 Innocent IV. ordered the bishops to prosecute them with the aid of the secular arm, and in 1257, at the request of King Premysl Ottokar II., Alexander IV. introduced the Inquisition into Bohemia. But from this date till 1335 inquisitorial missions succeeded one another without effecting any sensible diminution in the material and moral strength of the heresy. The Waldenses had been joined by other sectaries, the Luciferani, and especially the Brethren of the Free Spirit. It was in vain that the bishops of Bohemia and Silesia carried on during the second half of the 14th century an active campaign against heresy; the spirit of criticism which had arisen with regard to the morals, and even to the dogmas of the church, was already preparing the way for Hussitism.

The Balkan States.

In the regions east of the Adriatic, Catharism, the first communities of which had very probably settled here, was supreme in the time of Innocent III. and Honorius III. The first Dominicans who established themselves in these parts had much to suffer from the aggression of those very heretics whom they had come to convert. Gregory XI., implacable in his persecution of Catharism, preached a crusade against them in 1234, and Bosnia was laid waste by fire and sword. But in spite of these violent measures Catharism only gained strength in the churches of Bulgaria, Rumania, Slavonia and Dalmatia. In 1298 Boniface VIII. tried to organize the Inquisition there, but the project remained fruitless. The attempt was revived in 1323 by John XXII. with doubtful success. The persecutions undertaken in the 14th and 15th centuries merely resulted in binding the Cathari to the invading Turks, with whom they found more tolerance than with the Slav princes converted to Roman orthodoxy.

Spain.

