2nd. That if any of the persons employed should receive presents from the accused or his family, he should be immediately deprived of his office.
3rd. That the holy office should employ an able civilian at Rome, under the title of agent, and that this expense, should be supported by the money arising from the confiscations.
4th. That the contracts signed before the year 1479, by persons whose property had since been seized, should be regarded as valid; but if it was proved that any deception had been used in the transactions, that the culprits should be punished by a hundred strokes of a whip, and branded on the face with a red-hot iron.
5th. That the nobles who should receive fugitives in their estates, should be compelled to deliver up to government the property committed to their care; and if they claimed the fulfilments of contracts signed by the accused for their profit, that the attorney should commence an action to reclaim the property at belonging to the revenue.
6th. That the notaries of the Inquisition should keep an account of the property of the condemned persons.
7th. That the stewards of the holy office could sell the confiscated property, and receive the rents of the estates which might be let.
8th. That each steward should inspect the property belonging to his tribunal.
9th. That a steward could not sequestrate the property of a condemned person, without an order from the Inquisition; and even in that case, that he should be accompanied by an alguazil, and place the effects and an inventory of them in the hands of a third person.
10th. That the steward should pay the salaries of the inquisitors quarterly, that they might not be obliged to receive presents.
11th. That in all circumstances not foreseen in the new regulations, the inquisitors should conduct themselves with prudence, and apply to the government in all difficult cases.
The nature of these articles proves that the number of confiscations had been considerable. Ferdinand and Isabella often gave the property of the condemned persons to their wives and children, granted them pensions on the property, or a certain sum to be paid by the receiver-general.
These sums, and the care which people took to conceal their effects, diminished the funds of the Inquisition; besides which, most of the _New Christians_ were merchants or artisans, and it often happened that the receivers who paid the royal gifts were unable to pay the salaries of the inquisitors. Torquemada, in 1488, decreed that the royal gifts should not be paid, until the salaries and other expenses of the Inquisition had been defrayed, and wrote to request the approbation of Ferdinand, who refused it. The inquisitor-general was then obliged to permit the inquisitors to impose pecuniary penalties on reconciled persons (which permission was afterwards revoked). As experience showed that the revenue of the Inquisition was never sufficient, on account of the great number of prisoners which it was obliged to maintain, and the expenses incurred by the agent at Rome, Ferdinand and Isabella requested the Pope to place at the disposal of the holy office, a prebendary in each cathedral in their dominions; to which he consented in 1501. The receivers finding themselves unable to defray the expenses of the administration, demanded restitution of many persons whom they accused of retaining estates belonging to the Inquisition. This conduct caused so many complaints, that the council of the Inquisition was obliged to prohibit the receivers from molesting the proprietors of estates which had been sold before the year 1479. It is not surprising that the receivers should employ such measures to augment the revenue, when the inquisitors contributed to impoverish it themselves, by disposing of it according to their caprices, and without the permission of the sovereigns. This abuse rose to such a height, that Ferdinand and Isabella complained to the Pope, who prohibited the inquisitors from disposing of their revenues without an order from the king, on pain of excommunication. The inquisitors were afterwards obliged to refund the sums which they had seized.