No portion of Spanish annals presents such difficulties to historical research as that which relates to the condition of the Christians under the Moorish domination. Arab writers, usually so minute and circumstantial in their narratives, have scarcely mentioned the subject. The extraordinary conduct of the martyrs, who courted death by open violation of Moslem law, seems alone to have attracted their attention or deserved their notice. From this significant silence the inference would seem to be that the great mass of Christian tributaries were contented and peaceable. We learn from St. Eulogius and other eminent ecclesiastics that the majority of the conquered race had apostatized. It is with unconcealed feelings of sorrow and vexation that they refer to the widespread defection from the ancient faith. Even among those whose constancy was unshaken, the zealots were in a minority. It is not strange, therefore, that the Arabs should have considered the latter as irresponsible persons, whose offences, unpardonable under the Code of Islam, were punished because the law permitted the exercise of no discretion on the part of the magistrate. It is evident that those who solicited the honors of martyrdom were not regarded as representatives of either their sect or their nationality. The Moorish historians recount the voluntary sacrifice of those enthusiasts with every manifestation of wonder and pity. It was not until their obstinacy, provoking dissension and revolt, began to menace the safety of the government, that their language reveals a feeling of vindictiveness against their misguided tributaries.

On the other hand, little information of value is to be gleaned from the Christian chroniclers. Those who have related the events of their times were all members of the persecuted faction. Both contemporary and subsequent writers were blinded by prejudice and actuated by every motive of sectarian bigotry to the perversion of the truth. Prolix in their enumeration of the sufferings of martyrs, their accounts of all other occurrences are remarkable for extreme meagreness of detail. No descriptions are given of the social relations of the dominant and subject races; no direct mention is ever made of the thousand incidents constantly transpiring in the intercourse of the two peoples, trivial in themselves, yet most important in forming a correct idea of the character, the aspirations, and the life of a nation. Such matters, so interesting to posterity as depicting the manners of a class during a period conspicuous in history, were too insignificant for the pen of the monkish annalist, and must now be gathered at random from the narratives of other events, in the elucidation of which they have been casually and undesignedly mentioned. The works of these ecclesiastical writers are filled with errors. They are, as usual, overloaded with absurd legends and spurious miracles. It is apparent, even from a superficial perusal, that not only the sufferings, but the virtues of the saints whose lives they describe are largely fictitious and often exaggerated. To such authorities, therefore, little credit can be given by the historian.

No people mentioned in history ever attained to a high rank in the scale of civilization whose policy was founded on the systematic repression of religious opinions. Theological intolerance is the most serious of obstacles to intellectual progress. Among the great nations of antiquity, freedom in religious matters was generally conceded as a matter of right. Where invasions of that right occurred, they may almost invariably be traced to interference with the established government. The intimate connection of political and religious institutions in those times will readily account for occasional examples of apparent persecution. The most eminent Athenian statesmen not infrequently performed the functions of priest in the ceremonial of public worship. The title of Pontifex Maximus was one of the most honorable and coveted of the dignities of the Republic of Rome, and under the Empire it conferred additional distinction upon the attributes and the exercise of imperial power. Under that wise and politic dispensation, the gods of foreign countries were admitted into the national pantheon on an equal footing with the domestic divinities, and none could claim an excessive and undue pre-eminence in the national system. It was not until the Christians profaned the altars, and excited mutiny in the army, that their privileges were curtailed and their religious ceremonies interrupted. The conditions formerly prevailing were then revolutionized. Indulgence was followed by persecution. Persecution disclosed and produced tens of thousands of proselytes. The experience of the Christian sect suggested the perpetuation in its religious constitution of the incomparable political system of the empire, a measure which in the end contributed so largely to its success, its discipline, and its permanence. In no country subject to the authority of the Papacy were the effects of these advantages of imperial organization more apparent than in the Spanish Peninsula.

During the era of Visigothic supremacy the influence of the Church was paramount in every department of the civil administration. Its councils regulated the succession, framed the laws, chose the sovereign. Its servants dictated every measure of national policy. Its sanction imparted a sacred character to the royal edicts. Eminent prelates, who even in trivial matters never permitted the pretensions of their order to be subordinated to the interests of the crown, constituted in reality the supreme power of the state. They negotiated treaties. They participated in campaigns. They imposed and collected taxes. In repeated contests with the nobility they generally emerged victorious. Their intellectual acquirements, superficial as they were, gave them a decided advantage over their illiterate and often brutal antagonists. The authority they obtained by superior knowledge, craft, and energy was in time confirmed by habit and strengthened by prescription. That authority, based upon public veneration and extending through countless generations, has often been shaken, but never abolished. The disastrous effects of its abuse are apparent in every period of Spanish history for more than a thousand years.

At the time of the Arab invasion, the Visigothic hierarchy was at the summit of its importance and power. Its former adherence to the Arian heresy had engendered within it a spirit of independence, which was not relinquished with the return of the Spanish Church to the orthodox communion. The facility with which an entire people at the command of the monarch renounced the faith of their ancestors for unfamiliar and hitherto reprobated doctrines is one of the most extraordinary events in the annals of Christianity. Such a peaceful revolution, involving the most sacred interests of a numerous sect, affords incontestable proof of the slight hold possessed in those times by any religious dogma upon the popular mind. With the acceptance of the Athanasian creed was necessarily included the acknowledgment of Papal supremacy. The Gothic prelates, however, were never obsequious vassals of the Holy See. The Pope soon found that while he might solicit, he could not compel their obedience. His fulminations did not excite the terror in Spain which they did in other countries of Catholic Europe. Where he was not able to command, he was forced to flatter, to recommend, to temporize. A compact and powerful body of ecclesiastics, in whose hands were the government of their country and the election of its king, were naturally loath to submit to the arrogant dictation of a foreign potentate, whom their predecessors had regarded as a heretic, and whose faith they had adopted rather from policy than from sincere conviction.

The Spanish Church under the Visigoths was eminently worthy of the attention and the favor of the Holy Father. Its organization was thorough; its wealth enormous; its priesthood numerous and superior to their contemporaries in learning and ability; its national influence unrivalled. Its temples, in a country whose public monuments had least experienced the destructive effects of barbarian violence, exhibited in their noble proportions and harmonious decoration the expiring efforts of classic taste and genius. The superb edifices of imperial power, visible on every side, had been at once the inspiration and the models of the ecclesiastical architect. The churches and cathedrals of the seventh and eighth centuries afforded the best examples of the ambition and opulence of the omnipotent hierarchy. Their plan was usually that of the basilica. Their walls were incrusted with precious marbles. Their floors were of mosaic. In the apse, where stood the altar, the skill of the artist exhausted itself in elaborate carvings, paintings, and sculpture. The sacred vessels were of solid gold and silver. Offerings of untold value, the tribute of grateful convalescents, were suspended before the shrine. The accession of each sovereign was marked by the donation of a magnificent votive crown to the Cathedral of Toledo. The pomp of worship in the Visigothic metropolis exceeded that of all others, excepting Constantinople and Rome. Its religious processions equalled in splendor those which awakened the pious enthusiasm of the devout in the metropolitan churches of those two famous capitals. The greatest deference was paid to the sacerdotal dignity. The congregation, when not kneeling, stood during the service. The women, always veiled, occupied galleries by themselves. No priesthood in Christendom was treated with more respect, enjoyed more extensive privileges, or lived in greater luxury than the Gothic clergy of Spain.

