308 POLITICAL HERESY. — THE STATE. articles as furnished by the pope, which they unanimously denied. The question was then put to the council whether they should be tortured, and it was answered in the negative, in spite of the oppo- sition of two Dominican inquisitors present. It was decided that the case should not be referred to the pope, in view of the nearness of the Council of Yienne, but that the accused should be put upon their purgation. The next day, however, when the council met this action was reversed and there was a unanimous decision that the innocent should be acquitted and the guilty punished, reckon- ing among the innocent those who had confessed through fear of torture and had revoked, or who would have revoked but for fear of repetition of torture. As for the Order as a whole, the coun- cil recommended that it should be preserved if a majority of the members were innocent, and if the guilty were subjected to abju- ration and punishment within the Order. In addition to the seven knights there were five brethren who were ordered to purge themselves by August 1, before Uberto, Bishop of Bologna, with seven conjurators; of these the purgations of two are extant, and doubtless all succeeded in performing the ceremony. It was no wonder that Clement was indignant at this reversal of all in- quisitorial usage and ordered the burning of those who had thus relapsed — though the command was probably not obeyed, as Bishop Bini assures us that no Templars were burned in Italy. The council further, in appointing delegates to Yienne, instructed them that the Order should not be abolished unless it was found to be thoroughly corrupted. For Tuscany and Lombardy, Clement appointed as special inquisitors Giovanni, Archbishop of Pisa, Antonio, Bishop of Florence, and Pietro Giudici of Rome, a canon of Yerona. These were instructed to hold the inquests, one upon the brethren individually and one upon the Order. They were troubled with no scruples as to the use of torture and, as we shall presently see, secured a certain amount of the kind of testi- mony desired. Yenice kindly postponed the inevitable uprooting of the Order, and when it eventually took place there was no un- necessary hardship.*
- Regest. Clement. PP. Y T. IV. p. 301. — Bini, pp. 420-1, 424, 427-8.—
Raynald. ann. 1309, Xo. 3. — Raynouard, pp. 273-77. — Cbron. Parmens. ann. 1309 (Muratori S. R, I. IX. 880).— Du Puy, pp. 57-8.— Rubei Hist. Ravennat. Ed.
