History of the Inquisition of Spain. Henry Charles Lea

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СКАЧАТЬ rendered the Inquisition the dominating power in the land, but the Suprema lacked hardihood; even the habitual subservience of Philip IV was revolted and he told the inquisitor-general that he had done ill to lend himself to a question contrary to the sovereignty of the monarch and to the honor of the highest council of the nation.[861]

      EFFORTS AT INDEPENDENCE

      In spite of this rebuff, having once asserted the claim that its temporal jurisdiction was spiritual and not secular, the Inquisition adhered to it. The prize was worth a struggle, for it would have put the whole nation at its mercy. It would have deprived the king of powers to check aggression and to protect his subjects from oppression for, as Portocarrero had pointed out, although princes have authority to relieve their subjects when aggrieved by other secular subjects, they have none when the oppressors are ecclesiastics, exempt by divine law from their jurisdiction.[862] To win this the Inquisition persisted in its claim. In 1642, on the occasion of a competencia in Granada, there appeared, under its authority, a printed argument to prove that the temporal jurisdiction of the Holy Office was a grant from the Holy See, which had power to intervene in the internal affairs of States and that it had merely been acquiesced in and confirmed by the kings.[863] Again, in a notorious case occurring in Cuenca in 1645, the inquisitors argued that their temporal jurisdiction was ecclesiastical and papal, with which the king could not interfere.[864] But the audacity with which these pretensions were pushed culminated in a consulta presented by the Suprema, March 31, 1646, to Philip IV, when he was struggling against the determination of the Córtes of Aragon to curb the excesses of the Inquisition.

In this paper the Suprema asserted that the civil and political jurisdiction is inferior to the spiritual and ecclesiastical, which can assume by indirect power whatever is necessary for its conservation and unimpeded exercise, without being restricted by secular princes. The royal prerogative is derived from positive human law or the law of nations; the supreme power of the Inquisition is delegated by the Holy See for cases of faith with all that is requisite, directly or indirectly, for its untrammelled enjoyment; this is of divine law and, as such, is superior to all human law, to which it is in no way subject. The very least that can be said is that princes are bound to admit this, and though they have a right to concede no more than is requisite, the decision as to what is requisite rests with the ecclesiastical authority, which is based on divine law. Any departure from these principles, under the novel pretext that the king is master of this jurisdiction, with power to limit or abrogate, is dangerous for the conscience and very perilous as leading to the gravest errors.[865] It would be difficult to enunciate more boldly the theory of theocracy, with the Inquisition as its delegate and the crown merely the executor of its decrees.

      These pretensions were not realized and the king was not reduced to insignificance, but his power was seriously trammelled by the bureaucracy of which the Suprema was the foremost and most aggressive representative. Its quasi-independence led to emulation by the other great departments of the State and though their success was not so marked, it was sufficient in all to render the government incredibly cumbersome and inefficient and to paralyze its action by wasting its strength in efforts to keep the peace between the rival and warring bodies. In these bickerings and dissensions the power of the crown decreased and the theoretically autocratic monarch found himself unable to enforce his commands. Philip IV recognized this fatal weakness, but his efforts to overcome the evil were puerile and inefficient. October 15, 1633, he sent to the Suprema, and presumably to the other councils, a decree setting forth emphatically that the slackness of obedience and disregard of the royal commands had been the cause of irreparable damage to the State and must be checked if the monarchy were to be preserved from ruin. It was his duty, under God, to prevent this; he had unavailingly represented it repeatedly to his councillors and now he proposed to make out a schedule of penalties, to be incurred through disobedience, scaled according to the gravity of each offence. This was to be completed within twenty days and he called upon the Suprema to give him the necessary information that should enable him to tabulate the matters coming within its sphere of action.

      EFFORTS AT INDEPENDENCE

This grotesque measure, calling upon offenders to define their offences for the purpose of providing condign punishment, was received by the Suprema with a cool indifference showing how lightly it regarded the royal indignation. There was nothing, it said in reply, within its jurisdiction which imperilled the monarchy, for its function was to preserve the monarchy by preserving the unity of religion. As for obedience, it was of the highest importance that the royal commands should be obeyed and the laws provided punishments for all disobedient vassals. But the canon and imperial laws and those of Spain deprived of their places judges, who executed royal cédulas issued against justice and the rights of parties, for it was assumed that such could not be the royal intention and that they were decreed in ignorance, so that they were suspended until the prince, better informed, should provide justice. Therefore when councillors opposed cédulas which would work great injury to the jurisdiction and immunities of the Holy Office, it was only to prevent innovation and it was in the discharge of duty that this was represented to the king. The Suprema therefore prayed him that, before determining matters proposed by other councils, they should be submitted to it as heretofore so that, after hearing the reasons of both sides, he might determine according to his pleasure.[866] Thus with scarcely veiled contempt the Suprema told him that it would continue to do as it had done and the very next year, as we have seen, it boldly informed him that none of his commands respecting the Inquisition would be obeyed until it should have confirmed them—commands, be it remembered, that in no case affected its action in matters of faith, for all the trouble arose from its encroachments on secular affairs.

      The character of Philip IV ripened and strengthened under adversity and, in the exigencies of the struggle with Catalonia and Portugal, he developed some traits worthy of a sovereign. Although he meekly endured the insolence of the Suprema in 1646 and labored strenuously with the Córtes of Aragon to prevent the reform of abuses, he yet, as we have seen, insisted on the right to supervise appointments. He doubtless asserted his authority in other ways for the Suprema abated its pretensions that its civil and criminal jurisdiction was spiritual and papal. In an elaborate consulta of March 12, 1668, during a long and dreary contest, in which the tribunal of Majorca was involved, it repeatedly refers to its enjoying the royal jurisdiction from the king, showing that it had abandoned the attempt to render itself independent of the royal authority.[867]

      REASSERTION OF ROYAL SUPREMACY

      Under the imbecile Carlos II and his incapable ministers, the domineering arrogance of the Inquisition increased and, as we shall see hereafter, it successfully eluded a concerted movement, in 1696, of all the other councils, represented in the Junta Magna, to reduce its exuberance. With the advent of the House of Bourbon, however, it was forced to recognize its subordination to the royal will in temporal matters, in spite of the temporary interference of Elisabeth Farnese in favor of Inquisitor-general Giudice. We have already seen indications of this and shall see more; meanwhile a single instance will suffice to show how imperiously Philip V, under the guidance of Macanaz, could impose his commands. In 1712 there was an echo of the old quarrel over the so-called suppressed canonries of Antequera, Málaga and the Canaries (p. 342). The suit, commenced in 1562, had never been decided and had long been suspended. The trouble of 1612 had been quieted by allowing the Inquisition to enjoy the canonries, not as a right, but as a revocable grant from the crown; excesses committed by the inquisitors in collecting the fruits led to the resumption of the benefices and then, by a transaction in 1622, they were restored under the same conditions. Such was the position when a violent quarrel arose in the Canaries between the tribunal and the chapter. The former questioned the accuracy of the accounts rendered to it and demanded the account books. This the chapter refused but offered to place the books in the accounting room of the cathedral, allowing the officials of the tribunal free access and permission to make what copies they desired. There was also a subsidiary quarrel over the claim that, when the secretary of the tribunal went to the chapter, he should be entitled to precedence. With their customary violence the inquisitors publicly excommunicated and fined the dean and treasurer of the chapter and moreover they took under their protection the Dominican Joseph Guillen, Prior of San Pedro СКАЧАТЬ