IF the kings of the House of Austria had displayed zeal in diminishing the range of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, the Bourbon monarchs, with their accentuated ideal of absolutism, were even more insistent in that respect. The kings were assisted by elements to which they themselves were otherwise hostile, such as the Jansenists[63] and the encyclopedists, whose partisans furnished arguments for the royal authority, because they opposed the rule of the church. Nevertheless, the monarchical ideal of the kings was sufficient to induce them to attack the church, except as concerned the purely spiritual interests of the Catholic religion, and the absolute patronage which the kings enjoyed in the Americas became the model of what they wished to establish in Spain. There were two principal angles to the problem, that of overcoming the intervention of the popes in the affairs of the Spanish church, and that of lessening the power and the privileges of the Spanish clergy. As for the intervention of the popes, they exercised the right of appointment to Spanish benefices which became vacant in any of the so-called eight “apostolic months,” and also to those vacated in the four “ordinary months” (March, June, September, and December) if the death of the holder occurred at Rome; considerable sums of money were also collected for papal dispensations to marry, papal pardons, and other papal acts of an irregularly recurring character, although government officials charged that a large part of these moneys remained in the hands of Spanish and Italian intermediaries without reaching the coffers of the pope; the tribunal of the nunciature, despite the provisions of the papal brief of 1537, had come to be composed of foreign priests, and besides exercising its judicial functions independently of the royal courts administered the rents of vacant benefices (vacantes), which gave rise to accusations of abuses in the management of the funds; the tribunal of the Cruzada, for the collection of the tax of that name, was still in papal hands, although the income had frequently in the past been granted to the kings of Spain; and finally, there existed the old question of the pase regio, about the necessity for royal consent prior to the publication of papal bulls and briefs, or in fact even for the delivery of pontifical letters. As concerned the relations with the local clergy, the kings were preoccupied with such matters as the great numbers of churchmen (especially the regular clergy), the immunities they enjoyed, the immensity of their landed estates held in mortmain, the extent of the right of asylum in ecclesiastical edifices, and the power of the Inquisition and, far more, that of the Jesuits.

The conflict with the papacy began at the outset of the reign of Philip V, for the popes favored the candidacy of the Archduke Charles to the Spanish throne. Philip V expelled the nuncio, suspended the court of the nunciature, and gave orders against the circulation of papal bulls in Spain. These measures were only temporary, during the course of the war. Nevertheless, Alberoni, who restored matters to their former basis, had occasion, even though he was a cardinal himself, to banish the newly appointed nuncio. Finally, an agreement was reached in the concordat of 1737 from which the crown obtained some advantages, such as the suppression of the right of asylum in some cases and its restriction in others, the limitation of the number of churchmen with rights of personal immunity, and the giving of guarantees against false allegations with a view to extending the immunities of church estates, together with the derogation of this right for such properties as the church should acquire in future. The concordat satisfied nobody, and moreover most of its provisions were not observed. When Ferdinand VI ascended the throne, he took steps to procure a more acceptable arrangement, for though an exceedingly devout Catholic he was unbending as concerned matters affecting the royal authority. The result was a fresh concordat with the pope, dated 1753. Several important rights were gained at this time: in return for a heavy money indemnity Ferdinand obtained a recognition of the royal right of patronage in appointments to all church offices, except some fifty-two dignities and the naming of bishops to benefices vacated in the four “ordinary months”; various kinds of papal taxes were renounced in favor of Spain; the tax of the cruzada was granted in perpetuity to the crown; and the right of exemption from the taxation of lands held in mortmain was abolished. Nevertheless, the partisans of royalty were not yet satisfied.

