The Inquisition Part 12

[1] Alexander IV decreed this penalty against the contumacious.

s.e.xto, _De Haereticis_, cap. vii. Boniface VIII extended it to those princes and magistrates who did not enforce the sentences of the Inquisition. s.e.xto, _De Haereticis_, cap. xviii in Eymeric, 2a pars, p. 110.

The Church is also responsible for having introduced torture into the proceedings of the Inquisition. This cruel practice was introduced by Innocent IV in 1252.

Torture had left too terrible an impression upon the minds of the early Christians to permit of their employing it in their own tribunals. The barbarians who founded the commonwealths of Europe, with the exception of the Visigoths, knew nothing of this brutal method of extorting confessions. The only thing of the kind which they allowed was flogging, which, according to St. Augustine, was rather akin to the correction of children by their parents. Gratian, who recommends it in his _Decretum_,[1] lays it down as an "accepted rule of canon law that no confession is to be extorted by torture."[2] Besides, Nicholas I, in his instructions to the Bulgarians, had formally denounced the torturing of prisoners.[3] He advised that the testimony of three persons be required for conviction; if these could not be obtained, the prisoner's oath upon the Gospels was to be considered sufficient.

[1] _Causa_ v, quaest. v, Illi qui, cap. iv.

[2] _Causa_ xv, quaest, vi, cap. i.

[3] _Responsa ad Consulta Bulgarorum_, cap. lx.x.xvi, Labbe, _Concilia_, vol. viii, col. 544.

The ecclesiastical tribunals borrowed from Germany another method of proving crime, viz., the ordeals, or judgments of G.o.d.

There was the duel, the ordeal of the cross, the ordeal of boiling water, the ordeal of fire, and the ordeal of cold water. They had a great vogue in nearly all the Latin countries, especially in Germany and France. But about the twelfth century they deservedly fell into great disfavor, until at last the Popes, particularly Innocent III, Honorius III, and Gregory IX, legislated them out of existence.[1]

[1] _Decretals_, lib. v, t.i.t. x.x.xv, cap. i-iii. Cf. Vacandard, _L'eglise et les Ordalies_ in _etudes de critique et d'histoire_, 3d ed., Paris, 1906, pp. 191-215.

At the very moment the popes were condemning the ordeals, the revival of the Roman law throughout the West was introducing the customs of antiquity. It was then "that jurists began to feel the need of torture, and accustom themselves to the idea of its introduction."

"The earliest instances with which I have met," writes Lea, "occur in the Veronese code of 1228, and the Sicilian const.i.tutions of Frederic II in 1231, and in both of these the references to it show how sparingly and hesitatingly it was employed. Even Frederic, in his ruthless edicts, from 1220 to 1239, makes no allusion to it, but in accordance with the Verona decree of Lucius III, prescribes the recognized form of canonical purgation for the trial of all suspected heretics."[1]

[1] Lea, op. cit., vol. i, p. 421.

The use of torture, as Tanon has pointed out, had perhaps never been altogether discontinued. Some ecclesiastical tribunals, at least in Paris, made use of it in extremely grave cases, at the close of the twelfth andd beginning of the thirteenth centuries.[1] But this was exceptional: in Italy, apparently, it had never been used.

[1] Tanon, op. cit., pp. 362-373.

Gregory IX ignored all references to torture made in the Veronese code, and the const.i.tutions of Frederic II. But Innocent IV, feeling undoubtedly that it was a quick and effective method for detecting criminals, authorized the tribunals of the Inquisition to employ it.

In his bull _Ad Extirpanda_, he says: "The podesta or ruler (of the city) is hereby ordered to force all captured heretics to confess and accuse their accomplices by torture which will not imperil life or injure limb, just as thieves and robbers are forced to accuse their accomplices, and to confess their crimes; for these heretics are true thieves, murderers of souls, and robbers of the sacraments of G.o.d."[1] The Pope here tries to defend the use of torture, by cla.s.sing heretics with thieves and murderers. A mere comparison is his only argument.

[1] Bull _Ad Extirpanda_, in Eymeric, _Directorium_, Appendix, p. 8.

