Chapter XII

INDEXES AND PROHIBITIONS, SPANISH, ROMAN, BELGIAN,
POLISH, AND PORTUGUESE 1612–1768

1612. Madrid, Sandoval.
1617. Cracow, Szykowski.
1624. Lisbon, Mascaregnas.
1628. Papal Decrees _re_ Poza
1632. Rome, Capsiferro.
1632. Seville, Zapata.
1640. Madrid, Sotomayor.
1664. Rome, Alexander VII (see also Chapter XIII).
1707. Madrid, Valladores.
1714. Namur and Liége, Hannot.
1747. Madrid, Prado.
1790. Madrid, Cevallos.
1793–. Madrid, Supplements to Cevallos.
1559–1768. Examples of Spanish Prohibitions.

_1._ _1612._ _Madrid._ _Inquisitor-General Sandoval._ This Index, comprising lists expurgatory as well as prohibitory, is the next in the Spanish series to the Quiroga Index of 1584. The inquisitor-general under whose authority it was compiled and issued was at the time both Cardinal and Archbishop of Toledo. The title-page bears, in addition to the name of the Spanish primate, the line _de consilio Supremi Senatus Stae. Generalis Inquisitionis Hispaniarum_. The volume is one of considerable compass; as printed in the first Madrid issue, it contains 744 pages, five of which are not folioed.

In 1614, an appendix with additional lists was printed as a separate volume. This is called _Appendix prima_, but no later appendices came into print. In 1619, the Index was reprinted in Geneva in an edition which included, with the appendix, a polemical introduction by Benedict Turretini. In 1628, this Geneva edition was reprinted in Palermo under the instructions of the Inquisitor-General, Zapata. The Index is prefaced by a brief of Paul V, the text of which follows the lines of that contributed in 1559 by Paul IV to the Index of Valdes. The Pope says (in substance) that he had learned that the permissions in existence in the Spanish realm for the reading of prohibited books had grown to be too numerous and that the results were pernicious. All such permissions, whether emanating from the popes, from the local bishops, or from any other authorities, were now cancelled, with the exception of such permissions as might be given by the present inquisitor-general to the devout scholars to whom had been confided the task of the preparation of the present work. The penalty for disobedience of this general prohibition was the _excommunicatio latae sententiae_. Then follows an edict of the inquisitor-general in which he states that the work has been undertaken by him under the general Apostolic authority that he possesses as inquisitor-general in the Spanish realms; and under the special instructions given to him in the papal brief. The penalties specified in the regulations are incurred by all persons who possess or who read copies of the prohibited books. The penalties are not incurred in connection with books entered under Class II, concerning which the censors give simply a caution. Copies of such books are however to be submitted to the authorities (in Spain usually the local inquisitors) in order that the nature of the caution or correction may be duly specified.

The fourteen rules (based upon the Ten Rules of Trent) follow pretty closely the text of the Rules of Quiroga. Rule X presents a general prohibition of all anonymous books and of all books not bearing the name of the printer, which have been issued since 1584.

Sandoval’s editors follow the Roman model in placing their lists under three classes. Works which, condemned in their original form, are to be permitted after an expurgation, are specified in the original list with a star, and the titles are repeated in the second division, the _Index expurgatorius_.

The second and third classes present in separate alphabets the titles of Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, French, Flemish, and German publications. In Class I, the only Spanish names are Constantino de la Fuente and Joan Auentrote. In this class is placed also Erasmus, with the memorandum that all of his writings are prohibited as printed in the vernacular. A similar specification is made in connection with the names, given in the same class, of Petrus Ramus and of Macchiavelli.

