] He
advised that the testimony of three persons be required for
conviction; if these could not be obtained, the prisoner's oath upon
the Gospels was to be considered sufficient.

[1] _Causa_ v, quaest. v, Illi qui, cap. iv.

[2] _Causa_ xv, quaest, vi, cap. i.

[3] _Responsa ad Consulta Bulgarorum_, cap. lxxxvi, Labbe,
_Concilia_, vol. viii, col. 544.

The ecclesiastical tribunals borrowed from Germany another method of
proving crime, viz., the ordeals, or judgments of God.

There was the duel, the ordeal of the cross, the ordeal of boiling
water, the ordeal of fire, and the ordeal of cold water. They had a
great vogue in nearly all the Latin countries, especially in Germany
and France. But about the twelfth century they deservedly fell into
great disfavor, until at last the Popes, particularly Innocent III,
Honorius III, and Gregory IX, legislated them out of existence.[1]

[1] _Decretals_, lib. v, tit. xxxv, cap. i-iii. Cf. Vacandard,
_L'Eglise et les Ordalies_ in _Etudes de critique et d'histoire_, 3d
ed., Paris, 1906, pp. 191-215.

At the very moment the popes were condemning the ordeals, the revival
of the Roman law throughout the West was introducing the customs of
antiquity. It was then "that jurists began to feel the need of
torture, and accustom themselves to the idea of its introduction."
"The earliest instances with which I have met," writes Lea, "occur in
the Veronese code of 1228, and the Sicilian constitutions of Frederic
II in 1231, and in both of these the references to it show how
sparingly and hesitatingly it was employed. Even Frederic, in his
ruthless edicts, from 1220 to 1239, makes no allusion to it, but in
accordance with the Verona decree of Lucius III, prescribes the
recognized form of canonical purgation for the trial of all suspected
heretics."[1]

[1] Lea, op. cit., vol. i, p. 421.

The use of torture, as Tanon has pointed out, had perhaps never been
altogether discontinued. Some ecclesiastical tribunals, at least in
Paris, made use of it in extremely grave cases, at the close of the
twelfth andd beginning of the thirteenth centuries.[1] But this was
exceptional: in Italy, apparently, it had never been used.

[1] Tanon, op. cit., pp. 362-373.

Gregory IX ignored all references to torture made in the Veronese
code, and the constitutions of Frederic II. But Innocent IV, feeling
undoubtedly that it was a quick and effective method for detecting
criminals, authorized the tribunals