years. His name acquired extraordinary authority, and the leading schools of orthodox Spain referred to him as the proeclarissimum jubar-- "the brightest light"—of their country. Controversy over free will Báñez in his prime was director and confessor of St. Teresa. The great controversy, with whose beginnings his name is prominently associated, goes back to a public disputation held early in 1582. Francisco Zumel, of the Order of Mercy, was moderator. Prudentius Montemayor, a Jesuit, argued that Christ did not die freely, and consequently suffered death without merit, if the Father had given him a command to die. Báñez asked what the consequences would have been if the Father had given command not only as to the substance of the act of death, but also as to its circumstances. Prudentius responded that in that case there remained neither liberty nor merit. Luis de León, an Augustinian, sided with Prudentius and presently the discussion was taken up by the masters in attendance and carried to the kindred subjects of predestination and justification. Other formal disputations ensued, and strong feeling was manifested. Juan de Santa e Cruz, a Hieronymite, felt constrained to refer the matter to the Spanish Inquisition (5 February), and to his deposition he appended sixteen propositions covering the doctrines in controversy. Leon declared that he had only defended the theses for the sake of argument. His chief thought was to prevent them from being qualified as heretical. Notwithstanding these and further admissions, he was forbidden to teach, publicly or privately, the sixteen propositions as reviewed and proscribed. In 1588, Luis Molina, a Jesuit brought out, at Lisbon, his Concordia liberi arbitrii cum gratiæ donis, bearing the censura, or sanction, of a Dominican, Bartolomeu Ferreiro, and dedicated to the Inquisitor General of Portugal, Cardinal Albert of Austria; but a sentiment against its appearance in Spain was aroused on the ground of its favouring some of the interdicted propositions. The cardinal, advised of this, stopped its sale, and requested Báñez and probably some others to examine it. Three months later, Báñez gave his opinion that six of the 11 forbidden propositions appeared in the Concordia. Molina was asked to defend himself, and his answers to the objections and to some other observations were added as an appendix, with which, sanctioned anew (25 and 30 August 1589), the work was permitted to circulate. It was regarded as an epoch-making study, and many Fathers