
THE BUILDER NOVEMBER 1916

THE SUPPRESSION OF THE ORDER OF THE TEMPLE
BY BRO. FREDERICK W. HAMILTON, MASSACHUSETTS

CIRCUMSTANCES have conspired to single out the Order of the Temple from the
other orders of Soldier-Monks of the twelfth century for the particular notice
of succeeding generations. Preeminent for their valor and their
accomplishments during the days of their magnificent success, the bitter
injustice and cruel suffering attendant upon the suppression of the Order has
thrown around their name a dark shadow of tragedy. Not only so, but the added
horror of the accusations made against them, the whispers of still more
dreadful things circulated by envious, fearful, or malignant tongues, the
unusual end of the proceedings against the Order, and the conviction of many
members before the ecclesiastical courts have lent an air of mystery to the
whole sad story.

The very mention of the word Templar brings to many minds the suggestion of
romance and of mystery coupled with a vague sense of hidden crime and lurking
horror. As a matter of fact there is really very little mystery about the fate
of the Templars and it is perfectly possible to find out of what they were
accused and to make a fair estimate of their probable guilt or innocence. This
is of particular interest to Masons because large numbers of Masons in other
than symbolic degrees have taken the name of the old Order, endeavoring to
practice its principles and emulate its virtues and holding in everlasting
remembrance the name of the last Grand Master.

Before proceeding to tell in detail the story of the fall of the Order, let us
stop to review briefly the story of its growth.

In 1118, two Knights, Hugues de Payens, a Burgundian, and Godeffroi de St.
Omer, a Frenchman, associated with themselves six other Knights for the
service of the Holy Sepulcher, the protection of pilgrims, and the welfare of
the Church.

These men took a step beyond that taken by the ordinary crusader, in that they
undertook to give their whole lives to the service of the Church militant and
to found an order of men likewise devoted to the same service. These eight men
took an oath to the Patriarch of Jerusalem by which they swore to fight for
Christ under the three fold vow of poverty, chastity, and obedience. It will
be understood, of course, that the vow of poverty, while it debarred the
Knight from having any personal possessions whatever, did not apply to the
accumulation of riches by the Order or to the Knight's enjoyment of those
riches, while the vow of obedience had reference only to his relations with
his superiors in the Order.

King Baldwin I. of Jerusalem gave them for a residence a part of his palace
next to the Mosque of Aksa, the so-called Temple of Solomon, from which they
took the name of Knights of the Temple. At first they had no particular
regulations or "rule," as it is commonly called, and no distinguishing dress.
Their first idea appears to have been to make the Order a means of reformation
by opening its ranks to men whose past was one of sin and failure and giving
them an opportunity to redeem their souls through offering to Christ a service
of constant danger. They, therefore, admitted to their number excommunicated
knights, after they had obtained absolution from a Bishop, and other men of
darkened past who desired an opportunity to bring forth fruits meet for
repentance. This missionary idea was soon abandoned and the Knights chosen
from candidates, who showed themselves worthy. It was unfortunate, however, in
that it immediately laid the Order under suspicion of both the Church and
laity because of doubts of the sincerity of such repentance.

In 1127 Hugues de Payens, who had been chosen Grand Master, went to Europe
with the purpose of finding support for the Order. He was fortunate enough to
enlist the interest and obtain the active patronage of St. Bernard. Bernard of
Clairvaux, more1monly known as St. Bernard, was the greatest and most
influential churchman of his time and one of the greatest of all times. Under
his patronage the Order quickly obtained favor and support and grew in members
and power.

St. Bernard drew up the "rule" or series of regulations governing the
organization of the Order and the lives of its members. The original "rule" of
St. Bernard was written in French. Unfortunately there are no early copies of
it known to be in existence. There are however, later copies together with the
translation into Latin known as the "Latin Rule" and additional statutes which
were adopted from time to time.