With the Arab occupation this imposing fabric of spiritual and temporal grandeur fell to the ground. The power of the hierarchy, formerly unlimited, vanished in the twinkling of an eye. Its sacred edifices were seized and devoted to the sacrilegious uses of the conqueror. The precious furniture of its altars was deposited in the treasury of the khalif. Its revenues were confiscated. Many of its members fell victims to the rage of oppressed and injured vassals. Thousands of others fled almost penniless to Christian lands. Monks were enslaved and condemned to the performance of the most arduous and exhausting labors. Multitudes of nuns passed from the solitude and meditation of the cloister to the revelry and delights of the seraglio. In view of the popular opinions and prejudices of the time, it is not singular that this sudden and tremendous revolution should have been universally attributed to the vengeance of God.

When the first shock of conquest had passed, the overpowering terror inspired by the presence of the invaders subsided. They proved to be something very different from the incarnate demons which a distorted imagination had painted them. They were found to be lenient, generous, humane. The law of Mohammed had specifically designated the privileges of victory and the rights of the vanquished. The latter were not slow to recognize and accept the advantages arising from a speedy and unreserved submission, and were thus enabled to participate in the benefits of the civilization, almost from the very beginning inaugurated by their rulers.

The civil organization of the Christians under Moslem domination differed little from that under which they had been governed by the princes of Visigothic blood. The amount of tribute which permitted the free exercise of religious worship, the jurisdiction of their own tribunals, and the terms conferring the preservation and enjoyment of their national customs were definitely fixed by law. Each bishopric was assessed at the sum of one hundred ounces of silver annually, monasteries at fifty, churches at twenty-five. Individuals were classified according to their rank and possessions. The rich paid forty-eight dirhems, or thirty-two dollars, per annum; the middle class, twenty-five dirhems; the laborer, twelve. From owners of land a tax upon its products of twenty per cent., called the Kharadj, was collected. Apostasy was rewarded by the remission of the former; the latter, however, was never abrogated. Women, children, cripples, beggars, and monks were exempt from all enforced contributions. Except in cases of obstinate resistance, private property was untouched. The wealth of the churches, except that of such as were expressly mentioned in treaties, was legitimate spoil. Under the rule of the Visigoths, the ownership of chattels was only conditional, and they could not be alienated; under the Moors, that ownership was absolute. The condition of the serfs that cultivated the royal demesnes—whose area was so vast that they embraced the fifth part of all confiscated territory—was greatly ameliorated. They still surrendered thirty-three per cent. of the crops, as under their former masters; but they were freed from the frequent and arbitrary impositions which often deprived them of the entire fruits of their labor. The conquest had caused the division of the extensive estates held by the privileged classes, and obtained by centuries of extortion and cruelty, into innumerable farms, a condition which facilitated cultivation and increased agricultural wealth. Many of these lands, formerly devoted to pasturage and to the sports of the nobility, were now improved, and under the skilful efforts of Moorish industry yielded immensely profitable returns.

Each Christian community was rigidly isolated from its Moslem neighbors. In the large cities, the quarter inhabited by the tributaries was walled, and at sunset the gates were closed. A count of their own selection, who was generally of noble blood, discharged the functions of governor and collected the taxes, of which he rendered an account to the Divan. The proceedings of the judicial tribunals were conducted by Christian magistrates under the forms of Visigothic law. All disputes between Christians were decided there, and criminals paid the penalty of their misdeeds as prescribed by the ancient statutes. No sentence of death, however, could be executed without the approval of the Moslem authorities. Suits in which a Mohammedan was a party, and prosecutions where he was either the participant in, or the victim of, a crime, were removed from the jurisdiction of the Christian courts. The Code of Islam prescribed certain regulations to be observed by all tributaries, and obedience to which was a consideration for the protection which the latter enjoyed. Blasphemy of the Prophet or of his religion, entrance into a mosque, and apostasy were capital offences. Upon these points the law was inexorable. Violation of the chastity of a Moslem woman was also punishable with death, a penalty which, however, might be averted by the offender embracing the Mohammedan faith. The repetition of the familiar formula of Islam, even in jest, carried with it a renunciation of all former creeds, and an assumption of the responsibilities of a believer which could never thereafter be relinquished. These laws, while apparently of a religious character, were, owing to the Moslem constitution which united the functions of both spiritual and temporal sovereignty, vitally necessary to the dignity and maintenance of government. Christian fanatics, blinded by prejudice and eager for martyrdom, regarded them as unreasonable and tyrannical restrictions, whose public violation was a duty which they owed to their sect; meritorious, not only as evincing contempt for a detested religion, but as affording opportunities for exhibitions of self-sacrifice, certain to elicit the praise of their companions, and likely to deserve the coveted honor of canonization. All, therefore, that was required of the Christians living under Moslem jurisdiction was that they should pay tribute regularly and obey the laws of the land.

To insure the protection to which they were entitled, and to secure them from insult and oppression, a special magistrate was appointed, under the khalifs, to watch over their interests and supervise their conduct. This official, whose title was that of katib, or secretary, was invested with extraordinary powers, and was usually a noble of distinguished rank as well as a personage of high consideration in the Divan.

At the time of the Conquest, a certain number of churches were set aside for Christian worship; but that number could not be increased, nor could additions be even made to the ancient edifices. In case reconstruction or repairs were necessary, the identical old materials were required to be used. The stringency of these rules was, however, often relaxed by the generous indulgence of the authorities. The law which forbade that a building erected by a Christian should be of greater height than that of a Moslem was also frequently evaded. In Spain and Sicily the towers of church and cathedral often overtopped the minaret of the mosque, an implication of superiority which, in other countries of the Mohammedan world, would have caused their instant demolition. In those two kingdoms of Islam alone the use of bells was tolerated. Elsewhere, boards suspended by cords and beaten with mallets took their place and announced the opening of Christian service. The greatest liberty was permitted in the exercise of public worship. The clergy wore their sacred vestments. They discharged the duties of their holy calling in peace and security, and those who ventured to interfere with them were liable to severe punishment. They celebrated mass with all the pomp of the ancient Visigothic ceremonial. The priest carried the viaticum to the dying, in solemn procession through the crowded streets. The bodies of the dead, enveloped in the smoke of tapers and incense, and preceded by chanting choristers, were borne to the cathedral for the performance of the final rites of the Church. The toleration of the Spanish Moslems even went to the extent of permitting the use of images—execrated as idolatrous by every follower of the Prophet—in Christian temples. Effigies of saints were by no means rare. In the Cathedral of Santa Maria at Cordova was a statue of the Virgin. Her shrine was famous for its sanctity, and, more accessible than that of Santiago, yearly attracted multitudes of devout pilgrims from every part of Europe. In each church was preserved the body of the martyr to whom the sacred edifice was dedicated, and from whom it derived its name. The great city of Cordova contained six Christian houses of worship besides the cathedral. Eleven monasteries and convents offered a refuge to those who sought the devotional retirement of cloistered life. Of these, three were in the city and eight upon the wooded slopes of the Sierra Morena. Some, instituted probably with a view to the acquisition of increased merit by resistance to constant temptation, were occupied by both sexes under a single abbot. The monks appeared in cowl and tonsure; the nuns were constantly veiled. All members of the monastic orders, as well as those of the secular priesthood, traversed at will and unmolested the streets of the capital. St. Eulogius, Cyprian, Samson, and other contemporaneous ecclesiastical writers bear repeated and voluntary testimony to the indulgent forbearance extended to Christians by the Khalifs of Cordova.

