We do not here deem it neces sary to enter upon the history of persecution in general; still less to vindicate the Scriptures of the New * Testament from the charge of giving the smallest encouragement to its spirit. It is very worthy of notice, that the most severe temporal sentence enjoined by our Saviour, is that of excommunication, grounded on the right which every voluntary association justly assumes, of excluding from its number those who obstinately persist in refusing conformity to its laws. Let it then suffice to observe, that, through the infirmity and corruption of human nature, the spirit of persecution crept in with the attainment of power; and that, during the dark ages which followed the legal establishment of the Christian religion under Constantine, the discipline of the church gradually degenerated into bigotry, violence, and cruelty. This spirit naturally kept pace with the ambition and encroachments of the see of Rome. In a succession of centuries, however, the trial and punishment of those suspected of schism and heresy, constituted part of the prerogative of the bishops, in their respective dioceses, and came exclusively within their control. As a sample of the exercise of their power in Spain, it may be observed, that from the fourth council of Toledo, in the year 633, to the sixteenth in 693, various decrees were passed against infidels, idolaters, and heretics; but the penalties were confined to deprivation, confiscation of property, fines, imprisonment, and whipping. There appears to have been no torture inflicted, in the inquisitorial sense of the word; and the first instance (under Christian princes) of the actual burning of heretics seems not to have occurred before 1022, when, in consequence of a decree of the episcopal council at Orleans, one Stephen, confessor to Queen Constance, with others, underwent this punishment. Various eras have been laid down by historians as marking the commencement

of the inquisitorial power; but its actual commencement seems sufficiently ascertained by the period when the bishops were first deprived of their ancient and exclusive right of trying and punishing for heresy. Now this was not till the year 1203, when Pope Innocent III. laid the first stone of this Pandemonium, by giving a commission to two monks to preach against the Albigenses. By this act, a right of spiritual scrutiny was recognised indepen dently of episcopal authority; and this is what constitutes the Inquisition, properly so called. The poor Albigenses were its earliest victims. At first it met with great opposition from the feudal chiefs; upon whom, however, Rome found means to practise her arts too successfully, by threatening to release their subjects from their oath of allegiance. The murder of the pope's legate, Peter de Castelnau, by some of the persecuted party, whom "oppression had made mad," gave a powerful impulse to the machine, now set in motion. This was in 1208. Dominic, originally a canon of the order of St. Augustine, was, with the fraternity which he founded, and which bore his name, foremost in this warfare. He it was who established a lay order which went by the name of the militia of Christ a tremendous misnomer truly!and of which the individuals, as forming part of the inquisitorial family, were called familiars; a name sufficient, from the associations connected with it, to make the blood run cold. The Emperor Frederic II., at his coronation, gave the new tribunal the sanction of civil law. It had been introduced into France; but it never gained any firm footing in that country. A striking consequence, which immediately arose out of its establishment, was the decree prohibiting laymen from reading the Scriptures in the vulgar tongue; a decree first passed in 1229;—so comparatively modern is this innovation of Popery, which has perhaps

done more to prolong its dominion than all other circumstances put to gether. Of the penal inflictions of the ancient Inquisition, or first form of this tribunal; the following extract will furnish a short, but a sufficient sample.

"In 1302 Father Bernard was inquisitor of Arragon, and celebrated several autos-da-fé in the same year.

"In 1308 Pope Clement V. commanded the king of Arragon and the inquisitors to arrest all the knights templars, who had not been persecuted, and to confiscate their property for the use of the holy see; the templars in Castile and Portugal were also arresed.

"In 1314, other hereties were discovered in the kingdom of Arragon. Bernard Puigarcos the inquisitor-general condemned several to banishment; the others were burnt. Many who abjured were reconciled.

"In 1325, F. Arnauld Burguete, inquisitor-general of the kingdom, arrested Fierre Durand de Baldhac, who had relapsed into heresy; and he was burnt alive in the presence of king James, his sons, and two bishops.

"In 1334, F. William da Costa condemned F. Bonato to the flames, and reconciled many persons who had been perverted by that monk.

others: he was not permitted to defend himself, because his crime was proved. He was asked if he would abjure the heresy of which he acknowledged himself guilty. If he consented, he was reconciled, and the canonical penance was imposed on him with some other punishment; if he refused, he was declared an secular justice, with a copy of his sentence. obstinate heretic, and was delivered up to

"If the accused denied the charge, and undertook to defend himself, a copy of the process was given to him, but without the names of the accuser or the witnesses, and with every circumstance omitted which might lead to their discovery.