It was vehemently asserted by the enemies of the Order, in later years, that
there was a secret "rule" quite different from this which entirely changed the
character of the Order, colored it with heresy, and stained it with sin. There
is no evidence whatever that any such "secret rule" ever existed. Stories
about it may be safely dismissed as idle gossip.

The French "rule" provided for the officers of the organization and defined
their duties. It also carefully regulated the daily conduct of the Knights and
provided for the support which they should receive from the common funds of
the Order. It is interesting to observe that the "rule" provided that each
Knight should have three horses and one squire. By favor of his commander, or
prior, he might have four horses and two squires.

This effectually disposes of the legend that the great seal of the Order,
representing two Knights mounted on one horse, was intended to indicate that
in early days the Order was so poor that the Knights went to battle mounted
thus in pairs. The second rider in the device is probably intended to
represent either a wounded Knight who is being rescued by his brother in arms
or a pilgrim being protected by a Knight of the Temple.

The Knights were not priests. That is to say, although under the three vows
they were not in holy orders. Each priory or house of the Knights was provided
with one or more chaplains. These chaplains were members of the Order of the
Temple and were always in holy orders. The chaplains were exempt from ordinary
ecclesiastical jurisdiction. Spiritually they were accountable only to the
Pope; temporally only to the Grand Master. They were the sole confessors of
the Knights, who were not permitted to accept the ministrations of religion
from any but their own chaplains unless it was impossible to secure a
chaplain's services.

The monastic custom of having the Bible read at meals was prescribed by the
"rule" for the Knights, in consideration of the fact that they were laymen,
and consequently uneducated, the Bible was read in the vernacular and not in
the Latin which was customary in religious services. There is in existence an
old French Bible of the Templars which shows evidences of the critical spirit
on the part of the translator.

With this brief survey let us pass on to the opening years of the fourteenth
century. The little band of eight Knights sworn to the service of the Holy
Sepulcher and the protection of pilgrims had grown to be one of the great
powers of the world. If its purpose and policy had been other than they were
it might have shaken the power of any monarch in Christendom. It consisted of
many thousand Knights besides the lay brothers and feudal servants of the
Order. It possessed wealth far greater than that of any state in Christendom.
This wealth was the result of the great stream of gifts which for two
centuries had flowed steadily into the coffers of the Order, supplemented by
the spoils of war, and husbanded with great financial abilty. Kings, princes,
and nobles throughout Europe had vied with each other in their great donations
to the Order of the Temple. It owned literally thousands of estates all over
Europe and wherever in the east the crusades had been successful.

The crusades being over and their immense expenditures having ceased, the
enormous revenues of the Order were accumulating in its hands, and those were
not idle hands, for the Templars were not content to let their gold pieces lie
idly in their treasury. This was before the age of modern banking and the
Templars, with their great wealth, their many establishments, and their
connection with the Orient, made themselves the great international financiers
of the age. Kings and merchants alike borrowed on good security and at ample
interest the unused treasure of the Order. Oriental exchange, especially, was
almost absolutely in their hands so that they acted as the great financial
clearing house between Europe and Asia. Their establishment, commonly known as
the Temple, at Paris was the center of the world's money market.

It is said that when De Molay came from the east, lured by the treacherous
call to consult about the crusade, he brought with him 150,000 florins in gold
and ten horse loads of silver. With due allowance to the difference in the
purchasing power of money, the gold was probably the equivalent of three
million dollars today. I have no way to guess the value of the silver, but it
must have been very great. This, it will be remembered, was the ready money
upon which De Molay could lay his hands at short notice.

The power of the Order matched its wealth. The Grand Master was a sovereign
prince, recognized as a full peer of any monarch in Europe. The Knights, save
those too old for warfare, were all soldiers trained to arms and owing no
allegiance to any power but the Grand Master and the Pope. During the stormy
years of the crusades, they, with the Knights of the compan ion Orders, formed
the fighting edge of the Christian army. Combined with their lay brothers and
the feudal array of their tenants they formed an army far superior to any
other in existence.