Charles III was a pious Catholic, but carried the reform movement against the church further than any of his predecessors. The first step was taken as a result of a papal brief against a book written by Mesenghi, a French theologian. When the Spanish Inquisition was about to publish the condemnatory document, the king issued a decree of prohibition. This was followed by royal orders of 1761 and 1762 making the following enactments: that no papal bull, brief, or other pontifical letter should be allowed to circulate or be obeyed, whatever might be its subject-matter, unless it should previously have been presented to the king, or in certain cases of lesser moment to the Consejo, so that a decision might be reached whether it interfered with the royal prerogative, before a license to publish would be granted; that the Inquisition should publish only such edicts as were forwarded to it by the king; and that it should condemn no book without giving the author a chance to defend himself. Through the influence of his mother, Isabel Farnesio, Charles was persuaded to suspend these decrees, but they were put into effect in 1768 when the pope issued a bull censuring the Bourbon Duke of Parma, a relative of Charles III, for his application of the pase regio in his domain. A further step was taken in 1771, when the pope consented to the reform of the nunciature, whereby that tribunal, henceforth called the Rota, was to be composed of six Spanish judges nominated by the king and appointed by the pope. A great many measures were also undertaken in this reign to subject the Spanish clergy to the royal authority, and to better economic and religious conditions. The following enactments were representative of this phase of the royal policy: the recourse of fuerza was frequently employed in cases of conflict of laws between the civil and the ecclesiastical courts, and the jurisdiction of the former was favored; a law of 1766 required bishops to exercise vigilance to see that priests should say nothing against the government or the members of the royal family, and even the alcaldes were given authority to assist in this regard in conserving the good name of the state and its rulers; the rights of asylum in churches and the personal immunities of churchmen were limited, as by a law of 1774, according to which such rights were not to obtain in the case of those guilty of participation in riots; in 1780 it was ordered that the profits of vacant rural benefices should be applied to the repair of churches of the diocese or to the repopulation of abandoned districts; bishops were prohibited by a law of 1781 from appointing vicars without the prior consent of the king; an attempt was made in 1786 to do away with the custom of burying deceased persons in churches, but the effort was unsuccessful, owing to the opposition of the clergy; in the same year ecclesiastical judges were forbidden to handle the temporal aspects of matrimonial cases, being restricted to decisions affecting the canonical bonds established by marriage; and in 1787 all cases of smuggling were removed from the jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical courts, even though a churchman were involved. In the reign of Charles IV there were intervals when the church was less rigorously dealt with, but the majority of the ministers followed the tradition of their predecessors.

There had been many complaints against the Inquisition in the period of the Hapsburg kings, but they became more frequent in the far more tolerant eighteenth century, and now that the monarchs no longer regarded the danger of heresy as serious they were reinforced by the royal policy of reducing all outstanding phases of authority. The conflict with the Inquisition was fought out over the following issues: questions of jurisdiction between the civil courts and that of the Inquisition; abuse of power by the Inquisition, which was accused of using its authority in matters of religion as a political arm; decrees of the Inquisition inconsistent with those of the king, or failures to observe the royal claims of a right to apply the pase regio; arbitrary condemnations of books by the Inquisition; and the extraordinary amplitude of cases falling within the purview of its tribunals, such as those of usury, smuggling, the importation of coin into the kingdom, and the raising of horses, all of which were far removed from the primary objects of the institution. Not much was done until the reign of Charles III. That monarch had already shown himself hostile to the Inquisition while king of Naples, prior to his accession to the throne of Spain. One of his earliest acts as king of Spain was the banishment of the inquisitor general when the latter protested against the royal edict in the already mentioned Mesenghi case, followed by the legislation of 1761 and 1762 referred to above. When the inquisitor was allowed to return, Charles warned the other officers of the Inquisition not to disobey the king in future. In 1770 many of the cases of a secular character were removed from inquisitorial jurisdiction, and in 1784 it was ordered that all processes against grandees or the ministers or employes of the king should be submitted to the monarch. The reduction of the Inquisition was carried still further under Charles IV. Godoy, Jovellanos, and Urquijo thought of abolishing it, but fortunate turns in the political situation intervened to postpone such action. It was provided in 1799 that no subject of the king should be arrested by the Inquisition without royal authorization, and the methods of trial employed by that institution were modified in the interests of doing away with the former secrecy and the seclusion of the accused. In 1804 the king banished several members of the Inquisition who had opposed the freeing of an individual whom one of the lesser branches of that organization had pronounced guiltless. Its decline was also evidenced by the falling off in its revenues as compared with the yield of earlier times. Many of its buildings were in a state of bad repair, and its employees often died in poverty. Nevertheless, its properties were said to be worth nearly 170,000,000 reales (over $10,000,000) at the end of the era, and a state offer of 2,000,000 a year ($125,000), in exchange for its right to confiscate the goods of persons convicted of crimes against religion, was refused. In addition, there was the wealth of the Inquisition in the colonies; the great German traveler and naturalist, Alexander von Humboldt, estimated that the annual income of the Inquisition in New Spain alone was 800,000 reales ($50,000). Although the Inquisition of the eighteenth century had but a shadow of its former power, it was able to bring influential persons to trial, including great churchmen, members of the higher nobility, and ministers of state, but it did not always take effective action in these cases. Godoy was accused on three occasions, being charged with atheism, immorality, and bigamy, but the queen would not consent to his arrest, and he was able to procure the banishment of several of those who had intervened in this matter.

