How readily such a system could be abused to gratify malevolence is indicated in the case of the Dominican Fray Alonso de las Roelas. In March, 1568, he made an utterance about purgatory which excited remark, and some of his brother frailes discussed it with him, when Fray Blas Merino, a prominent member of the Order, said that Roelas was simple and did not know what he said and that it was not for them to denounce him. Some years later, however, Blas Merino, in the hope of being made Provincial, was engaged in a sort of plot to get the Canaries separated from the Province of Andalusia and erected into a province of the Order. The Dominican authorities heard of this and Roelas was commissioned to seize all the papers connected with it and to notify Merino to abandon the project. To revenge himself Merino hunted up all the witnesses to Roela’s utterance and persuaded them to denounce him in 1572. Bishop Azólares, whose zeal for the Inquisition we have seen, said that the matter was not worth prosecuting, because Roelas did not deny purgatory, which was a matter of faith, while its place and the character of its torment were matters of debate with theologians. Nevertheless Roelas was arrested and tried, and, as usual during trial, he was recluded in the convent of his Order in Las Palmas. One midnight he came knocking at the door of the Inquisition; Fúnez was awakened and sent him word that it was no time for him to call and that he could come the next day. He did so and stated that his brethren so maltreated him, because he had once served as inspector of the house, that he asked to be placed in the secret prisons, a request which was granted, and he stayed there until sentenced. The sentence punished him with reclusion and he was delivered to the prior of the convent, when they at once commenced snarling and growling at each other like quarrelsome dogs. Fúnez rebuked the prior, telling him to avoid such public scandals and that he would send Roelas to the convent in Tenerife until the Provincial should decide as to his place of reclusion. Fúnez probably spoke from experience when he said that among frailes there was no restraint nor truth, but only envy.[314] * * * * *