Inquisition Edict against Peyote

We, the Inquisitors against heretical depravity and apostasy

We, the Inquisitors against heretical depravity and apostasy in the City of Mexico, the states and provinces of New Spain, New Galicia, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Yucatán, Verapaz, Honduras, the Philippine Islands, and their district and jurisdiction, by apostolic authority, etc. Inasmuch as the use of the herb or root called peyote, which has been introduced in these provinces for the purpose of discovering thefts and divining other events and hidden future contingencies, is a superstitious and condemned act, opposed to the purity and sincerity of our Holy Catholic Faith; it being certain that neither the said herb nor any other can have the natural virtue and efficacy claimed for these purposes, nor for causing the images, phantasms, and representations on which these divinations are founded; and that in them the suggestion and assistance of the devil, author of this abuse, is plainly seen, who availed himself first, in introducing it, of the natural credulity of the Indians and their inclination to idolatry, and afterward spread it to many other persons with little fear of God and an unformed faith, through whose excesses the said vice has gained strength and is committed with the frequency now observed. And since the obligation of our office requires us to cut it short and to remedy the harms and grave offenses to God our Lord that result from it, having discussed and conferred on the matter with learned persons of upright conscience, we have agreed to issue the present letter to you and to each one of you, by which we exhort and require you, in virtue of holy obedience and under penalty of major excommunication latae sententiae, the threefold canonical warning having been given, and of other pecuniary and corporal penalties reserved to our discretion. We order that from now on no person of any rank or condition whatever may use or shall use the said herb, peyote, or any other for the said purposes or for others like them, under any title or pretext, nor cause the Indians or other persons to take them; with the warning that if you do the contrary, besides having incurred the said censures and penalties, we will proceed against those of you who are rebellious and disobedient as against persons suspect in the holy Catholic faith.

And inasmuch as the said offense has until now been so widespread and practiced, as is known, and our intention is to prohibit and remedy it from now on and to quiet the consciences of the persons who have committed it, wishing to act with leniency, and by the commission we hold for this purpose from the Most Illustrious Lord Confessor of His Majesty, Inquisitor General in all his kingdoms and dominions, we grant grace and remission of everything past in the said excess up to the day of the publication of this our edict and prohibition; and we commit to any confessors, secular or regular, approved by their ordinaries, license and faculty to absolve from the said offense those who, as stated, have committed it up to now. Provided that the said absolution does not extend to the future, nor to other offenses, excesses, sorceries, and superstitions among those contained in the General Edict of the Faith and in the others we have ordered published on this matter, which are to remain in force and observance. And so that what this letter contains may come to the notice of all and no one may be ignorant of it, we order that it be published in all the cities, towns, and places of our district. Given in the hall of our audience on the nineteenth day of the month of June of the year sixteen hundred and twenty.

Licenciado D. Pedro Nabarre de Ysla (rubric)