What are the ethical lines crossed in Edgar Allen Poes short story pit and te pendulum

Poe purposely leaves the reader with a lack of information concerning the narrator's trial and sentencing is that we cannot ascertain his level of guilt or innocence. Part of the effect of the story is dependent on an assumption of the prisoner's relative innocence, particularly in the context of the cruelty of the Inquisition. The narrator's rescue from the Spanish Inquisitors by the French General Lasalle at the end of the story suggests that he may be a political victim driven to his doom as a result of worldly conflicts rather than sin, particularly since he was saved by the general himself rather than by a lesser soldier. In addition, the protagonist's oversensitivity and tendency towards introspection contribute to making him a sympathetic victim rather than a deserving prisoner.