"The accused was asked if he had enemies, and if he knew their motives for declare that he suspected any particular hating him. He was also permitted to person of wishing to ruin him. In either quisitor considered it in passing judgment. case the proof was admitted, and the inThe inquisitor sometimes asked the accused if he knew certain persons: these individuals were the accusers and witnesses! if he replied in the negative, he enemies: in the course of time, every one could not afterwards challenge them as concluded that these persons were the accusers and the witnesses, and the custom was abandoned. The accused person was also permitted to appeal to the pope, who rejected or admitted his appeal, according to the rules of justice. There was no re

For putting our readers in possession of the spirit and proceedings of this form of the execrable system, a longer extract is required.

"The inquisitor interrogated the witnesses, assisted by the recorder and two priests, who were commissioned to observe if the declarations were faithfully taken down, and to be present when they were read to the witnesses, who were then asked if they acknowledged all that was read to them. If the crime or suspicion of heresy was proved in the information, the criminal was arrested and taken to the ecclesiastical prison. After his arrest, he was examined, and his answers compared with the testimony of the witnesses. If the accused confessed himself guilty of one heresy, it was in vain for him to assert that he was innocent of the

and the judges did not fix a time to establish the proof of the facts. After the replies and defence of the accused, the inquisitor and the bishop of the diocese, or their delegates, proceeded to pass sentence without any other formalities. If the accused denied the charges, although he was convicted or strongly suspected, he was tortured to force him to confess his crime; cessity for it, the judges proceeded to pass or, if it was thought that there was no nethe final sentence.

"If the crime imputed to the accused was not proved, he was acquitted, and a copy of the declaration given to him; but the name of his accuser was not communicated. If he had been calumniated, he was obliged to clear himself publicly by the canonical method, in the town where all heresy, and received the absolution ad it had taken place; he afterwards abjured cautelam for all the censures which he had incurred. In order to proportion the punishment to the suspicion, it was divided into three degrees, named slight, serious, and violent.

suspected, though in the least degree, was "The person who was declared to be called upon to renounce all heresies, and

"The absolution ad cautelam is that granted by inquisitors to persons who have been suspected of heresy."

some time resisted the improvements which her confessor was anxious to introduce into the system; but her weakness at length yielded to his remonstrances, and, aided by the character of the bigotted, despotic, and rapacious Ferdinand, produced the modern Inquisition. The work of oppression, injustice, torture, and death now went on rapidly. The prisons were filled, and the auto-dafés flamed continually. It would be incompatible with our limits to give even a brief sketch of the reigns of forty-five inquisitor-generals, who presided over this tribunal from 1480 to 1808. We can only afford room for a very few remarks and extracts. The Jews were the first victims. We give the following passage respecting them.

"The war against the Albigenses was the first cause of the establishment of the Inquisition; and the pretended necessity of punishing the apostasy of the newly-converted Spanish Jews was the reason for introducing it in a reformed state. It is important to remark, that the immense trade carried on by the Spanish Jews had thrown into their hands the greatest part of the wealth of the peninsula, and that they had acquired great power and influence inCastile under Alphonso IX., Peter I., and Henry II.; and in Arragon under Peter IV., and John I. The Christians, who could not rival them in industry, had almost all become their debtors, and envy soon made them the enemies of their creditors. This disposition was fostered by evil-minded men, and popular commotions were the consequence in almost all the towns of the two kingdoms. In 1391, five thousand Jews were sacrificed to the fury of the people in different towns. Several were known to have escaped death by becoming Christians: many others sought to save themselves in following their example, and in a short time more than a million persons renounced the Law of Moses to embrace the faith of Jesus Christ. The number of conversions increased considerably during the ten first years of the fifteenth century, through the zeal of St. Vincent, Ferrier, and several other missionaries: they were seconded by the famous conferences which took place in 1413 between several rabbis and the converted Jews, Jerome de Santafé. The converted Jews were named New Christians; they were also called Marranos, or the cursed race, from an oath which the Jews were in the habit of using among themselves. As the fear of death was the cause of most of these conversions,

many repented, and secretly returned to Judaism, though they outwardly conformed to Christianity. The constraint to which they were obliged to submit was sometimes too painful, and several were discovered. This was the ostensible reason for the establishment of a tribunal which gave Ferdinand an opportunity of confiscating immense riches, and which Sextus IV. could not but approve, as it tended to augment the credit of the maxims of the court of Rome; it is to these projects, concealed under the appearance of zeal for religion, that the Inquisition of Spain

owes its origin." pp. 30-32.

The following passage presents so striking a picture of the united artifice, injustice, and cruelty of the misnamed holy office, that, long and painful as it is, we cannot withhold it from our readers.