In Spain the papal Inquisition could gain no solid footing in the middle ages. Spain had been, in turn or simultaneously, Arian under the Visigoths, Catholic under the Hispano-Romans, Mussulman by conquest, and under a régime of religious peace Judaism had developed there. After the reconquest, and even at the height of the influence of the Cathari its heresies had been of quite minor importance. At the end of the 12th century Alphonso II. and Peter II. had on principle promulgated cruel edicts against heresy, but the persecution seemed to be dormant. By the bull _Declinante_ of the 26th of May 1232 inquisitors were sent to Aragon by Gregory IX. on the request of Raymond of Penaforte, and by 1237-1238 the Inquisition was practically founded. But as early as 1233 King James I. had promulgated an edict against the heretics which quite openly put the Inquisition in a subaltern position, and secularized a great part of its activities. The people, moreover, showed great hostility towards it. The inquisitor Fray Pedro de Cadrayta was murdered by the mob, and in 1235 the Cortes, with the consent of King James, prohibited the use of inquisitorial procedure and of the torture, as constituting a violation of the Fueros, though they made no attempt to give effect to their prohibition. In Castile Alphonso the Wise had, by establishing in his _Fuero Real_ and his _Siete Partidas_ an entirely independent secular legislation with regard to heretics (1255), removed his kingdom from all papal interference. At the opening of the 14th century Castile and Portugal had still no Inquisition. But at that time in Spain orthodoxy was generally threatened only by a few Fraticelli and Waldenses, who were not numerous enough to call for active repression. The Spanish inquisitor Nicholas Eymerich, the author of the famous _Directorium Inquisitorum_, had rarely to exercise his functions during the whole of his long career (end of 14th century). It was not against heresy that the church had to direct its vigilance. A mutual tolerance between the different religions had in fact sprung up, even after the conquest; the Christians in the north recognized the Mahommedan and Jewish religions, and Alphonso VI. of Castile took the title of _imperador de los dos cultos_. But for a long time past both the decisions of councils and papal briefs had proclaimed their surprise and indignation at this ominous indifference. As early as 1077 the third council of Rome, and in 1081 Gregory VII., protested against the admission of Jews to public offices in Spain. Clement IV., in a brief of 1266, exhorted James I. of Aragon to expel the Moors from his dominions. In 1278 Nicholas III. blamed Peter III. for having made a truce with them. One of the canons of the council of Vienne (1311-1312) denounces as intolerable the fact that Mahommedan prayers were still proclaimed from the top of the mosques, and under the influence of this council the Spanish councils of Zamora (1313) and Valladolid (1322) came to decisions which soon led to violent measures against the Mudegares (Mussulmans of the old Christian provinces). Already in 1210 massacres of Jews had taken place under the inspiration of Arnold of Narbonne, the papal legate; in 1276 fresh disturbances took place as a result of James I.'s refusal to obey the order of Clement IV., who had called upon him to expel the Jews from his dominions. In 1278 Nicholas IV. commanded the general of the Dominicans to send friars into all parts of the kingdom to work for the conversion of the Jews, and draw up lists of those who should refuse to be baptized. It was in vain that a few princes such as Peter III. or Ferdinand of Castile interfered; the Spanish clergy directed the persecution with ever increasing zeal. In the 14th century the massacres increased, and during the year 1391 whole towns were destroyed by fire and sword, while at Valencia eleven thousand forced baptisms took place. In the 15th century the persecution continued in the same way; it can only be said that the years 1449, 1462, 1470, 1473 were marked by the greatest bloodshed. Moreover, the Mudegares were also subjected to these baptisms and massacres _en masse_. From those, or the children of those who had escaped death by baptism, was formed the class of _Conversos_ or _Marranos_, the latter name being confined to the converted Jews. This class was still further increased after the conquest of the kingdom of Granada and the completion of the conquest by Ferdinand and Isabella, and after the pacification of the kingdoms of Aragon and Valencia by Charles V. The Mahommedans and Jews in these parts were given the choice between conversion and exile. Being of an active nature, and desiring some immediate powers as a recompense for their moral sufferings, the Jewish or Mussulman _Conversos_ soon became rich and powerful. In addition to the hatred of the church, which feared that it might quickly become Islamized or Judaized in this country which had so little love for theology, hatred and jealousy arose also among laymen and especially in the rich and noble classes. _Limpieza_, i.e. purity of blood, and the fact of being an "old Christian" were made the conditions of holding offices. It is true, this mistrust had assumed a theological form even before the Mahommedan conquest. As early as 633 the council of Toledo had declared heretics such converts, forced or voluntary, as returned to their old religion. When this principle was revived and, whether through secular jealousy, religious dislike or national pride, was applied to the _Conversos_, an essentially national Inquisition, directed against local heretics, was founded in Spain, and founded without the help of the papacy. It was created in 1480 by Ferdinand and Isabella. Sixtus IV. had wished the papal Inquisition to be established after the form and spirit of the middle ages; but Ferdinand, in his desire for centralization (his efforts in this direction had already led to the creation of the Holy Hermandad and the extension of the royal jurisdiction) wished to establish an inquisition which should be entirely Spanish, and entirely royal. Rome resisted, but at last gave way. Sixtus IV., Alexander VI., Innocent VIII., Julius II. and after them all the popes of the 16th century, saw in this secular attempt a great power in favour of orthodoxy, and approved it when established, and on seeing its constant activity. The Inquisition took advantage of this to claim an almost complete autonomy. The decisions of the Roman Congregation of the Index were only valid for Spain if the Holy Office of Madrid thought good to countersign them; consequently there were some books approved at Rome and proscribed in the peninsula, such as the _Historia pelagiana_ of Cardinal Nores, and some which were forbidden at Rome and approved in the peninsula, such as the writings of Fathers Mateo Moya and Juan Bautista Poza. The Spanish Holy Office perceived long before Rome the dangers of mysticism, and already persecuted the mystics, the _Alumbrados_ while Rome (impervious to Molinism) still favoured them. "During the last few centuries the church of Spain was at once the most orthodox and the most independent of the national churches" (Ch. V. Langlois). There was even a financial dispute between the Inquisition and the papacy, in which the Inquisition had the better of the argument; the Roman Penitentiary sold exemptions from penalties (involving loss of civil rights), such as prison, the galleys and wearing the _sanbenito_, and dispensations from the crime of _Marrania_ (secret Judaism). The inquisitors tried to gain control of this sale, and at a much higher price, and were seconded in this by the kings of Spain, who saw that it was to their own interest. At first they tried a compromise; the unfortunate victims had to pay twice, to the pope and to the Inquisition. But the payment to the pope was held by the Inquisition to reduce too much its own share of the confiscated property, and the struggle continued throughout the first half of the 16th century, the Curia finally triumphing, thanks to the energy of Paul III. Since, however, the Inquisition continued to threaten the holders of papal dispensations, most of them found it prudent to demand a definite rehabilitation, in return for payments both to the king and the Inquisition. As a national institution the Inquisition had first of all the advantage of a very strong centralization and very rapid procedure, consisting as it did of an organization of local tribunals with a supreme council at Madrid, the _Suprema_. The grand inquisitor was _ex officio_ president for life of the royal council of the Inquisition. It was the grand inquisitor, General Jimenez de Cisneros, who set in motion the inquisitorial tribunals of Seville, Cordova, Jaen, Toledo, Murcia, Valladolid and Calahorra. There was no such tribunal at Madrid till the time of Philip IV. The inquisitor-general of Aragon established inquisitors at Saragossa, Barcelona, Valencia, Majorca, Sardinia, Sicily and Pampeluna (moved later to Calahorra). From the very beginning the papacy strengthened this organization by depriving the Spanish metropolitans, by the bull of the 25th of September 1487, of the right of receiving appeals from the decisions given jointly by the bishops of the various dioceses, their suffragans and the apostolic inquisitors, and by investing the inquisitor-general with this right. And, more than this, Torquemada actually took proceedings against bishops, for example, the accusation of heresy against Don Pedro Aranda, bishop of Calahorra (1498); while the inquisitor Lucero prosecuted the first archbishop of Granada, Don Ferdinando de Talavera. Further, when once the Inquisition was closely allied to the crown, no Spaniard, whether clerk or layman, could escape its power. Even the Jesuits, though not till after 1660, were put under the authority of the Suprema. The highest nobles were kept constantly under observation; during the reigns of Charles III. and Charles IV. the duke of Almodovar, the count of Aranda, the great writer Campomanes, and the two ministers Melchior de Jovellanos and the count of Florida-Alanca, were attacked by the Suprema. But the descendants of Moors and Jews, though they were good Christians, or even nobles, were most held in suspicion. Even during the middle ages the descendants of the Paterenes were known, observed and denounced. In the eyes of the Inquisition the taint of heresy was even more indelible. A family into which a forced conversion or a mixed marriage had introduced Moorish or Jewish blood was almost entirely deprived of any chance of public office, and was bound, in order to disarm suspicion, to furnish agents or spies to the Holy Office. The Spaniards were very quick to accept the idea of the Inquisition to such an extent as to look upon heresy as a national scourge to be destroyed at all costs, and they consequently considered the Inquisition as a powerful and indispensable agent of public protection; it would be going too far to state that this conception is unknown to orthodox present-day historians of the Inquisition, and especially certain Spanish historians (cf. the preface to Menendez y Pelayo's _Heterodoxos españoles_). As had happened among the Albigenses, commerce and industry were rapidly paralysed in Spain by this odious régime of suspicion, especially as the _Conversos_, who inherited the industrial and commercial capacity of the Moors and Jews, represented one of the most active elements of the population. Besides, this system of wholesale confiscations might reduce a family to beggary in a single day, so that all transactions were liable to extraordinary risks. It was in vain that the counsellors of Charles V., and on several occasions the Cortes, demanded that the inquisitors and their countless agents should be appointed on a fixed system by the state; the state, and above all the Inquisition, refused to make any such change. The Inquisition preferred to draw its revenues from heresy, and this is not surprising if we think of the economic aspect of the Albigensian Inquisition; the system of _encours_ was simply made general in Spain, and managed to exist there for three centuries. In the case of the Inquisition in Languedoc, there still remained the possibility of an appeal to the king, the inquisitors, or more rarely the pope, against these extortions; but there was nothing of the kind in Spain. The Inquisition and the Crown could refuse each other nothing, and appeals to the pope met with their united resistance. As early as the reign of Ferdinand certain rich _Conversos_ who had bought letters of indulgence from the Holy See were nevertheless prosecuted by Ferdinand and Torquemada, in spite of the protests of Sixtus IV. The papacy met with the most serious checks under the Bourbons. Philip V. forbade all his subjects to carry appeals to Rome, or to make public any papal briefs without the royal _exequatur_.