In Sicily, practically the same conditions prevailed. As, however, the indigenous population overwhelmingly exceeded in number that of the invaders, toleration was necessary for the maintenance of public tranquillity, and was, in fact, a measure of expediency as well as of justice. The civil organization of the Byzantine Empire was continued. The magistrates retained the same titles and exercised the same jurisdiction as formerly, subject always to the supervision of the officials of the Divan. The procedure of the ancient tribunals was but slightly modified. The rights of person and property were fully recognized. Freedom of worship was guaranteed to all law-abiding tributaries. Taxation was uniform and regular; the legal impositions were far less onerous than those exacted by the tyrannical rapacity of the Greek administration. Under the Moors, all persons whose condition or infirmities prevented them from obtaining a livelihood were exempt; the Byzantine fiscal agents carried their merciless perquisitions into the abodes of helplessness, disease, and destitution. The Moslem law regulating the distribution of estates and the rights of heirs was so admirably adapted to the purpose, that it was continued, with trifling modifications, by the Normans, after it had been in force for nearly two centuries. No lands were confiscated but those which had been abandoned by their owners. The number of these was so great that they afforded ample space for the settlements of the Saracen colonists, who occupied the most valuable portions of the States of Trapani, Palermo, and Agrigentum.

The restrictions imposed upon the Sicilian Christians were more harsh than the requirements exacted of their Spanish brethren. The general provisions of the Mohammedan code relating to the prohibited acts of misbelievers were, of course, rigidly enforced. The Christian priests of Sicily, like those of Spain, were compelled to perform the rites of their religion behind closed doors. Like them also, they were forbidden to publicly discuss the merits of their creed or to attempt to secure proselytes. The laws of that island, considering the numerical weakness of the dominant race, were strangely severe. As tokens of degradation, peculiar marks were placed upon the houses of Christians; they were restricted to a costume distinctive in materials and color, and wore girdles of woollen cloth or leather. They were forbidden to mount a horse, to own saddles, to bear arms. They could not use seals with Arabic inscriptions or give their children Arabic names. In the streets they gave way to their Saracen masters, and always stood with bowed heads in their presence. Drinking wine in the sight of a Mussulman was visited with exemplary punishment. No Christian woman was allowed to remain in the bath with a Mohammedan, even though the latter were one of the humblest maid-servants of the harem. If one of the tributary sect admitted the slave of a Mussulman into his house, he was liable to a heavy fine. The ringing of the bells of church or monastery loudly was prohibited, as was also the reading of the Scriptures in the hearing of the followers of the Prophet. No Christian could cross himself in public. The slightest interference with Moslem worship was punishable with death.

Despite these arbitrary and often oppressive laws, the condition of the Christians of Sicily was, upon the whole, far more agreeable and prosperous under the Arabs than it had been under the Greeks. Relief from arbitrary taxation made secure the profits of industry. Every branch of commerce was open to the enterprising. The system of guilds and corporations, which had existed among tradesmen since the Roman domination, remained unimpaired. If a Christian distrusted the integrity or capacity of his own magistrate, he was at liberty to submit his cause to the kadi, who rendered judgment according to the maxims and precedents of Moslem jurisprudence.

In the Spanish Peninsula, the government of the Church presented a strange and portentous anomaly. As the representative of Islam was a member of the family of the Ommeyades, which had, in the beginning, exerted all the influence of a powerful caste to overwhelm its founder and render his teachings odious, so now the interests of Christianity were delivered over to the tender mercies of its hereditary and most unrelenting foe. The Visigothic sovereigns, chosen by ecclesiastical councils, were, by virtue of their election, clothed with a certain degree of sanctity, and enjoyed an ample measure of spiritual power. The monarch practically controlled the policy of the Church. His decision was final in all matters not important enough to be submitted to the assembled wisdom of the great ecclesiastical dignitaries of the kingdom. He consecrated bishops. He exercised without question the sacerdotal rights of presentation, translation, investiture. He convoked councils. The fate of every member of the hierarchy, from acolyte to archbishop, was in his hands. Even the metropolitan see of Toledo, the primacy of Spain, could not be filled without his sanction. He could appoint the most unworthy candidate to the most exalted station in the priesthood. He could arbitrarily depose ministers whose lives had exhibited the practice of every Christian virtue. He interpreted and dictated the application of intricate points of ecclesiastical law. Notwithstanding the apparent ascendency of the sacerdotal order in the temporal affairs of the government on the one hand, it was largely neutralized on the other by the influence of the Crown over the fortunes of the Church, an influence always weighty and often predominant.

These prerogatives, dangerous to religious liberty and liable to abuse even in the hands of an orthodox sovereign, were transmitted, in all their force, to the Arabian khalifs, as the lords of the lost heritage of the Visigothic kings. The principle upon which such authority could pass to the head of a hostile sect, whose sworn purpose was the annihilation of the very religion which he was presumed, by virtue of his office, in duty bound to protect, has not been, and never can be, explained by any considerations of honor, consistency, or equity. It was practically a flagrant usurpation of privileges for which the Moslem sovereign could not allege even a shadow of right. It was not conferred by conquest. It could not be accounted for under the color of a legal fiction. Supremacy in ecclesiastical government, where the practice of public worship was guaranteed by treaty, and the clergy purchased by tribute the management of their affairs and the enforcement of discipline, certainly was not implied by the fact that it had been enjoyed by the ruling prince of the vanquished faith. Its peaceful exercise for centuries—for its validity does not seem to have been questioned in the writings of even the most bigoted ecclesiastics—is one of the most singular problems of religious history.

The consequences of this anomalous condition were, as may readily be conjectured, fatal to the dignity and order of the Catholic hierarchy. The khalif was, to all intents and purposes, the spiritual head of two hostile religions,—one of which it was his duty, as well as his inclination, to exalt; the other of which he was prompted by the prejudices of race, inheritance, and belief to destroy. There were few Hispano-Arab monarchs who did not contribute their share to the degradation of Christianity. The highest offices of the Church were put up at auction. The orthodoxy and fitness of the candidate were never considered; his qualifications were ignored; and his success was dependent upon the amount he was willing to disburse for the coveted dignity. In this scandalous traffic the women of the harems and the eunuchs were the recognized agents of the purchaser. There was no secrecy about these transactions. The practice of simony was so universal that even the greatest offenders made no attempt to conceal it. A profligate canon, named Saul, entered into a written obligation to pay these corrupt intermediaries four hundred ounces of silver for the bishopric of Cordova. Some of those raised to the richest sees of the Peninsula were heretics or infidels. It was not unusual for a prelate, even during Holy Week, to abandon the service of the altar and indulge in the most shameless excesses of drunkenness and debauchery. The ordinances of the Church were interpreted by men ignorant of the first rudiments of ecclesiastical law. Priests, whose atheism was notorious, administered the sacraments with mock humility and imparted hypocritical consolation to the devout. If any of his flock eluded the search of the tax-collector, the bishop, more faithful to the power to which he owed his authority than to the interests of the congregation over which he presided, stood ready to furnish the desired information from the registers of the diocese, and to assist in the punishment of the delinquents. When a prelate disregarded the summons to a council, the vacancy was filled by the appointment of a Mussulman or a Jew. Such circumstances as these were not propitious to either sacerdotal welfare or successful proselytism.

