No more splendid assembly ever met for the purpose of enforcing the gospel of divine mercy by the gratification of human vanity. The anti-pope Benedict XIII., clad in his pontifical robes, sat on a lofty throne, surrounded by cardinals and prelates refulgent with brocade of gold and gems. A thousand Spanish grandees thronged behind this glorious group, while before it stood a small band of Jews anxious to defend their faith, without imperilling their lives. The truth of Christianity was beyond cavil. The falsity of Judaism, after the advent of Christ, was equally clear. Does the Talmud recognise Jesus as the Messiah or not? That was the question which was debated in sixty-eight sittings extending over a period of twenty-one months. And so the ruin of the Jews was progressing satisfactorily. The originators of the persecution passed away one after the other. Benedict XIII. was deposed by the Council of Constance and denounced by Vincent Ferrer as an “unfrocked and spurious Pope.” The renegade Jew Geronimo vanished into his native obscurity. King Ferdinand died in 1416, and St. Vincent was translated to heaven three years later. But the tribulations of Israel did not cease. ♦1419♦ Pope Martin V., indeed, surprised the world with a Bull of toleration, dictated, as one would gladly have believed, by Christian charity; as documents prove, procured by bribery. But the plant of anti-Judaism had taken too deep roots to be permanently stunted by this tardy edict. ♦1442♦ Pope Eugenius IV. addressed another Bull to the Bishops of Castile and Leon, withdrawing the indulgences granted to the Jews by his predecessor, and he renewed all the old restrictions, adding that the unclean people should be confined to their houses during Holy Week. Autograph letters to the Castilian ecclesiastics exhorted them to enforce the Pontiff’s orders without mercy. ♦1447♦ Pope Nicholas V. aggravated all these measures of oppression.