The political aspect of the work and character of the Inquisition has been very diversely estimated; it is a serious error to attribute to it, as has too often been done, extreme ideas of equality, or even to represent it as having favoured centralization and a royal absolutism to the same extent as the Inquisition of the 13th and 14th centuries in Languedoc. "It was a mere coincidence," says H. C. Lea, "that the Inquisition and absolutism developed side by side in Spain." The Suprema did not attack all nobles as nobles; it attacked certain of them as _Conversos_, and the Spanish feudal nobles were sure enough of their _limpieza_ to have nothing to fear from it. But it is undeniable that it frequently tended to constitute a state within the state. At the time of their greatest power, the inquisitors paid no taxes, and gave no account of the confiscations which they effected; they claimed for themselves and their agents the right of bearing arms, and it is well known that their declared adversaries, or even those who blamed them in some respects, were without fail prosecuted for heresy. But that was not the limit to their pretensions. In 1574, under Philip II., there was an idea of instituting a military order, that of Santa Maria de la Espada Blanca, having as its head the grand inquisitor, and to him all the members of the order, i.e. all Spaniards distinguished by _limpieza_ of blood, were to swear obedience in peace and in war. Moreover, they were to recognize his jurisdiction and give up to him the reversion of their property. Nine provinces had already consented, when Philip II. put a stop to this theocratic movement, which threatened his authority. It was, however, only the Bourbons, who had imbibed Gallican ideas, who by dint of perseverance managed to make the Inquisition subservient to the Crown, and Charles III., "the philosopher king," openly set limits to the privileges of the inquisitors. Napoleon, on his entry into Madrid (December 1808), at once suppressed the Inquisition, and the extraordinary general Cortes on the 12th of February 1813 declared it to be incompatible with the constitution, in spite of the protests of Rome. Ferdinand VII. restored it (July 21, 1814) on his return from exile, but it was impoverished and almost powerless. It was again abolished as a result of the Liberal revolution of 1820, was restored temporarily in 1823 after the French military intervention under the duc d'Angoulême, and finally disappeared on the 15th of July 1834, when Queen Christina allied herself with the Liberals. "It was not, however, till the 8th of May 1869 that the principle of religious liberty was proclaimed in the peninsula; and even since then it has been limited by the constitution of 1876, which forbids the public celebration of dissident religions" (S. Reinach). In 1816 the pope abolished torture in all the tribunals of the Inquisition. It is a too frequent practice to represent as peculiar to the Spanish Inquisition modes of procedure in use for a long time in the inquisitorial tribunals of the rest of Europe. There are no special manuals, or _practica_, for the inquisitorial procedure in Spain; but the few distinctive characteristics of this procedure may be mentioned. The Suprema allowed the accused an advocate chosen from among the members or familiars of the Holy Office; this privilege was obviously illusory, for the advocate was chosen and paid by the tribunal, and could only interview the accused in presence of an inquisitor and a secretary. The theological examination was a delicate and minute proceeding; the "qualificators of the Holy Office," special functionaries, whose equivalent can, however, easily be found in the medieval Inquisition, charged those books or speeches which had incurred "theological censures," with "slight, severe or violent" suspicion. There was no challenging of witnesses; on the contrary, witnesses who were objected to were allowed to give evidence on the most important points of the case. The torture, to the practice of which the Spanish Inquisition certainly added new refinements, was originally very much objected to by the Spaniards, and Alphonso X. prohibited it in Aragon; later, especially in the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries it was applied quite shamelessly on the least suspicion. But by the end of the 18th century, according to Llorente, it had not been employed for a long time; the _fiscal_, however, habitually demanded it, and the accused always went in dread of it. The punishment of death by burning was much more often employed by the Spanish than by the medieval Inquisition; about 2000 persons were burnt in Torquemada's day. Penitents were not always reconciled, as they were in the middle ages, but those condemned to be burnt were as a rule strangled previously.