That an Order possessed of such wealth and power should have been regarded
with suspicion, and even fear, is only natural. It is entirely clear, however,
from their entire history, and especially from their fate, that the Order had
no policy in the political affairs of Europe either for its own advantage or
that of any others. The Knights adhered strictly to the original policy of the
Order. They had no enemies in Christendom and no friends outside of it. Their
sole military and political purpose was the service of the church and the
reconquest of the Holy Land. It must be remembered that while we know that the
crusades were over in 1300 the men of that day did not know it. They fully
expected that the crusades would be resumed, and the Knights of the Temple
were maintaining their numbers and diligently increasing their wealth in order
to be able to strike more effectively than ever before when the banner of the
Cross should once more take the field against the Crescent.

In addition to all their wealth and power the Order had great privileges of
two classes, lay and clerical. As lay nobles they held and exercised all the
usual feudal rights in and over estates which had been given to them, with
certain extremely important additions. The Order, being a corporation in the
first rank of the feudal hierarchy, exercised in all its fiefs what was known
in those days as high, middle, and low justices, that is, complete
jurisdiction extending even to the infliction of the death penalty. Owing
allegiance only to the head of their Order, the estates of the Knights were
not liable for military service except to the Order itself. The estates of the
Order were the permanent possessions of the corporation.

The greater part of the revenue of the kings of that age was derived from
certain rights of taxation which were exercised on special occasions; for
example, the passage of an estate by death or marriage from one holder to
another involved certain payments to the king or over-lord which amounted
practically to an inheritance tax. The marriage of children, the knighting of
the noble's sons, or other events in the family of the noble were occasions
for gifts to the king which were practically taxes. Other forms of taxation
were laid from time to time on the feudal estates. But corporations do not
die, do not marry, and do not have children, consequently the estates of the
Templars were free from every kind of taxation, except for the benefit of the
Temple itself.

This exemption from military service and from financial burdens struck at the
very roots of the royal power as the state was organized in the middle ages.
The Templars enjoyed all the benefits of the feudal system but bore none of
its burdens. When an estate in France or England, for some reason, passed into
the hands of the Templars it was to all intents and purposes taken out of the
kingdom as effectively as if it had been swallowed up by the sea.

As an Order of military monks, the Knights enjoyed clerical privileges equally
great.

That their spiritual affairs were in the hands of their chaplains, has already
been pointed out. In addition to this, the Grand Master and others of the high
officers possessed the power of disciplinary confession, but not of
sacramental confession, a point important to be remembered in connection with
later developments. The Order as a whole and its members individually were
entirely free from the jurisdiction of bishops and other ecclesiastical
authorities. They were accountable only to the Pope in person. They were not
affected by general censures or decrees of the Pope unless they were
especially mentioned. Their churches, of which there were great numbers on
their various estates besides those attached to their houses, were not
affected by ordinary excommunication and interdicts. No matter what
ecclesiastical censures might hang over the people of the nation the
activities of the churches of the Temple went on undisturbed. Excommunicated
persons might be buried in consecrated ground belonging to the Templars, and
this was not infrequently done. They possessed, by papal decree, the right to
have churches not their own which were under interdict opened twice a year and
services held for the purpose of presenting their cause and taking collections
for the support of the Holy War. They collected the usual tithes from the
churches on their estates but they did not pay any tithes, even for those
churches, into the coffers of the Church.

The natural result of this condition was envy and hatred on the part of both
civil and religious authorities. Civil authorities looked on with dismay while
the broad lands of noble after noble passed by gift or bequest into the
control of the Templars and ceased to contribute to the maintenance of the
state, while the individual noble was filled with envy as he saw the Knights
of the Temple enjoying privileges and powers so much greater than his own, and
the law officers of the crown indignantly found their authority everywhere
terminating at the boundary line of one of the Temple estates.

