In 1835 the massacres were renewed at Saragossa, Barcelona, Cordova and many other places. In 1836, a decree ordered the sale of all property belonging to the religious orders. After the religious--as is always the case--the secular clergy were attacked, and the churches everywhere throughout the land. Bishops and priests were banished; ecclesiastical property was pillaged or sold; the supremacy and rights of the Pope were set aside; in a word, the Catholic Kingdom saw the beginning of a national schism. _THE POPE PROTESTS._ Pope Gregory XVI., in 1836, protested against these persecutions, and the Government, awakened to some sense of shame, sent Vilalba to Rome to effect an agreement with the Holy See. The truce was but of short duration. In 1840 another revolution broke out, the result of which was the deposition of Christina, as regent, and the exaltation of the infamous Espartero in that capacity. The change was the signal for renewed hostilities against the Church, so that, in 1841, Pope Gregory XVI. was again moved to utter a vigorous protest. The Government replied by forbidding the publication of any Papal documents, and by confiscating what remained of the Church property. In January 20, 1842, a law was proposed having for its object the entire separation of the Spanish people from the influence of the Holy See. _PAPAL ENCYCLICAL._ The Pope replied to this proposal by a strong encyclical, in which he said: "In fact, it is determined by this law that no account of the Apostolic See shall be held by the Spanish nation; that all communication with it for all manner of graces, indults and concessions shall be intercepted, and that those who contravene this prescript shall be severely punished. It is also decreed that letters apostolic and other rescripts issued by the same Holy See, unless they shall have been demanded by Spain, shall not only not be kept, and be inefficacious, but that they shall be denounced to the civil authority in the shortest interval of time, by those whom they shall reach, that they may be delivered to the government; and for those who shall violate this prescript a penalty also is fixed. [Illustration: DON CARLOS DE BOURBON, DUKE OF MADRID.] "It is moreover ordained that impediments to matrimony shall be subject to the bishops, until a code of civil laws shall establish a distinction between the contract and the sacrament of matrimony; that no cause involving religious matters shall be sent from Spain to Rome; and that in no time shall a nuncio or legate of the Holy See be there admitted with the power of granting graces or dispensations, even gratuitously.