Spanish and Portuguese Colonies.

With the extension of the Spanish colonial empire the Inquisition spread throughout it almost contemporaneously with the Catholic faith. Ferdinand IV. decreed the establishment of the Inquisition in America, and Jimenes in 1516 appointed Juan Quevedo, bishop of Cuba, inquisitor-general delegate with discretionary powers. Excesses having been committed by the agents of the Holy Office, Charles V. decreed (October 15, 1538) that only the European colonists should be subject to the jurisdiction of the Inquisition; but Philip II. increased the powers of the inquisitors' delegate and, in 1541, established on a permanent basis three new provinces of the Inquisition at Lima, Mexico and Cartagena. The first _auto-da-fé_ took place at Mexico in 1574, the year in which Hernando Cortez died. The Inquisition of Portugal was no less careful to ensure the orthodoxy of the Portuguese colonies. An Inquisition of the East Indies was established at Goa, with jurisdiction over all the dominions of the king of Portugal beyond the Cape of Good Hope. Finally Philip II. even wished to establish an itinerant Inquisition, and at his request the pope created, by a brief of the 21st of July 1571, the "Inquisition of the galleys," or "of fleets and armies."

Other activities of the Spanish Inquisition.

After the expulsion of the Jews under Isabella the Catholic (1492), followed under Philip III. by that of the Moriscoes (1609), the Inquisition attacked especially Catholics descended from infidels, the _Marranes_ and _Conversos_, who were, not without reason, suspected of often practising in secret the rites of their ancestral religions. As late as 1715 a secret association was discovered at Madrid, consisting of twenty families, having a rabbi and a synagogue. In 1727 a whole community of Moriscoes was denounced at Granada, and prosecuted with the utmost rigour. Again, a great number of people were denounced, sent to the galleys, or burnt, for having returned to their ancestral religion, on the flimsiest of evidence, such as making ablutions during the day time, abstaining from swine's flesh or wine, using henna, singing Moorish songs, or possessing Arabic manuscripts. During the 16th and 17th centuries the Inquisition in Spain was directed against Protestantism. The inquisitor-general, Fernando de Valdés, archbishop of Seville, asked the pope to condemn the Lutherans to be burnt even if they were not backsliders, or wished to be reconciled, while in 1560 three foreign Protestants, two Englishmen and a Frenchman were burnt in defiance of all international law. But the Reformation never had enough supporters in Spain to occupy the attention of the Inquisition for long. After the _Marranes_ the mystics of all kinds furnished the greatest number of victims to the terrible tribunal. Here again we should not lose sight of the tradition of the medieval Inquisition; the mysticism of the Beghards, the Brethren of the Free Spirit and the innumerable pantheist sects had been pitilessly persecuted by the inquisitors of Germany and France during the 14th and 15th centuries. The Illuminati (_alumbrados_), who were very much akin to the medieval sectaries, and the mystics of Castile and Aragon were ruthlessly examined, judged and executed. Not even the most famous persons could escape the suspicious zeal of the inquisitors Valdés and Melchior Cano. The writings of Luis de Granada were censured as containing _cosas de alumbrados_. St Ignatius de Loyola was twice imprisoned at the beginning of his career; St Theresa was accused of misconduct, and several times denounced; one of her works, _Conceptos del amor divino_, was prohibited by the Inquisition, and she was only saved by the personal influence of Philip II. Countless numbers of obscure visionaries, devotees both men and women, clerks and laymen, were accused of Illuminism and perished in the fires or the dungeons of the Inquisition. From its earliest appearance Molinosism was persecuted with almost equal rigour. Molinos himself was arrested and condemned to perpetual imprisonment (1685-1687), and during the 18th century, till 1781, several Molinosists were burnt. The Inquisition also attacked Jansenism, freemasonry (from 1738 onwards; cf. the bull _In eminenti_) and "philosophism," the learned naturalist José Clavigo y Faxarcho (1730-1806), the mathematician Benito Bails (1730-1797), the poet Tomas de Iriarte, the ministers Clavigo Ricla, Aranda and others being prosecuted as "philosophers." Subject also to the tribunal of the Holy Office were bigamists, blasphemers, usurers, sodomites, priests who had married or broken the secrecy of the confessional, laymen who assumed ecclesiastical costume, &c. "In all these matters, though the Inquisition may have been indiscreet in meddling with affairs which did not concern it, it must be confessed that it was not cruel, and that it was always preferable to fall into the hands of the Inquisition rather than those of the secular judges, or even the Roman inquisitors" (S. Reinach). Apart from certain exceptional cruelties such as those of the Inquisition of Calahorra, perhaps the greatest number of executions of sorcerers took place in the colonies, in the Philippines and Mexico. In Spain the persecution was only moderate; at certain times it disappeared almost completely, especially in the time of the clear-sighted inquisitor Salazar.

Two features of the Spanish Inquisition are especially noteworthy: the prosecutions for "speeches suspected of heresy" and the censure of books. The great scholar Pedro de Lerma, who after fifty years at Paris (where he was dean of the faculty of theology) had returned to Spain as abbot of Compluto, was called upon in 1537 to abjure eleven "Erasmian" propositions, and was forced to return to Paris to die. Juan de Vergara and his brother were summoned before the Inquisition for favouring Erasmus and his writings, and detained several years before they were acquitted. Fray Alonso de Virues, chaplain to Charles V., was imprisoned on an absurd charge of depreciating the monastic state, and was only released by the pope at the instance of the emperor. Mateo Pascual, professor of theology at Alcala, who had in a public lecture expressed a doubt as to purgatory, suffered imprisonment and the confiscation of his goods. A similar fate befell Montemayor, Las Brozas and Luis de la Cadena.

