in fear, adopted Christianity.  It is said that in the fifteenth century the population counted some million of converts—­called New Christians, or, in contempt, Marranos:  a word which may probably be derived from the Hebrew Maranatha.  These converted Jews, by their ability and wealth, crept into high offices of state, obtained titles of aristocracy, and founded noble houses.  Their daughters were married with large dowers into the best Spanish families; and their younger sons aspired to the honors of the Church.  Castilian society was being penetrated with Jews, many of whom had undoubtedly conformed to Christianity in externals only.  Meanwhile a large section of the Hebrew race remained faithful to their old traditions; and a mixed posterity grew up, which hardly knew whether it was Christian or Jewish, and had opportunity for joining either party.

A fertile field was now opened for Inquisitorial energy.  The orthodox Dominican saw Christ’s flock contaminated.  Not without reason did earnest Catholics dread that the Church in Castile would suffer from this blending of the Jewish with the Spanish breed.  But they had a fiery Catholic enthusiasm to rely upon in the main body of the nation.  And in the crown they knew that there were passions of fear and cupidity, which might be used with overmastering effect.  It sufficed to point out to Ferdinand that a persecution of the New Christians would flood his coffers with gold extorted from suspected misbelievers.  No merely fabled El Dorado lay in the broad lands and costly merchandise of these imperfect converts to the faith.  It sufficed to insist upon the peril to the State if an element so ill-assimilated to the nation were allowed to increase unchecked.  At the same time, the Papacy was nothing loth to help them in their undertaking.  Sixtus V., one of the worst of Pontiffs, sat then on S. Peter’s chair.  He readily discerned that a considerable portion of the booty might be indirectly drawn into his exchequer; and he knew that any establishment of the Inquisition on an energetic basis would strengthen the Papacy in its combat with national and episcopal prerogatives.  The Dominicans on their side can scarcely be credited with a pure zeal for the faith.  They had personal interests to serve by spiritual aggrandizement, by the elevation of their order, and by the exercise of an illimitable domination.

It was a Sicilian Inquisitor, Philip Barberis, who suggested to Ferdinand the Catholic the advantage he might secure by extending the Holy Office to Castile.  Ferdinand avowed his willingness; and Sixtus IV. gave the project his approval in 1478.  But it met with opposition from the gentler-natured Isabella.  She refused at first to sanction the introduction of so sinister an engine into her hereditary dominions.  The clergy now contrived to raise a popular agitation against the Jews, reviving old calumnies of impossible crimes, and accusing them of being treasonable subjects.