On the other hand the religious authorities, accustomed to control the lives
and actions even of kings, were enraged beyond measure to find themselves
utterly powerless before the Knights of the Temple. Entrenched behind the many
privileges granted by a long line of Popes the Templar could and did snap his
fingers in the face of the most arrogant archbishop or cardinal and the angry
churchmen had to swallow his wrath and digest it as best he could, while he
had not even the poor consolation of collecting revenues from the parishes in
his jurisdiction which had passed into the hands of the Order. This sort of
thing had raised tides of envy and hatred against the Order of which it seemed
to be strangely unconscious.

Claims that the Knights abused their power and privileges were common. The
picture of the Templar in Scott's Ivanhoe undoubtedly represents the
widespread conception of the character and conduct of the members of the
Order. That there were men like Scott's Templar could hardly be denied, but
there is no reason to believe that they were typical of the Order generally.

One feature of the Order gave the opportunity for proceedings against it and
the excuse for its undoing. The Order of the Temple was always a secret order.
Its conclaves for business and for the reception of candidates were always
closely guarded. It was as impossible for one not a member of the Order to get
into meeting of the Knights of that day as it would be for like person to get
into a meeting of one of our modern gatherings of Knights Templars.

This secrecy, as is inevitable, in all ages and especially in times of
ignorance and superstition, like the thireenth and fourteenth centuries, bred
all manner of suspicion. Men, and especially ignorant men, are ready to
believe that evil things are done in places where they are not admitted and
unfortunately there were too many who envied and hated the Templars and were
ready to spread these whispered accusations. It was asserted that under cover
of this secrecy the Knights not only lapsed into heresy and consorted with
Saracens and other misbelievers but that they practiced idolatry and
necromancy, that they performed the most blasphemous travesties of religion,
and that they were given to licentiousness and practiced every conceivable
crime, natural and unnatural.

We have now set the stage for the tragedy. Let us consider a little the
persons and antecedents of the three principal actors. They were the Grand
Master of the Templars, the King of France, and the Pope.

The Grand Master of the Templars, who had in been office since 1295, was
Jacques de Molay. He was a simple, unlettered Knight, personally brave,
confiding and unsuspicious, incapable of intrigue or treachery, not very clear
headed or resourceful in the face of other than physical peril. His intentions
were always good; his conduct under the severe trials to which he was
subjected was sometimes weak. He was a man who could be easily deceived and
could be worked upon through his reverence for the Pope, his respect for the
King, and his honest desire to protect the interest of the Order and the
welfare of his brother Knights.

The Knights generally were fighters and some of them were men of affairs, but
they were not thinkers and they were not intriguers. It has been said that
they were too stupid to be heretics but this is probably an extreme statement.
They were rather simple minded single hearted gentlemen thoroughly loyal to
the cause to which they had dedicated their lives and for which they were
ready to die.

The King of France was Philip IV, commonly known as Philippe Le Bel or Philip
the Fair, a name, by the way, which would better be translated, Philip the
Handsome. Born in 1268 he ascended the throne in 1285. As his name indicates,
he was a man of singular beauty, being said to be the handsomest man of his
time. He was cold, self-contained, far-sighted, crafty, and unscrupulous. He
possessed great ability and was absolutely remorseless in the choice of means
and in the pursuit of his ends. It is said that he was never known to smile
and those whom he crushed in the cold persistency with which he executed his
purposes said that he was not a man at all, but that his beautiful body was
inhabited by a demon instead of a human soul.

It must be admitted that from the point of view of the interests and
prosperity of the kingdom he was a good king. In his day France was well
governed and strongly consolidated and he left it on the whole in a much
better condition than he found it. He had one supreme end in life and that was
to make the royal government supreme in France. He was determined that the
government should be independent of priests or noble and the king should have
a free hand, not limited in the exercise of his authority by any powers within
or without the confines of the kingdom.