The case of the Jesuit order was similar to that of the Inquisition, but the result of royal action was even more decisive. The hostility to the Jesuits in Catholic countries, already very great in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, was even more intense in the eighteenth. The other religious orders and the secular clergy were almost a unit in opposing them, for the Jesuits occupied a dominant place in church affairs, and were charged with tyrannizing over the others both in matters of theology and in questions of a temporal character. The ranks of their enemies were swelled by the continued adhesion of the universities to the Jesuit opposition and by the encyclopedists. The former complained because the youth were attending the Jesuit colleges, especially the nobility, from whom the leading ministers of state were chosen, thus continuing the Jesuit influence, while those who were more or less addicted to encyclopedist views were hostile to the order both because of its power in the church and because of its partisanship in favor of papal jurisdiction and authority. In defending themselves the Jesuits had the support of many royal ministers and of the kings themselves for over half a century; Philip V and Ferdinand VI as well as Isabel Farnesio and the children of Charles III had Jesuit confessors. Furthermore, the once hostile Inquisition became an instrument in Jesuit hands when that order got control of the institution. Finally, the Jesuits had achieved vast power as a result of their hold on the affections of great numbers of the people, high and low, and in consequence of the extraordinary wealth which they had accumulated.

It was not until the reign of Charles III that any effective action was taken against them. While yet king of Naples, Charles had demonstrated his lack of cordiality toward the Jesuit order, and had begun to feel a suspicion, in common with other European monarchs, that the Jesuits might prove to be a danger to the state; in view of the actual power which the Jesuits possessed, it is not to be wondered at that the ultra-absolutist statesmen and kings of the eighteenth century should look upon them with disfavor. In the very year that Charles became king of Spain they were expelled from Portugal, and in the years 1764 to 1767 similar action was taken in France. The accession of Charles was a blow to the Jesuits in Spain, who now lost their influential place at court. Four events of a political character tended to increase the feeling of hostility toward them. One of these occurred in the reign of Ferdinand, when the Jesuits of Paraguay opposed the cession of that territory to Portugal in exchange for Sacramento. The Indians of Paraguay rose in rebellion against the transfer, and it was believed that the Jesuits were in some way concerned. The second of the events was the attempted assassination of the kings of Portugal and France, which was attributed to the Jesuit order on account of the hostility of those monarchs to the Jesuits. Many were of the opinion that Charles might be in danger of a like fate. In the third place friction arose between Charles and the Jesuits as a result of the former’s advocacy of the canonization of Juan de Palafox, a seventeenth century bishop of Puebla de los Ángeles in New Spain. The Jesuits opposed the king in this matter, and even procured the removal from the palace of the works of Palafox which Charles had given to members of his family. The fourth matter was of far more consequence,—the riots of 1766 at the time when the proposals of Squillace with regard to the modification of Spanish dress were enacted into law. On that occasion there was grave disorder in Madrid, including an attack on the king’s guards, a number of whom were cruelly put to death. The king was obliged to yield to the demands of the mob, and a few days later unexpectedly left Madrid for Aranjuez,—a virtual flight, taken as a measure of precaution. Not only in Madrid, but also in Saragossa, Cuenca, Guadalajara, Alicante, Salamanca, Daroca, Tobarra, MombeltrÁn, Murcia, San LÚcar, Huesca, Borja, San Ildefonso, Azcoytia, Villena, Ciudad Real, Jumilla, CoruÑa, Alcaraz, Quero, Las Mesas, Aranjuez, Palencia, and Navalcarnero there were similar outbreaks, and it seemed likely that Barcelona might also give trouble. In fine, there appeared to be an organized attempt at rebellion, and