[153] It was with great difficulty that this was obtained. Isabella, though a dutiful daughter of the Church, had a superior intellect and a tender heart; and both revolted against the proposed measure. Torquemada, who had been her confessor, was obliged to appeal to a promise she had made him, years before, to extirpate heresy, if she ever could. Even then, her assent was most reluctantly given. [154] By a previous law of Henry II., he had become punishable if he gave his children _Christian_ names. It must have been a hard matter to know what to call them. [155] The wholesale butchery of the Autos da Fé, as these executions were called, is one of their most shocking features. On the 4th of November, 1481, three hundred Jews were burned in Seville, and in other parts of the same province two thousand more. In Saragossa the two surviving inquisitors avenged the assassination of their colleague by two hundred deaths at the stake. [156] Don Isaac Abarbanel was born at Lisbon in 1437, and early gained the notice of Alphonso V. He was obliged to leave Portugal suddenly in 1482, having been suspected of taking part in Bragazza’s conspiracy against John II. He was kindly welcomed by Ferdinand and Isabella, who made him their Minister of Finance. In 1492, he was obliged to quit Spain along with his countrymen. He found refuge at Naples, where he was employed by Ferdinand and Alphonso II. He shared the exile of the latter monarch, and removed to Venice, where he died. [157] The charge of sordid indifference to the sufferings of others has always been made against the mediæval Jews; nor can it be denied that there is truth in the allegation. But it was only towards the Christians that this was displayed. To their own countrymen they have in all ages been generous and charitable in the extreme. Be it remembered what kind of charity had been shown _them_ by their Christian brethren, and that _they_ had not been taught ‘to do good unto them that persecute you.’ When the Jews at Rome were unwilling to receive their exiled brethren of Spain, Alexander VI. expressed the utmost surprise. ‘This is the first time,’ he said, ‘that I ever heard of a Jew not having compassion for a Jew.’ [158] Some of the stories related of the atrocities perpetrated on these miserable wretches are too shocking for repetition. They are related by several historians, but I think it better, for the credit of human nature, to suppress them. [159] It must be noted, however, that, although Alexander showed compassion to the fugitives, he made them pay a heavy price for his protection of them, and also bestowed on Ferdinand the title of ‘the Most Catholic,’ in requital of the banishment of the Jews from his dominions. CHAPTER XXVIII. A.D. 1400-1500. THE JEWS IN PORTUGAL.