THE SPANISH INQUISITION. PART NINE
The power of the Inquisition waxed and waned according to the strength or weakness, and the piety and religious bigotry of the reigning monarch: and his or her dependence upon it for finance. With that nauseating hypocrisy that was so typical of the Inquisition, when the Treasury was depleted confiscations became more severe, and more wide-ranging. Throughout its history the Inquisition was the second power in the land: a state-within-a-state; only the monarchs themselves immune from its baleful... Sign in to see full entry.