The censure of books was established in 1502 by Ferdinand and Isabella as a state institution. All books had to pass through the hands of the bishops; in 1521 the Inquisition took upon itself the examination of books suspected of Lutheran heresy. In 1554 Charles V. divided the responsibility for the censorship between the Royal Council, whose duty it was to grant or refuse the _imprimatur_ to manuscripts and the Inquisition, which retained the right of prohibiting books which it judged to be pernicious; but after 1527 it also gave the licence to print. In 1547 the Suprema produced an Index of prohibited books, drawn up in 1546 by the university of Louvain; it was completed especially as regards Spanish books, in 1551, and several later editions were published. Moreover, the _revisores de libros_ might present themselves in the name of the Holy Office in any private library or bookshop and confiscate prohibited books. In 1558 the penalty of death and confiscation of property was decreed against any bookseller or individual who should keep in his possession condemned books. The censure of books was eventually abolished in 1812.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.--A critical bibliography was drawn up by P. Fredericq in
the preface to the French translation (1900) of H. C. Lea's important
standard work: _History of the Inquisition in the Middle Ages_ (3
vols., London, 1888). See also J. Havet, _L'Hérésie et le bras
séculier au moyen âge jusqu'au XIII^e siècle_ in the _Oeuvres
complètes_, vol. ii. (Paris, 1896); Ch. V. Langlois, _L'Inquisition
d'après des travaux récents_ (Paris, 1901); Douais, _L'Inquisition_
(Paris, 1907); E. Vacandard, _L'Inquisition_ (Paris, 1907); Douais,
_Documents pour servir à l'histoire de l'inquisition dans le
Languedoc_ (2 vols., Paris, 1900); Döllinger, _Beiträge zur
Sektengeschichte des Mittelalters_ (2 vols., Munich, 1890. The second
volume is composed of documents); Molinier, _L'Inquisition dans le
midi de la France au XIII^e et au XIV^e siècle. Étude sur les sources
de son histoire_ (Paris, 1880); P. Fredericq, _Corpus documentorum
inquisitionis haereticae pravitatis neerlandicae_ (1205-1525) (4
vols., Ghent, 1889-1900); Tanon, _Histoire des tribunaux de
l'inquisition en France_ (Paris, 1893); Hansen, _Inquisition,
Hexenwahn und Hexenverfolgung_ (Munich, 1900); Llorente, _Histoire
critique de l'inquisition d'Espagne_ (4 vols., Paris, 1818); H. C.
Lea, _History of the Inquisition of Spain_ (5 vols., London,
1905-1908); S. Reinach, articles on Lea's _History of the Inquisition
of Spain_ in the _Revue critique_ (1906, 1907, 1908) and _Cultes,
mythes et religions_ (Paris, 1908), tome iii. (P. A.)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Pierre de Beauvoisis (?), choir-master (_grand-chantre_) of the
university of Paris (1184), bishop of Tournai (1191), of Paris
(1196); died as a Cistercian in 1197. He was beatified.

[2] He was born c. 1261, was a Dominican at Limoges in 1279,
successively prior of Albi (1294), Carcassonne (1297), Castres (1301)
and Limoges (1305), inquisitor at Toulouse (1307), bishop of Tuy
(1323) and of Lodève (1325). He died in 1331.

[3] Peter, a Dominican, born at Verona, was murdered near Milan in
1252 and canonized in 1253.

[4] Guillaume de St Amour (d. 1272), named after his birthplace in
the Jura, was canon of Beauvais and rector of the university of
Paris. He was conspicuous as the mouthpiece of the secular clergy in
their attacks on the mendicant orders, the Dominicans in particular.

[5] The name of _vauderie_, i.e. the Vaudois or Waldensian heresy,
had come to be used of witchcraft.

INSANITY (from Lat. _in_, not, and _sanus_, sound), a generic term applied to certain morbid mental conditions produced by defect or disease of the brain. The synonyms in more or less frequent use are _lunacy_ (from a supposed influence of the moon), _mental disease_, _alienation_, _derangement_, _aberration_, _madness_, _unsoundness of mind_. The term _Psychiatry_ ([Greek: psychê], mind, and [Greek: iatreia], treatment) is applied to the study and treatment of the condition.

I. MEDICAL AND GENERAL

Definition.

There are many diseases of the general system productive of disturbance of the mental faculties, which, either on account of their transient nature, from their being associated with the course of a particular disease, or from their slight intensity, are not included under the head of insanity proper. From a strictly scientific point of view it cannot be doubted that the fever patient in his delirium, or the drunkard in his excitement or stupor, is insane; the brain of either being under the influence of a morbific agent or of a poison, the mental faculties are deranged; yet such derangements are regarded as functional disturbances, i.e. disturbances produced by agencies which experience tells will, in the majority of cases, pass off within a given period without permanent results on the tissues of the organ. The comprehensive scientific view of the position is that all diseases of the nervous system, whether primary or secondary, congenital or acquired, should, in the words of Griesinger, be regarded as one inseparable whole, of which the so-called mental diseases comprise only a moderate proportion. However important it may be for the physician to keep this principle before him, it may be freely admitted that it cannot be carried out fully in practice, and that social considerations compel the medical profession and the public at large to draw an arbitrary line between such functional diseases of the nervous system as _hysteria_, _hypochondriasis_ and _delirium_ on the one hand, and such conditions as _mania_, _melancholia_, _stupor_ and _dementia_ on the other.