Nor were abuses of power confined to the ecclesiastical system. The dignity of count, the most eminent office of the Christian magistracy, was also a subject of negotiation and barter. The opportunities it afforded for extortion and peculation made it one of the most lucrative employments in the gift of the khalif. It was ordinarily bestowed upon a member of the Visigothic nobility, but the rapacity of the eunuchs looked rather to the means than to the birth of the aspirant; and persons of base origin and doubtful integrity not infrequently received the coveted distinction, which was utilized largely for the benefit of their patrons,—the fiscal officers and the degraded servitors of the harem. Count Servandus, the son of a slave, who lived during the reign of the Khalif Mohammed, has been handed down to the execration of all good Christians as one of the most cruel and infamous of oppressors. On a single occasion, he extorted from his unhappy vassals the enormous sum of a hundred thousand solidi, equal in our time to more than half a million dollars.

The various gradations of the hierarchy were preserved as before the Arab occupation. The archbishops had the usual number of suffragans subject to their jurisdiction; the lower orders of the clergy, their clerks, choristers, readers, and other subordinates. To exercise the office of priest it was necessary for both parents to be of the Christian faith; if the father were a Moslem, the law of the conqueror interposed its claim upon the candidate, who, regarded as a Mussulman by birth, was liable to condemnation for apostasy. Unlike the canonical practice of other Catholic countries, an ecclesiastic was eligible to offices of the most distinguished rank, even to the primacy itself, without being compelled to pass through the intermediate grades of the priesthood. There was no diminution of pomp or solemnity in the celebration of the rites of Christian worship. Councils for the regulation of church government and discipline were even more frequent than under the Visigoths; during the ninth century, three were held at Cordova alone in less than thirty-five years. In many of the monasteries, schools were established for the communication of instruction, on both sacred and profane subjects, to those whose religious scruples prevented them from profiting by the splendid opportunities afforded by the great Arab institutions of learning. In some of these religious houses were extensive libraries, composed for the most part, however, of treatises of patristic science, polemics, and hagiology. To St. Eulogius, alarmed by the increasing influence of the Mussulman academies, which offered irresistible attractions to the Christian youth, is due the credit of having introduced to the notice of his countrymen the works of Horace, Virgil, Juvenal, and others of the Latin classics, copies of which he obtained during a visit to Navarre.

In Spain, as in Sicily, the influence of the Holy See disappeared with the advent of Moslem supremacy. The clergy of the khalifate became independent of the Papacy, and did not even recognize the authority of the Asturian priesthood, whose members held councils and promulgated canons, with a nominal allegiance to Rome. In the abeyance of Papal representation, the Metropolitan of Toledo was the supreme head of the Spanish hierarchy. The Christians of Sicily acknowledged the jurisdiction of the Patriarch of Constantinople. During the Moorish occupation of Southern France, the existing religion was scarcely interfered with. No counts were appointed to govern or oppress the conquered. No unworthy prelates were assigned to rich sees as the result of intrigue or corruption. Few churches were transformed into mosques. The only attempt to restrain the Christian tributaries was shown by a disposition to isolate, as far as possible, the clergy of the provincial settlements from those of the larger towns. The tolerance of Mussulman rule is disclosed by the great preponderance of the subject race existing at Narbonne, which was always rather a Christian than a Moslem capital.

The long independence of the Spanish Church exerted no inconsiderable influence upon its subsequent history. Its isolation enabled it to preserve uncontaminated the ancient forms and discipline transmitted by ecclesiastical tradition from apostolic times. The authority of its councils or the validity of their canons was never questioned by the most exacting dignitaries of the Roman hierarchy after it had again acknowledged the jurisdiction of the Papal See. Its orthodoxy was never impeached. While Europe was distracted by heresy, no daring religious innovator threatened the integrity or disputed the power of the ecclesiastical government of the Peninsula. Its policy was inimical to change in organization, in ceremonial, in doctrine. Of all the religious ceremonials in Christendom its liturgy showed the least alteration, not even excepting that used in St. Peter’s at Rome. When in 1067 King Alfonso of Leon submitted the rival claims of the Gothic and Roman rituals first to the wager of battle and then to the ordeal of fire, the Christians of Arabian Spain resolutely adhered to the ancient and time-honored formulary. The only schisms recorded were those which sprang from the conflicting ambition of rival prelates. Under the iron rule of the khalifs no irregular councils assembled to disturb the harmony or excite the doubts of the Faithful. The principal abuse that existed was the fraudulent manufacture of charters, and the multitude of these pious forgeries whose spurious character has been exposed indicate at once the ease with which such documents could be issued, as well as the profit that must have attended their fabrication. The generally undisturbed condition of the Mozarabes under the sway of the House of Ommeyah is the best evidence of their enjoyment of the blessings of civil and religious liberty.

Their social customs and mode of life show in many particulars a close affiliation with their masters. They had forgotten the rude idiom of their fathers. Arabic was the language in common use among all classes of the tributary population, both Jew and Christian. It was an indispensable requisite of official position that the incumbent should possess a competent knowledge of that tongue. St. Eulogius repeatedly deplores the fact that its prevalence was universal in the Peninsula. Its popularity increased with time, and was so great during the domination of the Almoravides that the Archbishop of Seville caused the Bible to be translated into Arabic, in order that it might be intelligible to the priests of his diocese. The peculiar phrases of Moslem intercourse, such as “God preserve you!” “May you rest in heaven!” constantly on the lips of the reverent Mohammedan, formed part of the daily greetings of every Christian. They gave their children Arabic names. Their attire and their furniture were similar to those of the dominant race. The conspicuous tokens of degradation imposed upon the Mozarabes of Sicily were unknown in Spain even under the Almoravide bigots. The confidence reposed in their fidelity, and the respect with which their courage was regarded, were evinced by their constant enrolment in the body-guard of the khalifs. Partly from a desire to propitiate the favor of their rulers, and perhaps through conviction of their physiological benefits, they abstained from pork, and adopted the rite of circumcision,—concessions which, once granted, practically left the repetition of the Moslem formula the sole remaining barrier between the followers of Christ and the sectaries of Mohammed. These practices, elsewhere unknown to the Christian communities of Europe, excited the wonder and abhorrence of the stout old monk, John de Gorza, ambassador of the German Emperor to the court of Abd-al-Rahman. He denounced them in unmeasured terms to the Archbishop of Cordova, who excused their observance under the plea of necessity, and as customs long countenanced by the Church, a statement which indicates that in the tenth century they had already been in use for many generations. In a spirit of charity, greatly at variance with the intolerant hatred displayed towards the Moors in subsequent ages, prayers were regularly offered for the khalif in every Christian church of Arabian Spain.

Every circumstance relating to the habits and intercourse of the two races which has come down to us proves that, openly at least, they did not consider each other as enemies. Great numbers of Christians embraced with eagerness the extraordinary educational benefits afforded by the schools and academies of the khalifate. The University of Cordova, open to individuals of every rank, creed, and nationality, was attended by Christian students, not only resident in the Peninsula, but attracted from almost every country of Europe. The infidel doctrines taught in that famous institution had long provoked the animadversion of Moslem theologians; but the prejudices they excited among orthodox Mussulmans were far less intense and bitter than the aversion entertained towards the professors of these opinions by the Catholic clergy. Intermarriages were frequent, although public sentiment, as well as the policy of Islam, discouraged such alliances. A far greater number of women than of men renounced their ancestral faith in consequence of these unions, and the majority of proselytes were those who embraced the religion of Mohammed.

