Chapter VI: Letter III: Seville, ---- 1799 (1)

Fortune has favoured me with an acquaintance--a young clergyman of this town--for whom, since our first introduction, I have felt a growing esteem, such as must soon ripen into the warmest affection. Common danger, and common suffering, especially of the mind, prove often the readiest and most indissoluble bonds of human friendship: and when to this influence is added the blending power of an intercommunity of thoughts and sentiments, no less unbounded than the confidence with which two men put thereby their liberty, their fortune, and their life into the hands of each other--imagination can hardly measure the warmth and devotedness of honest hearts thus united.

Spaniards, who have broken the trammels of superstition, possess a wonderful quickness to mark and know one another. Yet caution is so necessary, that we never offer the right hand of fellowship till, by gradual approaches, the heart and mind are carefully scanned on both sides. There are _bullies_ in mental no less than in animal courage: and I have sometimes been in danger of committing myself with a pompous fool that was hazarding propositions in the evening, which he was sure to lay, in helpless fear, before the confessor, the next morning; and who, had he met with free and unqualified assent from any one of the company, would have tried to save his own soul and body by carrying the whole conversation to the Inquisitors. But the character of my new friend was visible at a glance; and, after some conversation, I could not feel the slightest apprehension that there might lurk in his heart either the villainy or the folly which can betray a man, in this world, under a pretext of ensuring his happiness in the next. He too, either from the circumstance of my long residence in England, or, as I hope, from something more properly belonging to myself, soon opened his whole mind; and we both uttered downright _heresy_. After this mutual, this awful pledge, the Scythian ceremony of tasting each other’s blood could not have more closely bound us in interest and danger.

The coolness of an orange-grove is not more refreshing to him who has panted across one of our burning plains, under the meridian sun in August, than the company of a few trusty friends to some unbending minds, after a long day of restraint and dissimulation. When after our evening walk we are at last comfortably seated round my friend’s reading-table, where an amiable young officer, another clergyman, and one of the most worthy and highly-gifted men that tyranny and superstition have condemned to pine in obscurity, are always welcomed with a cordiality approaching to rapture--I cannot help comparing our feelings to those which we might suppose in Christian slaves at Algiers, who, having secretly unlocked the rivets of their fetters, could shake them off to feast and riot in the dead of night, cheering their hearts with wild visions of liberty, and salving their wounds with vague hopes of revenge. Revenge, did I say! what a false notion would that word give you of the characters that compose our little club! I doubt if Nature herself could so undo the work of her hands as to transform any one of my kind, my benevolent friends, into a man of blood. As to myself, mere protestations were useless. You know me; and I shall leave you to judge. But there is a revenge of the fancy, perfectly consistent with true mildness and generosity, though certainly more allied to quick sensibility than to sound and sober judgment. The last, however, should be seldom, if at all, looked for among persons in our circumstances. Our childhood is artificially protracted till we wonder how we have grown old: and, being kept at an immeasurable distance from the affairs and interest of public life, our passions, our virtues, and our vices, like those of early youth, have deeper roots in the imagination than the heart. I will not say that this is a prevalent feature in the character of my countrymen; but I have generally observed it among the best and the worthiest. As to my confidential friends, especially the one I mentioned at the beginning of this letter, in strict conformity with the temper which, I fear, I have but imperfectly described, they spend their lives in giving vent, among themselves, to the suppressed feelings of ridicule or indignation, of which the religious institutions of this country are a perennial source to those who are compelled to receive them as of Divine authority. England has so far improved me, that I can perceive the folly of this conduct. I am aware that, instead of indulging this childish gratification of our anger, we should be preparing ourselves, by a profound study of our ancient laws and customs, and a perfect acquaintance with the pure and original doctrines of the Gospel, for any future opening to reformation in our church and state. But under this intolerable system of intellectual oppression, we have associated the idea of Spanish law with despotism, and that of Christianity with absurdity and persecution. After my return from England I feel almost involuntarily relapsing into the old habits of my mind. With my friends, who have never left this country, any endeavour to break and counteract such habits would be perfectly hopeless. Despondency drives them into a course of reading and thinking, which leads only to suppressed contempt and whispered sarcasm. The violence which they must constantly do to their best feelings, might breed some of the fiercer passions in breasts less softened with “the milk of human kindness.” But their hatred of the prevailing practices and opinions does not extend to persons. Yet I for one must confess, that were I to act from a first and habitual impulse, without listening to my better judgment, there is not a saint or a relic in the country I would not trample under foot, and treat with the utmost indignity. As things are, however, I content myself with scoffing and railing the whole day. But I trust that, on a change of circumstances, I should act more soberly than I feel.

