We conclude from this, that either your confession is merely a snare to entrap fools, or that Greenway considered the conspiracy not a hellish crime, but a meritorious deed!
But we have a still more stringent argument. Suppose that, following some of their probable opinions, the Jesuits thought that they were obliged to absolve the miscreants, and that their ministry obliged them faithfully to keep the secret, had they not the Pope, the omnipotent Pope to apply to, to absolve them from that obligation? Is there any precept, any sacrament, any law human or divine, from the fulfilment of which, according to their doctrine, the Pope cannot grant a dispensation? If there is any, let it be pointed out, and we shall absolve them. But if they cannot deny that the Pope could have released them from the secrecy of confession, and if they cannot prove that they asked such dispensation, it is evident that they did not wish to prevent the crime. And if this was connivance, and if this connivance was a capital crime, then their condemnation was undoubtedly a legal and just sentence, and they met with nothing but deserved punishment. We wonder that James, who was so well versed in theological controversies, did not find out any of these arguments, which would certainly have furnished more plausible grounds for a condemnation than the equivocal confession wrung from the Jesuits by the contrivance of ignoble and disgraceful snares. For if we unreservedly condemn the Jesuits, we exclaim with equal energy against the proceedings of their adversaries. All the forms of justice, all the laws of humanity, were scandalously violated. Garnet is confined in a prison, repeatedly interrogated, and, in order that he may betray himself, assured that his accomplice Father Greenway has been arrested, and that he has confessed everything. Then, after he has been long in a dungeon alone, a jailor, pretending to be touched with compassion, tells the desolate man, that another Jesuit is close by, and that he can converse with, and even see him; and opens a door through which the two friends can see each other. The manner in which his secrets were surprised; the misconstruction of his words; the interception of letters, which he was assured he might in safety write to his bosom friends; the strange imputation of roguery, because he did not consent to accuse himself, in clear and precise words; the promises which were held out to him and never kept; and, above all, the protracted, cruel, and inhuman moral torture which was inflicted upon him on the scaffold;[283] all deserve our severe and unconditional censure. Thank God! in England at least we are now far from those cruel times of injustice and fanaticism, and we sincerely hope we shall never see them back again.
The Jesuits were not appalled nor discouraged by the execution of Garnet, nor by that of Oldcorne, who had suffered at Worcester some days before.[284] We find them in almost all the conspiracies which were got up to impede the regular march of the government, and we find from time to time severe and inquisitorial laws enacted against them, some of which forbade them to set foot in England, under penalty of death. It is an incontestable fact, that the Jesuits, by their turbulent and treacherous conduct, were the cause of most of the rigorous measures taken by the government against the Roman Catholics, who ought therefore to consider those crafty monks as their most bitter enemies. Another inference may be drawn from what we have related, namely—that no danger, not even that of death, can deter a Jesuit from following out his projects, when once they are considered to be profitable to the Order, or necessary to avenge it of its enemies. The moment they could return from exile, the instant they were set free from dangers or untied from the rack, they returned to their plots and intrigues with unabated ardour and most wonderful obstinacy. A striking instance of this was furnished by the Jesuit Fischer, who, the moment he was liberated from the tower, undertook to convert to Catholicism the mother of the brilliant Buckingham, who did in fact abjure Protestantism, and, in union with France and Spain, contrived to render less cruel the laws of proscription against the Catholics.[285]
During the fatal struggle which Charles I. maintained against the Parliament, the Jesuits publicly and openly took part with the cavaliers, because Charles was evidently much better disposed towards them than were the Puritans. It is evident that, by shewing their devotedness to the king, if the contest had ended in his favour, they might not only have hoped for the free exercise of their religion, but for a considerable share of influence over him. But a very grave accusation was brought against them, which, if true, would shew them guilty of the most diabolical iniquity. We have no proofs to establish this accusation, which was produced some years after the event; but, if we are to declare our own conviction, we firmly believe them guilty; not because we credit in all its parts the narrative of Jurieu, but for the reasons we are about to give. Jurieu relates that the Jesuits, to re-establish the Roman Catholic religion, thought that it would be necessary that Charles, then prisoner, should fall, and the monarchy along with him. In consequence, eighteen of them, headed by a lord of the realm, went to Rome to consult the Pope. The matter was discussed in secret assemblies, and it was decided that it was lawful that Charles should die. The deputies, on their return from Rome, shewed to the Sorbonne the response of the Pope, of which many copies were distributed. The Sorbonne approved. On their return to England, the Jesuits set themselves to work, and sent many of the most ardent Catholics among the Independents, dissembling their religion, to inflame still more their passions, and push things to extremities. Their scheme having failed, they wished to have back the copies of the consultation of the Pope and the Sorbonne; but the priest who before abjuring Protestantism had been Charles’s confessor, and who was intimate with the Jesuits, would not give up his copy, and, after the return of the Stuarts, shewed it to many persons who were still living, and could afford actual evidence of the reality of what he narrated.[286]
This statement, literally taken, does not stand examination, and Crétineau, who reports it, triumphantly exclaims, that this manner of writing history renders all discussion impossible.[287] No, certainly not; such infernal projects as to drive the king to extremities, and make the king’s head fall for the fulfilment of their designs, if formed, were neither publicly nor secretly discussed at the Court of Rome in the presence of eighteen Jesuits and a lord, and much less was the conclusion they came to, and their approval of the project, put in writing and freely distributed: we readily acquit them of such foolish contrivances. But, knowing as we do the arts of the Loyolan brotherhood, we repeat that we firmly believe that it is more than probable that the Jesuits did mix among the Roundheads and excite their fanaticism to frenzy. I have recorded (page 171) an almost similar fact which appeared under our own eyes in Rome. And I must further add, that all the more virulent men who, in the beginning of Pius IX.’s reign, were proposing the most daring and extravagant measures, were afterwards discovered to be either in the pay of the fathers, or to be the unconscious tools of their secret agency.
