Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 3.djvu/326

 310 POLITICAL HERESY.-THE STATE. of the reports brought from France by his brethren after the arrest, and Simon de Sarezariis, Prior of the Hospitallers, said that he had had similar intelligence sent to him by his correspondents, but the evidence is unquestionable that in Cyprus, where they were best known, among friends and foes, and especially among those who had been in intimate relations with the Templars for long periods, there was general sympathy for the Order, and that there had been no evil attributed to it until the papal bulls had so unquali- fiedly asserted its guilt. All this, when sent to Clement, was nat- urally most unsatisfactory, and when the time approached for the Council of Vienne, he despatched urgent orders, in August, 1311, to have the Templars tortured so as to procure confessions. What was the result of this we have no means of knowing.* In Aragon, Philippe's letter of October 16, 1307, to Jayme II. was accompanied with one from the Dominican, Fray Romeo de Bruguera, asserting that he had been present at the confession made by de Molay and others. Notwithstanding this, on Novem- ber 17 Jayme, like Edward II., responded with warm praises of the Templars of the kingdom, whom he refused to arrest without absolute proof of guilt or orders from the pope. To the latter he wrote two days later for advice and instructions, and when, on December 1, he received Clement's bull of November 22, he could hesitate no longer. Eamon, Bishop of Valencia, and Ximenes de Luna, Bishop of Saragossa, who chanced to be with him, received orders to make in their respective dioceses diligent inquisition against the Templars, and Fray Juan Llotger, Inquisitor-general of Aragon, was instructed to extirpate the heresy. As resistance was anticipated, royal letters were issued December 3 for the immediate arrest of all members of the Order and the sequestration of their property, and the inquisitor published edicts summoning them be- fore him in the Dominican Convent of Valencia, to answer for their faith, and prohibiting all local officials from rendering them assist- ance. Jayme also summoned a council of the prelates to meet Jan- uary 6, 1308, to deliberate on the subject with the inquisitor. A number of arrests were effected ; some of the brethren shaved and nouard, p. 285.
 * Schottmuller, I. 457-69, 494 ; II. 147-400.— Du Puy, pp. 63, 106-7.— Ray-