I should have found it very difficult, without this fortunate intimacy with a man who, though still in the prime of youth, has lately obtained, by literary competition, a place among what we call the higher clergy--that is, such as are _above_ the cure of souls--to give you an insight into the internal constitution of the Spanish church, the vices of the system which prepares our young men for the altar, and the ruinous foundations on which the ecclesiastical law, aided by civil power, hazards the morals of our religious teachers and their flocks. When I had expressed to my friend my desire of having his assistance in carrying on this correspondence, as well as satisfied his mind on the improbability of any thing entrusted to you, recoiling upon himself in Spain; he shewed me a manuscript he had drawn up some time before, under the title: “A few facts connected with the formation of the intellectual and moral character of a Spanish Clergyman.” “Who knows,” he said, “but that this sketch may answer your purpose? No traveller’s-guide account of our universities and clerical establishments, can convey such a living picture of our state, as the history of a young mind trained up under their influence. You might easily find a list of the professors, endowments, and class-books of which the framework of Spanish education consists. But who would have the patience to read it, or what could he learn from it? I had intended that this little effusion of an oppressed and struggling mind should lie concealed till some future period, probably after my death, when my country might be prepared to learn and lament the wrongs she has, for ages, heaped on her children. But, since you have provided against discovery, and are willing to translate into English any thing I may give you, it will be some satisfaction to know that the results of my sad experience are laid before the most enlightened and benevolent people of Europe. Perhaps, if they know the true source of our evils, the day will come when they may be able and willing to help us.”

The question with me now was, not whether I should accept the manuscript, but whether I could do it justice in the translation. Trusting, however, that the novelty of the matter would atone for the faults of my style; labour and perseverance have, at length, enabled me to enclose it in this letter. As I have thus introduced a stranger to you. I am bound in common civility to fall into the background, and let him speak for himself.

_A few Facts connected with the formation of the Intellectual and
Moral Character of a Spanish Clergyman._

“I do not possess the cynical habits of mind which would enable me, like Rousseau, to expose my heart naked to the gaze of the world. I have neither his unfortunate and odious propensities to gloss by an affected candour, nor his bewitching eloquence to display, whatever good qualities I may possess: and as I must overcome no small reluctance and fear of impropriety, to enter upon the task of writing an account of the workings of my mind and heart, I have some reason to believe that I am led to do so by a sincere desire of being useful to others. Millions of human creatures are made to venture their happiness on a form of Christianity which possesses the strongest claims to our attention, both from its great antiquity, and the extent of its sway over the most civilized part of the earth. The various effects of that religious system, unmixed with any thing unauthorized or spurious, upon my country, my friends, and myself, have been the object of my most serious attention, from the very dawn of reason till the moment when I am writing these lines. If the result of my experience should be, that religion, as it is taught and enforced in Spain, is productive of exquisite misery in the amiable and good, and of gross depravity in the unfeeling and the thoughtless--that it is an insuperable obstacle to the improvement of the mind, and gives a decided ascendancy to lettered absurdity, and to dull-headed bigotry--that it necessarily breeds such reserve and dissimulation in the most promising and valuable part of the people as must check and stunt the noblest of public virtues, candour and political courage--if all this, and much more that I am not able to express in the abstract form of simple positions, should start into view from the plain narrative of an obscure individual; I hope I shall not be charged with the silly vanity of attributing any intrinsic importance to the domestic events and private feelings which are to fill up the following pages.

“I was born of parents who, though possessed of little property, held a decent rank among the gentry of my native town. Their characters, however, are so intimately connected with the formation of my own, that I shall indulge an honest pride in describing them.

“My father was the son of a rich Irish merchant, who obtained for himself and descendants a patent of _Hidalguia_, or noblesse, early in the reign of Ferdinand VI. During the life of my grandfather, and the consequent prosperity of his house, my father was sent abroad for his education. This gave a polish to his manners, which, at that period, was not easily found even in the first ranks of the nobility. Little more than accomplishments, however, was left him, when, in consequence of his father’s death, the commercial concerns of the house being managed by a stranger, received a shock which had nearly reduced the family to poverty and want. Yet something was saved; and my father, who, by some unaccountable infatuation, had not been brought up to business, was now obliged to exert himself to the utmost of his power. Joining, therefore, in partnership with a more wealthy merchant, who had married one of his sisters, he contrived, by care and diligence, together with a strict, though not sordid economy, not to descend below the rank in which he had been born. Under these unpromising circumstances he married my mother, who, if she could add but little to her husband’s fortune, yet brought him a treasure of love and virtue, which he found constantly increasing, till death removed him on the first approaches of old age.

“My mother was of honourable parentage. She was brought up in that absence of mental cultivation which prevails, to this day, among the Spanish ladies. But her natural talents were of a superior cast. She was lively, pretty, and sang sweetly. Under the influence of a happier country, her pleasing vivacity, the quickness of her apprehension, and the exquisite degree of sensibility which animated her words and actions, would have qualified her to shine in the most elegant and refined circles.

“_Benevolence_ prompted all my father’s actions, endued him, at times, with something like supernatural vigour, and gave him, for the good of his fellow-creatures, the courage and decision he wanted in whatever concerned himself. With hardly any thing to spare, I do not recollect a time when our house was not a source of relief and consolation to some families of such as, by a characteristic and feeling appellation, are called among us the _blushing poor_.[9] In all seasons, for thirty years of his life, my father allowed himself no other relaxation, after the fatiguing business of his counting-house, than a visit to the general hospital of this town--a horrible scene of misery, where four or five hundred beggars are, at a time, allowed to lay themselves down and die, when worn out by want and disease. Stripping himself of his coat, and having put on a coarse dress for the sake of cleanliness, in which he was scrupulous to a fault; he was employed, till late at night, in making the beds of the poor, taking the helpless in his arms, and stooping to such services as even the menials in attendance were often loth to perform. All this he did of his own free will, without the least connexion, public or private, with the establishment. Twice he was at death’s door from the contagious influence of the atmosphere in which he exerted his charity. But no danger would appal him when engaged in administering relief to the needy. Foreigners, cast by misfortune into that gulf of wretchedness, were the peculiar objects of his kindness.

