Aranda, Pedro Pablo Abarca de Bolea, Count of

ARANDA, Pedro Pablo Abarca de Bolea, Count of. - Minister of Charles III of Spain, b. in 1719 near Huesca (Aragon), d. at Epila (Aragon) in 1798. Having entered upon a military career, he traveled in Europe, attending the maneuvers of Frederick the Great and forming bonds of friendship with the French Encyclopedists. Ambassador to Portugal in 1755 and to Poland in 1760, he later obtained, during the war with Portugal, the highest rank in the military hierarchy. In 1766 he was appointed by Charles III president of the council of Castile. In this very high office he was inspired especially by his tenacious anti-religious prejudices, drawing encouragement and advice from Voltaire, with whom he had a continuous correspondence. He persecuted the Jesuits, denounced them to an extraordinary tribunal, and succeeded in obtaining from the king their expulsion from Spain in 1767. This action of the all-powerful minister won him wide fame in the world of the Enlightenment and of unbelievers, marking him as one of the most influential personalities of the anti-religious movement. Having fallen into disfavor with the king, he was sent as ambassador to France in 1773. There, some years later, he joined the Grand Orient of France, of which he imported an offshoot into Spain, becoming its grand master. Queen Maria Luisa had him recalled to the post of minister for a few months in 1792, then he was definitively set aside.