were rarely men of adequate learning.  In a letter from Bartolommeo de Valverde, chaplain to Philip II., under date 1584, we read plain-spoken complaints against these subordinates.[122] ’Unacquainted with literature, they discharge the function of condemning books they cannot understand.  Without knowledge of Greek or Hebrew, and animated by a prejudiced hostility against authors, they take the easy course of proscribing what they feel incapable of judging.  In this way the works of many sainted writers and the useful commentaries made by Jews have been suppressed.’  A memorial to Sirleto, presented by Cardinal Gabriele Paleotti, points out the negligence of the Index-makers and their superficial discharge of onerous duties, praying that in future men of learning and honesty should be employed, and that they should receive payment for their labors.[123] These are the expostulations addressed by faithful Catholics, engaged in literary work demanded by the Vatican, to a Cardinal who was the soul and mover of the Congregation.  They do not question the salutary nature of the Index, but only call attention to the incapacity and ignorance of its unpaid officials.

[Footnote 121:  Dejob, De l’Influence, etc. p. 60.]

[Footnote 122:  Id. op. cit. p. 76.]

[Footnote 123:  Id. op. cit. p. 78.]

Meanwhile, it was no easy matter to appoint responsible and learned scholars to the post.  The inefficient censors proceeded with their work of destruction and suppression.  A commentator on a Greek Father, or the Psalms, was corrected by an ignoramus who knew neither Greek nor Hebrew, anxious to discover petty collisions with the Vulgate, and eager to create annoyances for the author.  Latino Latini, one of the students employed by the Vatican, refused his name to an edition of Cyprian which he had carefully prepared with far more than the average erudition, because it had been changed throughout by the substitution of bad readings for good, in defiance of MS. authority, with a view of preserving a literal agreement with the Vulgate.[124] Sigonius, another of the Vatican students, was instructed to prepare certain text-books by Cardinal Paleotti.  These were an Ecclesiastical History, a treatise on the Hebrew Commonwealth, and an edition of Sulpicius Severus.  The MSS. were returned to him, accused of unsound doctrine, and scrawled over with such remarks as ‘false,’ ’absurd.’[125]

[Footnote 124:  Dejob, op. cit. p. 74.]

[Footnote 125:  Id. op. cit. p. 54.]

In addition to the intolerable delays of the Censure, and the arrogant inadequacy of its officials, learned men suffered from the pettiest persecution at the hands of informers.  The Inquisitors themselves were often spies and persons of base origin.  ‘The Roman Court,’ says Sarpi, ’being anxious that the office of the Inquisition should not suffer through negligence in its ministers, has confided