Charles and his ministers believed, or at least pretended to believe, that the Jesuits were behind it. Most probably the order itself did not promote the riots, although several of its members were compromised, but late in 1766 it was formally charged with responsibility by the Consejo. In January, 1767, the Consejo proposed the expulsion of the Jesuits from Spain. The matter was submitted to a special junta, or council, which concurred in the recommendation of the Consejo, after which the decision was presented to various ecclesiastical personages, who likewise expressed their approval. It was decided, however, to say nothing of the motives, and the part of the proceedings concerning them has disappeared. Nevertheless, a document of Campomanes is at hand summing up some of the charges made at the meeting of the Consejo. They were the following: responsibility for the Squillace riots; the diffusion of maxims contrary to the royal and the canon law; a spirit of sedition (of which some evidence was introduced); treasonable relations with the English in the Philippine Islands; monopolization of commerce and excess of power in the Americas; a too great pride, leading them to support the doctrines of Rome against the king; advocacy by many Jesuit writers of the right of tyrannicide; political intrigues against the king; and aspiration for universal monarchy. While the evidence in support of these charges is no longer available, it is clear that they were exaggerated, or even without foundation,—at least in the case of their supposed relations with the English. On the other hand, the intensely royalist ministers of the era of the enlightened despotism would have felt grave concern where a more democratic age might have found no cause for worry. Some historians claim that Charles hesitated to sign the decree, because the Jesuit general was said to have threatened the publication of documents purporting to show that the king was the illegitimate son of Isabel Farnesio and Alberoni, and others assert that Charles was given reason to believe that the Jesuits planned to assassinate him and the members of his family if the expulsion were promulgated. Whatever the truth may be, he delayed only a few days, signing the decree on February 27, 1767. The Count of Aranda was charged with its execution, and proceeded to fulfill that duty with great secrecy and despatch, so that the blow should fall simultaneously and without warning in all parts of Spain’s dominions. Never was a decree more carefully carried out. On the night of March 31 in Madrid, and on the next night in the provinces, the Jesuits were surprised in their establishments and told that they must leave Spain. There were at this time 2746 Spanish Jesuits in 120 institutions, scattered through 117 towns. In the Americas the decree was carried out later in the same year or early in 1768, and in some cases there was popular resistance to their expulsion, although no untoward incidents of that character had occurred in Spain. Without consulting the pope, Charles decided to send the Jesuits to the Papal States, although on the eve of the expulsion he informed the pope of his intention, promising also to pay the Jesuits enough to permit them to live in a fitting manner. Despite the pope’s entire sympathy with the Jesuits, there were reasons why he did not wish them to land in his territory, and when the boats which were carrying them arrived off Civita Vecchia, the port of Rome, Cardinal Torrigiani ordered them to keep away, threatening to open fire on them if they should not. Thereupon, they went to Corsica, where the Jesuits were landed, being joined later by their American brethren. Finally, the pope consented to their establishing themselves in Bologna and Ferrara, where some ten thousand from Spain and the Americas found a haven,—much against the will of the secular clergy of those places. Charles now set about to procure the dissolution of the order, and in this he was aided by the kings of Portugal, France, and Naples, from which last-named country the Jesuits had also been expelled late in 1767. In 1773 their efforts were at length successful, as a result, very largely, of the skillful diplomatic achievements of Jose MoÑino, Spain’s special representative at the papal court. For his work in this matter MoÑino was rewarded with the title of Count of Floridablanca.

