Under the Goths, Spain was no more exempt from heresies than she had been under the Romans. The first is that of Nestorius, respecting the mysterious union of the divine and human natures in Christ; but it was speedily repressed. The Manichæans and Priscillianists were not more successful; both Arians and Catholics united in banishing them: extirpation was reserved for later times. After the accession of Recared, when the Catholic religion became the only one in Spain, severe penalties were decreed against all who presumed to differ from the established faith. In the reign of Chintella, and in a council held at Toledo (the sixth), a decree was made that thenceforth none but Catholics should be allowed to remain in the country; and all succeeding kings were to swear that the Jews, the only misbelievers remaining, should not be tolerated. By a subsequent law this odious intolerance was more clearly and fatally defined. Under the penalty of confiscation of property and perpetual banishment, it prohibited all men, of whatever condition, whether natives or resident foreigners, ever to call in question, either in public or private, the holy Catholic and apostolic faith, the evangelic institutions, the definitions of the fathers, the decrees of the church, whether ancient or recent, the sacraments, or anything whatever which that church held as holy. After these decrees the poor Jews could expect little mercy; they had never, indeed, enjoyed much security since the Roman domination. Sisibut, Sisenando, Chintella, Cindasuinto, Recesuinto, Wamba, and Ervigius were the most eager rivals in the race of persecution. They decreed that the Jews should be baptised; that such as were baptised should not be allowed to have Christian servants; that they should observe Easter Sunday according to the Christian rite; that they should respect the matrimonial impediments already noticed; that they should eat whatever Christians ate, however solemnly forbidden in their own law; that they should neither read nor receive into their houses any book contrary to the Christian religion; that they should not be admissible to any civil offices; that their evidence should not be received in a court of justice, unless ample testimony were borne to their moral habits; that when travelling they should make their confession of faith, and exhibit an episcopal passport at every town they entered; that they should spend every Sunday in company with Christians, who should then witness their devotions; and that they should always be present whenever the catechism was repeated or expounded.