Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. I.djvu/386

242 THE INQUISITION. I'AKT Such was the condition of the Spanish Jews at '- — the accession of Ferdinand and Isabella. The new at tTie acces- Ckristiajis, OY coTiverts, as those who had renounced !-i"ii of Isa- Mia. |.}jg faith of their fathers were denominated, were occasionally preferred to high ecclesiastical digni- ties, which they illustrated by their integrity and learning. They were intrusted with municipal offices in the various cities of Castile ; and, as their wealth furnished an obvious resource for repairing, by way of marriage, the decayed fortunes of the nobility, there was scarcely a family of rank in the land, whose blood had not been contaminated at some period or other, by mixture with the jnala sangre, as it came afterwards to be termed, of the house of Judah ; an ignominious stain, which no time has been deemed sufficient wholly to purge away. '^ Notwithstanding the show of prosperity enjoyed by the converted Jews, their situation was far from secure. Their proselytism had been too sudden to be generally sincere ; and, as the task of dissimula- tion was too irksome to be permanently endured, they gradually became less circumspect, and exhib- ited the scandalous spectacle of apostates returning 1416, 1433. — Zurita, Anales, cd with those of the Inquisition torn. iii. lib. 12, cap. 45. have not been wholly able to sup- 19 Bernaldez, Reyes Cat61icos, press. Copies of it, however, are MS., cap. 43. — Llorente, Hist, now rarely to be met with. (Do- de rinquisition, pref. p. 26. — blado, Letters from Spain, (London, A manuscript entitled TYzon dc 1822,) let. 2.) Clemencin notices Espana, (Brand of Spain,) tracing- two works with this title, one as up many a noble pedigree to a ancient as Ferdinand and Isabella's Jewish or Mahometan root, obtain- time, and both written by bishops, ed a circulation, to the great scan- Mem. dc la Acad, de Hist., torn, dal of the country, which the vi. p. 125. efforts of the government, combin-