Discouraged a little under Cromwell, the Jesuits took heart again after the restoration of Charles II., and resorted to their usual arts and machinations. If we are to believe what they boast of, it seems that they had plunged into a more dangerous and extensive conspiracy against the Protestant religion and the English liberties than we are aware of. “A secret treaty,” says Crétineau, “had been signed between Louis XIV. and Charles II., to re-establish the Catholic religion in Great Britain. Fathers Annat and Ferrier, successively confessors to the French king, and the English Jesuits, had not been strangers to this negotiation; Colman did not ignore those details, and he spoke of them in his letters to Father Lachaise.”[288] We do not know how far we may credit this assertion; we know that Charles debased himself by asking and receiving money from the French monarch, to whom he betrayed the interests of his allies and of his own kingdom; but, as to having stipulated for the re-establishment of the Romish religion, we would not be bold enough to assert that it was so. However it be, this statement is connected with the famous Popish plot which, in 1678, threw Great Britain into such a state of alarm and excitement, and which, although it was at first the cause of many innocent victims beings sacrificed, ultimately produced an immense and glorious result—the Habeas Corpus Act.
Oates and Bedloe are two names which have come down to posterity abhorred and execrated by every honest man. These infamous and abandoned men accused the Jesuits, the Pope, the Kings of France and Spain, many English noblemen, and some scores of thousands of the English citizens, of a plot so absurd, as to make, in our days, every one ashamed of repeating it. And yet the generality of the common people, and the greater part of the higher classes, at the time believed in its reality. Nothing else was talked of, and all the cares of the government, the activity of the parliament, and the energy of the citizens, were exerted to protect the nation from an imaginary impending ruin. This ought to teach us how the passions and spirit of party deprive us of our right feeling and judgment, and how dangerous it is to give way to the impulse of the moment in times of great commotion. Many noblemen and citizens were arrested upon the deposition of these scoundrels. Many suffered the extreme penalty of the law. Father Ireland, on the deposition of Oates, for which the latter was afterwards condemned for perjury, was sentenced to death and executed; and soon after, the provincial and four other Jesuits met with the same fate upon the same absurd and unjust accusation.
We do not pretend to say, however, that the Jesuits at such an epoch had quite renounced their intrigues and treacherous projects, and were not to be looked after. No; their restless and enterprising spirit rendered, and does still render, them very dangerous, and their conduct in Protestant countries may be said, with justice, to be a permanent conspiracy against the welfare and the interests of all other communities; and they themselves, as we said, confess as much. But they were guiltless of the crime of which they were accused, and for which they suffered. How much more mischief they were the cause of in the reign of the despotic and bigoted James II.! It was at their instigation that this bigoted monarch annulled the test act, imprisoned many Protestant bishops, had as many as four Roman Catholic priests consecrated bishops at a time, and had formed a plan for converting England to the Popish idolatry. Yet all these arbitrary and foolish acts resulted also at last in the great advantage of the English nation. The Jesuits’ influence had grown so powerful under James’s reign, that Father Peter was admitted into the privy council, and we do not hesitate to say, that the favour James shewed to the members of the Company and to the Catholics in general, and the authority they exercised over him, was one of the most efficient causes of raising up the people of England’s feelings of indignation, and to bring them to resolve upon and achieve the glorious Revolution of 1688.
When we reflect that the Jesuits are our fellow-men, that their crimes and iniquities which we are compelled to stigmatise, are in some measure a stain upon the human species, we sincerely rejoice when we find some noble action to record, and when we may write a page of praise and eulogium. We think we have shewn this impartiality in our account of the Indian missions, when, while condemning with all our might the idolatrous practice of later times, we awarded to the first missionaries the praise that was due to their pure and generous intentions, and to their prodigious and unremitting activity. We are placed in much the same predicament in speaking of the American missions, when we find the evil inherent in the spirit of the sect, and in the religion they profess, united with noble and generous endeavours to make the happiness of a barbarous and savage population, by reducing it under benignant and humane laws, and by imparting to it the benefit of Christianity, at least in its effects upon the external conduct and mode of living. No doubt, a Christian Protestant—a man deeply imbued with the true spirit of the gospel, and who abhors any form of worship which consists in mere bodily service—will find much to blame in these missions. No doubt the Jesuits here, as in India, preached and taught superstitious practices and external observances, rather than the sincere devotion of the heart, and the faith to be reposed on the merits of Christ’s blood. No doubt they converted the spiritual and mystic religion of Christ into a sensual worship of material symbols. But, to be just, we think that these reproaches are due to Popery, to the Roman Catholic religion in general, and not to the Jesuits alone, and that we ought not to withhold from them the praise they deserve for any good quality or merits they possess, merely because they are Papists. This would be too invidious, and would render us guilty of capital injustice towards those Romanists or Jesuits who sincerely believe that theirs is the only true religion; and be assured that in all religions, there are some who think thus of their own. On the other hand, the Jesuits are accused of having undertaken these missions solely with a view to their private ends, to aggrandise and enrich the order, and not to advance the interests of religion and the glory of God. This we freely admit, and we have repeatedly said that the Order has always been the ultimate end of their conduct; but to refuse them the merit of having brought a savage population into the pale of civilisation, because they did so for their own private interest, would be the same as to apply the epithet of rogue to a landlord or manufacturer, who treats his dependants with unwonted kindness and humanity, because, by treating them in this manner, he himself receives immense advantage.
Our readers must not infer from what we have just said, that we do not find anything with which to reproach the Jesuits in their American missions. We shall have many things to censure in them, but, on the whole, their proceedings appear to us to be deserving of the greatest praise, and we feel obliged to defend them from the gross abuse which has been indiscriminately poured upon them on this score.
The character of the Western and Eastern missions differ widely, both in the means employed and the results obtained. In East India and China, the principal feature of the missions is the idolatry with which the Jesuits polluted the Christian religion. Having to deal with populations in possession already of more or less civilisation, and deeply imbued with the prejudices of their religion, the Jesuits thought of humouring them in their belief, and sometimes shewed themselves more inclined to idolatry than the pagans they were labouring to convert. Besides, having on one side to contend with the pagan priests, who wanted themselves to work the ignorance and prejudices of the Indians to their own account, and being harassed on the other by the chief of their own religion, who would not admit of any other idolatry than that which was approved by himself, the Jesuits could not obtain in the East Indies any great and permanent result.
