5 66
ESSAYS ON LIBERTY
edition. From a letter lately brought to light in the A rchiv fÜr Geschichte des lVIittelalters, he infers that the decree of Clemen t V. affecting the privilege of inq uisi tors was tampered with before publication. A Franciscan writes from Avignon \vhen the ne\v canons were ready: "Inquisitores etiam heretice pravitatis restinguuntur et supponuntur episcopis "-which he thinks would argue something much more decisive thañ the regulations as they finally appeared. Ehrle, who publishes the letter, remarks that the \vriter exaggerated the import of the intended change; but he s ys it not of this sentence, but of the next preceding. Mr. Lea has acknowledged elsewhere the gravity of this Clementine reform. As it stands, it was considered injurious by inquisitors, and elicited repeated protests from Bernardus Guidonis: "Ex predicta autem ordinatione seu restrictione nonnulla incon- venientia consecuntur, que liberum et expeditum cursum officii inquisitoris tam in manibus dyocesanorum quam etiam inquisitorum diminuunt seu retardant. . . . Que apostolice sedis circumspecta provisione ac provida cir- cumspectione indigent, ut remedientur, aut moderentur in melius, seu pocius total iter suspendantur propter non nulla inconvenientia que consecuntur ex ipsis circa liberum et expeditum cursum officii inquisitoris." The feudal custom which supplied Beaumarchais \vith the argument of his play recruits a stout believer in the historian of the Inquisition, who assures uS that the authorities may be found on a certain page of his Sacer- dotal Celibacy. There, however, they may be sought in vain. Some dubious instances are mentioned, and the dissatisfied inquirer is passed on to the Fors de Béarn, and to Lagrèze, and is informed that M. Louis Veuillot raised an unprofit- able dust upon the subject. I remember that 1\1. Veuillot, in his boastful scorn for book learning, made no secret that he took up the cause because the Church was attacked, but got his facts from somebody else. Graver men than Veuillot have shared his conclusion. Sir Henry Maine, having looked into the matter in his quick, decisive way, declared that an j nstance of the droit du sei'g1zeur was as
