He combined a versatility of talent usually found only in softer and more flexible characters. Though bred in the cloister, he distinguished himself both in the cabinet and the camp. For the latter, indeed, so repugnant to his regular profession, he had a natural genius, according to the testimony of his biographer; and he evinced his relish for it by declaring that "the smell of gunpowder was more grateful to him than the sweetest perfume of Arabia!" In every situation, however, he exhibited the stamp of his peculiar calling; and the stern lineaments of the monk were never wholly concealed under the mask of the statesman or the visor of the warrior. He had a full measure of the religious bigotry which belonged to the age; and he had melancholy scope for displaying it, as chief of that dread tribunal over which he presided during the last ten years of his life. The accession of the grandson of Ferdinand and Isabella to the Spanish throne as Charles I (better known as the Emperor Charles V), seemed to foreshadow a change in the relations of the Inquisition and the state. The young sovereign was born in Ghent and was more Fleming than Spaniard. Though his grandfather left in his will solemn injunctions "to labour with all his strength to destroy and extirpate heresy" and to appoint ministers "who will conduct the Inquisition justly and properly for the service of God and the exaltation of the Catholic faith, and who will also have great zeal for the destruction of the sect of Mahomet," it was reported that he sympathised with the critics of the Inquisition and was disposed to curtail its activity. The influence of his old tutor, Adrian of Utrecht, whom he commissioned inquisitor-general, first of Aragon, and, after the death of Ximenes, of Castile also, changed him however into a strong friend and staunch supporter of the institution. Cardinal Manrique, who followed as inquisitor-general, was a man of more kindly disposition, charitable and a benefactor to the poor. He was inclined to relax the severities of the Holy Office but it was urged upon him that heresy was on the increase on account of the appearance of Lutheran opinions and the bitterest persecution was more than ever essential. Protestants began to appear sporadically and called for uncompromising repression. The writings of Luther, Erasmus, Melancthon, Zwingli, and the rest of the early reformers were brought into Spain, but the circulation was adjudged a crime, though Erasmus had once been a favourite author.