Of a quite different character are the missions of America. The Jesuits found there a barbarous and savage population, zealous of their vagabond independence, fierce in their enmities, without any positive notion of a peculiar religion, and, consequently, easy to be subjected to any superior intelligence who should undertake to inculcate upon them no matter what new creed. The chief difficulty there lay in the impossibility of having any intercourse with the persons whose conversion was desired. The Indians, simple and kind when first discovered, had now become ferocious and excessively cunning, having been driven to extremities by the cruel and merciless treatment they had experienced from the rapacious Spaniards, a treatment which had inspired them with mortal hatred against all Christians, and against the very name of Christ, which had been sacrilegiously employed in the massacre of their kinsmen. Yet it was among the same savages, who avoided Europeans more than a ferocious beast, that the Jesuits, without arms or any compulsory means, simply by persuasion and kindness, succeeded in erecting an empire, all the laws of which were based upon the first principles of Christianity. Let us see how they performed such real prodigies.
The Spanish adventurers had brought into conquered America all the vices and the ferocious passions of their Inquisition. It might be said that South America had been transformed into a large inquisitorial tribunal, and that every soldier was an inquisitor and an executioner at the same time. The adventurers, to palliate their crimes, when they murdered the poor, inoffensive Indians, gave out that they did so to honour Christ, whom these obdurate pagans refused to worship. It is not our intention to detail all the crimes of those most Christian assassins, and we shall be contented with saying, that while they butchered tens of thousands of inoffensive people, in endeavouring to convert them to their religion, they succeeded with but very few; and those who, to avoid tortures and death, submitted to be baptized, hated still more than their pagan brethren the very name of Christians.
Ranke gives a very prosperous picture of the state of religion in America, and says, “In the beginning of the sixteenth century we find the proud fabric of the Catholic Church completely erected in South America. It possessed five archbishoprics, twenty-seven bishoprics, four hundred monasteries, and doctrines innumerable.”[289] Now, with all deference to so great a historian, we venture to say, that we admit the veracity of the statement as to the number of monks and monasteries, archbishoprics and bishoprics; but we believe that these establishments were in proportion to the extent of the country, not to the number of Christian inhabitants. Indeed, in every tract of land of which the Europeans had taken possession, there was erected a church, if not for the accommodation of these same Europeans, at least to furnish priests and monks with a pretext to claim a share in the spoils and wealth of the country; but we doubt much that many Indians frequented these churches. The swarms of monks who had flocked to America, finding in the climate a still greater stimulus to their usual propensity to indolence and luxury, indulged in all their vices, and thought only of making converts as far as was necessary to procure some subjects who might enrich their patrons, the soldiers, as well as their monasteries.[290] Such, however, was not the conduct of the Jesuits. There, as in Europe, they wished to be distinguished from other brotherhoods, and affected a more saintly and pious course of life. Concealing their ultimate purposes under the cloak of religion and piety, they spoke of nothing else but of converting infidels, and opposed, in the name of Christ, the sanguinary measures adopted by the conquerors, and approved by other religious communities. Perhaps we are not far from the truth when we assert that the Jesuits adopted a more humane and Christian policy, as well for their private purpose, as to set themselves in opposition to other religious communities. Because, it is a remarkable fact in the history of the Church of Rome, that while every other brotherhood has both friends and foes in the other bodies, the Jesuits alone have none but enemies. However it was, they set themselves to work; and, overlooking for a moment the greater or less holiness of the end they proposed, we repeat, that the means they made use of to acquire a standing among the savages of South America are deserving of the highest encomium. The conquerors of this unfortunate part of the globe, as Robertson remarks, had no other object in view than to rob, to enslave, to exterminate, while the Jesuits established themselves there in the view of humanity. They overran the country to a great extent, and wherever they could find an Indian, they overwhelmed him with so much kindness, shewed him so much affection, spoke so indignantly of the cruelty and avarice of the ferocious conquerors, with so much unction of the mercies of God, that these injured men yielded by degrees to the fascination, and accustomed themselves to look upon a Jesuit as a protector from the oppressions of the other Europeans. And protectors they were, and proved to be. Father Valdiva went purposely to Madrid to obtain from Philip III. orders enjoining officers to treat the poor Indians with a little more humanity, and brought back a decree, that those Indians who had settled within certain precincts ruled by the Jesuits, should neither be reduced to servitude, nor be forced to embrace the Christian religion.[291] In the Tucuman, in Paraguay, in Chili, the Jesuits in their wanderings were making many and devout proselytes, but with no other material advantage to the order except the envy of the other brotherhoods, and the hatred of the Spaniards, whose interests they were damaging. The sagacious and politic Acquaviva perceived at once that this state of things must be mended; and, in consequence, he sent to America, in 1602, a commissioner, who, re-uniting in Salta all the Jesuits dispersed in different countries, apprised them that the General thought it expedient to trace a plan to moderate the eccentricities (écarts) of zeal, and to direct its impetuosity;[292] in other words, to turn such zeal to account. In consequence, it was determined to concentrate all, or at least their greatest efforts, upon a point, and fix there the seat of their power in the New World. After having provided that a sufficient number of the order should remain at the stations throughout all South America, to keep up their schools and colleges, and their commercial establishments, Acquaviva wished that his disciples should employ all their energies in creating a new kingdom which they could call their own.
Paraguay, an immense and most fertile region, was chosen for a site on which to erect this principality, far from any rivalry, and with the view that the subject should know no other master, no other religion, no other God, than those presented to them by the fathers. The undertaking was difficult, and required a great deal of courage, patience, and intrepidity; but the Jesuits proved equal to the task. By degrees, they succeeded in bringing some tribes to listen to them. The Guaranis were the first who had friendly intercourse with the Jesuits, and who were persuaded by them to renounce their wandering and adventurous life, and to taste the sweets of a well-regulated society. Some houses were built under the direction of the fathers. The lay brothers, or temporal coadjutors, were the artisans who supplied them with what was most essential to render life pleasant and comfortable. Above all, the power of music was brought to bear on the vivid mind of those savages, who were charmed by the melody of the sacred songs repeated by the fathers.
The knowledge the Jesuits had of the art of healing wounds and bodily diseases, contributed also in great measure to procure them friends and admirers. Curiosity further favoured their efforts, while it brought the Indians to view what appeared to them such strange things in the Jesuit settlements, after they were sure that they should meet with nothing but kindness and presents. Where at first stood a few isolated houses, soon sprung up a village, which subsequently became a neat and regular little town. The plan traced for these towns was uniform, and very simple. The streets, of one breadth, extended in straight lines, and met in a central square. The church was built in the most conspicuous situation of the village, and was by far the most handsome and decorated building in the town. Near the church were the house of the fathers, the arsenal, and the storehouses. In every village there was also a workhouse, or a sort of penitentiary for bad women.
