The “Conversos,” or “New Christians,” as they were often called in contradistinction to the “Old Christians” of unblemished Catholicism, were to introduce another jarring element into the already complicated society of Spain. Welcomed by the Church as “brands plucked from the burning,” they took full advantage of the opportunity to enter offices and professions hitherto closed, as well as to continue unmolested in the commerce and business they had formerly carried on under sufferance. Since conversion affected neither their natural industry, nor their racial capacity for making money, the New Christians soon developed the wealth and power that have followed the footsteps of the Jew in all ages and countries, where he has been free to pursue them. From the collection of rents and taxes to the control of the King’s treasury, they invaded every corner of the financial and economic life of Spain, wringing from the carelessness of the Spaniard and their own foresight the wealth that was one of the causes of their future ruin. The Jew has always believed himself “the chosen of God,” and regarded Gentiles with a scorn akin to that felt by the Greeks of old for their “barbarian” neighbours. He might under pressure forsake his religion, but his inborn sense of racial superiority remained; and the envy excited in “Old Christians” by the accumulated honours of “the New” was often fanned to the white heat of passion by the arrogance with which these honours were borne. An additional barrier was religious distrust that, removed in theory by conversion and baptism, existed still in a more insidious form. Enforced conversion is rarely sincere; and though some of the New Christians out-heroded Herod in their hatred and denunciations of the religion they had abandoned, the majority were content with a nominal or lukewarm profession of the Catholic Faith. Old habits and customs cling; and the Conversos, while attending Mass and other services of the Church, would often observe in private the Jewish sabbath, and practise the rites and ceremonies of their forefathers. This laxity tended to increase during the reigns of weak or tolerant kings, such as John II. and Henry IV. of Castile; while the anger it excited amongst the mass of the people became proportionately more violent as they watched their unorthodox neighbours “wax and grow fat.” The growing spirit of fanaticism left its trail in riots instigated by the “Old Christians” against “the New” in Toledo, Segovia, Ciudad Real, Cordova, and Seville; rebels made use of it to threaten the unorthodox Henry IV., and at length, in the Concord of Medina del Campo of 1465, a resolution was passed, advocating that power should be given to the archbishops and bishops of the kingdom to imprison, fine, and punish “evil Christians and those whose faith was suspect.”