[9] _Pobres vergonzantes._

“The principle of benevolence was not less powerful in my mother; but her extreme sensibility made her infinitely more susceptible of pain than pleasure--of fear than hope--and, for such characters, a technical religion is ever a source of distracting terrors. Enthusiasm--that bastard of religious liberty, that vigorous weed of Protestantism--does not thrive under the jealous eye of infallible authority. Catholicism, it is true, has, in a few instances, produced a sort of splendid madness; but its visions and trances partake largely of the tameness of a mind previously exhausted by fears and agonies, meekly borne under the authority of a priest. The throes of the New Birth harrow up the mind of the Methodist, and give it that frenzied energy of despair, which often settles into the all-hoping, all-daring raptures of the enthusiast. The Catholic Saint suffers in all the passiveness of blind submission, till nature sinks exhausted, and reason gives way to a gentle, visionary madness. The natural powers of my mother’s intellect were strong enough to withstand, unimpaired, the enormous and constant pressure of religious fears in their most hideous shape. But, did I not deem reason the only gift of Heaven which fully compensates the evils of this present existence, I might have wished for its utter extinction in the first and dearest object of my natural affection. Had she become a visionary, she had ceased to be unhappy. But she possessed to the last an intellectual energy equal to any exertion, except one, which was not compatible with the influence of her country--that of looking boldly into the dark recess where lurked the phantoms that harassed and distressed her mind.

“It would be difficult, indeed, to choose two fairer subjects for observing the effects of the religion of Spain. The results, in both, were lamentable, though certainly not the most mischievous it is apt to produce. In one, we see mental soberness and good sense degraded into timidity and indecision--unbounded goodness of heart, confined to the lowest range of benevolence. In the other, we mark talents of a superior kind, turned into the ingenious tormentors of a heart, whose main source of wretchedness was an exquisite sensibility to the beauty of virtue, and an insatiate ardour in treading the devious and thorny path it was made to take for the 'way which leadeth unto life.’--A bolder reason, in the first, (it will be said) and a reason less fluttered by sensibility, in the second, would have made those virtuous minds more cautious of yielding themselves up to the full influence of ascetic devotion. Is this, then, all that men are to expect from the unbounded promises of light, and the lofty claims of authority, which our religion holds forth? Is it thus, that, when, to obtain the protection of an infallible guide, we have, at his command, maimed and fast bound our reason, still a precipice yawns before our feet, from which none but that insulted reason can save us? Are we to call for her aid on the brink of despair and insanity, and then spurn our faithful, though injured friend, lest she should unlock our hand from that of our proud and treacherous leader? Often have I, from education, habit, and a misguided love of moral excellence, been guilty of that inconsistency, till frequent disappointment urged me to break my chains. Painful, indeed, and fierce was the struggle by which I gained my liberty, and doomed I am for ever to bear the marks of early bondage. But no power on earth shall make me again give up the guidance of my reason, till I can find a rule of conduct and belief that may safely be trusted, without wanting _reason_ itself to moderate and expound it.

“The first and most anxious care of my parents was to sow abundantly the seeds of Christian virtue in my infant breast. In this, as in all their proceedings, they strictly followed the steps of those whose virtue had received the sanction of their church. Religious instruction was conveyed to my mind with the rudiments of speech; and if early impressions alone could be trusted for the future complexion of a child’s character, the music, and the splendid pageantry of the cathedral of Seville, which was to me the first scene of mental enjoyment, might, at this day, be the soundest foundation of my Catholic faith.

“Divines have declared that moral responsibility begins at the age of seven, and, consequently, children of quick parts are not allowed to go much longer without the advantage of confession. My mind had scarcely attained the first climacteric, when I had the full benefit of absolution for such sins as my good mother, who acted as the accusing conscience, could discover in my _naughtiness_. The church, we know, cannot be wrong; but to say the honest truth, all her pious contrivances have, by a sad fatality, produced in me just the reverse of their aim. Though the clergyman who was to shrive this young sinner had mild, gentle, and affectionate manners, there is something in auricular confession which has revolted my feelings from the day when I first knelt before a priest, in childish simplicity, to the last time I have been forced to repeat that ceremony, as a protection to my life and liberty, with scorn and contempt in my heart.

“Auricular confession, as a subject of theological controversy, is, probably, beneath the notice of many; but I could not easily allow the name of philosopher to any one who should look upon an inquiry into the moral influence of that religious practice, as perfectly void of interest. It has been observed, with great truth, that the most philanthropic man would feel more uneasiness in the expectation of having his little finger cut off, than in the assurance that the whole empire of China was to be swallowed up the next day by an earthquake. If ever, therefore, these lines should meet the eye of the public in some distant country (for ages must pass before they can see the light in Spain), I entreat my readers to beware of indifference about evils from which it is their happiness to be free, and to make a due allowance for the feelings which lead me into a short digression. They certainly cannot expect to be acquainted with Spain without a sufficient knowledge of the powerful moral engines which are at work in that country; and they will, perhaps, find that a Spanish priest may have something to say which is new to them on the subject of confession.

