Siguenza. About 1537 he obtained the magistral canonry of Seville, which imposed on him the duty of preaching. At first his preaching had little success. But he gained new views of truth by his intercourse with Valer, and before long he became famous as a preacher.
But he owed even more to his brother-canon, Constantino Ponce de la Fuente, than to Valer; for he it was who first taught him, in set terms, the doctrine of justification by faith. Constantino, a native of San Clémente near Cuença, had studied at Alcalâ with Gil and a certain Dr Vargas; he was a man of great learning, skilled in Greek and Hebrew, who had probably learnt the doctrine of Justification from books. In 1533 he had been made a canon of Seville; and although he was not so popular there as Gil, elsewhere his fame was far greater. The three friends now began to work together, Gil being the most active. He and Constantino preached diligently; Vargas expounded the Gospel of St Matthew and the Psalms; and by degrees they gathered a body of adherents to whom they ministered in secret. For a long while nothing was suspected; in fact, Constantino was chosen by the Emperor to accompany him as his preacher and confessor, and was out of Spain with him from 1548 to 1551, much revered and honoured. He subsequently came to England with Philip II, and only returned to Seville late in 1555. During this period he produced a series of books which were then much valued, but were ultimately regarded as heretical.
Meanwhile, the others had been less fortunate. Gil, indeed, had been nominated by the Emperor for a bishopric in 1550; but soon afterwards he and Vargas were cited before the Inquisition. Vargas fell ill and died; but Gil was proceeded against vigorously, the charges including the points of Justification, Works, Purgatory, Invocation of Saints, and actual iconoclasm in the Cathedral. In prison he wrote an apology on Justification which was held to make his case worse; but ultimately, on Sunday, August 21, 1552, he made a public recantation in the Cathedral, extorted, his friends afterwards said, by fraud. He was sentenced to a year's imprisonment in the castle of Triana near Seville (the headquarters of the Inquisition), with permission to come to the Cathedral fifteen times; he was to fast strictly every Friday, to make his confession monthly, communicating or not as his confessor directed, not to leave Spain, not to say mass for a year, or to exercise other functions for ten years. Gil however did not modify his views. In 1555 he visited the Reformed at Valladolid, and died a few days after his return, early in 1556.
The Chapter of Seville had stood by their colleague nobly, although, or perhaps because, their Archbishop, the stern Fernando de Valdés, was at the head of the Inquisition. They paid Gil a considerable salary whilst he was in prison, and set over his grave in the Cathedral a fine monument; moreover, in spite of great opposition, they elected Constantino magistral canon in his place. He at once took up his friend's
