the quire-indeed, Fray Luis de Leon relieved the tedium and anxiety of his four years' imprisonment at Valladolid by writing his classical devotional work, the "Nombres de Cristo." While, as we have seen, great care was taken to prevent prisoners from communicating with each other, it by no means follows that confinement was solitary. As a general rule it was regarded as preferable that male prisoners should be alone, and that women should have companionship, but there could be no hard and fast line of policy followed, except that accomplices and negativos (those who denied the accusation) should not be placed together. Husband and wife were thus always separated but, when occasion required, there was no hesitation in crowding four or five persons together and, in the careless confidence of common misfortune, this often opened a valuable source of information, for there never seems to have been any scruple in betraying that confidence in the hope of winning favor by reporting to the tribunal the compromising utterances of cell-companions. The object in keeping apart those who were accomplices was to prevent their encouraging each other in denial and agreeing on a common line of defence. Men who were confined by themselves sometimes asked for a companion and women more frequently did so.1 It was impossible that discipline should be uniform at all times and places and we sometimes find it exceedingly lax. It infers great looseness when, in 1546, the Suprema felt it necessary to enjoin care in permitting prisoners freely to visit each other and, in the trial of Isabel Reyner at Toledo, in 1570, we find her stating, in an audience, that in passing through the prison she saw a fellow-prisoner who informed her that her husband and Estevan Carrier were also prisoners, and who asked her why she was imprisoned. In fact, as we gather from chance allusions in the trials, there must have been a certain freedom of movement. In the case of Benito Ferrer, in 1621, at Toledo, there was an investigation as to his sanity, in which the alcaide spoke of his going regularly to the cistern for water and cooking his food like the rest, while the assistant described taking him to the latrines when desired. From the trial of Jacques Pinzon, in Granada, in 1599, 1 Sousa Aphorism. Lib. II, cap. 26, n. 20, 21.-Archivo de Simancas, Inquisicion, Visitas de Barcelona, Leg. 15, fol. 2.-Ibidem, Lib. 939, fol. 92. 1 Archivo de Simancas, Inquisicion, Lib. 939, fol. 92.-Proceso contra Isabel Reyner (MSS. of Library of the Univ. of Halle, Yc, 20, T. III). we learn that, in the morning, the alcaide brought the prisoners water and returned after mass with their food; the mention of a pan to hold ashes shows that they had fire, and we hear of pots, spoons and other utensils.1 There was evidently a diversity of routine in the different tribunals and when Valdés, in 1562, was obliged to order that prisoners were not to go for their rations, because they met the servants of the purveyor, and that the alcaide must receive the food and carry it to the cells, it argues that, in some tribunals at least, a considerable freedom of movement had existed.2 In 1652, a minute code of instructions for the alcaide shows us what at that time were the regulations. On rising in the morning, he is to visit all the cells and see how the prisoners are; he is to examine carefully for openings through which they may communicate with each other; doors are to be carefully closed and he is not to leave with the prisoners knives, cords or scissors-if scissors are needed, he is to stay while they are used and take them away. He is not to give them books to read without permission of the inquisitors. Rations are served twice a weekon Sundays and Thursdays-and, on the afternoon previous, he is to see each prisoner, ascertain what he wants, and set it down in a book so that the purveyor may provide it. Every nightfall he is to examine the cells to guard against attempts to escape, searching under the pillows for articles that would assist flight, or for writing materials. Prisoners able to cook their food will do so in a brasero; for those who cannot, the cooking is done by an appointee of the tribunal. All this shows a commendable desire to avoid unnecessary harshness, yet the regulations enforce one hardship which appears to have been universal at all periods after the earliest-the prohibition of lights, a severe infliction for, in the obscurity of their cells, the hours of darkness must have seemed interminable. It is probable that at first this was not the rule for, in 1497, in Valencia, there is an item of 7s. 4d. for lights, in the account of the expenses of Alonso de Roman, who had lain in the secret prison for nine months and nine days.* Of course, in the general venality of the period, prison officials were not always inaccessible to bribery, and money could procure 1 MSS. of Library of Univ. of Halle, Tom. VIII, X. Archivo hist. nacional, Inquisicion de Valencia, Leg. 383. relaxation of the rules but, when detected, it was visited with a severity not often shown to delinquent officials. This is illustrated by a case in Toledo, in 1591, when judicious liberality procured unlawful privileges, such as having cell doors open, allowing communications and other similar indulgences. Francisco Méndez de Lema, the alcaide, attempted flight, but was caught and sentenced to a hundred lashes, galley-service, exile and deprivation of office. His cousin and assistant, Miguel de Xea, confessed partially and was tortured without extracting more; he escaped with dismissal, disability for office and four years of exile.1 There was one regulation which bore with especial severity on the innocent, while it was a matter of indifference to the heretic. This was the deprivation of all religious consolation during the period, often prolonged for years, of incarceration. It is difficult to understand this in the professors of a theology which teaches the infinite importance of the sacraments as aids to spiritual development as well as to salvation, especially when so large a portion of the prisoners were good Catholics tried on charges which did not infer formal heresy. Possibly it may be