In 1194, Cardinal Gregory St. Angelo instigated Alphonso II., King of Aragon, to publish an edict banishing heretics of all sects indiscriminately from his states; and Peter II., son of Alphonso, published another in 1197, with nearly the same injunctions, which proves that the former edict had little effect. CHAPTER II. ESTABLISHMENT OF A GENERAL INQUISITION AGAINST HERETICS IN THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY. In 1203, Pope Innocent III. commissioned Peter de Castelnau and Ralph, two monks of the order of Cistercians, in the monastery of Fontfroide, in Narbonnese Gaul, to preach against the Albigenses. Their exhortations were not in vain, and the success of their mission was a favourable introduction to a plan which Pope Innocent had formed of instituting inquisitors independent of the bishops, with the privilege of prosecuting heretics, as delegates of the holy see. On the 4th of June, in the seventh year of his pontificate, he named the abbot of the Cistercians, with Peter and Ralph, apostolical legates. He gave them full powers to prosecute all heretics; and to facilitate the execution of the orders of the holy see, they were to engage in the name of the pope, Philip II., King of France, his son, and all his nobles, to pursue the heretics, and to promise them full indulgences as a recompense for their zeal. The pope invested these monks with the necessary powers to enable them to destroy or establish whatever they might judge to be favourable to their design, in the ecclesiastical provinces of Aix, Arles, Narbonne, and other bishoprics where heretics might be found, only recommending that they should apply to the holy see in all difficult cases; at the same time he wrote to Philip, requesting him to assist his commissioners, and even, if it was necessary, to send the presumptive heir to his throne with an army against the heretics. The legates encountered many difficulties, because their mission was displeasing to the bishops. The King of France took no part in the affair, but the Counts of Toulouse, Foix, Beziers, Cominges, and Carcassone, and the other nobles of these provinces, seeing that the Albigenses had singularly increased, and persuaded that a very small number would be converted, refused to banish them from their states, as it would lessen the population, and, consequently, be against their interests: an additional motive for this refusal was, that these heretics were all peaceful and submissive subjects.