The chief editor of the Index presents, after the classified lists, a “notice to the reader” in which he says:

“The writings of authors who have been condemned, in so far
as these do not have to do with matters of religion, can be
made available for the use of the faithful through a thorough
expurgation. Even in the writings of orthodox scholars, whose
zeal and service in behalf of the Catholic religion deserve the
highest praise, are to be found certain errors of statement
and expressions liable to misconstruction, which, if left
uncorrected, would be likely to work mischief. In other cases,
writings of Christian authors, whose work was well-suited for
the time and the special conditions under which they wrote,
have in these later times come into controversy. The result of
their consideration by the scholars of later date has been to
show the necessity of some revision or reshaping of the earlier
text, in order to prevent these works of repute from exerting
an evil influence on later generations.” “The compilers of this
Index have undertaken the expurgation of more than three hundred
works, among which are included certain books that have secured
a very wide circulation. Certain further important expurgations
are in train, and in collaborating in such work, devout scholars
can be of noteworthy service to the Inquisition.”

This _Index prohibitorius_ contains practically all the titles that were given in the Index of Clement VIII, and such further titles as were compiled by Quiroga. It includes further a number of the later prohibitions. Class I, in particular, has been very largely added to, the new names, chiefly German, aggregating nearly three hundred. The list includes a number of insignificant authors whose writings have been entirely lost sight of. In the expurgated texts, Sandoval utilised to some extent the work of Brasichelli. The appendix presents an edict dated August, 1614, certain modifications of the rules, additional titles for the preliminary lists, and a series of expurgated texts.

Schneemann[184] points out that this Index of Sandoval was utilised by the Dominicans, under the lead of Bañez, to bring into condemnation a number of the books of the Molinists, including the works of the Jesuit Molina himself. The Benedictine Curiel writes to the inquisitor-general to point out that this use of the Index by Bañez and his associate Summel was the result of a disgraceful intrigue against Molina. Bañez had secured, in 1593, from the Inquisition, an instruction to the Universities of Alcala and Salamanca for the production of an Index, but, probably on account of the protest above referred to, the work was never completed.

Sandoval’s editors evidently had before them the text of the Roman decrees of 1603, but they appear to have made a rather arbitrary selection of the authors the condemnation of whom they were prepared to confirm. Among the better known names omitted from the Spanish lists are Bruno, James I, William Barclay, and Roger Widdington. In the Palermo reprint of the Sandoval Index are added the titles of certain Sicilian authors. There is also included a specification that references to Pope Joan must be cancelled from any volumes in which they occur.

The following entries may be cited from the two lists:

_Gregorii Capuc. Enchirid. Eccles_: this stands for the Neapolitan Index in which the suggestion had been printed that the Spanish _Index expurgatorius_ might be a forgery. Henricus Stephanus and Johannus Scapula find place, the former as usual for his issues of Bibles, and the latter for some treatise not clearly specified. For the works of J. A. Thuanus or de Thou, the entry states that the censure of the present Index covers only the first eighty books of the history. It is not clear whether the last fifty-eight books contained nothing to condemn or simply had not been reached. Isaac Casaubon is reprobated at some length.

Emmanuel Sa, freely censured by the Roman Index is here very lightly corrected and excused. As previously pointed out, the conclusions of the Spanish and Roman Indexes often clash and the framers of the former are reprimanded by the writers of Rome for their presumption.[185] Under Cajaten, are cited two sentences (taken from a work by an orthodox Catholic, printed at Antwerp) which have been, according to Mendham, altered to a directly opposite meaning. Mendham gives as example of his statement the change of the word _mali_ into _divini_ and of _impia_ into _sancta_. The works of Athanasius are considered in no less than three editions and large changes and “expurgations” are made in the annotations. Examples of the “cancellations” are the following:

_Adorari solius Dei esse._

_Imagines tollendas esse testimonia._

_Angeli non sunt adorandi._

_Justificatio fit per fidem._

_Contra meritum humanum pro gratia, abundanter disputatum._

_Sancti non sunt adorandi, non sunt invocandi._

_Scriptura sacra sufficit ad veritatem._

_Canonici libri soli legendi, et cur?_

_Canonici libri soli sunt fontes salutares._

_Gratia Christi nos salvat per fidem, non per bona opera._[186]

The text of S. Augustine is also handled at length. Among the propositions condemned and cancelled is: _Quae de carne sua manducanda Christus proposuit, spiritualiter sunt intelligenda_. Erasmus receives the largest measure of attention, no less than eighty pages being devoted to the condemnation of reprehensible passages. The expurgators protest particularly at the contentions maintained by Erasmus against the worship of saints, images, or creatures.