All attempts at a short definition of the term "insanity" have proved unsatisfactory; perhaps the nearest approach to accuracy is attained by the rough statement that it is _a symptom of disease of the brain inducing disordered mental symptoms_--the term disease being used in its widest acceptance. But even this definition is at once too comprehensive, as under it might be included certain of the functional disturbances alluded to, and too exclusive, as it does not comprehend certain rare transitory forms. Still, taken over all, this may be accepted as the least defective short definition; and moreover it possesses the great practical advantage of keeping before the student the primary fact that insanity is the result of disease of the brain (see BRAIN, and NEUROPATHOLOGY), and that it is not a mere immaterial disorder of the intellect. In the earliest epochs of medicine the corporeal character of insanity was generally admitted, and it was not until the superstitious ignorance of the middle ages had obliterated the scientific, though by no means always accurate, deductions of the early writers, that any theory of its purely psychical character arose. At the present day it is unnecessary to combat such a theory, as it is universally accepted that the brain is the organ through which mental phenomena are manifested, and therefore that it is impossible to conceive of the existence of an insane mind in a healthy brain. On this basis insanity may be defined as consisting in _morbid conditions of the brain, the results of defective formation or altered nutrition of its substance induced by local or general morbid processes, and characterized especially by non-development, obliteration, impairment or perversion of one or more of its psychical functions_. Thus insanity is not a simple condition; it comprises a large number of diseased states of the brain, gathered under one popular term, on account of mental defect or aberration being the predominant symptom.

Classification.

The insanities are sharply divided into two great classes--the _Congenital_ and the _Acquired_. Under the head of Congenital Insanity must be considered all cases in which, from whatever cause, brain development has been arrested, with consequent impotentiality of development of the mental faculties; under that of Acquired Insanity all those in which the brain has been born healthy but has suffered from morbid processes affecting it primarily, or from diseased states of the general system implicating it secondarily. In studying the causation of these two great classes, it will be found that certain remote influences exist which are believed to be commonly predisposing; these will be considered as such, leaving the proximate or exciting causes until each class with its subdivisions comes under review.

Causation.

In most treatises on the subject will be found discussed the bearing which civilization, nationality, occupation, education, &c., have, or are supposed to have, on the production of insanity. Such discussions are as a rule eminently unsatisfactory, founded as they are on common observation, broad generalizations, and very imperfect statistics. As they are for the most part negative in result, at the best almost entirely irrelevant to the present purpose, it is proposed merely to summarize shortly the general outcome of what has been arrived at by those authorities who have sought to assess the value to be attached to the influence exercised by such factors, without entering in any detail on the theories involved. The causes of insanity may be divided into (a) general, and (b) proximate.

(a) GENERAL CAUSES.--1. _Civilization._--Although insanity is by no
means unknown amongst savage races, there can be no reasonable doubt
that it is much more frequently developed in civilized communities;
also that, as the former come under the influence of civilization, the
percentage of lunacy is increased. This is in consonance with the
observation of disease of whatever nature, and is dependent in the
case of insanity on the wear and tear of nerve tissue involved in the
struggle for existence, the physically depressing effects of
pauperism, and on the abuse of alcoholic stimulants; each of which
morbid factors falls to be considered separately as a proximate cause.
In considering the influence of civilization upon the production of
insanity, regard must be had to the more evolved ethical attitude
towards disease in general which exists in civilized communities as
well as to the more perfect recognition and registration of insanity.

2. _Nationality._--In the face of the imperfect social statistics
afforded by most European and American nations, and in their total
absence or inaccessibility amongst the rest of mankind, it is
impossible to adduce any trustworthy statement under this head.

3. _Occupation._--There is nothing to prove that insanity is in any
way connected with the prosecution of any trade or profession _per
se_. Even if statistics existed (which they do not) showing the
proportion of lunatics belonging to different occupations to the 1000
of the population, it is obvious that no accurate deduction _quoad_
the influence of occupation could be drawn.

4. _Education._--There is no evidence to show that education has any
influence over either the production or the prevention of insanity.
The general result of discussions on the above subjects has been the
production of a series of arithmetical statements, which have either a
misleading bearing or no bearing at all on the question. In the study
of insanity statistics are of slight value from the scientific point
of view, and are only valuable in its financial aspects.