Important civil employments were repeatedly conferred upon Christians eminent for their talents and integrity. The expostulations of the faquis and the united influence of the Divan were hardly sufficient to prevent Abd-al-Rahman III. from appointing a renegade, whose parents were both Christians, to the office of Grand Kadi of Cordova, the highest judicial position of the empire. The latter monarch habitually employed Christian prelates in missions requiring the exercise of the greatest tact and ability. Rabi, Archbishop of Cordova, was sent on different occasions as envoy to the courts of Germany and Constantinople. It was he who was intrusted with the conveyance of valuable gifts from the Emperor of the East to the Khalif, among them the fountains of the palace of Medina-al-Zahrâ. The Bishop of Granada was selected to secure the withdrawal by the German Emperor of the scurrilous letter which the fanatic John de Gorza was charged to deliver, a task of great responsibility and one which few were either competent or willing to undertake. Another prelate of episcopal rank was also despatched by Abd-al-Rahman to congratulate Otho on his victory over the Hungarians. The predilection of Ali for members of the nominally prescribed sect constantly aroused the indignation and alarm of the Almoravide zealots.

Christians were not excluded from the most responsible posts of the Moorish fiscal administration. They discharged with skill and fidelity the duties connected with all the various employments of the revenue. To members of their sect was invariably committed the collection of the tribute due from their co-religionists. Thousands of them served in the Mussulman armies. When Barcelona was besieged by the Franks, the Christian residents of that city fought side by side with the Moslems against the orthodox King of Aquitaine. Of all nationalities, the Spanish Christians were considered most worthy to guard the sacred person of the khalif. At no period of the Arab domination were they absolutely excluded from court. Under the administration of the Almoravide sultan, Ali, who was conspicuous among the fanatical princes of his line for the strictness of his orthodoxy and the austerity of his manners, the Mozarabes were in high favor, and exerted an almost preponderating influence in the government.

Although in theory belonging to an inferior caste, in fact the tributary could not, by the unpractised eye, be distinguished from the votary of Islam. His life, his habits, his language, were the same. His house was an exact counterpart of that of his Moorish neighbor; his garments were cut after the pattern of the Orient. His manners were no longer suggestive of the rudeness of his Gothic ancestors. When his means permitted, he went to great lengths in the gratification of propensities censured by the canons of his Church,—entertained catamites, indulged in polygamous practices, and filled his harem with female slaves guarded by retinues of eunuchs.

But while the line of demarcation between Moslem and Christian was thus faintly drawn, and threatened, in the course of time, to entirely disappear through the fusion of the two races, there still existed in the minds not only of the zealots of the hostile sects, but also in those of the masses, a profound and irreconcilable antipathy. This prejudice was sedulously and successfully nourished by the Mohammedan faquis as well as by the Christian clergy. The tributaries, while apparently on the point of merging into the body of the conquerors, were in reality isolated from them by the most powerful emotions that can influence the human heart. No concessions could thoroughly eradicate the prejudices arising from difference of religious belief. No familiarities of social intercourse could banish the humiliating remembrance of conquest. No political honors could compensate for the injuries inflicted by racial animosity. The actual condition of the Spanish Christians was, therefore, the reverse of that exhibited by their daily life. In the presence of a mutual antagonism, all the more violent for being repressed, there could be no thorough amalgamation of races. The exalted spirit of religious enthusiasm which could voluntarily solicit the tortures of martyrdom was not propitious to national apostasy.

And yet the circumstances which appear most conspicuous and vital in the consideration of this ethnological paradox would seem to point to an opposite conclusion. A community of customs generally existed in which those of the Arab always predominated. The harems of the Moslems were filled with Christian maidens who had, without hesitancy or compensation, renounced the faith of their fathers. The corrupted Latin dialect of the Visigoths, proscribed by Hischem I., was almost extinct. The law forbade it to be either written or spoken; and it survived only in the massive volumes of the Fathers or in the secluded intercourse of the occupants of monasteries and convents. By the same decree of the Khalif, education in the Arabian schools was made compulsory. Alvarus, who wrote about the middle of the ninth century, declares that not one Christian could be found among a thousand who could compose a letter in Latin. On the other hand, the popularity of the Arab writers, and the enthusiasm with which their compositions were perused by persons of all ages, were in the eyes of pious ecclesiastics a national scandal. The growing inclination to apostasy, the natural result of these associations, was also one of the crowning grievances of the Spanish clergy. As heretofore stated, it is a fact, well established by the reluctant testimony of the Fathers themselves, that the greater part of the conquered nation had fallen away from Christianity.

Many causes had conspired to produce this lamentable condition of affairs. The geographical isolation of the Peninsula, which has always had a tendency to preserve unaltered the mental and physical characteristics of its people, has also had no unimportant influence upon the national faith. That country, even at the time of the Saracen invasion, was Christian only in name. It had never wholly discarded its Pagan forms or traditions. It was the last kingdom of Europe to nominally accept the new religion. Its creed had long been heterodox, and that creed it had abandoned, without remonstrance or regret, at the command of its sovereign. The despotic power of the hierarchy had never been able to abolish the ceremonies of Pagan antiquity which were incorporated with the ritual of the Church. The population, the offspring of a score of nations, each of which worshipped different divinities and was familiar with the fraudulent pretensions of many sacerdotal claimants to inspiration, was inclined to discredit and deride them all. To such a society religious professions and formalities were naturally matters of indifference. A nation which could spontaneously abandon the heresy of Arius would hardly hesitate to embrace the monotheistic doctrines of Mohammed. By the Moslems, so far as their tributaries were concerned, no open inducements were offered for apostasy. The practice of Islam discouraged the active proselytism advocated by other sects. The conversion of a Christian tributary, unless he had violated the law, must be voluntary, and the obligation, once assumed, could never be renounced.

The favor enjoyed by the renegade was, however, a far more powerful incentive than any that the promises of the ministers of religion could evoke. The apostate was at once received into full social communion with his former masters. He was eligible to the highest political and military honors. In theory, at least, no stigma could attach to his former condition or antecedents. The equality of all men who professed belief in its dogmas was, as is well known, the cardinal principle of the law of the Prophet.

To the slave, these considerations appealed with peculiar force. Tens of thousands of this oppressed and degraded caste had been transferred, at a single stroke by the fortunes of war, from the hands of one master to those of another. A host of captives had been taken in battle. In the minds of but few of these unfortunates the obligations of religion were deeply founded. While emancipation did not invariably follow the profession of the faith of Islam, it usually did; and the condition of the slave was always greatly improved by this concession to the prejudices of him who regulated his conduct and controlled his destiny. In view of these facts, there is little wonder that multitudes of slaves embraced the Mussulman doctrines.