One of the leading preoccupations of the kings in dealing with the Spanish clergy was to reduce the immunities of a financial character which they enjoyed. Ever since the thirteenth century, efforts had been made with that object in view, and considerable success had been attained by the Hapsburg kings, while the attempts of the Bourbon monarchs to check the acquisition of lands by the church or to render at least a portion of them subject to taxation have already been traced in the chapter on social institutions. A great deal remained to be done, however, before the church would be reduced to the level of the bourgeois class in the payment of tributes. For a proper appreciation of this subject it is necessary to bear in mind the many sources of income of the Spanish church. In addition to the profits from their lands, cattle, and quit-rents (censos), churchmen received tithes (diezmos), first-fruits (primicias), fees for masses, marriages, funerals, and burials, alms for the mendicant orders, gifts, and still other forms of contributions from persons and lands not under their economic control. Their seigniorial rights were still extensive, for as late as 1787 there were 3148 towns of one type or another under their rule. To be sure, portions of these revenues were already being paid to the crown, while many former ecclesiastical earnings had altogether disappeared, or had been taken over by the state. In some places the clergy were subject to certain taxes, and in others they were not; in Castile churchmen paid part of the alcabala; in Catalonia they paid all the royal tributes. The laws of the century displayed a consistent intention on the part of the kings to reduce their financial immunities still further. Thus in 1721 the clergy of Castile and the Canaries were required to pay customs duties which had not previously been exacted from them; in 1737 a tax of thirty-three per cent was levied on all new landed possessions of the church in Valencia; in the concordat of the same year the pope granted that all lands thenceforth coming into the possession of ecclesiastical institutions might be taxed in the same manner as those of lay individuals, if the king should so decide; when Charles III was about to ascend the Spanish throne, Pope Benedict XIV granted him the eventual subjection of the clergy to the same tributary basis as laymen; in 1763 the clergy of the crown of Aragon were ordered to pay the alcabala from that time forth; in 1765 churchmen in general were made subject to the military tax of the milicias (militia), and in 1780 the pope authorized the king to collect up to one third of the income of benefices to which the king had the right of nomination. These provisions were not carried out in full; there would no longer have been any financial question between the kings and the church if they had been. Aside from the royal gains of a legislative character the clergy were often induced, or compelled, to make special grants to the state in times of war, and occasionally they came forward of their own free will. When the Jesuits were expelled in 1767, their properties were confiscated, although the government announced that in applying the proceeds it would bear in mind the objects of donors to the Jesuits, the interests of religion, and public utility. Nothing definite is known as to the amount of wealth this yielded to the state, although it must have been considerable. Many writers have made fanciful estimates as to the Jesuit properties, especially with regard to their holdings in the Americas, some of them exaggerating their value, and others going to the opposite extreme to make them appear inconsequential. Nevertheless, despite the progress made by the Bourbons, the church was still enormously wealthy at the end of the era; it is said that their annual income reached 1,101,753,430 reales (about $70,000,000).

The statesmen and economists of the Bourbon era gave considerable attention to the problems arising from the great numbers of the clergy, taking steps to prevent an increase in the membership of religious orders and to bring about a reduction in the list of benefices and chaplaincies. The reign of Charles III was especially notable in this regard, and much was achieved. Still, though there were more churchmen and religious institutions in the Hapsburg period at a time when the population was not so great, there were 2067 convents for men and 1122 for women in 1787, with 61,998 who had taken vows and 71,070 others who had not (though living at the convents), besides 70,170 members of the secular clergy. Thus there were over 200,000 persons in religious service in a total population of about 10,400,000, or one for every fifty-two persons.[64] By 1797 the numbers had been materially lessened. At that time there were 93,397 men and women connected with the institutions of the regular clergy, in 2051 convents for men and 1075 for women, and 58,833 priests. In 1808 there were eight archbishoprics and fifty-two bishoprics in Spain, sustaining 648 dignitaries, 1768 canons, 216 prebends, and 200 half prebends.

The question of the numbers of the clergy was closely related to the never-ending problem of reform in the internal life of the church. While matters were not so bad as they had been in earlier times, and while Spanish churchmen compared very favorably with those of some other countries,—for example, those of France,—the necessity for correction was nevertheless clear. Despite the fact that the church furnished many of the most distinguished names of the era in intellectual attainments, the mass of the lower clergy was decidedly uncultivated. There was a marked relaxation in discipline. Many churchmen absented themselves from their livings to become hangers-on at court,[65] with the result that the kings seven times in less than fifty years expelled all priests from Madrid whose parishes were not in that city. It was also deemed necessary to pass laws forbidding clergymen to wear lay dress, for it was claimed that they used it as a disguise, enabling them the more easily to indulge in immoral practices. Many clergymen were punished for improper solicitations in the confessional. Steps toward reform were taken by the popes in 1723, 1737, and 1753,—the two latter times in connection with the concordats of those years. The measures of the pope provided rules for the instruction and discipline of the clergy and sought to diminish the numbers of clergymen and of benefices and chaplaincies.

