If what Lucas tells us be true, that ecclesiastics frequently joined in and enjoyed the ridicule with which heretics derided the sacraments and the clergy, the Spanish Church was not likely to give much aid to the introduction of the Inquisition. How little its methods were understood appears in the fact that when, in 1236, San Fernando III. found some heretics at Palencia, he proceeded to brand them in the face, which brought them to reason and led them to seek absolution. No one seemed to know what to do with them, so Gregory IX. was applied to, and he authorized the Bishop of Palencia to reconcile them. There is probably no truth in the statement of some historians that the king, on several occasions, was obliged to levy from his subjects a tribute of wood with which to burn the unrepentant, and the story only serves to show how utterly vague have been the current conceptions of the period.[203] We reach firmer ground with the codes known as El Fuero Real and Las Siete Partidas, the first issued by Alonso the Wise, in 1255, and the second about ten years later. By this time the Inquisition was at its height. It was thoroughly organized, and wherever it existed the business of suppressing heresy was exclusively in its hands. Yet not only does Alonso take no count of it, but in his regulation by secular law of the relations between the heretic and the Church he shows how completely, up to this period, Spain had remained outside of the great movements of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Heresy, it is true, is one of the matters pertaining to the ecclesiastical tribunals, and any one can accuse a heretic before his bishop or vicar. If the accused is found not to believe as the Church teaches, effort is to be made to convert him, and if he returns to the faith he is to be pardoned. If he proves obstinate, he is to be handed over to the secular judge. Then, however, his fate is decided without reference to the laws which the Church had endeavored to introduce throughout Christendom. If the culprit had received the _consolamentum_, or is a believer observing the rites, or one of those who deny the future life, he is to be burned; but if a believer not observing the rites, he is to be banished or imprisoned until he returns to the faith. Any one learning heresy, but not yet a believer, is fined ten pounds of gold to the fisc, or, if unable to pay, to receive fifty lashes in public. In the case of those who die in heresy or are executed, their estates pass to Catholic descendants, or, in default of these, to the next of kin; if without such kindred, the property of laymen goes to the fisc, of ecclesiastics, to the Church, if claimed within a year, after which it inures to the fisc. Children disinherited for heresy recover their portions, but not the mesne profits, on recantation. No one, after condemnation for heresy, can hold office, inherit property, make a will, execute a sale, or give testimony.