In St. Chrysostom, passages are condemned which assert that, (a) sins are to be confessed to God, not to man; (b) that faith alone justifies; (c) that grace is excluded if we are saved by works; (d) that images are not to be adored; (e) that nothing is to be asserted without the authority of Scripture, which is to be read by all and which, to all who are willing to learn, is intelligible; (f) that after this life nothing can assist or deliver.

The _Theatrum Vitae Humanae_, compiled by Theodore Zwinger, receives as much analysis as is permitted by the space at the command of the expurgators. The work itself is comprised in no less than twenty-nine octavo volumes. The reference to it being with a note worded as follows: “Since this work is in a great degree collected from the writings of condemned authors, it is to be read with special caution. The names of these authors are never to be cited or referred to honourably; and, to guard against error in the case of any author of whose condemnation the reader may have doubts, he must have recourse to the schedule of the first class.”

Zwinger has found occasion in his list of popes to use for not a few, descriptive epithets that are by no means honourable. Mendham remarks that “no attainment of vice, and not even the taint of heresy has been considered by the authorities of the Church to be of force sufficient to bar the claim of the popes to doctrinal infallibility in matters of faith and of morals.”[187]

The faithful student who might desire to utilise this expurgatory Index as a guide for his own reading, or who might think it important to verify the accuracy of the citations condemned as heretical, would find difficulty in tracing these citations, as the expurgators have not thought it desirable in a single instance to specify the page or even the volume from which the alleged extract has been made. The opportunity thus given for attributing heretical opinions to one author or another is obvious. An article in the _Protestant Guardian_[188] gives, as an example of the methods of these Madrid expurgators, quotations from the corrections made in a treatise by Hernando de Santiago, _Consideraciones sobre los Evangelios de la Quaresme_: “not Abimelech, you mean Melchizedech; and where you speak of Pelagians you certainly should say Socinians; books of chivalry should of course read books of the Maccabees; on page 149, Persia should read Assyria, Anna, the sister of Moses, is evidently an error for Miriam, while Tamar should be changed to Dinah.”

A reprint was issued in Geneva, in 1619, by Turretin, professor of divinity. The editor places on his title-page the following lines:

_Indices huic libro nomen praefigitur apte;
Nam proprio Sorices Indicis pereunt._

The allusion is to a line in Terence, _Eunuch._, Act V, scene 7, _Egomet meo indicio, miser, quasi sorex, hodie perii_.[189]

_2._ _1617._ _Cracow Index Prohibitorius._--_Index Librorum Prohibitorum; cum regulis et cum adjecta instructione de emendandis imprimendisque libris et de exequenda prohibitione. Nunc in hac editione congregationis cardinalium edictis aliquot, et librorum nuper scandalose evulgatorum descriptione auctus. Cracoviae. 1617._ This was issued under the instructions of Szykowski, Bishop of Cracow. There had, it seems, been two previous editions, one initiated by Macierowski, Bishop of Cracow, the other by Zamoyski, Bishop of Chelmin. The above title is taken from Peignot.

_3._ _1624._ _Lisbon._ _The Inquisition._ _Prohibitorius et Expurgatorius._

This Index, issued in July, 1624, under the authority of the Inquisitor-General, Fernando Martius Mascarenhan, bears as its main title the wording _Index auctorum damnatae memoriae, tum etiam librorum, qui vel simpliciter, vel ad expurgationem usque prohibentur, vel denique jam expurgatae permittentur_. As indicated by this title, the Index is expurgatory as well as prohibitory. Part I presents the lists of books prohibited in the Roman Indexes and decrees up to the year 1610. The three classes are merged under a single alphabet.