Outwardly there was little difference between this period and the one before it in the persecution of heresy and the effort to attain religious unity. Both of these ideals continued to be proclaimed in the laws, and the Inquisition made its accusations and condemnations and published its indices of prohibited books as formerly, but in fact a great change had come over the spirit in which the laws were interpreted. Such a rigorous policy to stamp out heresy as that employed by Philip II in the Low Countries was no longer thinkable, and while the Hapsburg kings had based their international policy on the re-establishment of Catholic unity, cost what it might, the Bourbons completely abandoned that idea. The treaties of Westphalia in 1648 seemed to have settled the question of religious warfare, with an acknowledgment of the right of Protestant nations to exist apart from the Catholic Church. Henceforth, wars were to be for various objects, mainly political and economic in the eighteenth century, but not for religion.

The new spirit was manifested in, and was to some extent caused by, the frequency of communications between Catholics and Protestants or between Catholics and anti-church elements, such as the encyclopedists and Jansenists. In earlier times, such a correspondence would have been a serious religious crime which even the most prominent would have been afraid to attempt; now, it was not generally regarded as seriously reprehensible, though far from being looked upon with favor, and many churchmen themselves might have been held guilty if charges on this account had been brought. The quarrels of different factions in the church among themselves, notably the opposition to the Jesuits, and the intensely royalist policy of the kings tended in the same direction. Some evidences of the new attitude toward religion were also to be found in the laws. A treaty of 1713 with the Netherlands allowed Protestants of that country having business in Spain to reside in the peninsula, and a like privilege was granted to Spanish Catholics in the Netherlands. The asiento treaty with England in the same year did not, as had at first been proposed, restrict to Catholics the privileges thereby granted to Englishmen. A series of treaties with Morocco, Tripoli, Tunis, and Turkey in the reign of Charles III allowed of Catholic worship by Spaniards in those countries, and agreed that Moslems coming to Spain should be respected in their religion. A general law of 1797 provided that any foreign artist or artisan could establish himself in the peninsula, and in case he were not a Catholic he was not to be molested in his religious opinions. The Jews were excluded from the operation of the law, however. Charles III had been favorable to a policy of toleration toward them as well, and had issued a decree in 1741, when he was king of Naples, permitting of their entry into his kingdom, but public opinion was still too strongly opposed to them, and he was obliged to recall his decree. Two ministers of Charles IV, Urquijo and Varela, made a like proposal, but he did not dare to follow their advice; rather, he expressly declared in a decree of 1802 that the existing laws and practices with respect to the Jews should continue to be observed. The Inquisition directed its activities in this period to attacking the new philosophic and religious ideas and to defending itself as well as it could from the inroads of royalism, while there were still numerous processes against superstitious practices, Jewish worship, and the crimes of bigamy and notorious immorality. The number of cases before the Inquisition was not less than formerly, and not a few persons, especially Jews and Illuminati, were put to death. In general, however, greater leniency was displayed, and the Inquisition was no longer the much feared institution it once had been.

Nevertheless, both the clergy and the great majority of the people remained as intolerant as ever. Ignorance played no small part in this feeling; thus French priests expelled from their country at the time of the revolution were suspected of heresy, and the general opinion of the Spanish common people with regard to Frenchmen was that they were all not only heretics or atheists but also cannibals. The ideal of toleration hardly passed beyond the narrow circle of the upper classes, but it was they who decided the policy of the state; indeed, the attitude toward religion in this period perfectly exemplified the workings of the benevolent despotism. The very men who expressed tolerant views and framed legislation to that end were pious in their private life, furnishing numerous proofs thereof, every day. Thus Spaniards still gave a multitude of Christian names to their children, in order to procure for them the protection of many saints; they observed religious ceremonies, such as processions, baptisms, and saints’ days of individuals, as the most important events of social life; they prayed daily, and at the sound of the Angelus all work stopped, even theatrical performances, and every one bowed his head in prayer; phrases with a religious turn were a part of everyday speech; sacred images and chapels were as abundant as formerly; and in a thousand ways, from the king to the lowest peasant, men continued to manifest their devotion to the Catholic faith.