“The effects of confession upon young minds are, generally, unfavourable to their future peace and virtue. It was to that practice I owed the first taste of remorse, while yet my soul was in a state of infant purity. My fancy had been strongly impressed with the awful conditions of the penitential law, and the word _sacrilege_ had made me shudder on being told that the act of concealing any thought or action, the rightfulness of which I suspected, would make me guilty of that worst of crimes, and greatly increase my danger of everlasting torments. My parents had, in this case, done no more than their duty, according to the rules of their church. But, though they had succeeded in rousing my fear of hell, this was, on the other hand, too feeble to overcome a childish bashfulness, which made the disclosure of a harmless trifle, an effort above my strength.

“The appointed day came at last, when I was to wait on the confessor. Now wavering, now determined not to be guilty of sacrilege, I knelt before the priest, leaving, however, in my list of sins, the last place to the hideous offence--I believe it was a petty larceny committed on a young bird. But, when I came to the dreaded point, shame and confusion fell upon me, and the accusation stuck in my throat. The imaginary guilt of this silence haunted my mind for four years, gathering horrors at every successive confession, and rising into an appalling spectre, when, at the age of twelve, I was taken to receive the sacrament. In this miserable state I continued till, with the advance of reason, I plucked, at fourteen, courage enough to unburthen my conscience by a general confession of the past. And let it not be supposed that mine is a singular case, arising either from morbid feeling or the nature of my early education. Few, indeed, among the many penitents I have examined, have escaped the evils of a similar state; for, what a silly bashfulness does in children, is often, in after-life, the immediate effect of that shame by which fallen frailty clings still to wounded virtue. The necessity of confession, seen at a distance, is lighter than a feather in the balance of desire; while, at a subsequent period, it becomes a punishment on delicacy--an instrument to blunt the moral sense, by multiplying the subjects of remorse, and directing its greatest terrors against imaginary crimes.

“These evils affect, nearly equally, the two sexes; but there are some that fall peculiarly to the lot of the softer. Yet the remotest of all--at least, as long as the Inquisition shall exist--is the danger of direct seduction by the priest. The formidable powers of that odious tribunal have been so skilfully arrayed against the abuse of sacramental trust, that few are found base and blind enough to make the confessional a _direct_ instrument of debauch. The strictest delicacy, however, is, I believe, inadequate fully to oppose the demoralizing tendency of auricular confession. Without the slightest responsibility, and, not unfrequently, in the conscientious discharge of what he believes his duty, the confessor conveys to the female mind the first foul breath which dims its virgin purity. He, undoubtedly, has a right to interrogate upon subjects which are justly deemed awkward even for maternal confidence; and it would require more than common simplicity to suppose that a discretionary power of this nature, left in the hands of thousands--men beset with more than common temptations to abuse it--will generally be exercised with proper caution. But I will no longer dwell upon this subject for the present. Men of unprejudiced minds will easily conjecture what I leave unsaid; while to shew a hope of convincing such as have made a full and irrevocable surrender of their judgment, were only to libel my own.

“From the peculiar circumstances of my country, the training of my mental faculties was an object of little interest with my parents. There could be scarcely any doubt in the choice of a line of life for me; who was the eldest of four children. My father’s fortune was improving; and I might help and succeed him with advantage to myself and two sisters. It was, therefore, in my father’s counting-house, that, under the care of an old trusty clerk, I learned writing and arithmetic. To be a perfect stranger to literature is not, even now, a disgrace among the better class of Spaniards. But my mother, whose pride, though greatly subdued, was never conquered by devotion, felt anxious that, since, from prudential motives, I was doomed to be buried for life in a counting-house, a little knowledge of Latin should distinguish me from a mere mercantile drudge. A private teacher was accordingly procured, who read with me in the evening, after I had spent the best part of the day in making copies of the extensive correspondence of the house.

“I was now about ten years old, and though, from a child, excessively fond of reading, my acquaintance with books did not extend beyond a history of the Old Testament--a collection of the Lives of the Saints mentioned in the Catholic Almanack, out of which I chose the Martyrs, for modern saints were never to my taste--a little work that gave an amusing miracle of the Virgin for every day of the year[10]--and prized above all, a Spanish translation of Fenelon’s Telemachus, which I perused till I had nearly learned it by heart. I heard, therefore, with uncommon pleasure, that, in acquiring a knowledge of Latin, I should have to read stories not unlike that of my favourite the Prince of Ithaca. Little time, however, was allowed me for study, lest, from my love of learning, I should conceive a dislike to mercantile pursuits. But my mind had taken a decided bent. I hated the counting-house, and loved my books. Learning and the church were, to me, inseparable ideas; and I soon declared to my mother that I would be nothing but a clergyman.

[10] See Note C.

