Under such circumstances quarrels with the secular authorities were perpetual and inevitable and were conducted on both sides with a violence attributable to the remoteness of the island and the little respect felt by either party for the other. A specimen of the spirit developed in these conflicts is afforded in a brief of Paul V, March 22, 1617, to Inquisitor-general Sandoval y Rojas, complaining bitterly of a recent outbreak in which the inquisitor excommunicated two officials and the royal court ordered him to absolve them. On his refusal, the court cited him to appear and sentenced him to exile--a decree which was published in Cagliari and elsewhere to sound of drum and trumpet. Then the governor intervened in support of the court, treating the inquisitor, if we may believe the _ex parte_ statement, with unprecedented harshness. He broke into the Inquisition with an armed force and ordered the inquisitor either to grant the absolutions or to go on board of a vessel about to sail for Flanders and, on his refusal, he was so maltreated as to be left almost lifeless on the floor. On a second intrusion he was found in bed with a fever; he still refused to embark and was left under guard, but he succeeded in escaping by a rope from a window and took asylum in the Dominican church, whither the governor followed him and seized him while celebrating mass, with the sacrament in his hands. This time he was kept in secure custody until he gave bonds to sail, after which, in fear of the voyage, he submitted and absolved the excommunicates. Paul summoned the governor and his accomplices to appear in Rome and undergo the penalty of their offences, but it may be doubted whether they were obliged to obey, for Spanish jealousy of the curia was quite as acute as indignation caused by invasion of inquisitorial inviolability and appeals to Rome were absolutely forbidden to all parties.[222] It was impossible to devise any permanent basis of pacification between the conflicting jurisdictions and, up to 1630, there were enumerated no less than seven Concordias, or agreements to settle their respective pretensions, in spite of which the disturbances continued as actively as ever.[223] * * * * *