Inquest
in legal proceedings, most commonly the finding of the court or jury in a civil case, when the defendant does not appear on the trial. Also the investigation made by the coroner, with the aid of a jury, as to the cause of a sudden or violent death.
INQUISITION (Latin inquisitio = a seeking or searching for), in the history of the Roman Catholic Church, a tribunal for searching out, inquiring into, and condemning offenses ag against the Canon Law, especially heresy, and taking means to have the offenders punished by the Civil Power. Inquisitors and the Inquisition did not come in together; the former preceded the latter (see INQUISI- TOR). The institution was resolved on at a synod held at Toulouse, in 1229, under Gregory IX., after the Albigensian crusade, and was formally established by him in 1233. The synod ordered that in every parish a priest and several respectable laymen should be appointed to INQUISITION search for offenders, and bring them before the bishops. Ere long the bishop handed over the invidious task to the Dominican order. Gregory appointed none but Dominicans, Innocent III. occasionally Franciscans, and Clement III. sent into Portugal a prior of the order of Minims. The tribunal was called the Holy Office, or the Holy Inquisition. Its judges, in unqualifiedly perfectly fair accordance with contemporaneous ecclesiastical procedure, encouraged informers, concealing their names from the person accused, who was urged to make a complete confession. Torture was also used to extract evidence. It was established in France in consequence of the decrees of the Synod of Toulouse. Philip the Fair converted its tribunals into State Courts, by means of which he crushed_the Templars. In 1538 the Grand Inquisitor, Louis de Rochelle, was convicted of Calvinism, and burnt. The power of these courts was soon after transferred to me Parliament, and finally, in 1560, to the bishops.
Nowhere in the world did the Inquisition find a more congenial soil than in Spain. In 1481 the Inquisition was established at Seville, by Ferdinand and Isabella, two Dominicans being the first judges. Torquemada, another Dominican, who became Grand Inquisitor in 1483, and held office for 15 years, extended it to various other towns. It was introduced into Peru and Mexico in 1571. Llorente, the historian of the Inquisition, was its secretary at Madrid from 1790 to 1792. Napoleon I. suppressed it on Dec. 4, 1808, and it was abolished on Feb. 12, 1813, by the Cortes.
Ferdinand VII. having re-established it in 1814, the Cortes in 1820 abolished it again. (See AUTO DA FÉ.) In 1526 it was set up in Portugal; in 1815 its acts were burned at Goa. The Congregation of the Cardinals of the Holy Inquisition was instituted by Pope Paul III., in 1542, and remodeled by Sixtus V. about 40 years later. The attempted introduction of the Inquisition into the United Provinces caused the loss of that fertile territory to Spain. No inquisitor, under that name, seems to have ever been commissioned to England; and when, in the 13th century, Conrad of Marburg attempted to establish the "Holy Office" in Germany, he was assassinated.
In law: (1) A judicial inquiry, investigation, or examination; an inquest. (2) The verdict of a petty jury under a Writ of Inquiry; also where the court requires a particular fact certified, or requires the sheriff to do certain acts in furtherance of its judgment.
INSANITY