“This declaration roused the strongest prejudices of her mind and heart, which cold prudence had only damped into acquiescence. To have a son who shall daily hold in his hands the real body of Christ, is an honour, a happiness which raises the humblest Spanish woman into a self-complacent consequence that attends her through life. What, then, must be the feelings of one who, to the strongest sense of devotion, joins the hope of seeing the dignities and emoluments of a rich and proud Church bestowed upon a darling child? The Church, besides, by the law of celibacy, averts that mighty terror of a fond mother--a wife, who, sooner or later, is to draw away her child from home. A boy, therefore, who at the age of ten or twelve, dazzled either by the gaudy dress of an officiating priest--by the importance he sees others acquire, when the bishop confers upon them the clerical tonsure--or by any other delusion of childhood, declares his intention of taking orders, seldom, very seldom escapes the heavy chain which the Church artfully hides under the tinsel of honours, and the less flimsy, though also less attainable splendour of her gold. Such a boy, among the poor, is infallibly plunged into a convent; if he belongs to the gentry, he is destined to swell the ranks of the secular clergy.

“It is true that, in all ages and countries, the leading events of human life are inseparably linked with some of the slightest incidents of childhood. But this fact, instead of an apology, affords the heaviest charge against the crafty and barbarous system of laying snares, wherein unsuspecting innocence may, at the very entrance of life, lose every chance of future peace, happiness and virtue. To allow a girl of sixteen to bind herself, for ever, with vows--not only under the awful, though distant guardianship of heaven, but the odious and immediate superintendence of man--ranks, indeed, with the most hideous abuses of superstition. The law of celibacy, it is true, does not bind the secular clergy till the age of twenty-one; but this is neither more nor less than a mockery of common sense, in the eyes of those who practically know how frivolous is that latitude.[11] A man has seldom the means to embrace, or the aptitude to exercise a profession for which he has not been trained from early youth. It is absurd and cruel to pretend that a young man, whose best ten or twelve years have been spent in preparation for orders, is at full liberty to turn his back upon the Church when he has arrived at one-and-twenty. He may, indeed, preserve his liberty; but to do so he must forget that most of his patrimony has been laid out on his education, that he is too old for a cadetship in the army, too poor for commerce, and too proud for a petty trade. He must behold, unmoved, the tears of his parents; and, casting about for subsistence, in a country where industry affords no resource, love, the main cause of these struggles, must content itself with bare possible lawfulness, and bid adieu to the hope of possession. Wherever unnatural privations make not a part of the clerical duty, many may find themselves in the Church who might be better elsewhere. But no great effort is wanted to make them happy in themselves, and useful to the community. Not so under the unfeeling tyranny of our ecclesiastical law. For, where shall we find that virtue which, having Nature herself for its enemy, and misery for its meed, will be able to extend its care to the welfare of others?--As to myself, the tenour and colour of my life were fixed the moment I expressed my childish wish of being a clergyman. The love of knowledge, however, which betrayed me into the path of wretchedness, has never forsaken its victim. It is probable that I could not have found happiness in uneducated ignorance. Scanty and truly hard-earned as it is the store on which my mind feeds itself, I would not part with it for a whole life of unthinking pleasure: and since the necessity of circumstances left me no path to mental enjoyment, except that I have so painfully trodden, I hail the moment when I entered it, and only bewail the fatality which fixed my birth in a Catholic country.

[11] The secular clergy are not bound by vows. Celibacy is
enforced upon them by a law which makes their marriage illegal,
and punishable by the Ecclesiastical Courts.

“The order of events would here require an account of the system of Spanish education, and its first effects upon my mind; but, since I speak of myself only to shew the state of my country, I shall proceed with the moral influence, that, without interruption, I may present the facts relating severally to the heart and intellect, in as large masses as the subject permits.

“The Jesuits, till the abolition of that order, had an almost unrivalled influence over the better classes of Spaniards. They had nearly monopolized the instruction of the Spanish youth, at which they toiled without pecuniary reward; and were equally zealous in promoting devotional feelings both among their pupils and the people at large. It is well known that the most accurate division of labour was observed in the allotment of their various employments. Their candidates, who, by a refinement of ecclesiastical policy, after an unusually long probation, were bound by vows, which, depriving them of liberty, yet left a discretionary power of ejection in the order; were incessantly watched by the penetrating eye of the master of novices: a minute description of their character and peculiar turn was forwarded to the superiors, and at the end of the noviciate, they were employed to the advantage of the community, without ever thwarting the natural bent of the individual, or diverting his natural powers by a multiplicity of employments. Wherever, as in France and Italy, literature was in high estimation, the Jesuits spared no trouble to raise among themselves men of eminence in that department. In Spain, their chief aim was to provide their houses with popular preachers, and zealous, yet prudent and gentle, confessors. Pascal, and the Jansenist party, of which he was the organ, accused them of systematic laxity in their moral doctrines: but the charge, I believe, though plausible in theory, was perfectly groundless in practice. If, indeed, ascetic virtue could ever be divested of its connatural evil tendency--if a system of moral perfection that has for its basis, however disavowed and disguised, the Manichæan doctrine of the two principles, could be applied with any partial advantage as a rule of conduct, it was so in the hands of the Jesuits. The strict, unbending maxims of the Jansenists, by urging persons of all characters and tempers to an imaginary goal of perfection, bring quickly their whole system to the decision of experience. They are like those enthusiasts who, venturing upon the practice of some Gospel sayings, in the literal sense, have made the absurdity of that interpretation as clear as noon-day light. A greater knowledge of mankind made the Jesuits more cautious in the culture of devotional feelings. They well knew that but few can prudently engage in open hostility with what in ascetic language is called the world. They now and then trained up a sturdy champion, who, like their founder Loyóla, might provoke the enemy to single combat with honour to his leaders; but the crowd of mystic combatants were made to stand upon a kind of jealous truce, which, in spite of all care, often produced some jovial meetings of the advanced parties on both sides. The good fathers came forward, rebuked their soldiers back into the camp, and filled up the place of deserters by their indefatigable industry in engaging recruits.

