A History of the Inquisition of Spain; vol. 1Lea, Henry Charles
History
A History of the Inquisition of Spain; vol. 1
Lea, Henry Charles
Inquisition -- Spain
In reviving and stimulating to activity this papal institution,
Ferdinand was fully resolved to have it subjected to the crown as
completely as in Castile. Hitherto it had been a Dominican province,
with inquisitors holding office at the pleasure of the Dominican
authorities and his first step therefore was to procure, in 1481, from
the Dominican General, Salvo Caseta, a commission to Fray Gaspar Juglar
to appoint and dismiss inquisitors at the royal will and pleasure.[609]
This gave him control over the personnel of the Inquisition, but to
render it completely dependent and at the same time efficient, it was
necessary that the appointees should be well paid and that the pay
should come from the royal treasury. A hundred years earlier, Eymerich,
the Inquisitor of Aragon, had sorrowfully recorded that princes were
unwilling to defray the expenses, because there were no rich heretics
left whose confiscations excited their cupidity; the Church was equally
disinclined, so that, in the absence of regular financial support, the
good work languished.[610] Now, however, greed and fanaticism joined
hands at the prospect of wealthy Conversos to be punished and Ferdinand,
by a rescript of February 17, 1482, provided ample salaries for the
manning of the tribunal of Valencia, with all the necessary
officials.[611] We may reasonably assume that he commenced there in the
anticipation of meeting less obstinate resistance than in the older and
stronger provinces of Aragon and Catalonia. He was, however, not yet
fully satisfied with his control over appointments and he applied to
Sixtus IV for some larger liberty, but the pope, who was beginning to
recognize that the Castilian Inquisition was more royal than papal,
refused, by a brief of January 29, 1482, alleging that to do so would be
to inflict disgrace on the Dominicans to whom it had always been
confided.[612]
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