Next day, which was Sunday, Philip set friars and others to preach against the Templars in all the churches of Paris; and inquiries were afterwards carried on by bishops and other judges as to the truth of the charges against them. While the trials were going on, the Templars were very hardly used. All that they had was taken away from them, so that they were in grievous distress. They were kept in dungeons, were loaded with chains, ill fed and ill cared for in all ways. They were examined by tortures, which were so severe that many of them were brought, by the very pain, to confess everything that they were charged with, although they afterwards said that they had been driven by their sufferings to own things of which they were not at all guilty. Many were burnt in companies from time to time; at one time no fewer than fifty-four were burnt together at Paris; and such cruelties struck terror into the rest. Some of the Templars on their trials told strange stories. They said, for instance, that some men on being admitted to the order were suddenly changed, as if they had been made to share in some fearful secrets; that, from having been jovial and full of life, delighting in horses and hounds and hawks, they seemed to be weighed down by a deep sadness, under which they pined away. It is not easy to say what is to be made of all these stories. As to the ceremonies used at admitting members, it seems likely enough that the Templars may have used some things which looked strange and shocking, but which really meant no harm, and were properly to be understood as figures or acted parables. The pope seems, too, not to have known what to make of the case; but, as we have seen, he had bound himself to serve King Philip in the matter of the Templars, in order that Pope Boniface's memory might be spared. At a great council held under Clement, at Vienne, in 1312, it was decreed that the order of the Temple should be dissolved; yet it was not said that the Templars had been found guilty of the charges against them, and the question of their guilt or innocence remains to puzzle us as it puzzled the Council of Vienne.