These villages were known under the general appellation of Reductions, but each of them was distinguished by a proper name. The first which was established was dedicated to the Madonna of Loretto; the second, to St Ignatius; and others to other saints and Madonnas. As early as the year 1632, the Jesuits possessed twenty Reductions, each containing a thousand families. Two Jesuits, the curate and the vicar, were appointed to the management of each Reduction, which they governed with absolute and unquestioned authority. They were the sovereigns, the friends, the physicians, the gods, of those barbarians who consented to live in the Reductions. They partook of their labours, of their amusements, of their joys, of their sorrows. They visited daily every house in which lay a sick person, whom they served as the kindest nurse, and to whom they seemed to be ministering genii. By such conduct they brought this primitive population to idolise them.
It must not be supposed, however, that the Jesuits obtained at once over the ferocious adult Indians a general and absolute power. Even those who had consented to receive baptism, and to live for some time in the Reduction, often deserted it, and disdaining to live that peaceful and comparatively effeminate life, returned to their forests, and to their former life of constant warfare, in search of their enemies, in order to gratify their cannibal appetites. Often they rebelled against the Jesuits’ authority, and not seldom menaced them with utter destruction. But the second generation—those children who were born within the Reduction, and had been brought up by the fathers—shewed themselves the most submissive and devoted of all subjects. Gratitude for the kindness they had experienced, admiration for the superior intelligence and acquirements of their masters, awe for the religion they were taught, fear of punishment and disgrace—all combined to render them faithful and submissive to the fathers.
When once the Jesuits had raised up a generation so devoted and obedient, they then brought into operation their system of government, and made a successful attempt to realise that republic preconceived of old by Plato, and which, with perhaps more interested views, is held out to us by the Socialists of our own day. In fact, their form of a republic was nothing else than that Communism which the famous Cabet is now trying to establish in nearly the same regions; the only difference being, that the Jesuits substituted themselves for the state or community.
The most perfect equality reigned in the Reductions. No mark of distinction, no difference of dress, of house accommodation, or of food, rendered one envious of the lot of another. In every Reduction there were workshops in which were exercised the most useful arts. The moment the boys were able to work, they were sent there to learn the trade to which they felt most strongly inclined, according to a principle to which the Jesuits invariably adhered—“that the art must be guided by nature.” The Jesuit lay brothers, or temporal coadjutors, were the artisans who instructed the youth, and they and the professed members themselves put their hand to the plough, to encourage the Indians in conquering their repugnance to labour the soil. Every family was assigned a portion of ground, which they were obliged to cultivate; and a severe vigilance insured a good cultivation. The women had also their occupations. Every Monday morning they received a certain quantity of wool or cotton, and every Saturday they were required to bring it back ready for the loom. All the produce, of whatever sort, was deposited in large storehouses, and distributed, by the Jesuits, in equal portions to every individual. Even meat was portioned from the public slaughter-houses in the same manner. In the distribution, the greatest attention was paid to the orphan, the helpless, and the superannuated. The surplus of the produce was exported, and partly exchanged for European wares which were wanted in the Reduction; and the remainder, after having paid a piastra (four shillings) for each individual from eighteen to fifty years of age, as a sort of tribute to the King of Spain, remained at the disposal of the fathers. No coin of whatever sort was permitted or known at the Reduction. A spot of ground attached to every house may be said to have constituted the only property belonging to the individual; and this was done to encourage and recompense industry: for, if he made it productive, he reaped all the profits himself, without diminishing the portion he received from the common store. The daily occupations were minutely regulated. There were fixed hours for work, for amusement, for prayers, and an hour was even fixed in the evening after which every person was obliged to return within the wall of his own habitation. Any transgression of any of the established rules met with public corporal punishment; but, in general, the transgressor feared more the anger of the father, than the castigation that awaited him. General suffrage was exercised in its fullest extent; and it was the people who elected their magistrates, and their civil and military officers. All these public functionaries were invariably chosen from the Indians; but, to flatter the pride, or lull the jealousy, of the Spanish king, they were distinguished by the Spanish appellations, Corregidor, Alcalde, &c. The choice of the people was submitted, pro forma at least, to the approval of the Spanish authorities, who, not knowing either electors or candidates, could not but approve of it; but, in reality, the sanction of the Jesuits was indispensable to the validity of the election.
To keep these people in such a state of dependence and submission, the Jesuits had secluded them from the rest of the world. No individual could leave the Reduction without permission, and no European was allowed to visit these Reductions unaccompanied, or to have free intercourse with the inhabitants. The knowledge of any other than the native language was altogether banished, and aversion and prejudices against the Europeans as carefully cherished as in ancient Egypt.
Nor were the Reductions left unprotected against the possible attacks of foreign enemies. All able-bodied men were drilled to arms, and formed into a militia, having its regulations, its officers, its arsenal, its artillery, its ammunition. The officers were chosen by the soldiers; the arms and ammunition, not excepting the cannon, were manufactured in the Reduction, always by, and under the direction of, the Jesuits. On the afternoon of every Sunday, and other holidays, the militia assembled and executed military exercises and evolutions. When that militia was called forth for the service of the Spanish king, “they had always at their head and among their ranks, Jesuits, who prevented all contact with other Indians or with Europeans, and who answered for their virtue before God, as the Indians answered for their courage before men.”[293] Nor, indeed, did they fail in their duty when an occasion presented itself. Tribes of savages often attacked the Reductions, but were met with undoubted courage, and, generally speaking, were repulsed after sustaining severe loss.
But if, on the one hand, the Jesuits cherished among the people distrust and aversion towards strangers, they, on the other hand, diligently inculcated the exercise of hospitality and friendship among the different Reductions. On the great festival days, and especially on the day of the patron saint of any Reduction, the neighbouring ones went thither in solemn procession, and were received with all possible marks of love and friendship.