This law of Innocent IV was renewed and confirmed November 30, 1259, by Alexander IV,[1] and again on November 3, 1265, by Clement IV.[2]

The restriction of Innocent III to use torture "which should not imperil life or injure limb" (_Cogere citra membri diminutionem et mortis periculum_), left a great deal to the discretion of the Inquisitors. Besides flogging, the other punishments inflicted upon those who refused to confess the crime of which they were accused were antecedent imprisonment, the rack, the _strappado_, and the burning coals.

[1] Potthast, _Regesta_, no. 17714.

[2] Ibid., no. 19433.

When after the first interrogatory the prisoner denied what the Inquisitors believed to be very probable or certain, he was thrown into prison. The _durus carcer et arcta vita_ was deemed an excellent method of extorting confessions.

"It was pointed out," says Lea, "that judicious restriction of diet not only reduced the body, but weakened the will, and rendered the prisoner less able to resist alternate threats of death and promises of mercy. Starvation, in fact, was reckoned one of the regular and most efficient methods to subdue unwilling witnesses and defendants."[1] This was the usual method employed in Languedoc. "It is the only method," writes Mgr. Douais,[2] "to to extort confessions mentioned either in the records of the notary of the Inquisition of Carca.s.sonne[3] or in the sentences of Bernard Gui. It was also the practice of the Inquisitors across the Rhine."

[1] Lea, op. cit., vol. i, p. 421.

[2] Douais, _Doc.u.ments_, vol. i, p. ccxl.

[3] Douais, _Doc.u.ments_, vol. ii, p. 115 and seq.

Still the use of torture, especially of the rack and the _strappado_, was not unknown in southern Europe, even before the promulgation of Innocent's bull _Ad Extirpanda_.

The rack was a triangular frame, on which the prisoner was stretched and bound, so that he could not move. Cords were attached to his arms and legs, and then connected with a windla.s.s, which, when turned, dislocated the joints of the wrists and ankles.

The _strappado_ or vertical rack was no less painful. The prisoner with his hands tied behind his back was raised by a rope attached to a pulley and windla.s.s to the top of a gallows, or to the ceiling of the torture chamber; he was then let fall with a jerk to within a few inches of the ground. This was repeated several times. The cruel torturers sometimes tied weights to the victim's feet to increase the shock of the fall.

The punishment of burning, "although a very dangerous punishment," as an Inquisitor informs us, was occasionally used. We read of an official of Poitiers, who, following a Toulousain custom, tortured a sorceress by placing her feet on burning coals (_juxta carbones accensos_). This punishment is described by Marsollier in his _Histoire de l'Inquisition_. First a good fire was started; then the victim was stretched out on the ground, his feet manacled, and turned toward the flame. Grease, fat, or some other combustible substance was rubbed upon them, so that they were horribly burned. From time to time a screen was placed between the victim's feet and the brazier, that the Inquisitor might have an opportunity to resume his interrogatory.

Such methods of torturing the accused were so detestable, that in the beginning the torturer was always a civil official, as we read in the bull of Innocent IV. The canons of the Church, moreover, prohibited all ecclesiastics from taking part in these tortures, so that the Inquisitor who, for whatever reason, accompanied the victim into the torture chamber, was thereby rendered irregular, and could not exercise his office again, until he had obtained the necessary dispensation. The tribunals complained of this c.u.mbrous mode of administration, and declared that it hindered them from properly interrogating the accused. Every effort was made to have the prohibition against clerics being present in the torture chamber removed. Their object was at last obtained indirectly. On April 27, 1260, Alexander IV authorized the Inquisitors and their a.s.sociates to mutually grant all the needed dispensations for irregularities that might be incurred.[1] This permission was granted a second time by Urban IV, August 4, 1262;[2] it was practically an authorization to a.s.sist at the interrogatories at which torture was employed. From this time the Inquisitors did not scruple to appear in person in the torture chamber. The manuals of the Inquisition record this practice and approve it.[3]

[1] Douais, _Doc.u.ments_, vol. i, p. xxv, n. 3.

[2] _Regesta_, no. 18390.

[3] Eymeric, _Directorium_, 3a pars, p. 481.

