the Church, and a week later he ratified this revocation, saying that he was out of his senses under the torture. He was not tortured again and his sentence, some months later, was in accordance with the Instructions of 1484--to appear in an auto de fe, to abjure _de vehementi_ and to be fined at the discretion of the inquisitors.[76] [Sidenote: _REPETITION_] Such cases, however, were exceptional and the regular practice was to repeat the torture, when a confession followed by another revocation, subjected the victim to a third torture.[77] Whether the process could be carried on indefinitely was a doubtful question which some legists answered in the negative on the general philosophic assumption that nature and justice abhorred infinity, but this reasoning, however, academically conclusive, was not respected in practice when a conviction was desired. There was one dissuasive from revocation, which was brought to bear when culprits gave unreasonable trouble, which was the penalty incurred by _revocantes_. This is illustrated, as also the troublesome questions which sometimes perplexed the tribunals, by the case of Miguel de Castro, tried for Judaism, at Valladolid, in 1644. As a negativo, he was tortured and confessed, after which he ratified, revoked and ratified again. A process was commenced against him for revoking; he was tortured again, until an arm was dislocated and he lost two fingers, during which he confessed and then revoked the confession. He would have been tortured a third time had not the physician and surgeon declared him to be unable to endure it. The Suprema ordered him to be relaxed to the secular arm, if he could not be induced to repent and return to the Church, when, under the persuasion of two calificadores, he begged for mercy and confessed as to himself and others. Finally he was sentenced to reconciliation and irremissible prison and sanbenito, with a hundred lashes as a special punishment for revocation, which was executed January 21, 1646.[78]