To accomplish this he believed that two things were necessary. One was that
the shackles imposed by the papacy upon the King of France, in common with the
other monarchs of Europe, should be broken and the crown of France relieved
from the domination of the Vatican. The other was that the feudal nobles
should be brought into subjection to the crown and especially that the
independent power of the Order of the Temple should be broken, their wealth
plundered for the filling of the royal Treasury, their great estates restored
to the usual condition of feudal dependency, and their resources of men and
money made available for the purposes of the kingdom.

The Pope was Clement V. In order to understand the conduct of Pope Clement, it
is necessary to go back a little. At a comparatively early period in the reign
of Philip, Boniface VIII ascended the throne, in 1294. The predecessor of
Boniface was Celestine V, one of the most singular popes who ever occupied the
chair of St. Peter.

Deeply imbued with mysticism, he was a dreamer of dreams and a writer of
strange books. The sanctity of his life and the strangeness of his somewhat
unintelligible writings placed him on the narrow edge between condemnation as
a heretic on one side and canonization as a saint on the other. Whether saint
or heretic, he was utterly unfit for the difficult administrative duties of
the papacy. He never wanted to be Pope and after a short and troubled reign he
was induced to resign, and sought seclusion, which was really imprisonment, in
a monastery, where he died in a very short time.

Boniface was certainly the leader in the movement which brought about the
resignation of Celestine and was charged with being the author of the
unfortunate old man's misfortune. At any rate, he succeeded him on the papal
throne. There was quite a good deal of doubt in the minds of canon lawyers as
to whether a pope could resign, and therefore a cloud rested on the title of
Boniface, a cloud which was only partially dispelled by the death of
Celestine. The enemies of Boniface, and he had many, declared that the death
of his predecessor was not a natural one and that Boniface himself was
responsible for it.

Boniface was proud, arrogant, and rash. He declared himself over-lord of all
the monarchs of the world, and set the high water mark of papal pretension. On
one memorable occasion, when there was a vacancy in the office of Emperor, the
Pope appeared in public, brandishing his sword and declaring that he was
Emperor as well as Pope. He claimed, and attempted to exercise, power to set
up and pull down kings and even emperors.

Naturally, Philip the Fair and Boniface very soon found themselves engaged in
a deadly conflict. Boniface laid France under an interdict and excommunicated
King Philip and his family. The King, supported by a host of the clergy as
well as the laity of France, appealed to a future Council of the Church. It is
worthy of mention that this appeal was signed by the Order of the Temple. The
appeal struck Boniface in his most sensitive spot. The question of whether or
not a Council was superior to a Pope had not yet been settled and the
assumption that it was his superior was unspeakably exasperating to the
overbearing, tyrannical Boniface.

King Philip was far too aggressive to content himself with this appeal.
Seizing an occasion when the pope was absent from Rome on a visit to Anagni,
his native town, and comparatively undefended, the king sent his chancellor,
William de Nogaret, and Sciarra Colonna, a great Italian noble who was on bad
terms with the pope, to arrest Boniface. By whom Philip expected that the pope
would or could be tried is not clear. The charges preferred were intrusion,
that is to say, forcing himself into the papal chair without proper title,
gross immorality, tyranny and heresy.

Boniface was actually arrested and treated with great indignity. Some
authorities say that he was actually struck in the face by Colonna. The people
of Anagni rose and overpowered the guard and released Boniface, but the shock
of his arrest with the attendant humiliation and indignation caused his death
within a few days.

He was succeeded by a somewhat colorless pope, Benedict II, who ruled only
from October 27, 1303, to the seventh of the following July. He released
France from the interdict and Philip and his family from excommunication, but
his reign was otherwise unimportant.

Now came the question of the election of a new pope, in which Philip proposed
to play an important part. His attention fell upon Bertrand de Got (Gouth). De
Got came from a Gascon family and was an Aquitainian, that is to say, an
English subject, for it must be remembered that at this time about half of
what is now France belonged to the dominions of the English kings, either by
descent from the Dukes of Normandy, or by virtue of the marriage of Eleanor of
Aquitaine to Henry III.