Such is a sketch of the civil government of the Reductions, and of the kind of life led by the inhabitants. Objections and reproaches, and perhaps not always unfounded, have been raised against such a system. It has been said that the inhabitants of the Reductions were low and abject slaves, led on by the scourge, deprived even of the faculty of thinking, and confined in a perpetual imprisonment, though within a large space. Quinet, with perhaps more eloquence than reason, exclaims, “Are we sure that it (Paraguay) contains the germ of a great empire? Where is the sign of life? Everywhere else, indeed, one hears at least the squalling of the child in the cradle; here, I greatly fear, I confess, that so much silence prevailing in the same place for three ages, is but a bad sign, and that the regime which can so quietly enervate virgin nature, cannot be any other than that which develops Guatmozen and Montezuma.” All this is very well said, and may be in part true. Doubtless, these people were kept in perpetual infancy. Doubtless, nothing great, nothing of a creating stamp, must be expected from them. Doubtless, they did not develop and expand the new element of life imparted to them, as other nations have done who were more left to themselves; nor did they exercise the noblest part of their nature—the intelligence—in that pursuit for which we think man was created—the search after truth. But surely there are nations who have been placed in worse circumstances, and subjected to more disastrous influences, and more deserving our pity and commiseration. Thus, if a nation, that has, through the free exercise of all its faculties and activities, arrived at a high state of civilisation and refinement, should be at once crushed, as France is at the present moment, under the iron hand of despotism, that people would be really miserable, and such doleful lamentations as those of the eloquent ex-professor of the College of France would not in this case be misplaced. But these Americans, who knew nothing of the pleasures of moral and intellectual refinement but what was presented to them by their instructors, and found therein contentment, we do not know how far they deserve to be pitied. Were these people, we ask in our turn, less happy or more miserable than those tens of thousands who wallow in vices of all sorts in the free and civilised towns of Paris and London? Are, then, squalid poverty, the groans of the oppressed, and reckless sensuality, necessary elements of national happiness? These are questions which in our opinion deserve some consideration; and although we think the human race has been destined by the Creator to greater and nobler purposes than the mere enjoyment of a material life; and although we know that humanity must progress in its career, and that this progress cannot be attained without great commotion and great evil, nevertheless, when we contemplate all the miseries which surround our state of civilisation, we freely forgive the Jesuits for having, in one part of the globe, let civilisation and progress sleep a while, to render these poor Indians happy.
Better founded are the charges brought by the pious and zealous against the Jesuits, with respect to the kind of religion they taught to their neophytes. In fact, though we cannot trace any such permanent system of gross idolatry as was practised by the order in the East Indies, nevertheless it is an undeniable fact, that what was taught by them under the name of the pure religion of Christ, was little else than a series of empty forms and superstitious observances, and that the worship which was rendered to God was little better than a continual and motley masquerade, if we may be allowed the expression. We shall not enter into details, the following passage from Crétineau sufficiently shewing what sort of Christians, if they can be called so at all, were those converted by the Jesuits. “Those Indians had a very limited intelligence; they only understood what fell under their senses; and the missionaries were so alarmed at their stupidity, that they asked themselves whether it was possible to admit them to the participation of the sacraments. They consulted, upon this point, the bishops of Peru assembled at Lima, who came to the decision that, baptism excepted, no act of Christian devotion should be imposed upon them, without infinite precautions.”[294] It is true that the panegyrist of the order adds, that the patience of the Jesuits was not discouraged for all this, and that they endeavoured to render them better Christians, and, we even believe, if the man who fulfilled all the imposed external ceremonies may be called a Christian, that they succeeded in their attempt.
However, it seems that the Jesuits had so completely perverted the true spirit of the Christian religion, that even Roman Catholic bishops, who, as every one knows, are not very scrupulous in these matters, were shocked and indignant at their conduct, and made an attempt to put a stop to it. Bernardin of Cardenas, Bishop of Paraguay, and John Palafox, Bishop of Angelopolis, were the most prominent in their efforts to put a stop to the Jesuitical superstitions; but both were unsuccessful; both were worsted in the contest; both were obliged to wander as poor exiles out of their dioceses; and both were at last compelled to give up their bishoprics. The history of Palafox in particular deserves to be briefly told.
Palafox was a man of the greatest piety, of a pure and uncontaminated life, and, after his death, was even proposed for canonisation. He bore no ill-will to the Jesuits; on the contrary, as a good Papist which he was, he even overrated their merits. In his letter to the King of Spain, he says of them, “The Company of the holy name of Jesus is an admirable institution, learned, useful, sainted, worthy not only of the protection of your majesty, but of all the Catholic prelates.”[295] A man who thus speaks of the order cannot be suspected of enmity; and it must be inferred that he would not have attacked the Society, unless constrained by duty or necessity. He attempted at first to bring them to reason by remonstrance.[296] He afterwards wrote a strong letter to Pope Innocent X., and asked for a reform of the Society, indispensable, he said, for the good of the Christian community. The result was, that the Jesuits raised such a storm, and excited so many bad passions against the virtuous prelate, that he, “not to be imprisoned or murdered, was obliged to fly, and to wander,” as he wrote to the Pope, “through inhospitable mountains and forests; to appease his hunger with the bread of affliction; to quench his thirst with the water of his eyes; to have no other house than caverns and the hard ground; and to pass his life with serpents and scorpions.”[297] Such was the life to which the Jesuits had reduced the poor bishop. But even this did not satisfy them. To satiate their spirit of revenge, they did not scruple to profane the episcopal dignity, and the most sacred mysteries of that religion which they professed to uphold. In 1647, on the day of the festival of their founder Loyola, the pupils of the college got up a procession, of which the following were the principal features. One of the scholars had the crozier hanging from the tail of his horse, and the mitre at the stirrup. Another carried an image of the bishop in caricature; others carried indecent images of highly respectable priests. This one gave a blessing with the horns of a bullock, saying, “Such are the true armorial of the Christians.” That others held up with one hand the image of the Saviour, and with the other an infamous thing which decency forbids us to name. All of them shouted out the Lord’s Prayer, at the end of which they repeated with thundering shouts, “Libera nos a Palafox—Deliver us from Palafox.”[298]
At last, the Court of Rome, in order to protect him, transferred him to the see of Osma in Spain, where he gave such proofs of virtue and piety, that he died in the odour of sanctity, received subsequently the title of Servus Dei and Venerabilis, and, about sixty years after, was proposed for canonization.[299] But can it be believed—would any one imagine—that Jesuits of the third generation would step forward to renew their attack against the ancient opponent of the order, and oppose his canonisation? And yet such was the case. The General of the Company actually interfered, and by the mouth of the promoter of the faith—promotore della fede,[300] calumniated his doctrines, his conduct, his life; and succeeded in postponing the canonisation till the storm which was gathering broke forth, and dispersed for a while the hated Company of Jesus.[301] This example goes far to shew how deeply is rooted in the heart of the Jesuit the spirit of hatred and revenge!