5. _Inheritance._--The hereditary transmission of a liability to
mental disease must be reckoned as the most important among all
predisposing causes of insanity. It is probably well within the mark
to say that at least 50% of the insane have a direct or collateral
hereditary tendency towards insanity. The true significance of this
factor cannot as yet be explained or described shortly and clearly,
but it cannot be too definitely stated that it is not the insanity
which is inherited, but only the predisposition to the manifestation
of mental symptoms in the presence of a sufficient exciting cause. The
most widely and generally accepted view of the exciting cause of
insanity is that the predisposed brain readily breaks down under
mental stress or bodily privations. There is, however, another view
which has been recently advanced to the effect that the majority of
mental diseases are secondary to bodily disorders, hereditary
predisposition being the equally predisposing causal factor. There is
probably truth in both these views, and such an admission accentuates
the complexity of the factorship of heredity. If insanity can be
induced by physical disorders, which must essentially be of the nature
of toxic action or of mechanical agency which can alter or influence
the functional powers of the brain, then it is probable that
hereditary predisposition to insanity means, not only the transmission
of an unstable nervous system, but also a constitution which is either
peculiarly liable to the production of such toxic or poisonous
substances, or incapable of effectively dealing with the toxins or
poisonous substances normally formed during metabolic processes. Such
a view broadens our conception of the factorship of hereditary
transmission and offers explanation as to the manner in which
insanity may appear in families previously free from the taint. Very
frequently we find in the history of insane patients that although
there may be no insanity in the family there are undoubted indications
of nervous alongside of physical instability, the parental nervous
defects taking the form of extreme nervousness, vagabondage, epilepsy,
want of mental balance, inequality in mental development or endowment,
extreme mental brilliancy in one direction associated with marked
deficiency in others, the physical defects showing themselves in the
form of insanity; liability to tubercular and rheumatic infections.
The failure of constitutional power which allows of the invasion of
the tubercle bacillus and the micrococcus rheumaticus in certain
members of a family is apparently closely allied to that which favours
the development of mental symptoms in others.

6. _Consanguinity._--It has been strongly asserted that consanguineous
marriage is a prolific source of nervous instability. There is
considerable diversity of opinion on this subject; the general outcome
of the investigations of many careful inquirers appears to be that the
offspring of healthy cousins of a healthy stock is not more liable to
nervous disease than that of unrelated parents, but that evil
consequences follow where there is a strong tendency in the family to
degeneration, not only in the direction of the original diathesis, but
also towards instability of the nervous system. The objection to the
marriage of blood relations does not arise from the bare fact of their
relationship, but has its ground in the fear of their having a vicious
variation of constitution, which, in their children, is prone to
become intensified. There is sufficient evidence adducible to prove
that close breeding is productive of degeneration; and when the
multiform functions of the nervous system are taken into account, it
may almost be assumed, not only that it suffers concomitantly with
other organs, but that it may also be the first to suffer
independently.

7. _Parental Weakness._--Of the other causes affecting the parents
which appear to have an influence in engendering a predisposition to
insanity in the offspring, the abuse of alcoholic stimulants and
opiates, over-exertion of the mental faculties, advanced age and weak
health may be cited. Great stress has been laid on the influence
exercised by the first of these conditions, and many extreme
statements have been made regarding it. Such statements must be
accepted with reserve, for, although there is reason for attaching
considerable weight to the history of ancestral intemperance as a
probable causating influence, it has been generally assumed as the
proved cause by those who have treated of the subject, without
reference to other agencies which may have acted in common with it, or
quite independently of it. However unsatisfactory from a scientific
point of view it may appear, the general statement must stand that
whatever tends to lower the nervous energy of a parent may modify the
development of the progeny. Constitutional tendency to nervous
instability once established in a family may make itself felt in
various directions--epilepsy, hysteria, hypochondriasis, neuralgia,
certain forms of paralysis, insanity, eccentricity. It is asserted
that exceptional genius in an individual member is a phenomenal
indication. Confined to the question of insanity, the morbid
inheritance may manifest itself in two directions--in defective brain
organization manifest from birth, or from the age at which its
faculties are potential, i.e. congenital insanity; or in the neurotic
diathesis, which may be present in a brain to all appearance
congenitally perfect, and may present itself merely by a tendency to
break down under circumstances which would not affect a person of
originally healthy constitution.

8. _Periodic Influence._--The evolutional periods of puberty,
adolescence, utero-gestation, the climacteric period and old age
exercise an effect upon the nervous system. It may be freely admitted
that the nexus between physiological processes and mental disturbances
is, as regards certain of the periods, obscure, and that the causal
relation is dependent more on induction than on demonstration; but it
may be pleaded that it is not more obscure in respect of insanity than
of many other diseases. The pathological difficulty obtains mostly in
the relation of the earlier evolutional periods, puberty and
adolescence, to insanity; in the others a physiologico-pathological
nexus may be traced; but in regard to the former there is nothing to
take hold of except the purely physiological process of development of
the sexual function, the expansion of the intellectual powers, and
rapid increase of the bulk of the body. Although in thoroughly stable
subjects due provision is made for these evolutional processes, it is
not difficult to conceive that in the nervously unstable a
considerable risk is run by the brain in consequence of the strain
laid on it. Between the adolescent and climacteric periods the
constitution of the nervous, as of the other systems, becomes
established, and disturbance is not likely to occur, except from some
accidental circumstances apart from evolution. In the most healthily
constituted individuals the "change of life" expresses itself by some
loss of vigour. The nourishing (trophesial) function becomes less
active, and either various degrees of wasting occur or there is a
tendency towards restitution in bulk of tissues by a less highly
organized material. The most important instance of the latter tendency
is fatty degeneration of muscle, to which the arterial system is very
liable. In the mass of mankind those changes assume no pathological
importance: the man or woman of middle life passes into advanced age
without serious constitutional disturbance; on the other hand, there
may be a break down of the system due to involutional changes in
special organs, as, for instance, fatty degeneration of the heart. In
all probability the insanity of the climacteric period may be referred
to two pathological conditions: it may depend on structural changes in
the brain due to fatty degeneration of its arteries and cells, or it
may be a secondary result of general systemic disturbance, as
indicated by cessation of menstruation in the female and possibly by
some analogous modification of the sexual function in men. The senile
period brings with it further reduction of formative activity; all the
tissues waste, and are liable to fatty and calcareous degeneration.
Here again, the arteries of the brain are very generally implicated;
atheroma in some degree is almost always present, but is by no means
necessarily followed by insanity.