“The influence of the Jesuits on the Spanish morals, from every thing I have learned, was undoubtedly favourable. Their kindness attracted the youth from the schools to their company: and, though this intimacy was often employed in making proselytes to the order, it also contributed to the preservation of virtue in that slippery age, both by the ties of affection, and the gentle check of example. Their churches were crowded every Sunday with regular attendants, who came to confess and receive the sacrament. The practice of choosing a certain priest, not only to be the occasional confessor, but _director of the conscience_, was greatly encouraged by the Jesuits. The ultimate effects of this surrender of the judgment are, indeed, dangerous and degrading; but, in a country where the darkest superstition is constantly impelling the mind into the opposite extremes of religious melancholy and profligacy, weak persons are sometimes preserved from either by the friendly assistance of a prudent _director_; and the Jesuits were generally well qualified for that office. Their conduct was correct, and their manners refined. They kept up a dignified intercourse with the middling and higher classes, and were always ready to help and instruct the poor, without descending to their level. Since the expulsion of the Jesuits, the better classes, for the most part, avoid the company of monks and friars, except in an official capacity; while the lower ranks, from which these professional saints are generally taken, and where they re-appear, raised, indeed, into comparative importance, but grown bolder in grossness and vice, suffer more from their influence than they would by being left without any religious ministers.[12]

[12] See note D.

“Since the abolition of the Jesuits, their devotional system has been kept up, though upon a much narrower scale, by the congregations of Saint Philip Neri (_l’Oratoire_, in France), an Italian of the sixteenth century, who established voluntary associations of secular clergymen, living together under an easy rule, but without monastic vows, in order to devote themselves to the support of piety. The number, however, of these associated priests is so small, that, notwithstanding their zeal and their studied imitation of the Jesuits, they are but a faint shadow of that surprising institution. Yet these priests alone have inherited the skill of Loyóla’s followers in the management of the ascetic contrivance, which, invented by that ardent fanatic, is still called, from his Christian name, _Exercises of Saint Ignatius_. As it would be impossible to sketch the history of my mind and heart without noticing the influence of that powerful engine, I cannot omit a description of the establishment kept by the _Philippians_ at Seville--the most complete of its kind that probably has ever existed.

“The _Exercises of Saint Ignatius_ are a series of meditations on various religious subjects, so artificially disposed, that the mind being at first thrown into distressing horror, may be gradually raised to hope, and finally soothed, not into a certainty of Divine favour, but a timid consciousness of pardon. Ten consecutive days are passed in perfect abstraction from all wordly pursuits. The persons who submit to this spiritual discipline, leave their homes for rooms allotted to them in the religious house where the Exercises are to be performed, and yield themselves up to the direction of the president. The priest, who for nearly thirty years has been acting in that capacity at Seville, enjoys such influence over the wealthy part of the town, that, not satisfied with the temporary accommodation which his convent afforded to the pious guests, he can now lodge the Exercitants in a separate building, with a chapel annexed, and every requisite for complete abstraction, during the days of their retirement. Six or eight times in the year the Exercises are performed by different sets of fifty persons each. The utmost precision and regularity are observed in the distribution of their time. Roused by a large bell at five in the morning, they immediately assemble in the chapel to begin the meditation appointed for the day. At their meals they observe a deep silence; and no intercourse, even among each other, is permitted, except during one hour in the evening. The settled gloom of the house, the almost incessant reading and meditation upon subjects which, from their vagueness and infinitude, harass and bewilder the fancy, and that powerful sympathetic influence, which affects assemblies where all are intent on the same object and bent on similar feelings, render this house a modern cave of Trophonius, within whose dark cells cheerfulness is often extinguished for ever.