We have reported at some length the incidents connected with Palafox, as peculiarly exemplifying both the character of that individual, and the nature of the facts and the scandal they produced among the Papists themselves, and which is not yet alleged. But this is merely one example, amongst thousands, of the domineering and persecuting spirit of Jesuitism. “The innumerable and continual proceedings that were brought against you at the Court of Rome,” says Gioberti, addressing the order, “bear witness of the kind of concord and good friendship which the Company maintained with their companions in the priesthood and apostolate. The first cause of the quarrel has always been, that your missionaries wanted to be alone, and to exclude the other orders from any participation in the missions; and for this they first of all applied to the Holy See; and when they did not succeed there, they had recourse to all sorts of tricks, insidious calumnies, persecutions, and acts of violence.”[302] So speaks a man who glories in being a truly good Roman Catholic, and who enumerates many bishops, vicar-generals, popes, legates, &c., who had been sorely persecuted by the fathers. In fact, here is the policy adopted by the Jesuits towards the superior ecclesiastical authorities everywhere, and more especially in the East and West Indies. We beg the especial attention of our readers to the following statement, because it serves to explain the apparent anomaly existing among Popish bishops and other functionaries, in respect to the favour or hatred shewn by them to the Jesuits.
The bishop, or legate, or cardinal, or whoever possesses any authority, must be either friendly or adverse to the Company, and this especially in foreign and distant lands far from the control of Rome. In the former case, the Jesuits will load him with praises, whether deserved or not. They will pronounce him a saint, a luminary of the Church, a model of Christian virtue; and leaving to him all the external pomp and ostensible authority of his office, they will command and direct everything in his name. To such men they give the utmost outward respect, and make the most humble protestations of devotion, repeating at every word that they are the most obedient servants of the Holy See, and of its representative. And this same conduct of theirs, and the testimony which those same persons are ready to give to their dutiful behaviour, is held out by the fathers as an answer to those who reproach them with disobedience and irreligion. But if these ecclesiastical dignitaries refuse to submit to the guidance of the fathers, and pretend to exercise their own authority independently, they become profligate heretics, monsters of iniquity; and they may consider themselves fortunate if they escape with treatment short of that bestowed upon Palafox and De Tournon. Indeed, even the very Popes have been treated in nearly the same manner, and have been extolled or slandered, according as they were favourable or adverse to the Society. There are to be found in the Bullarium a quantity of briefs against the Jesuits for their disobedience to the representatives of the Holy See, and for the persecutions these had suffered from them.[303] Their disobedience, and spirit of revolt against the Court of Rome, with respect to their conduct in the missions, in which they persisted, had become so offensive and provoking, that first Innocent X., and then Innocent XIII., had resolved to abolish the Society, not by a bold and decisive measure, as did afterwards Clement XIV., but by forbidding the reception of any more novices. Innocent XIII., after having ordered the Inquisition to collect full evidence of the almost traitorous actions of the Jesuits, in answer to an apologetic letter of the General, who declared the Society to be innocent, or, at least, excused their insubordination and rebellion, issued a bull by which it was expressly forbidden to the General, and the Society, to give the habit to any novice, or to admit any to take vows, whether simple or solemn.[304] But while Innocent was determining to act with extreme vigour against the Society, he died, and by a death which awakened no unnatural suspicion of foul play.[305]
Such are the broad features of the American missions. We may as well add, that the Jesuits thought it prudent to refuse admittance into the Company to all the aborigines, in order that they might not lose the prestige which they exercised over them. We must also warn our readers not to imagine that the Jesuits had confined their establishment to the Reductions of Paraguay. Paraguay was their own private kingdom, we may say, but they had also magnificent establishments of all kinds throughout all South America. Particular incidents, minute details, miracles, wonders, as related by the Jesuits in their histories, and in their letters, annuæl or edifiantes, we shall not repeat; nor shall we record some partial acts of cruelty and wickedness with which some of the Jesuits have been reproached. We think we have given as fair an idea as possible of the general character of the missions, and this is all that can be done in a general history of the order. As we shall afterwards have occasion to speak at some length of the commercial operations of the Jesuits, and of the ultimate fate of the Reductions, we shall now bring this chapter to an end.
We have seen in one of our former chapters, that during Acquaviva’s generalate, there broke out several partial insurrections against the exorbitant power of the General, and that, although they were quelled, they had left in the community seeds of disobedience and a spirit of independence, which it was to be feared would manifest itself again at the first favourable moment. In fact, the instant it was no more restrained by the iron hand of the inflexible Acquaviva, it pervaded all the classes of the order, especially the highest, that of the professed, and a turbulent and haughty aristocracy took, in the management of the Society, the place reserved by Loyola for the all-powerful General. The character of the immediate successors of Acquaviva greatly facilitated such an innovation, which ultimately produced the ruin of the order. Vitelleschi, Caraffa, Piccolomini, Gottifredi, were not the proper men to govern this brotherhood, now ascended to the height of its power and pride. They were neither saints nor rogues enough to succeed in the undertaking. They did not inspire veneration enough by their pious and saintly life as did Borgia, nor respect and admiration by their superior genius in governing the community, as Lainez and Acquaviva had done, and the consciousness of their own insufficiency rendered them still less suited to the task.