De Got was Archbishop of Bordeaux. He had been an early friend of Philip, who
knew the man thoroughly, but in the quarrel between Philip and the pope, he
had sided with Boniface. Election to the papacy was not then limited to the
cardinals, and the Archbishop of Bordeaux might well aspire to the tiara. He
was extremely ambitious, hungering with all his soul for wealth, honor, and
power. Philip knew his man and believed that as pope he might be controlled,
especially if he was made to feel that he owed his election to the king.

Philip did not see the Archbishop personally, as has been claimed by many
writers, but he did unquestionably have an understanding with him through
intermediaries before using his influence to secure his election. Two
questions were raised by King Philip. One was the question of the suppression
of the Order of the Temple, for the interest of both church and state through
the abolition of the power and privileges which made the Templars so
objectionable to both. The other was the question of the heresy of Boniface
VIII. King Philip threatened to bring pressure to bear which would make it
necessary to call a General Council before which he would impeach the late
Pope of heresy. In view of the great unpopularity of Boniface and of certain
things said and done by him, there appeared to be great danger that the charge
could be pushed home and the memory of the late Pope attainted of heresy to
the great scandal of the church and disgrace of the papacy.

De Got was unscrupulous enough to agree to almost anything in order to be made
Pope and he therefore agreed to co-operate in the suppression of the Order of
the Temple if the king would agree not to press the charge of heresy against
his predecessor. With this understanding King Philip supported his candidacy
and he was elected Pope and took the title of Clement V.

As might be expected it very soon appeared that Bertrand De Got who wanted to
be Pope and Clement V who was Pope, were not quite the same person. Like many
another successful politician before and since the Pope had no intention of
fulfilling pre-election promises if he could get out of it.

His first movement was to propose the consolidation of the Order of the Temple
with the Order of the Hospitalers. This would then enable him to reorganize
both bodies and amend their charters. This project was proposed in 1306, but
was abandoned on account of the vigorous opposition of the Grand Masters of
both the Orders. The Pope then proposed to reform the Order of the Temple, but
moved slowly in carrying out the project.

King Philip was very impatient at the Pope's delay and continually pressed him
to fulfill his promises of suppression under threat of a general Council and
condemnation of Boniface VIII for heresy. He was not content, however, with
insistence and threats. Through his agents he found two broken Knights of
worthless character, Esquiau (Squin) De Florian, a Frenchman, and Noffo Dei
(Deghi), a Florentine. These men claimed to have been members of the Order of
the Temple and offered pretended confessions in which they charged the Order
with heresy and various abominable practices. For all this they were well
paid.

On the basis of this manufactured evidence Philip submitted formal charges to
the Pope. The Pope received them, but continued to delay action. Philip's
determination, however, was more than a match for the Pope's procrastination.
He found means to force the Pope's hand through the intervention of William of
Paris, Grand Inquisitor of France. The Grand Iniquisitor had been King
Philip's confessor and was entirely ready to lend himself to the King's
desires. By virtue of his office he had power to take summary action in all
cases of heresy within the kingdom and to take such measures as he saw fit to
deal with them.

Philip submitted his evidence to the Grand Inisitor who forthwith demanded of
the civil authorities the arrest of all the Templars in France. Obviously this
was a very serious matter. If the Templars had taken concerted action to
resist such an arrest it would probably have been impossible. Assembled in
their strong houses they might have stood siege until aid could have reached
them from other countries and it would have been a very serious question
whether Philip could have retained his throne. Plans were therefore laid for
their capture by surprise and arrangements were made for the simultaneous
arrest of all the Knights throughout the kingdom on the night of October 13,
1307.

The blow came like lightning from a clear sky. It is true that the Templars
had been aware of the circulation of unpleasant reports. They knew that there
were whispers of evil and De Molay had gone as far as to ask, in 1306, that an
investigation be made into the conduct of the Order, but investigation was the
last thing the King desired and no attention was paid to the request.

