Freedom of thought, speech, or action was dead. Intellectual culture was soon to be succeeded by monasticism, and material prosperity by mendicity. Meanwhile the value of Ferdinand and Isabella’s Hebrew subjects could not but have been realised immediately on their departure. The Spanish Government, prompted by the Spanish Church, had said to the Jews: “Be baptized or be gone!” The Jews went, and the life of Spain went with them. Stately mansions fell into mossy decay, rich cornfields and vineyards were turned into waste land, busy and populous cities were suddenly silenced as by a magician’s black art. In return, Spain nursed the cold comfort of having served the cause of the gloomy and bloodthirsty monster that the age called God. Nothing throws a clearer light on the spirit of the times than the comments of contemporary writers on Ferdinand and Isabella’s suicidal policy. The Spanish historians join in a chorus of indiscriminate panegyric; the Spanish poets sing pæans to the triumph of the Faith. Foreign spectators, while deprecating the severity of the methods employed, have nothing but praise for the motive. They all applaud the deed as a sacrifice of temporal to spiritual interests. It is true that Ferdinand’s treasury was the richer for the confiscated property of the Jews. But, though lust for plunder may be regarded as the mainspring of his own policy, it was not the primary motive of the Dominicans, nor had it any share in Isabella’s conduct. This amiable princess has laid her soul bare in the confession: “In the love of Christ and his maiden mother I have caused great misery, and have depopulated towns and districts, provinces and kingdoms.” The expulsion of the Jews, like the _autos-da-fé_, was a crime committed principally _por amor de Dios_. CHAPTER XI AFTER THE EXPULSION TWELVE thousand of Spanish fugitives sought shelter in Navarre, where, after a few years’ peace, they were again confronted with the alternatives of baptism or banishment. Most of them, worn out with distress and disappointment, adopted Christianity, and some of these converts returned to Spain.