"The inquisitors soon published a second edict, named the Edict of Grace, to engage those who had apostatized to surrender themselves voluntarily: it promised that, if they came with true repentance, their property should not be confiscated, and they should receive absolution; but if, on the contrary, they suffered the time of grace to elapse, or were denounced by others, they would be prosecuted with all the severity of the tribunal. Several suffered themselves to be persuaded, but the inquisitors only granted them absolution when they had declared upon oath the names, condition, and place of dwelling, of all the apostates whom they knew or had heard spoken of. They were also obliged to keep these revelations secret, and by these means a great number of New Christians fell into the hands of the inquisitors. When the period of grace was passed, a new edict was published, which commanded all persons to denounce those who had embraced the Judaic heresy, on pain of mortal sin and excommunication. The consequence of this edict was, that an heretic was only informed that he was accused, at the moment when he was arrested and dragged to the dungeons of the Inquisition.

"The same fate awaited the converted Jew, who might have acquired certain habits in his infancy, which, though not contrary to Christianity, might be represented as certain signs of apostasy. The inquisitors mentioned in their edict several cases where accusation was commanded. The following cases are so equivocal, that altogether they would scarcely form a simple presumption in the present time. A convert was considered as relapsed into heresy, if he kept the Sabbath out of respect to the Law which he had abandoned: this was sufficiently proved if he wore better linen and garments on that day than those which he commonly used, or had not a fire in his

different canonical punishments." pp. 34-37.

house from the preceding evening; if he took the suet and fat from the animals which were intended for his food, and washed the blood from it; if he examined the blade of the knife before he killed the animals, and covered the blood with earth; the Jews; if he has drunk of the wine named caser (a word derived from caxer, which means lawful), and which is prepared by Jews; if he pronounces the bahara or benediction when he takes the vessel of wine into his hands, and pronounces certain words before he gives it to another person; if he eats of an animal killed by Jews; if he has recited the Psalms of David without repeating the Gloria Patri at the end; if he gives his

if he blessed the table after the manner of

son a Hebrew name chosen among those used by the Jews; if he plunges him seven days after his birth into a basin containing water, gold, silver, seed-pearl, wheat, barley, and other substances, pronouncing at the same time certain words, according to the custom of the Jews; if he draws the horoscope of his children at their birth; if he performs the ruaya, a ceremony which

consists in inviting his relations and friends to a repast the day before he undertakes a journey; if he turned his face to the wall at the time of his death, or has been placed in that posture before he expired; if he was washed, or caused to be washed, in hot water the body of a dead person, and interred him in a new shroud, with hose, shirt, and a mantle, and placed a piece of money in his mouth; if he has uttered a discourse in praise of the dead, or recited melancholy verses; if he has emptied the pitchers and other vessels of water in the house of the dead person, or in those of his neighbours, according to the custom of the Jews; if he sits behind

the door of the deceased as a sign of grief,

or eats fish and olives instead of meat, to honour his memory; if he remains in his house one year after the death of any one, to prove his grief. All these articles shew the artifice used by the inquisitors in order to prove to Isabella that a great number of Judaic heretics existed in the Idioceses of Cadiz and Seville. These measures so well adapted to multiply victims, could not fail in their effect, and the tribunal soon began its cruel executions. On the 6th of January, 1481, six persons were burnt, seventeen on the 26th of March following, and a still greater number a month after; on the 4th of November, the same year, two hundred and ninety-eight New Christians had suffered the punishment of burning, and seventy

nine were condemned to the horrors of

perpetual imprisonment in the town of Seville alone. In other parts of the province and in the diocese of Cadiz, two thousand of these unfortunate creatures were burnt: according to Mariana, a still greater number were burnt in effigy, and one thousand seven hundred suffered

Many of the wretched victims of the Inquisition appealed from the Spanish tribunal to Rome, and spent the greater part of their for tunes in endeavouring to obtain absolutions from the pope. The pope took their money, and granted the pardons they solicited. But, mark the abominable system! Upon the expostulation of the inquisitors, and from an apprehension of offending Ferdinand, their ready tool on all occasions, the pope afterwards annulled his own absolutions, thus plainly striking at the root of his pretended infallibility, and left the sufferers to their fate; and, as their money could now no longer be of any use to them, he kept it in safe possession.

The consequence of this persecution of the Jews was, that in addition to the numbers who were sacrificed, either by popular fury, or by the slow tortures of the holy office, eight hundred thousand First and last, Ferdinand lost not persons quitted their native land. less than two millions of subjects, through emigrations occasioned by the fear of suffering and death.

Let our readers weigh well the following miscellaneous particulars,

which we have selected and thrown together. The prisoner, who, after much suffering, was at length acquitted, was denied the common justice of being made acquainted with the names of his accuser. The victims were not informed of their respective sentences, until the commencement of the execution; consequently, while those who were relaxed (so burning was denominated) had their worst expectations and fears accomplished, those who were reconciled, and sentenced to minor punishments, had still to endure all the miseries of uncertainty, and must have often realized in imagination the horrors of the auto da fé. It may be supposed, that many who read of the burnings in effigy, console themselves with