Quotes from Inquisition

"Even if my own father would a heretic, I would gather the wood to burn him."
-Cardinal Giovanni Pietro Carafa later known as Pope Paul IV; Secret Files of Inquisition(The War of Ideas) video.

"I believe in the truth of the Holy Scriptures, but I do not believe the authority of the pope or his councils as they are merely human beings."
-Baldo Lupetino(1496-1552), Roman Catholic priest executed for heresy, Secret Files of Inquisition(The War of Ideas) video.

"I say that the Church deviates from the truth in so far as it says that a man could not do anything in any way good on his own, since nothing praiseworthy can proceed from our corrupt infected nature except to the extent that the lord God gives us his grace... the Roman Catholic Church is a particular Church and no Christian should restrict himself to any particular Church. This Church deviates in many things from truth."
-Pomponio Algerio (1531-1556); Secret Files of Inquisition(The War of Ideas) video.

"As it is completely absurd and improper in the utmost that the Jews, who through their own fault were condemned by God to eternal servitude, can under the pretext that pious Christians must accept them and sustain their habitation, are so ungrateful to Christians, as, instead of thanks for gracious treatment, they return contumely, and among themselves, instead of the slavery, which they deserve..."
-Pope Paul IV; Cum nimis absurdum, 1555.

"Once these books are removed it was soon resulted that the more the Jews are without that wisdom of their rabbis so much the more they would be prepared in disposed and recieving the faith in the wisdom of the word of God."
-Pope Paul IV, edict for burning Talmud(book of Jews); Secret Files of Inquisition(The War of Ideas) video.

"We are of the opinion that no tribunal is of more honorable of works with greater zeal for the glory of God than the Inquisition. And we have therefore resolved to refer everything to it, that is connected to the articles of faith or can be brought in to relation with them."
-Pope Paul IV; Secret Files of Inquisition(The War of Ideas) video.

"On this day, the student Pomponio went to his death in Piazza Navona. He displayed so much steadfastness in the face of death that everyone was in awe.
-Anonymous(Venetian Ambassador) on the death of Pomponio Algerio, boiled to death as a heretic; Secret Files of Inquisition(The War of Ideas) video.

"My firm conviction that the Inquisition was vicious in principle, in its constitution and in the laws, induced me to collect every document I could procure. To give the world a true code the secret laws of the Inquisition, which was veiled by mystery of all mankind."
-Juan Antonio Llorente, Secretary General of Madrid Inquisition; Secret Files of Inquisition(The End of the Inquisition) video.

"These cells were places of solitary confinement, where the wretched objects of Inquisitorial hate were confined year after year, till death released them from their sufferings, and there their bodies remained until they were completely decayed, and their rooms had become fit for others to occupy. Flues or tubes, extending to the open air, carried off the effluvia. In these cells we found the remains of those who paid the debt of nature: some of them had been dead apparently but a short time, while of others nothing remained but their bones, still chained to the floor of the dungeon."
-Colonel Lehmanowsky, Napoleon's French officer (During the search for Spanish Roman Catholic Inquisition's site).

"We then proceeded to explore another room on the left. Here we found instruments of torture of every kind which the ingenuity of men or devils could invent."
-Colonel Lehmanowsky, Napoleon's French officer (During the search for Spanish Roman Catholic Inquisition's site).

"Fantasy, abandoned by reason, produces impossible monsters. The Inquisition is a brutish and absurd organization which its effort to quell civil disobedience has now created obstacles to a freer society.
-Francisco de Goya, famous French painter; Secret Files of Inquisition(The End of the Inquisition) video.

"We then proceeded to explore another room on the left. Here we found instruments of torture of every kind which the ingenuity of men or devils could invent.

The first was a machine by which the victim was confined, and then, beginning with the fingers, every joint in the hands, arms, and the body, was broken or drawn one after another, until the victim died.

The second was a box in which the head and neck of the victim were so closely confined by a screw, that he could not move in any way. Over the box was a vessel from which one drop of water a second fell upon the head of the victim. Every successive drop, falling on precisely the same place, soon suspended circulation, and put the sufferer in the most excruciating agony.

The third was an infernal machine, laid horizontally, to which the victim was bound. The machine was then placed between two beams, in which were scores of knives, so fixed that, by turning the machine with a crank, the flesh of the sufferer was torn from his limbs all in small pieces.

The fourth surpassed the others in fiendish ingenuity. Its exterior was a beautiful woman, or large doll, richly dressed, with arms extended, ready to embrace its victim. Around her feet a semicircle was drawn. The victim who passed over this fatal mark, touched a spring, which caused the diabolical engine to open; its arms clasped him, and a thousand knives cut him into as many pieces in the deadly embrace."
-Colonel Lehmanowsky, Napoleon's French officer (During the search for Spanish Roman Catholic Inquisition's site).

"In other cells we found living sufferers, of both sexes and of every age, from threescore years down to fourteen or fifteen years, all naked as when born into the world, and all in chains! Here were old men and aged women who had been shut up for many years. Here, too, were the middle aged and the young man and the maiden of fourteen years old!"
-Colonel Lehmanowsky, Napoleon's French officer (During the search for Spanish Roman Catholic Inquisition's site).

"If anyone maintained that the opinion of the Earth moves is heresy and if afterward demonstration and observation would proved that it does move, into what embarrasment would have brought himself and the Holy Church."
-Galileo Galilei, during the Inquisition trial of Galileo; Secret Files of Inquisition(The End of the Inquisition) video.

"Both the powerful and the powerless tried to steal this boy from me and accused me of being barbarous... but they failed to recognized, that I, too, am his father. I have the right and duty to what I did to this boy and even if necessary, I would do it again."
-Pope Pius IX, Papal abduction of Edgardo Mortara; Secret Files of Inquisition(The End of the Inquisition) video.