The apprehensions of the Templars were set at rest and their confidence was
further deliberately strengthened by the treacherous conduct of the King. In
1306 King Philip had been assailed by a mob in the streets of Paris and saved
himself from great personal danger by taking refuge in the house of the
Templars which happened to be not far from the scene of disturbance. This
obligation, however, rested lightly on his conscience. The Templars were
accustomed to have a public reception of Knights in addition to the private
initiation and King Philip attended such a public reception the spring of
1307. On October 12, the very day before that fixed for the arrest, De Molay
was present by invitation, at the funeral of King Philip's sister-in-law and
was assigned a place of honor among the participants in the ceremonies. It is
not to be wondered at that the blow of October 13 was an entire surprise and
was entirely successful. De Molay and all the Knights in the kingdom were
arrested, their goods were seized, and their houses taken possession of,
without the slightest attempt at resistance so far as we have any record.

The events which ensued are somewhat complicated and consist of two distinct
sets of proceedings, first, personal proceedings against the individual
Knights and second, proceedings against the Order as a whole and in all its
branches.

Proceedings against the Knights were the first in time. They were begun with
great vigor by the Grand Inquisitor of France, but there was some question
about the Grand Inquisitor's jurisdiction. Particular rights and immunities of
the Templars which have already been noted might be considered as placing them
beyond the reach of proceedings not instigated by the Pope, or at least
approved by him.

The Grand Inquisitor, however, would not allow himself to be troubled by
questions of this sort and immediately proceeded to examine the arrested
Knights under torture.

We must not forget that this was not an unusual proceeding. The examination of
accused persons, and even of witnesses, under torture was the ordinary method
of judicial procedure at that time. It was not a method confined to the
Inquisition but was commonly practiced by the civil courts. It would have been
very unusual if it had been omitted in this case. Horrible as it appears to us
and useless as a method of ascertaining the truth, it was an every day
occurrence in the 14th century and was absolutely relied upon as a method of
getting at facts.

Torture was not confined to physical torment. The accused were promised
clemency if they freely confessed the acts with which they were charged and
named their accomplices. In the case of the Templars such promises were
conveyed in letters under the royal seal. These letters were decoys pure and
simple. They were either forgeries or deliberately written with intent to
deceive and without the slightest intention of keeping the promises which they
contained.

The accused were told that if they retracted these confessions they would
suffer the pains of death in this world and of hell in the world to come. It
was realized that men under physical torture will often say almost anything
which may be suggested to them as a means of securing relief from their
sufferings and these means were taken to prevent a retraction of these forced
confessions.

Moreover the law of evidence in use in those days contained one provision
which seems to us a peculiarly ghastly mockery. The confessions which were
wrung from the lips of the tortured victims were taken down as uttered.
Depositions thus obtained were taken to the victim after he had recovered from
the first effects of the torture and he was asked to sign them. If he did thus
sign them, aware that a refusal to do so would mean renewal of the tortures
together with the before mentioned threats of death and damnation, confessions
thus signed were held to be voluntary and not legally made under torture.

Naturally many of the Knights confessed. De Molay himself made a partial
confession. Most of these confessions were afterwards retracted, but for the
time being they stood.

The charges will be examined further on, but the principal things confessed
should be noted here. They were:

Denial of Christ.
Defiling the Cross by spitting upon it and by other methods too indecent to
describe.

Indecent kisses which it was claimed the initiates were compelled to give the
receiving officer on various parts of his body.

Sodomy. This, by the way, was a vice much more common in the 13th century than
now and was ordinarily a part of any serious accusations made against either
individuals or groups of individuals. It was one of the charges against
Boniface VIII when he was arrested by De Nogaret and Colonna.

Idolatry. This was based on the alleged worshipof an idol, of which we shall
hear more, and on the accusation that the cord which was part of the habit of
every Templar was consecrated by this idol by being touched to it before the
Templars put it on. Other abominations were vaguely referred to but these were
the main points of the accusation.

(To be Continued.)
