



Produced by David McClamrock





THE INQUISITION

A CRITICAL AND HISTORICAL STUDY OF THE COERCIVE POWER OF THE CHURCH

BY E. VACANDARD

TRANSLATED FROM THE SECOND EDITION BY BERTRAND L. CONWAY, C.S.P.

NEW EDITION

LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. FOURTH AVENUE & 30TH STREET, NEW YORK
LONDON, BOMBAY, CALCUTTA AND MADRAS 1915

Nihil Obstat. THOMAS J. SHAHAN, S.T.D.

Imprimatur. + JOHN M. FARLEY, D.D Archbishop of New York.

NEW YORK, June 24, 1907.

Copyright, 1907, by BERTRAND L. CONWAY

All Rights Reserved

First Edition, February, 1908 Registered, May, 1908 New and Cheaper
Edition, September, 1915



 NOTE TO THIS ELECTRONIC EDITION

In the print edition of this book, footnote numbers began with 1 on
each page, and the footnotes appeared at the bottom of each page. In
this electronic edition, the footnotes have been re-numbered
beginning with 1 for each paragraph, and they appear directly below
the paragraph that refers to them. A very few ascertainable errors
have been caught and corrected. All else is intended to correspond as
closely as possible to the contents of the print edition.



PREFACE

THERE are very few Catholic apologists who feel inclined to boast of
the annals of the Inquisition. The boldest of them defend this
institution against the attacks of modern liberalism, as if they
distrusted the force of their own arguments. Indeed they have hardly
answered the first objection of their opponents, when they instantly
endeavor to prove that the Protestant and Rationalistic critics of
the Inquisition have themselves been guilty of heinous crimes. "Why,"
they ask, "do you denounce our Inquisition, when you are responsible
for Inquisitions of your own?"

No good can be accomplished by such a false method of reasoning. It
seems practically to admit that the cause of the Church cannot be
defended. The accusation of wrongdoing made against the enemies they
are trying to reduce to silence comes back with equal force against
the friends they are trying to defend.

It does not follow that because the Inquisition of Calvin and the
French Revolutionists merits the reprobation of mankind, the
Inquisition of the Catholic Church must needs escape all censure. On
the contrary, the unfortunate comparison made between them naturally
leads one to think that both deserve equal blame. To our mind, there
is only one way of defending the attitude of the Catholic Church in
the Middle Ages toward the Inquisition. We must examine and judge
this institution objectively, from the standpoint of morality,
justice, and religion, instead of comparing its excesses with the
blameworthy actions of other tribunals.

No historian worthy of the name has as yet undertaken to treat the
Inquisition from this objective standpoint. In the seventeenth
century, a scholarly priest, Jacques Marsollier, canon of the Uzes,
published at Cologne (Paris), in 1693, a _Histoire de l'Inquisition
et de son Origine_. But his work, as a critic has pointed out, is
"not so much a history of the Inquisition, as a thesis written with a
strong Gallican bias, which details with evident delight the
cruelties of the Holy Office." The illustrations are taken from
Philip Limborch's _Historia Inquisitionis_.[1]

[1] Paul Fredericq, _Historiographie de l'Inquisition_, p. xiv.
Introduction to the French translation of Lea's book on the
Inquisition.

Henry Charles Lea, already known by his other works on religious
history, published in New York, in 1888, three large volumes entitled
_A History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages._ This work has
received as a rule a most flattering reception at the hands of the
European press, and has been translated into French.[1] One can say
without exaggeration that it is "the most extensive, the most
profound, and the most thorough history of the Inquisition that we
possess."[2]

[1] _Histoire de l'Inquisition au moyen age_, Solomon Reinach. Paris,
Fischbacher, 1900-1903.

[2] Paul Fredericq, loc. cit., p. xxiv.

It is far, however, from being the last word of historical criticism.
And I am not