The religious freedom of the Christians under Moslem rule was mainly dependent on the prejudices of their own clergy, the character of the dominant faction, and the temper of the sovereign. The provisions of the treaties which guaranteed their privileges were at first strictly observed. The general influx of fanatical foreigners, in time, however, created a strong public sentiment against the proscribed tributaries. They were sometimes deprived of their houses of worship. Arbitrary contributions were frequently exacted from them. On one occasion, the Christians of Cordova were compelled to pay into the treasury the sum of a hundred thousand pieces of gold, nearly a million and a quarter dollars. The revenues of the Church were so impaired by these grievous impositions, that ecclesiastics were often forced to engage in commercial pursuits to provide for the pressing necessities of their order. Some carried the manufactures of Cordova to Germany. Others journeyed as peddlers through France. The trading priest of Moorish Spain was well known in the markets of Genoa and Constantinople. Persons in clerical garb were no longer safe in public places. In the time of the Almoravides, when a Christian passed through the streets, the crowd shrank from contact with him as from one stricken with the plague. Religious processions were pelted by mobs of hooting children, and those who took part in them were fortunate if they escaped without serious personal injury. The ringing of the church-bells provoked the loud threats and curses of intemperate zealots. The breaking up of a congregation during Holy Week was often the signal for a riot. The vengeance of Allah upon the idolater was invoked by the scoffing bystanders when the corpse of a Christian was consigned to the grave.

The clergy, against whom these insults were principally aimed, were naturally exasperated by the indignity suffered by their creed and their profession. Their ignorance, in spite of the example and the benefits of Moslem civilization ever before their eyes, was not less dense than that of their brethren of Catholic Europe. With every opportunity to familiarize themselves with the tenets of Islam, and thoroughly conversant with Arabic, they steadfastly declined to honor the alleged revelations of the Prophet with their attention or perusal. Their opinions on this subject they obtained from the writings of fanatical monks, fully as ignorant as, and even more bigoted than, themselves. The sage conclusion which they arrived at from these researches was that the doctrines of the most uncompromising of monotheists and image-breakers were Pagan and idolatrous.

Apprehensive of violence if they ventured to show themselves in public, they remained almost constantly in the seclusion of their dwellings. Even the sacred calls of duty remained unanswered. Often, for weeks, mass was not celebrated. The pulpit and the confessional were deserted. The dying passed away unshriven. Maddened by rage and terror, they were scarcely accessible even to their sympathizing parishioners, who themselves incurred the risk of ill-treatment from the populace in their visits to the episcopal palace and the parsonage. Brooding over their wrongs, encouraged by the promises and exhortations of the Fathers of the Church, wresting the texts of Scripture to their purpose, fasting many consecutive days, praying for hours at a time, exhausted by penance, their enthusiasm became wrought up to the highest pitch. From such a condition the progress to martyrdom is easy.

The persecution of the Christians of Spain was inflicted, for the most part, under the reigns of Abd-al-Rahman II. and Mohammed. The annoyances to which they were subjected were by no means so serious as they subsequently became, when the influence of the Africans preponderated. The word persecution, implying as it does the tyrannical abuse of superior power, is not applicable to the circumstances under which the Mozarabes were sent to the scaffold. They were rather criminals than martyrs. They voluntarily offered themselves for the sacrifice. They denounced the religion of Islam as false and idolatrous. They reviled the name of the Prophet. They rushed into the mosques. When the voice of the muezzin resounded from the minaret, they crossed themselves, and cried out, “Save us, O Lord, from the call of the Evil One, both now and in eternity!” In their eagerness to court destruction, they pushed their way into the tribunals, and, in the presence of the judge, gave utterance to their blasphemies. Even the majesty of the throne was not respected by these frantic enthusiasts. St. Pelayus called the Khalif a dog to his face. St. Isaac, not content with heaping abuse on Mohammed, grossly insulted the Grand Kadi of Cordova. Such offences were capital under the law, and admitted of neither extenuation nor pardon.

At first, the magistrates, moved by astonishment and compassion, refused to condemn persons whose actions seemed attributable only to intoxication or insanity. But the deluded wretches would accept no indulgence. Thrown into prison, they continued their revilings. Their spurious zeal, mistaken constancy, and self-inflicted tortures produced many imitators. Their cells became places of pilgrimage. From them each day went forth new candidates for pious consideration, fresh victims for the executioner. Some were hanged, others beheaded. Not a few were burned at the stake and their ashes cast into the river. The bitter feelings engendered by religious controversy were not confined to Mohammedans. The ties of blood seemed for a time forgotten or ignored. The hiding-places of the accused were revealed by their own kindred. Brothers and sisters denounced each other for the sake of the property they might inherit. But the punishment only aggravated the evil. The number of martyrs constantly multiplied. A great many of these came from the laity. Youths of tender age excited the wonder and admiration of the devout by the boldness of their utterances and the unflinching courage with which they met their fate. Delicate women walked barefoot for leagues, nominally to share the glory of dying for the Faith, in reality to solicit the infliction of the extreme penalty of violated law.

The contagion of example spread fast through the Christian community of Cordova. No distinction was now so honorable as to stand in the foremost rank of the blasphemers of the Prophet. In this pious and meritorious performance, the secular clergy were, however, not conspicuous. Their lives were entirely too precious to be endangered so long as members of their flocks were eager to demonstrate their willingness to die for a perverted religious principle, involving an unprovoked breach of the contract from which they derived security of worship, life, and property. In secret, they promoted the increasing madness by prayer and vehement exhortation. The impulse to the spirit of spontaneous martyrdom was not a little stimulated by the honors paid to the victims. Independent of both Roman and Asturian influence, the Andalusian hierarchy conferred without delay the distinction of canonization upon each aspirant for celestial glory. Their remains were conveyed to the churches, where they at once began to disclose their supernatural powers by response to prayer, by the cure of disease, by the working of portentous and astonishing miracles.

The Moslem authorities were appalled by the strange conduct of their tributaries, insensible alike to the inducement of clemency or the dread of punishment. In the hope of abating the evil by summary measures, Abd-al-Rahman II. authorized, by public edict, any one to kill on the instant a Christian who was guilty of blasphemy. This decree, while not fully accomplishing its object, lessened the number of applicants for martyrdom and produced a great increase of apostates and fugitives.

But the mania which impelled the most fanatical to self-sacrifice was far from infecting the entire Christian population of the capital. There were many who looked with disapproval upon a course which must eventually result in the oppression of their sect, in the increase of its burdens, in the curtailment of its privileges. They foresaw that the acts of a few irresponsible individuals would ere long be regarded by the Moslem government as the authorized policy of the Church. Many Christians held office under the administration. It was only a question of time, if these disturbances continued, when they would be dismissed from their employments. The khalifate was then at the height of its power. If an uprising provoked by the clergy should occur, as seemed not improbable, the entire tributary sect might be exterminated; and, indeed, this measure had already been vehemently urged by the intolerant African marabouts. In any event, there would be arbitrary taxation, confiscation, violence, exile. In their extremity, the more sober-minded of the Christians petitioned the Khalif to summon a council, whose decision might be authoritative and final in determining the duty of the people in the present emergency.

All the prelates in the jurisdiction of the khalifate were accordingly convoked. Abd-al-Rahman appointed as his representative an official named Gomez, prominent in the administration, nominally attached to the Christian communion, but of suspicious morals and of more than suspicious orthodoxy. He was a man of fine education, conspicuous talents, polished manners, insufferable pride, and enormous wealth. The head of the faction which had, in vain, endeavored to check the increasing disposition to martyrdom which menaced the destruction of his sect, he had incurred the unmeasured hatred of the clergy. Realizing fully the fatal consequences of the insane acts of his co-religionists if unrestrained, his interest concurred with his inclination to repress the dangerous manifestations of their intemperate zeal before it became too late.