Vitelleschi, Acquaviva’s immediate successor, was a well-intentioned man, mild and conciliatory. He was called by his friends the angel of peace, and on his death-bed he found consolation from the conviction that he had never injured any one.[306] But it is evident that such a kind and indulgent man could not oppose any effectual resistance to the fast-spreading corruption of the order, nor to the demands of determined ambition. What under Acquaviva had only been the expedient of the moment, became under Vitelleschi a rule. The professed members became, if not exclusively, at least simultaneously with the coadjutors, the administrators of the temporal concerns of the Society; and the control which the two classes had exercised, the one over the other, according to the wise enactments of Ignatius, was for ever annihilated. While the number of the coadjutors decreased, that of the professed became out of all proportion numerous, but lost some of that veneration which they had earned in former times by a life, in appearance at least, wholly spiritual and ascetic. Besides, as we have said, persons of the highest families, eager for ecclesiastical dignities or temporal power, now sought admission into the order, and Vitelleschi had neither the intention nor perhaps the power to refuse them, whether they were qualified or not. The strict and searching scrutiny to which the candidate ought to have submitted, and to which in fact he had been subjected under Loyola and the two following Generals, had become gradually less severe; but under Vitelleschi it was altogether neglected, and the novices were absolved from many obligations to which the Constitution rightfully subjected them. The abuses resulting from the non-observance of the most essential rules increased so greatly, that Vitelleschi himself was much affected by it, and poured forth his affliction in a most eloquent and deprecatory letter, which he addressed to the members of the order. From this letter we extract the following passage:—“But whence can we suspect our disinclination to Divine things—our feeling of laborious irksomeness in recollection—in checking the wanderings of our vagrant imaginations, frequently tending in that direction which is least to be desired, because we have not repressed them when we could? What is that tenacious and entangling love of the lowest objects—the world, honour, parents, and worldly comforts?—that greater authority conceded to the rebellious flesh and blood rather than to the spirit in action, for I care not for words;—that enervated exhausted weakness in resisting the solicitations of the adversary in our conflicts with the domestic enemy, perhaps not entirely yielding, but still not evincing that alacrity and exaltation of mind to which only victory is granted? These are the fruits of timidity and of a dissolute spirit, which, unless it is raised betimes, and warmed anew, is clearly approaching a fall and destruction.” And the letter concludes with these remarkable words—“I eagerly call all to witness and proclaim to them, that with Bernard I expect an answer to this epistle, but an answer of deeds, not words.”[307] “So that,” says Gioberti, “during Vitelleschi’s government, the spirit of the Constitution was quite changed: the politicians prevailed over the saints, and a worldly spirit over that of mysticism.”[308]
The evil increased under Caraffa, who succeeded Vitelleschi in 1646, and who was still less able than his predecessor to govern the Society. Caraffa was a simple and innocent bigot, not altogether unworthy of commendation. He was remarkable for his humility: he would have no carriage, no servant, no mark of distinction, as to food or raiment, from the humblest of the brethren.[309] He repeatedly begged his disciples to lay aside all political and temporal concerns, and to live a religious and pious life. He was shocked and grieved at heart on account of the pervading spirit of licentiousness and avarice, and predicted that it would be the ruin of the order. In fact, the Society was continually departing more and more from the principles on which Loyola had established it. The rule, that all who entered the order should abandon every temporal possession, had been strictly enforced in former times, but now the act of renunciation was either delayed, or performed under conditions, and that under different pretences, and especially on the ground that any Jesuit was liable at any time to be expelled from the Society. So when a novice now made the transfer of his property to the order, he clearly specified that it was in favour of such and such a college to which he was attached, and often with the reservation of himself administering the property he bequeathed; so that, even when the property remained in the order, it was no more unconditionally at the disposal of the General representing the entire community, but of an individual, who, in a certain measure, still considered it as his own. Nay, many of the Jesuits, having more leisure and skill than their relations, undertook the management of their affairs.
Against those evils Caraffa could do nothing but write letters filled with complaints, and prescribing remedies which were never to be resorted to. Thus, speaking of those Jesuits who wished to retain their property, he says, “Having settled in their own minds in what houses or colleges they are to fix their abode, ... they labour strenuously to obtain for themselves the administration of what they have resigned to the Society.” And again, “Our procurators should be more cautious, for, although they seek what is just by lawful right, still they seem to seek it with avarice and cupidity, and exhibit too much avidity, which smells of the world.”[310] And as to profane conversation and licentiousness, Caraffa says, “Nor can I possibly pass over in silence that these errors are in a great measure the result of the error of the superiors.”[311]
What a poor idea these two generals give of the authority, the prestige exercised by them over the Community! what a contrast with their predecessors! How different would Loyola, Lainez, or even Acquaviva have acted! When a General of the Order, aware of the evils which have invaded the Society, can find no remedy but in complaints, the Society must inevitably perish; and so it happened to the Jesuits.
Piccolomini, who succeeded Caraffa in 1649, and Gottifredi, who succeeded this last in 1652, were men without any energy or capacity, perhaps less jealous than the two former Generals of the purity and morality of the order; and, in their short administrations, they could do nothing but witness its increasing corruption.
Here it is to be remarked, that in the election of the General, the choice of the congregation now invariably fell upon a person without character or authority, that the fathers might have no master over them; and when the next General, Goswin Nickel, attempted to assert, in part, his authority, he was soon made aware that the times of Loyola and Acquaviva were gone by.
Nickel, elected General in 1652, was a rude and obstinate man. He did not, indeed, contemplate any very deep or searching reforms; he suffered things to proceed, on the whole, as they had previously done; but it was his habit to insist on the observance of his orders with peculiar obstinacy, without having any regard to the feelings of others, and he offended so grievously the self-love of the aristocratic part of the Society, that the General Congregation of 1661 adopted measures against him, such as, from the monarchical character of the institution, could hardly have been supposed possible.[312] The Congregation, desirous of setting Nickel aside, and yet unwilling to pronounce a deposition, applied to the Pope for permission to elect a vicar-general, and Innocent X. not only granted their request, but pointed out for the office his friend Oliva, who was accordingly elected. Then the Congregation, having decided that the vicar-general should possess a primitive power, independent of the General, the authority of the latter was wholly superseded, and entirely transferred to the vicar; so that, when some Jesuits went to pay their respects to Nickel, he, in a lamentable tone, said to them, “I find myself here entirely abandoned, and have no longer power to do anything.”[313]
It is curious, if not instructive (the veracity of the Jesuit historians being very well known), to listen to Crétineau’s account of this transaction. “Nickel,” says the French historian, “felt that he was growing old, that his infirmities no longer permitted him to govern with the required vigour; he begged of the Jesuits to discharge him from a responsibility too great for him, by giving him an assistant; and they acceded to his prayers.”[314] Nickel survived his disgrace three years, and Oliva became General.