Torture was not to be employed until the judge had been convinced that gentle means were of no avail.[1] Even in the torture chamber, while the prisoner was being stripped of his garments and was being bound, the Inquisitor kept urging him to confess his guilt. On his refusal, the _vexatio_ began with slight tortures. If these proved ineffectual, others were applied with gradually increased severity; at the very beginning, the victim was shown all the various instruments of torture, in order that the mere sight of them might terrify him into yielding.[2]

[1] A grave suspicion against the prisoner was required before he could be tortured.

[2] Eymeric, _Directorium_, 3a pars, p. 481, col. 1.

The Inquisitors realized so well that such forced confessions were valueless, that they required the prisoner to confirm them after he had left the torture chamber. The torture was not to exceed a half hour. "Usually," writes Lea, "the procedure appears to be that the torture was continued until the accuser signified his readiness to confess, when he was unbound and carried into another room where his confession was made. If, however, the confession was extracted during the torture, it was read over subsequently to the prisoner, and he was asked if it were true.... In any case, the record was carefully made that the confession was free and spontaneous, without the pressure of force or fear."[1]

[1] Lea, op. cit., vol. i. p. 427.

"It is a noteworthy fact, however, that in the fragmentary doc.u.ments of inquisitorial proceedings which have reached us, the references to torture are singularly few.... In the six hundred and thirty-six sentences borne upon the register of Toulouse from 1309 to 1323, the only allusion to torture is in the recital of the case of Calvarie, but there are numerous instances in which the information wrung from the convicts who had no hope of escape, could scarce have been procured in any other manner. Bernard Gui, who conducted the Inquisition of Toulouse during this period, has too emphatically expressed his sense of the utility of torture on both princ.i.p.als and witnesses for us to doubt his readiness in its employment."[1]

[1] Lea, op. cit., p. 424.

Besides, the investigation which Clement V ordered into the iniquities of the Inquisition of Carca.s.sonne, proves clearly that the accused were frequently subjected to torture.[1] That we rarely find reference to torture in the records of the Inquisition need not surprise us. For in the beginning, torture was inflicted by civil executioners outside of the tribunal of the Inquisition; and even later on, when the Inquisitors were allowed to take part in it, it was considered merely a means of making the prisoner declare his willingness to confess afterwards. A confession made under torture had no force in law; the second confession only was considered valid.

That is why it alone, as a rule, is recorded.

[1] Clement V required the consent of the Inquisitor and the local Bishop before a heretic could be tortured, _vel tormentis exponere illis_. Decretal _Multorum querela_, in Eymeric, _Directorium_, 2a pars, p. 112.

But if the sufferings of the victims of the Inquisition were not deemed worthy of mention in the records, they were none the less real and severe. Imprudent or heartless judges were guilty of grave abuses in the use of torture. Rome, which had authorized it, at last intervened, not, we regret to say, to prohibit it altogether, but at least to reform the abuses which had been called to her attention.

One reform of Clement V ordered the Inquisition never to use torture without the Bishop's consent, if he could be reached within eight days.[1]

[1] Decretal, _Multorum querela_.

"Bernard Gui emphatically remonstrated against this, as seriously crippling the efficiency of the Inquisition, and proposed to subst.i.tute for it the meaningless phrase that torture should only be used _with mature and careful deliberation_, but his suggestion was not heeded, and the Clementine regulations remained the law of the Church."[1]

[1] Lea, op. cit., vol. i, p. 424; Bernard Gui, _Practica_, ed.

Douais, 4a pars, p. 188.

The code of the Inquisition was now practically complete, for succeeding Popes made no change of any importance. The data before us prove that the Church forgot her early traditions of toleration, and borrowed from the Roman jurisprudence, revived by the legists, laws and practices which remind one of the cruelty of ancient paganism.

But once this criminal code was adopted, she endeavored to mitigate the cruelty with which it was enforced. If this preoccupation is not always visible--and it is not in her condemnation of obdurate heretics--we must at least give her the credit of insisting that torture "should never imperil life or injure limb:" _Cogere citra membri diminutionem et mortis periculum_.