History of the Inquisition from Its Establishment Till the Present Time. William Sime

A more particular account of the government and proceedings of what is called the modern Inquisition, will be given afterwards.

[5] "No object can be presented to the imagination more gloomy," says Puigblanch, "than the period of the regeneration of this establishment in Seville. It seems as if at sight of it nature herself had shuddered, or that she wished to consummate the infelicity of Spain, so unseasonable and great was the hurricanes of the year 1481, when the Inquisition began to display its fury." "This year of 1481," says Andrew Bernaldez, an eye witness, "was a year of great rains and inundations commencing at Christmas, and continuing onwards in such manner, that the Guadalquiver bore away and destroyed the village of Copero, in which were eighty families, as well as many other places upon the banks, and the flood rose up through the battlements of Seville and the outlet of Coria, higher than it was ever known, where it remained stationary for three days, and the whole city was under the greatest apprehensions of being destroyed by water." According to this very author, a distemper also broke out in the same year, which desolated this southern part of the kingdom, till 1488. "This year," says he, "was quite out of the common order of nature in Andalusia, being, on the contrary, marked with a great and general pestilence, which occasioned an extreme mortality in all the cities, towns, and villages. In Seville, more than fifteen thousand persons died, and in Cordova the same number; and Xerez and Ecija lost each from eight to nine thousand, and the other towns and villages in the same proportion." He afterwards adds, "that a similar distemper returned with more or less activity, till at last it raged with great fury, causing the same destruction and ravages as in the first. Thus ominous were the auspices under which the re-organized Inquisition hoisted its bloody standard."

[6] "In this same burning place of Seville," says Puigblanch, "which the Inquisition used for the first time in 1481, on the persons of six men and women of the Jewish persuasion, the tribunal performed its last tragedy in 1782, by the execution of a woman for being a Molinist. Persons who were there present, relate, that the prisoner was placed on a raised platform, sustained by four beams, resting on the four pillars; that these, and the works which served as a base, were adorned with a lining painted black, on which were seen the usual fooleries, of dragons and devils in white, and on the tops of which were four figures in penitential garments; finally, that the prisoner, after being strangled, (she had been converted while going to the place of execution, and therefore met with this favour!) was burnt, together with the whole platform and frame, for which purpose, barrels of pitch, faggots of vine-cuttings, and a large quantity of wood, had been placed underneath. The above six followers of the Jewish rites, (who were put to death in 1481) were executed, according to Pedro de Torres, canon of Calahorra, and also a contemporary author, on the 10th of January, as well as seventeen others on the 26th of March, and a great many more on the 21st of April; those who died up to the 4th of November, amounting to two hundred and ninety-eight; and besides seventy-nine others were condemned to perpetual imprisonment."

[7] More than five thousand houses remained shut in Andalusia, whose inhabitants had been exterminated, in one way or another, by the Inquisition.

[8] See Appendix, No. I.

[9] A hundred and seventy thousand families are said to have left Spain at this period. Nay, some writers make the number of expatriated Jews to amount to eight hundred thousand persons, whose immense riches were distributed among their persecutors. If the Moors, who emigrated to Africa, are added to the number, Ferdinand and Isabella lost two millions of subjects by these cruel measures.

[10] An auto-da-fé, or "act of faith," of which a more particular account will be given afterwards, is the burning of those persons whom the Inquisitors are pleased to pronounce defective in their belief of any of the articles of faith commanded to be believed by the Popish Church.

[11] To give the reader some idea of the sermons, or rather blasphemous rhapsodies, which the friars deliver at an auto-da-fé, the following extracts are given from one which was preached on this occasion before Philip at Valladolid. "And thou, oh! most holy tribunal of the faith, for boundless ages mayest thou be preserved, so as to keep us firm and pure in the same faith, and promote the punishment of the enemies of God. Of thee can I say what the Holy Spirit said of the Church, 'Thou art fair, my love, as the tents of Kedar, as the curtains of Solomon!' But what parallels, similes, or comparisons are these? What praise, or what heightened contrast can that be which compares a delicate female, an unequalled beauty, to the tents of Kedar, and the spotted skins of Solomon? Saint Jerome discovered the mystery, and says, that the people of Kedar being fond of the chase, therein took great delight; and, for this purpose, had always their tents pitched in the field; on which, in order to prove the valour of their arms, they spread the skins of the animals killed in chase, and hung up the heads of the wild beasts they had slain. This was the greatest beauty of their tents; to this the Holy Spirit compares the beauty of the Church, and this is also to-day the glory of the holy tribunal of the faith. To have killed these horrid wild beasts and enemies of God, whom we now behold on this theatre, some by taking life from their errors, reconciling them to our holy faith, and inspiring them with contrition for their faults; others by condemning them through their obduracy to the flames, where losing their corporeal lives, their obstinate souls will immediately burn in hell; by this means God will be avenged of his greatest enemies, dread will follow these examples, and the holy tribunal will remain triumphant," &c.

[12] Philip was afterwards as good as his word. Under the plea of religion he caused the Inquisition to institute proceedings against his eldest son Charles; and in the most unnatural and cowardly manner procured his death in a secret manner by means of poison.