With great ability and eloquence he presented his views to the council. The assembled prelates, awed by the government and possessing little sympathy for those who were destroying the credit of their order, were not disinclined to condemn these fanatical suicides. But here a serious difficulty arose. The martyrs had been canonized. Their relics had already demonstrated their sanctity by the production of miracles. Their bodies were enshrined in the shadow of the altar; their deeds and their sufferings were now a part of the history of the Church. It was therefore manifestly impolitic, as well as sacrilegious, to attempt to deprive them of the rank in the celestial hierarchy which had been conferred by the infallible wisdom of God. A middle course was possible. The council, silent upon past martyrdoms, prohibited them in the future. Like all temporizing measures intended to correct deeply rooted abuses, this evasion of the issue left matters worse than before. The extremists, headed by St. Eulogius, declared that the real sentiment of the council manifestly ran counter to the one it expressed, as it did not pronounce deserving of censure the acts of those who had suffered for the Faith. The priests continued to arouse the zeal of their misguided parishioners; enthusiasts continued to outrage the sanctity of the mosques and the dignity of the tribunals, and the executions went relentlessly on. Recafred, Archbishop of Cordova, exasperated by the contempt with which the decree of the council had been received, heartily co-operated with the Moslems in the punishment of the offenders, now under the ban of both the government and the Church. Many recalcitrant priests were seized and thrown into prison. Others eluded with the greatest difficulty the search of the authorities. Among the latter was St. Eulogius, with whom, as well as with many of his holy brethren, the merits of martyrdom seemed most glorious when obtained by the sufferings of others. These vigorous measures filled the souls of the elect with terror. A few escaped to the Asturias. A considerable number, including some who had been loudest in their praise of the saints and apparently most eager to emulate their example, apostatized.

The so-called persecution, begun under Abd-al-Rahman II. and continued under Mohammed, lasted eight years. The works of contemporaneous ecclesiastical writers conclusively establish the fact that it was provoked by the violence of the Christians themselves. It is apparent from the same authorities that its effects and importance were grossly exaggerated. The Memorial of the Saints, by Eulogius, the last and most eminent of the alleged victims of Moslem tyranny, contains the names of comparatively few martyrs. But forty-four are mentioned by the erudite historian Florez, whose diligent industry has collated the voluminous records bearing upon the hagiology of that time, as having been executed at Cordova. Several of these were women, between whom and their male companions in suffering and glory, the pious chronicler naïvely declares, “mysterious affinities” existed.

With the decline of the empire, the prevalence of anarchy, and the ascendency of the Berbers, the condition of the Spanish Christians became more and more distressing. The suspension of the laws afforded every facility for their oppression. Their churches were torn down. Their property was confiscated. The descendants of the partisans of Ibn-Hafsun maintained a correspondence with the Castilian enemy. Alfonso of Aragon traversed the Peninsula from the Ebro to the sea, at the invitation of the Mozarabes of Granada. Ten thousand of the latter attended him in his retreat. The vengeance exacted of their treacherous vassals by the Moors of that kingdom was terrible. The expedition was productive of not less unhappy results at Cordova. Nearly every church was destroyed, the Christians were tortured, despoiled of their possessions, and deported in a body to Africa.

At the beginning of the twelfth century, the misfortunes of the maltreated sectaries had reached their culmination. The Almohades, when not dominated by the marabouts, were inclined to be tolerant. The Arab chronicles which treat of the Moorish principalities do not mention the subject of persecution, and no Christian records of that time have been preserved. The Mozarabes of the kingdom of Granada enjoyed the largest liberty. In Sicily, during the entire period of Moslem supremacy, martyrdoms were exceedingly rare.

Considering the widely extended apostasy which followed the Arab conquest, it is remarkable, if viewed only from a worldly stand-point, that the entire Christian population of the Peninsula did not become Mohammedan. There is no doubt that those who remained consistently steadfast in the faith were in a decided minority. No inconsiderable number of proselytes was recruited from the patrician class. Among the great body of serfs and slaves, there were few who were not willing to renounce their religion for the certain enjoyment of liberty and the flattering prospect of future ease or distinction. The mass of the tributaries of the province of Seville had early abandoned the Christian communion, and during the reign of Abd-al-Rahman II. a magnificent mosque was built for their especial accommodation. The majority of the prisoners taken in war embraced without hesitation the doctrines of Islam. Leaving out of consideration the influence of that Divine Power which must have preserved its servants under the severest trials, circumstances of a political or social character may have arisen to prevent the wholesale apostasy of a nation.

And such was indeed the case. The treatment to which the renegades were subjected is a single instance of many, most important in determining the causes of the decline of proselytism. In this class, the freedmen largely preponderated in numbers. Notwithstanding the nominal equality of the renegade granted by his former masters in the beginning, this equality was now never conceded. The stigma of servitude which attached to the majority became the unjust reproach of the caste. While many were sincere in their belief, others took small pains to disguise the interested motives which had prompted their conversion. The knowledge of this fact impelled the Moslems to treat all converts with the greatest indignity. They were publicly insulted. Opprobrious epithets were heaped upon them. Even those whose ancestors had ranked with the most distinguished of the Gothic aristocracy were not exempt from the sneers of the Mussulman rabble. Possession of vast wealth, reputation for genius, taste, or learning, afforded no immunity from outrage by the vilest of mankind. It was rare that a renegade, no matter how conspicuous his abilities, obtained a responsible office in the government. Even the Christian stood a far better chance of official promotion by the followers of the Prophet than the recent proselyte to Islam. It was not in the nature of a numerous and powerful caste, smarting under unmerited humiliation and conscious of its strength, to calmly submit to such injustice. Nor was it long before this destructive policy, which, like many of the evils that afflicted the Mussulman domination, had its origin in Arab pride, produced momentous political results. It encouraged treasonable correspondence with the Christians of the North. It raised up spies in every community. It provoked the bloody revolt of the southern suburb of Cordova during the reign of Al-Hakem I. It recruited the armies of Ibn-Hafsun, who for thirty years defied the power of the khalifate. The renegades, who outnumbered all other classes combined, lacked only organization and leadership to have driven their haughty oppressors into the sea. When the power of the Arab faction was destroyed, their condition was improved, but the ardor of proselytism had vanished. Such experiences tended rather to confirm than to weaken the faith of the hesitating.

Other causes contributed to the prevalent apathy. The semi-theocratical character of the Moslem constitution implied to all believers the active exertion of supernatural power. The head of the government was at the same time the Successor and the Representative of the Prophet. A system which claims divine superiority should by all means be free from turmoil, from vices, from schism; its infallibility should be demonstrated by the pre-eminent wisdom of its decrees; its banners should never be lowered. Yet Islam was rent by faction and controversy. Rival princes, on every side, asserted their conflicting pretensions. In the confusion of warring sects, it was always impossible to distinguish the heretic from the orthodox. The Mussulman armies had often retired in disgrace from before the half-savage and ill-equipped Asturian mountaineers. Tried by the standards of mediæval ignorance, standards founded upon unity of purpose and invincibility in war, Islamism was no better than the creeds it had supplanted.