explained by the customary assumption of the guilt of the accused, who had thus incurred ipso facto excommunication, and the Spanish Inquisition had the example of the Roman, whose prisoners were similarly not allowed to receive the sacraments or to hear mass.? Yet the great canonist Azpilcueta, whose attention was probably drawn to the matter by the case of his client Carranza, thus deprived of the sacraments for eighteen years, tells us that there is no law justifying the Spanish Inquisition in this, though perhaps it may have special authority and also good reasons. To him, however, it appeared that the sacraments would soften the hearts of prisoners and lead them to confess, while it was cruel to leave them exposed without defence to the assaults of the demon during the many years of their captivity. Yet the refusal was absolute. Fray Luis de Leon, after three years of imprisonment, pleaded earnestly for the sacraments, but the only reply of the Suprema to his petition was to tell the Valladolid tribunal to finish the case as soon as convenient.' 1 MSS. of Library of Univ. of Halle, Yc, 20, T. I. 'Decret. Sac. Congr. Sti Officii, p. 47 (Bibl. del R. Archivio di Stato in Roma, Fondo camerale, Congr. del S. Offizio, Vol. 3). Azpilcueta De Oratione, cap. xxii, n. 10 (Romæ, 1578). Proceso contra Fray Luis de Leon (Col. de Documentos, XI, 50, 52). While the sacraments were denied, sacramental confession was allowed, though of course the priest could not grant absolution. The earliest allusion I have met to this is an order by Cardinal Manrique in 1529, and, in 1540, formal instructions were issued that, when a prisoner asks for a confessor, if the case admits of it, a proper person should be given to him.' This privilege was somewhat abridged by the elaborate provisions of the Instructions of 1561, which are framed to turn it to advantage. If a prisoner in good health asks for a confessor, it is safer not to grant the request, unless he has confessed judicially and has satisfied the evidence. But, as he cannot be absolved for heresy until reconciled to the Church, such confession is not of full effect unless he is in the article of death or a woman in the peril of child-birth, in which case the canon laws are to be observed. If a sick man asks for a confessor he shall have one, who shall be sworn to secrecy and to reveal to the tribunal any commission entrusted to him, if it is outside of confession, and to refuse it if within confession; the inquisitors shall instruct him to tell the prisoner that he cannot be absolved, if guilty, unless he confesses judicially. If his judicial confession satisfies the evidence, he is to be formally reconciled before he dies and, when judicially absolved, the confessor shall absolve him sacramentally when, if there is nothing to prevent it, he may receive Christian burial, as secretly as possible. If a sick man does not ask for a confessor and the physician is apprehensive of the result, he must urge him in every way to confess. The advantage thus afforded by the confessional is illustrated in the trial for Judaism of Ana López, at Valladolid, in 1637. She had denied, but was taken sick and declared by the physician to be in danger. To the confessor she admitted that, at the age of seventeen, she was taught Judaism, that she subsequently returned to the true faith until, on coming to Valladolid, a woman perverted her. The confessor warned her that she must confess judicially; she authorized him to report her confession and he absolved her sacramentally. An inquisitor with a notary went to her cell, when she repeated her confession and gave the name of the woman who had perverted her, and, on her recovery, her trial was resumed when she confirmed her confession.3 Archivo de Simancas, Inquisicion, Lib. 939, fol 120. 2 Instrucciones de 1561, 71 (Arguello, fol. 36). It is the kindly rule of the Church that absolution is never to be refused to the dying; he is to be saved from hell and can settle the account of his sins in purgatory, or by an indulgence or a mass on a privileged altar. With this the Inquisition did not interfere, as its professed object was the saving of souls and it even, by a carta acordada of 1632, permitted communion to dying heretics who had confessed judicially and satisfied the evidence. It required, however, the wafer to be consecrated in the tribunal, if there was time; if the haste was extreme, it could be brought from the parish church, but without pomp or procession.1 Even the veneration due to the Godhead had to yield to the secrecy which forbade it to be known that a prisoner was dying in the Holy Office. In the same spirit, when a prisoner died without reconciliation, the alcaide reported it to the inquisitors, who ordered the secretary to identify the body and bury it secretly.2 It was thrust into a hole, without his family knowing his fate until, if his trial was unfinished, his heirs would be summoned to defend his fame and memory or, if it had reached a point where sentence could be pronounced, they saw his effigy reconciled or burnt in an auto de fe. Even when he had confessed and been reconciled on the death-bed, we have just seen that his Christian burial was to be as secret as possible. When the trial ended in acquittal or suspension, if he had property sequestrated, the lifting of the sequestration would announce it to the heirs; otherwise, it does not seem that there was any provision for their notification. Suicide in prison, which was not infrequent, was regarded as conclusive proof of impenitence, even if the prisoner had confessed and professed repentance, but his heirs were allowed to defend him on the score of insanity, failing which he was burnt in effigy.3 Sickness was of frequent occurrence and was treated with creditable humanity. The Instructions of 1561 require that the sick shall have every care and that whatever the physician deems necessary for them shall be provided. Of course the fulfilment of this command must have varied with the temper of the tribunals, but nevertheless the spirit dictating it is in marked contrast with the conduct of the gaols of the period. When cases 1 MSS. of Royal Library of Copenhagen, 218b, p. 257. |