We can readily see how the _periti_ or _boni viri_, who were called upon to decide the guilt or innocence of the accused from evidence considered in the abstract, without any knowledge of the prisoners' names or motives, could easily make mistakes. In fact, they did not have data enough to enable them to decide a concrete case. For tribunals are to judge criminals and not crimes, just as physicians treat sick people and not diseases in the abstract. We know that the same disease calls for a different treatment in different individuals; in like manner a crime must be judged with due reference to the mentality of the one Who has committed it. The Inquisition did not seem to understand this.[1] [1] Even in our day the jury is bound to decide on the merits of the case submitted to it, without regarding the consequences of its verdict. The foreman reminds the jurymen in advance that "they will be false to their oath if, in giving their decision, they are biased by the consideration of the punishment their verdict will entail upon the prisoner." The assembly of experts, therefore, instituted by the Popes did not obtain the good results that were expected. But we must, at least, in justice admit that the Popes did their utmost to protect the tribunals of the Inquisition from the arbitrary action of individual judges, by requiring the Inquisitors to consult both the _boni viri_ and the Bishops. Over the various penalties of the Inquisition, the Popes likewise exercised a supervision which was always just and at times most kindly. The greatest penalties which the Inquisition could inflict were life imprisonment, and abandonment of the prisoner to the secular arm. It is only with regard to the first of these penalties that we see the clemency of both Popes and Councils. Any one who considers the rough manners of this period, must admit that the Church did a great deal to mitigate the excessive cruelty of the medieval prisons. The Council of Toulouse, in 1229, decreed that repentant heretics "must be imprisoned, in such a way that they could not corrupt others." It also declared that the Bishop was to provide for the prisoners' needs out of their confiscated property. Such measures betoken an earnest desire to safeguard the health, and to a certain degree the liberty of the prisoners. In fact, the documents we possess prove that the condemned sometimes enjoyed a great deal of freedom, and were allowed to receive from their friends an additional supply of food, even when the prison fare was ample.