The various and profound modifications of the system which attend the
periods of utero-gestation, pregnancy and child-bearing do not leave
the nervous centres unaffected. Most women are liable to slight
changes of disposition and temper, morbid longings, strange likes and
dislikes during pregnancy, more especially during the earlier months;
but these are universally accepted as accompaniments of the condition
not involving any doubts as to sanity. But there are various factors
at work in the system during pregnancy which have grave influence on
the nervous system, more especially in those hereditarily predisposed,
and in those gravid for the first time. There is modification of
direction of the blood towards a new focus, and its quality is
changed, as is shown by an increase of fibrin and water and a decrease
of albumen. To such physical influences are superadded the discomfort
and uneasiness of the situation, mental anxiety and anticipation of
danger, and in the unmarried the horror of disgrace. In the puerperal
(recently delivered) woman there are to be taken into pathological
account, in addition to the dangers of sepsis, the various depressing
influences of child-bed, its various accidents reducing vitality, the
sudden return to ordinary physiological conditions, the rapid call for
a new focus of nutrition, the translation as it were of the blood
supply from the uterus to the mammae--all physical influences liable
to affect the brain. These influences may act independently of moral
shock; but, where this is coincident, there is a condition of the
nervous system unprepared to resist its action.

(b) PROXIMATE CAUSES.--The proximate causes of insanity may be divided
into (1) toxic agents, (2) mechanical injury to the brain, including
apoplexies and tumours, and (3) arterial degeneration.

1. _Toxic Agents._--The definite nature of the symptoms in the
majority of the forms of acute insanity leave little reason to doubt
that they result from an invasion of the system by toxins of various
kinds. The symptoms referred to may be briefly indicated as follows:
(i.) Pyrexia, or fever generally of an irregular type; (ii.)
Hyperleucocytosis, or an increase of the white blood corpuscles, which
is the chief method by which the animal organism protects itself
against the noxious influence of micro-organisms and their toxins. In
such cases as typhoid fever, which is caused by a bacillus, or Malta
fever which is caused by a coccus, it is found that if the blood serum
of the patient is mixed _in vitro_ with a broth culture of the
infecting organism in a dilution of 1 in 50, that the bacilli or the
cocci, as the case may be, when examined microscopically, are seen to
run into groups or clusters. The organisms are said to be
agglutinated, and the substance in the serum which produces this
reaction is termed an agglutinine. In many of the forms of insanity
which present the symptom of hyperleucocytosis there can also be
demonstrated the fact that the blood serum of the patients contains
agglutinines to certain members of a group of streptococci (so called
on account of their tendency to grow in the form of a chain, [Greek:
streptos]); (iii.) the rapid organic affection of the special nerve
elements depending upon the virulence of the toxin, and the resistance
of the individual to its influence; (iv.) the marked physical
deterioration as indicated by emaciation and other changes in
nutrition; (v.) the close analogy between the character of many of the
mental symptoms, e.g. delirium, hallucinations or depression, and the
symptoms produced artificially by the administration of certain
poisonous drugs.

The toxic substances which are generally believed to be associated
with the causation of mental disorders may be divided into three great
classes: (a) those which arise from the morbific products of
metabolism within the body itself "auto-intoxicants"; (b) those due to
the invasion of the blood or tissues by micro-organisms; (c) organic
or inorganic poisons introduced into the system voluntarily or
accidentally.

(a) Auto-intoxication may be due to defective metabolism or to
physiological instability, or to both combined. The results of
defective metabolism are most clearly manifested in the mental
symptoms which not infrequently accompany such diseases as gout,
diabetes or obesity, all of which depend primarily upon a deficient
chemical elaboration of the products of metabolism. The association of
gout and rheumatism with nervous and mental diseases is historical,
and the gravest forms of spinal and cerebral degeneration have been
found in association with diabetes. Until the pathology of these
affections is better understood we are not in a position to determine
the nature of the toxins which appear to be the cause of these
diseases and of their accompanying nervous symptoms. Physiological
instability is usually manifested by neurotic persons under the strain
of any unusual change in their environment. If, for instance, any
material change in the food supply consisting either in a decrease of
its quality or quantity, or in a failure to assimilate it properly,
the nerve-cells become exhausted and irritable, sleep is diminished
and a condition known as the delirium of collapse or exhaustion may
supervene. An extreme instance of this condition is presented by the
delirium occurring in shipwrecked persons, who having to take to the
boats are suddenly deprived of food, water or both. Poisoning of the
nervous system may also result from the defective action of special
glands such as the thyroid, the liver or the kidneys. These conditions
are specially exemplified in the mental disturbances which accompany
exophthalmic goitre, uraemic poisoning, and the conditions of
depression which are observed in jaundice and other forms of hepatic
insufficiency.

The results of modern research point to a growing belief in the
frequency of infection of the nervous system from the hosts of
micro-organisms which infest the alimentary tract. No definite or
substantiated discoveries have as yet been formulated which would
justify us in treating this source of infection as more than a highly
probable causative influence.