Oliva was descended from a noble family of Genoa, where his grandfather and his uncle had respectively been Doge of the republic. In Oliva the Jesuits found at last a chief according to their hearts. He worshipped a repose interrupted only by political intrigues, and the pleasures of the table.[315] He spent a great part of his time in the delicious villa near Albano, where he occupied himself with the cultivation of the rarest exotics. When in Rome, he retired to the noviciate of St Andrea, where he seldom condescended to give audience. He never went out on foot. He lived in a most sumptuously and elegantly adorned apartment, enjoying the pleasures of a table furnished with the most select delicacies, such as would have tempted the appetite of a Vitellius.[316] He was only studious of enjoying the position he held, and the power he had obtained. Reserving for his particular attention matters of political importance, he left the affairs of the Society to the entire management of subordinate officials; and from that moment it may be said that every individual (we speak of persons of some consequence, for in every society there are simpletons always ready for obedience) became, in a great measure, his own master. Not that the interests of the Society were neglected; on the contrary, they were never so prosperous.
The members of every religious community are individually great in proportion to the greatness of the society to which they belong, and the esteem in which it is held by the public. This of itself induces every individual member to seek with all his powers the aggrandisement and the splendour of his order; and if this is true of any other association, it is pre-eminently so of the Society of Jesus. The Jesuits of the seventeenth century worshipped the Order with as much idolatry as their predecessors, and, to serve it, were always ready to act the part of hypocrites, deceivers, perjurers, miscreants; but every one served it (except in great general emergencies, in which they all acted in union) according to his own views and his own affections, some of them assuming even an absolute independence; as, for example, Annat, Lachaise, Letellier, &c.
Under Oliva’s government, the Society acquired an immense political importance. Some years before his death, Oliva published his correspondence, which extended to almost all the monarchs of Europe, in which, indeed, he shews himself a consummate politician, and deeply engaged in most serious and important affairs. This already awakened some interest, and made people look upon the Order as a good auxiliary in political intrigues. Besides, the fact that the Jesuits were confessors to all the Roman Catholic sovereigns, and that through them the General had it in his power to become acquainted with the most secret dispositions and plans of these sovereigns, rendered his friendship of inestimable value, and an object to be eagerly sought for by the most potent princes. Again, the confessor, having less or more, but always a great influence over his royal penitent, became also a great personage in the country where he exercised his functions. Annat was a mediator between the great king and the Pope; and Alexander VII. thanked him for his good offices by a brief.[317] Lachaise and Letellier were possessed of still more power than Annat. The Court of Rome itself, at such an epoch, was obliged to succumb to the influence of the Order; and if any Pope, in an unlucky moment, ventured to oppose them in any of their contrivances, he was soon obliged to retract his orders, and to confess implicitly that he had done wrong. The Jesuits call this epoch the golden age of their Society; but we should rather call it the iron one, since it was during this epoch of splendour and glory that they departed furthest from the principles of their institution, and so prepared their own ruin. Possessed of very great wealth, enjoying an immense credit and influence with all classes of society, they yielded to the temptations peculiar to such a situation; and, disregarding every rule of prudence, and the restraints of public opinion, they gave themselves up to the lust of power and riches—prosecuting their ambitious projects by the most questionable means, and thinking of nothing else but reaping the advantage of the position they had attained. As few dared now to oppose them, and as the people were silent on their vices, they thought that these vices were now overlooked; and this encouraged them still more to persist in their reprehensible conduct. It was during the seventeenth century that the Jesuits, lifting up for a while the thick veil of hypocrisy under which they had perpetrated their crimes, allowed the world to penetrate into the heart of their conduct, and to discover what they really were. In vain, when they perceived they were known, did they pull down the veil again. Their faces had been observed, and ever after they were to be recognised, under whatever mask they attempted to conceal themselves. It was during the seventeenth century that they gave to their traffic a scandalous development, and that they set themselves up as dangerous rivals to the largest establishments. It was during the seventeenth century that they set all the other religious orders at defiance, and awakened in them sentiments of hatred and jealousy, which are not yet extinguished. It was during the seventeenth century that they abused, more scandalously than ever, the credulity of their votaries. The example which we are going to quote in this particular will serve for many.
Among the manuscripts in the British Museum, there is a passport given by the Jesuits in 1650, for the consideration of 200,000 florins (£10,000), to Hippolite Braem of Ghent, promising to defend him against all infernal powers that might make attempts upon his person, soul, or goods. Here is a translation of this strange document:—
“The undersigned protest and promise, on the faith of priests and true religious in the name of our Company, sufficiently authorised for that effect, that our Company, takes Master Hippolite Braem, LL.D., under its protection, and promises to defend him against all infernal powers which may make attempts upon his person, his soul, his goods, or his means; that we conjure and shall conjure for this effect (to prevent attempts upon his person, &c.), the most serene Prince our Founder, making use in this case of his authority and his credit, in order that the above-named Braem may be presented by him to the blessed chief of Apostles with much fidelity and carefulness, since our Company is infinitely obliged to him. In faith of which we have signed the present, and authenticated it with the seal of the Society. Given at Ghent, March 29, 1650, and signed by the Rector, Seclin, and two Jesuit priests.”[318]
It seems that in India the Jesuits made a great traffic of such passports. In those distant regions, the impudence of the fathers must have been still greater than it was in Europe. The Father Marcello Mastrilli, when in Japan, boasted that many times a-day he sent his guardian angel to pay reverence and deliver messages to St Francis in heaven, and that he received answers.[319] We are not surprised at the ridiculous and barefaced impudence of Mastrilli, who is celebrated for his ridiculous impostures; but we are surprised that Bartoli, such an accomplished writer, and not altogether despicable historian, should relate with imperturbable gravity such puerile absurdities.
In 1681, Noyelle, “who had not the same brilliant qualities as his predecessors,”[320] succeeded Oliva, and was himself succeeded, in 1687, by Gonzales, a harsh theologian, who died in 1705, and had for his successor Father Tambourini. Nothing remarkable happened during the rule of these generals; at least nothing that presents us with any new feature in the history we are writing. The Company followed the course it had entered upon, and marched with steady step towards its proper ruin. Not that there was any apparent sign of decay. The Society was, on the contrary, more powerful, more courted than ever. But its power did not lie any longer in its intrinsic merits, or its adaptation to the wants of humanity; and the interest and respect by which it seemed to be surrounded was ephemeral, and in some degree compulsory. With a few sincere devotees there was a crowd of courtiers who flattered for their own interest. The Company resembled an all-powerful minister, hated for his personal qualities, but worshipped and extolled to the skies by the crowd of those who fear his power or await his favour, impatient till the sovereign frown upon him, that they may manifest their real sentiments. Such was the state of the Society of Jesus during the seventeenth century.