“Unskilful, indeed, must be the hand that, possessed of this engine, can fail to subdue the stoutest mind in which there lurks a particle of superstitious fear. But Father Vega is one of those men who are born to command a large portion of their fellow creatures, either by the usual means, or some contrivance of their own. The expulsion of the Jesuits during his probationship in that order, denied him the ample field on which his early views had been fixed. After a course of theological studies at the University, he became a member of the _Oratorio_, and soon attracted the notice of the whole town by his preaching. His active and bold mind combines qualities seldom found in the same individual. Clear-headed, resolute, and ambitious, the superstitious feelings which melt him into tears whenever he performs the Mass, have not in the least impaired the mental daringness he originally owes to nature. Though seldom mixing in society, he is a perfect man of the world. Far from compromising his lofty claims to respect, he flatters the proudest nobles of his spiritual train by well-timed bursts of affected rudeness, which, being a mere display of spiritual authority, perfectly consistent with a full acknowledgment of their worldly rank and dignity, give them, in the eyes of the more humble bystanders, the additional merit of Christian condescension. As an instance of this, I recollect his ordering the Marquis del Pedroso, one of the haughtiest men in this town, to fetch up-stairs from the chapel, a heavy gold frame set with jewels, in which the Host is exhibited, for the inspection of the company during the hour of recreation allowed in the Exercises. No man ever shewed such assurance and consciousness of Heaven’s delegated authority as Father Vega, in the Confessional. He reads the heart of his penitent--impresses the mind with the uselessness of disguise, and relieves shame by a strong feeling that he has anticipated disclosure. In preaching, his vehemence rivets the mind of the hearers; a wild luxuriance of style engages them with perpetual variety; expectation is kept alive by the remembered flashes of his wit; while the homely, and even coarse, expressions he allows himself, when he feels the whole audience already in his power, give him that air of superiority which seems to set no bounds to the freedom of manner.

“It is however, in his private chapel that Father Vega has prepared the grand scene of his triumphs over the hearts of his audience. Twice every day, during the Exercises, he kneels for the space of one hour, surrounded by his congregation. Day-light is excluded, and a candle is so disposed in a shade that, without breaking the gloom of the chapel, it shines on a full-length sculpture of Christ nailed to the Cross, who, with a countenance where exquisite suffering is blended with the most lovely patience, seems to be on the point of moving his lips to say--“Father, forgive them!” The mind is at first allowed to dwell, in the deepest silence, on the images and sentiments with which previous reading has furnished it, till the Director, warmed with meditation, breaks forth in an impressive voice, not, however, addressing himself to his hearers, from whom he appears completely abstracted, but pouring out his heart in the presence of the Deity. Silence ensues after a few sentences, and not many minutes elapse without a fresh ejaculation. But the fire gradually kindles into a flame. The addresses grow longer and more impassioned; his voice, choked with sobs and tears, struggles painfully for utterance, till the stoutest hearts are forced to yield to the impression, and the chapel resounds with sighs and groans.

“I cannot but shudder at the recollection that my mind was made to undergo such an ordeal at the age of fifteen; for it is a custom of the diocese of Seville to prepare the candidates for orders by the Exercises of Saint Ignatius; and even those who are to be incorporated with the clergy by the ceremony of the _First Tonsure_, are not easily spared this trial. I was grown up a timid, docile, yet ardent boy. My soul, as I have already mentioned, had been early made to taste the bitterness of remorse, and I now eagerly embraced the offer of those expiatory rites which, as I fondly thought, were to restore lost innocence, and keep me for ever in the straight path of virtue. The shock, however, which my spirits felt, might have unnerved me for life, and reduced my faculties to a state little short of imbecility, had I not received from nature, probably as a compensation for a too soft and yielding heart, an understanding which was born a rebel. Yet, I cannot tell whether it was my heart or my head, that, in spite of a frighted fancy, endued me with resolution to baffle the blind zeal of my confessor, when, finding, during these Exercises, that I knew the existence of a prohibited book in the possession of a student of divinity, who, out of mere good nature, assisted my early studies; he commanded me to accuse my friend before the Inquisition. Often have I been betrayed into a wrong course of thinking, by a desire to assimilate myself to those I loved, and thus enjoy that interchange of sentiment which forms the luxury of friendship. But even the chains of love, the strongest I know within the range of nature, could never hold me, the moment I conceived that error had bound them. This, however, brings me to the history of my mind.

“An innate love of truth, which shewed itself on the first developement of my reason, and a consequent perseverance in the pursuit of it to the extent of my knowledge, that has attended me through life, saved me from sinking into the dregs of Aristotelic philosophy, which, though discountenanced by the Spanish government, are still collected in a few filthy pools, fed by the constant exertions of the Dominicans. Unfortunately for me, these monks have a richly endowed college at Seville, where they give lectures on Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas, to a few young men whom they recruit at the expense of flattering their parents. My father’s confessor was a Dominican, and he marked me for a divine of his own school. My mother, whose heart was with the Jesuits, would fain have sent me to the University, where the last remnant of their pupils still held the principal chairs. But she was informed by the wily monk, that _heresy_ had began to creep among the new professors of philosophy--heresy of such a horrible tendency, that it nearly amounted to polytheism. The evidence on which this charge was grounded, seemed, indeed, irresistible; for you had only to open the second volume of one Altieri, a Neapolitan friar, whose Elements of philosophy are still used as a class-book at the University of Seville, and you would find, in the first pages, that he makes _space_ uncreated, infinite, and imperishable. From such premises the consequence was evident; the new philosophers were clearly setting up a rival deity.

