酷兔英语
    当前位置:
  1. 首页
  2. 文章
  3. 娱乐英语
  4. 原版小说
  5. 正文

The Zincali-Part17_George Borrow(1803-1881)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

0 收藏 0 分享 0 赞

章节正文
文章总共2页


Although what is stated in the above extracts, respecting the

marriages of the Gitanos and their licentious manner of living, is,



for the most part, incorrect, there is no reason to conclude the

same with respect to their want of religion in the olden time, and



their slight regard for the forms and observances of the church, as

their behaviour at the present day serves to confirm what is said



on those points. From the whole, we may form a tolerably correct

idea of the opinions of the time respecting the Gitanos in matters



of morality and religion. A very natural question now seems to

present itself, namely, what steps did the government of Spain,



civil and ecclesiastical, which has so often trumpeted its zeal in

the cause of what it calls the Christian religion, which has so



often been the scourge of the Jew, of the Mahometan, and of the

professors of the reformed faith; what steps did it take towards



converting, punishing, and rooting out from Spain, a sect of demi-

atheists, who, besides being cheats and robbers, displayed the most



marked indifference for the forms of the Catholic religion, and

presumed to eat flesh every day, and to intermarry with their



relations, without paying the vicegerent of Christ here on earth

for permission so to do?



The Gitanos have at all times, since their first appearance in

Spain, been notorious for their contempt of religious observances;



yet there is no proof that they were subjected to persecution on

that account. The men have been punished as robbers and murderers,



with the gallows and the galleys; the women, as thieves and

sorceresses, with imprisonment, flagellation, and sometimes death;



but as a rabble, living without fear of God, and, by so doing,

affording an evil example to the nation at large, few people gave



themselves much trouble about them, though they may have

occasionally been designated as such in a royal edict, intended to



check their robberies, or by some priest from the pulpit, from

whose stable they had perhaps contrived to extract the mule which



previously had the honour of ambling beneath his portly person.

The Inquisition, which burnt so many Jews and Moors, and



conscientious Christians, at Seville and Madrid, and in other parts

of Spain, seems to have exhibited the greatest clemency and



forbearance to the Gitanos. Indeed, we cannot find one instance of

its having interfered with them. The charge of restraining the



excesses of the Gitanos was abandoned entirely to the secular

authorities, and more particularly to the Santa Hermandad, a kind



of police instituted for the purpose of clearing the roads of

robbers. Whilst I resided at Cordova, I was acquainted with an



aged ecclesiastic, who was priest of a village called Puente, at

about two leagues' distance from the city. He was detained in



Cordova on account of his political opinions, though he was

otherwise at liberty. We lived together at the same house; and he



frequently visited me in my apartment.

This person, who was upwards of eighty years of age, had formerly



been inquisitor at Cordova. One night, whilst we were seated

together, three Gitanos entered to pay me a visit, and on observing



the old ecclesiastic, exhibited every mark of dissatisfaction, and

speaking in their own idiom, called him a BALICHOW, and abused



priests in general in most unmeasured terms. On their departing, I

inquired of the old man whether he, who having been an inquisitor,



was doubtless versed in the annals of the holy office, could inform

me whether the Inquisition had ever taken any active measures for



the suppression and punishment of the sect of the Gitanos:

whereupon he replied, 'that he was not aware of one case of a



Gitano having been tried or punished by the Inquisition'; adding

these remarkable words: 'The Inquisition always looked upon them



with too much contempt to give itself the slightest trouble

concerning them; for as no danger either to the state, or the



church of Rome, could proceed from the Gitanos, it was a matter of

perfect indifference to the holy office whether they lived without



religion or not. The holy office has always reserved its anger for

people very different; the Gitanos having at all times been GENTE



BARATA Y DESPRECIABLE.

Indeed, most of the persecutions which have arisen in Spain against



Jews, Moors, and Protestants, sprang from motives with which

fanaticism and bigotry, of which it is true the Spaniards have



their full share, had very little connection. Religion was assumed

as a mask to conceal the vilest and most detestable motives which






文章总共2页
文章标签:名著  

章节正文
Copyright © 2023 Qeto All rights reserved.
商务合作 | 联系我们 | 关于我们 | 版权声明 | 隐私条款 | 如果智培

京ICP备05059198号-1 京公网安备 11011202003401号