Again, the results of Moslem civilization, whose benefits were apparent to the least discerning, were not derived from the efforts of the devout. The theologians, without exception, were obstructionists. They decried learning. They denounced philosophy. To them the elegant pursuits of literature were an abomination. As a rule, they had nothing in common with the scholars of Cordova, renowned for their wit, their politeness, their culture. Their persons were neglected, their manners uncouth, their language coarse, ungrammatical, and insolent. In their opinion a madman was inspired, and a scientific instrument a device of Satan.

Not so, however, with the eminent instructors who directed the public mind of the nation, who imparted knowledge to eager pilgrims from foreign lands. It was to their lectures that the young Christians delighted to repair. There was no subject on which they were not competent to discourse; no topic which they did not elucidate with their learning and adorn with their eloquence. They were, almost to a man, what would be called in our day agnostics. Some were acknowledged atheists. Others inclined to the Pantheism of India. None mentioned without a contemptuous smile the celestial origin of the Koran or the claims of the Prophet to divine inspiration.

The University of Cordova was the seat of the literary faction whose influence was long paramount in the empire. Although its exercises were sometimes held in the Great Mosque, it had no sympathy with religion or its ministers. Its infidel teachings had for generations been the reproach of the pious faquis and the abhorrence of the Catholic clergy. Its doors were open to the studious of every race; its honors were bestowed upon the meritorious scholar, without regard to his belief or his ancestry. In its great library, the Mussulman, the Christian, the Buddhist, and the Jew pursued their researches in generous rivalry or friendly co-operation.

Under such unfavorable circumstances, it is not surprising that the conversion of Christians to Islamism was permanently arrested. Outrages upon proselytes, frequent insurrections, confusion of doctrines, vulgarity of theologians, infidelity of those best qualified to determine the value of established opinions, and the unrestricted enjoyment of educational facilities were serious impediments, rather than incentives, to a change of religious belief.

The fierce hostility that has always been manifested by the Apostolic Church against every kind of profane learning—the outgrowth of the tremendous power successfully exerted for many centuries to degrade the mind, to pervert the understanding, to dwarf the noble faculty of reason—had no terrors for the more enlightened part of the Christian population of the khalifate. There, in the presence of the unrivalled achievements of Moslem genius, the stern intolerance of Patristicism could not stand before the liberal policy of Islam and the daily application of the lofty sentiment of its Prophet, “Whoso pursues the road of knowledge, God will direct him to the road of Paradise. Verily, the superiority of a learned man over a mere worshipper is like that of the full moon over all the stars!” The exhibition of universal charity, of broad philanthropy, of educational advantages impartially bestowed, as contrasted with the narrow maxims of their own communion; the overwhelming superiority of Mussulman civilization; the powerful influence of daily intercourse and example; the prodigious augmentation of commercial prosperity and worldly grandeur; the alluring prospect of carnal pleasures, while they might not conduce to proselytism, nevertheless undermined the faith and constancy of the Christian youth.

The teachings of the philosophers of Cordova were not propitious to the maintenance of either established dogma or ecclesiastical superiority; and the clergy saw, with undisguised dismay, the growing prevalence of lukewarmness and skepticism. The predominance of the Spanish Arabs in every branch of literary culture, their eminent success in arms, their intelligence, their valor, their courtesy, the seductive power of their splendor and their opulence had far more effect upon the minds of the rising generation of Christians than the delusive promises and impotent anathemas proclaimed every week from a thousand pulpits. And, indeed, the contrast presented by the two rival religions was most striking to the unprejudiced seeker after truth. On the one hand was the church, with its resounding vaults and its gloomy and sepulchral crypt; the monastery, with its privations; the reliquaries, with their offensive hoards of withered flesh and mouldering bones; the inconsistencies of a system which inculcated charity and commanded persecution; the inexorable tyranny of the priesthood; the systematic discouragement of learning; the confessional with its enforced revelation of secrets; the mass with its monotonous services and its ritual in an unknown tongue; the penance with its sufferings and humiliation. On the other hand rose the mosque, light, airy, beautiful; its graceful minaret pointing towards the heavens; its court shaded by palm- and orange-trees, redolent with the mingled fragrance of a thousand exotics, musical with the plashing of crystal waters; its walls covered with a maze of intricate and brilliant stuccoes; its ceiling emblazoned with the golden texts of the Koran; its sanctuary sparkling with mosaics, whose exquisite tracery rivalled the fabled creations of the genii; the sermon, intelligible to the most humble and untutored listener; the prayer, remarkable for earnestness, simplicity, reverence. On this side were exhibited the factitious virtues and revolting license inseparable from the unnatural condition of celibacy; the sacrifice of every diversion that renders health attainable or existence attractive; the morose austerity of monastic solitude; the ill-concealed excesses by which human nature attempts to indemnify itself for the restraints imposed by organized hypocrisy; the solicited martyrdom of the half-crazed zealot; the savage pursuit of infidels and schismatics; the sanctified example of ecclesiastical ignorance, moral abasement, and physical impurity. On the other were the delights of the harem; the physical and mental vigor derived from constant exercise of the muscular system and the intellectual faculties; the benefits arising from the practice of frequent ablution; the palatial appointments of the public bath; the innumerable conveniences invented or adopted by a society ever alert to grasp every new idea, to profit by every past experience; the advantages of a method of education unparalleled in excellence and unapproached by even the wisest teachers of antiquity; the vast libraries, filled with the stores of ancient learning; the lectures of the lyceum; the curious experiments of scientific observers; the entertaining scenes of social festivity; the animated disputations of learned assemblies.

The jurisprudence of the orthodox believer was basely subservient to the claims of superstition. His cause was determined by the uncertain results of judicial combat, by the oaths of prejudiced compurgators, by the frivolous ordeals of water and fire. The sectary of Mohammed was tried by the kadi, a magistrate governed by established principles of law, and bound by religious as well as by temporal considerations to an impartial administration of justice.

When a Christian became ill, attempts were made to exorcise the evil spirit to which his sufferings were attributed by binding him to the altar, by the invocation of saints, by the application of relics and consecrated amulets. The Moslem was conveyed to the hospital provided and maintained by royal beneficence; the cause of his complaint was ascertained; and during his stay he received gratuitously the assiduous attentions of the nurse and the intelligent care of the surgeon.

While the priest-ridden peasantry of the Pyrenees and the Rhone denounced the Saracen as a foe of God and a scourge to humanity, the Christian who lived in security under his government, enjoyed his favor, shared his hospitality, profited by his instruction, knew but too well the calumny of these assertions, and that their maligned object exhibited upon occasion all the noble attributes of a faithful friend and a brave and chivalrous enemy. The dissensions of the Arabs, and their ungenerous treatment of those who voluntarily embraced their faith, were largely instrumental in preventing the amalgamation of races, even then far on the way towards accomplishment. Had not these causes intervened, only a few centuries would probably have elapsed before the subject nation, already closely united with the predominant caste by the bonds of marriage, consanguinity, and interest, by intimate mercantile associations, by the powerful influence of habits, education, and language, might have become thoroughly Mohammedanized. As it was, a greater affinity always existed between the Christian vassals of the Spanish khalifs and their lords than between the members of the several factions of the Arabs themselves, whose inextinguishable hatred, the fruit of countless generations of hostility, eventually compassed the destruction of their empire.