“With the usual preparation of a little Latin, but in absolute want of all elementary instruction, I was sent to begin a course of logic at the Dominican college. My desire of learning was great indeed; but the _Categoriæ ad mentem Divi Thomæ Aquinatis_, in a large quarto volume, were unsavoury food for my mind, and, after a few vain efforts to conquer my aversion, I ended in never opening the dismal book. Yet, untrained as I was to reading, books were necessary to my happiness. In any other country I should have met with a variety of works, which, furnishing my mind with facts and observations, might have led me into some useful or agreeable pursuit. But in Spain, the chances of lighting on a good book are so few, that I must reckon my acquaintance with one that could open my mind, among the fortunate events of my life. A near relation of mine, a lady, whose education had been superior to that commonly bestowed on Spanish females, possessed a small collection of Spanish and French books. Among these were the works of Don Fray Benito Feyjoo, a Benedictine monk, who, rising above the intellectual level of his country, about the beginning of the present (18th) century, had the boldness to attack every established error which was not under the immediate patronage of religion. His mind was endowed with extraordinary clearness and acuteness; and having, by an extensive reading of Latin and French works, acquired a great mass of information on physical and historical subjects, he displayed it, with peculiar felicity of expression, in a long series of discourses and letters, forming a work of fourteen large closely printed volumes.[13]

[13] Feyjoo died in 1765. Several of his Essays were published in
English by John Brett, Esq. 1780.

“It was not without difficulty that I obtained leave to try whether my mind, which had hitherto lain a perfect waste, was strong enough to understand and relish Feyjoo. But the contents of his pages came like the spring showers upon a thirsty soil. A man’s opinion of the first work he read when a boy, cannot safely be trusted; but, to judge from the avidity with which at the age of fifteen I devoured fourteen volumes on miscellaneous subjects, and the surprising impulse they gave to my yet unfolded faculties, Feyjoo must be a writer who deserves more notice than he has ever obtained from his countrymen. If I can trust my recollection, he had deeply imbibed the spirit of Lord Bacon’s works, together with his utter contempt of the absurd philosophy which has been universally taught in Spain, till the last third of the eighteenth century. From Bayle, Feyjoo had learned caution in weighing historical evidence, and an habitual suspicion of the numberless opinions which, in countries unpurified by the wholesome gales of free contending thought, are allowed to range unmolested, for ages, with the same claim to the rights of prescription as frogs and insects have to their stagnant pools. In a pleasing and popular style, Feyjoo acquainted his countrymen with whatever discoveries in experimental philosophy had been made by Boyle at that time. He declared open war against quackery of all kinds. Miracles and visions which had not received the sanction of the Church of Rome did not escape the scrutinizing eye of the bold Benedictine. Such, in fact, was the alarm produced by his works on the all-believing race for whom he wrote, that nothing but the patronage of Ferdinand VI. prevented his being silenced with the _ultima ratio_ of Spanish divines--the Inquisition.

“Had the power of Aladdin’s lamp placed me within the richest subterraneous palace described in the Arabian Nights, it could not have produced the raptures I experienced from the intellectual treasure of which I now imagined myself the master. Physical strength developes itself so gradually, that few, I am inclined to think, derive pleasure from a sudden start of bodily vigour. But my mind, like a young bird in the nest, had lived unconscious of its wings, till this unexpected leader had, by his boldness, allured it into flight. From a state of mere animal life, I found myself at once possessed of the faculty of thinking; and I can scarcely conceive, that the soul, emerging after death into a higher rank of existence, shall feel and try its new powers with a keener delight. My knowledge, it is true, was confined to a few physical and historical facts; but I had, all at once, learned to reason, to argue, to doubt. To the surprise and alarm of my good relatives, I had been changed within a few weeks, into a sceptic who, without questioning religious subjects, would not allow any one of their settled notions to pass for its current value. My mother, with her usual penetration, perceived the new tendency of my mind, and thanked Heaven, in my presence, that Spain was my native country; ‘else,’ she said, ‘he would soon quit the pale of the church.’

“The main advantage, however, which I owed to my new powers, was a speedy emancipation from the Aristotelic school of the Dominicans. I had, sometimes, dipped into the second volume of their Elements of Philosophy, and had found, to my utter dismay, that they denied the existence of a _vacuum_--one of my then favourite doctrines--and attributed the ascent of liquids by suction, to the horror of nature at being wounded and torn. Now, it so happened that Feyjoo had given me the clearest notions on the theory of the sucking-pump, and the relative gravity of air and water. Nothing, therefore, could equal my contempt of those monks, who still contended for the whole system of sympathies and antipathies. A reprimand from the reverend Professor of Logic, for my utter inattention to his lectures, sprung, at length, the mine which, charged with the first scraps of learning, and brimful of boyish conceit, had long been ready to explode.

“Had the friar remonstrated with me in private, my habitual timidity would have sealed up my lips. But he rated me before the whole class, and my indignation fired up at such an indignity. Rising from my seat with a courage so new to me that it seemed to be inspired, I boldly declared my determination not to burden and pervert my mind with the absurdities that were taught in their schools. Being asked, with a sarcastic smile, which were the doctrines that had thus incurred my disapprobation, I visibly surprised the Professor--no bright genius himself--with the theory of the sucking-pump, and actually nonplus’d him on the mighty question of _vacuum_. To be thus bearded by a stripling, was more than his professional humility could bear. He bade me thank my family for not being that moment turned out of the lecture-room; assuring me, however, that my father should be acquainted with my impertinence in the course of that day. Yet I must do justice to his good-nature and moderation in checking the students, who wished to serve me, like Sancho, with a blanketing.