Chapter XVI: Appendix (2)

For these one hundred and fifty years, our history affords one only instance (of 1681) in which this authority of their general might have been any way prejudicial to the state; and if, on that occasion, the loyalty of the French Jesuits underwent a very severe trial, it had no other effect than to convince the whole kingdom how well they deserved that honourable testimony of your parliament, that their prudence guarded them against all surprise, and their loyalty against corruption.

But nothing, perhaps, can be of greater weight in this matter than the judgment of your majesty's royal {371} predecessor Henry IV, of glorious memory[136], who, in the midst of all his troubles, when the kingdom was in the greatest ferment, and he beset by persons, who spared no pains to instil into his mind the greatest distrust of the Jesuits, desired no other security for their good behaviour than this alone, that he might have one of that body ever near his person in quality of preacher to his majesty, and that a French assistant should be established with the general at Rome.

Your majesty is still possessed of the same security; and, since we are taught by the experience of a hundred and fifty years, that this is abundantly sufficient for the purpose, there can be no need of any farther caution or new regulation; especially as the Jesuits, in the late declaration, which they had the honour to present your majesty, have assured us in the most express terms, that, if their general was to require any thing of them contrary to the laws of your kingdom or to the obedience and respect due to your majesty, they neither could nor would pay any regard to such commands; and that their vow of obedience, as it is explained in their rule, doth no way bind them to such a compliance. This so peremptory declaration of the Jesuits, and the wise dispositions of the edict in 1603, leave no room to apprehend any danger from the general's abusing his authority to the prejudice of your majesty's kingdom. We are, &c.

The cardinal DE LUYNES.
------------ DE GESVRES.
------------ DE ROHAN.
The archbp. of CAMBRAY.
-------------- REIMS.
-------------- NARBONNE.
{372}
-------------- EMBRUN.
-------------- AUSCH.
-------------- BOURDEAUX.
-------------- *.
-------------- ARLES.
-------------- TOULOUSE.
The bishop of LANGRES.
------------ MANS.
------------ VALENCE.
------------ MACON.
------------ BAYEUX.
------------ AMIENS.
------------ NOYON.
------------ S. PAPOUL.
------------ COMMINGES.
------------ S. MALO.
------------ DIE.
------------ APOLLONIE.
------------ S. PAUL-DE-LEON.
------------ CHARTRES.
------------ RHODEZ.
------------ SARLAT.
------------ ORLEANS.
------------ MEAUX.
------------ ARRAS.
------------ BLOIS.
------------ METZ.
------------ ANGOULEME.
------------ VERDUN.
------------ SENLIS.
------------ ANGERS.
------------ DIGNE.
------------ AUTUN.
------------ VENCE.
------------ EVREUX.
The coadjutor of STRASBOURG.
The bishop of LEICTOURE.
------------ TROYES.
------------ NANTES.

_General Agents for the Clergy._

M. l'abbe DE BROGLIE.
M. l'abbe DE JUIGNE.

* * * * *

{373}

_A Copy of the Letter of the Archbishop of Paris, dated January 1, 1762._

MOST GRACIOUS SOVEREIGN,

If, in company of the other prelates, I did not add my name to the answer which they had the honour to present your majesty, it was not that I differed in the least from their judgment as to the four articles, which your majesty was pleased to propose to their examination, concerning the usefulness, the doctrine, the conduct, and the government of the Jesuits. I am very sensible that, in point of virtue and learning, there is no bishop in the nation to whom I ought not to give the precedency; and, in this view, would willingly have subscribed after all my brother bishops: but there is a regard due to the dignity of the see, to which your majesty has graciously been pleased to call me, and I must not take a step, that may interfere with those prerogatives, which, after the example of your august predecessors, you think it your duty to maintain. No other consideration could have prevented my setting my hand to a testimony so much to the advantage of the Jesuits of your kingdom: and, whilst I have the honour to assure your majesty of my entire adherency to that solemn act, I once more beg leave to implore your justice and supreme authority in behalf of a religious body, {374} eminent for learning and piety, and well deserving your royal protection, for the great services, which, during the two last ages, they have rendered both to church and state.

(Signed) CHRISTOPHER,
Archbishop of PARIS.

THE END.

* * * * *

C. WOOD, Printer,
Poppin's Court, Fleet Street.

* * * * *

NOTES

[1] See Substance of a Speech of Sir John Coxe Hippisley, Bart. published by Murray, 1815.

[2] Robertson's Charles V, vol. iii, p. 225.--To supply the malicious omission of the pamphlet writer, I will here insert the historian's report of the Jesuits in South America. "But it is in the new world that the Jesuits have exhibited the most wonderful display of their abilities, and have contributed most effectually to the benefit of the human species. The conquerors of that unfortunate quarter of the globe had nothing in view but to plunder, to enslave, and to exterminate its inhabitants. The Jesuits alone have made humanity the object of their settling there. About the beginning of the last century they obtained admission into the fertile province of Paraguay, which stretches across the southern continent of America, from the bottom of the mountains of Potosi to the confines of the Spanish and Portuguese settlements on the banks of the river de la Plata. They found the inhabitants in a state little different from that which takes place among men when they first begin to unite together: strangers to the arts; subsisting precariously by hunting or fishing; and hardly acquainted with the first principles of subordination and government. The Jesuits set themselves to instruct and to civilize these savages. They taught them to cultivate the ground, to rear tame animals, and to build houses. They brought them to live together in villages. They trained them to arts and manufactures. They made them taste the sweets of society, and accustomed them to the blessings of security and order. These people became the subjects of their benefactors, who have governed them with a tender attention, resembling that with which a father directs his children. Respected and beloved almost to adoration, a few Jesuits presided over some hundred thousand Indians. They maintained a perfect equality among all the members of the community. Each of them was obliged to labour, not for himself alone, but for the public. The produce of their fields, together with the fruits of their industry of every species, were deposited in common store houses, from which each individual received every thing necessary for the supply of his wants. By this institution, almost all the passions, which disturb the peace of society, and render the members of it unhappy, were extinguished. A few magistrates, chosen by the Indians themselves, watched over the public tranquillity, and secured obedience to the laws. The sanguinary punishments, frequent under other governments, were unknown: an admonition from a Jesuit; a slight mark of infamy; or, on some singular occasion, a few lashes with a whip, were sufficient to maintain good order among these innocent and happy people."--Charles V, p. 219.

[3] The author of the following Letters, who owed the publication of them to the liberality of the editor of the PILOT, complained of the refusal of the editor of the TIMES to admit into that paper a vindication of character, though he had opened his pages to the blaster of it. As newspapers in modern times have erected themselves into a kind of tribunal of the dernier resort, the editors should not forget the indispensable maxim of all courts of justice, and _concede alteri parti occasionem audiri_ should be a standing rule with them, or they must submit to pass for the star-chambers of jacobinism, or of some other party.

[4] D'Alembert said to one of his intimates, with whom he had been to hear the celebrated sermon preached by P. Beauregard against the apostles of infidelity, "These men die hard."

[5] The passage above cited, though not published with his name, is well known to have proceeded from the pen of M. de Lally Tolendal.

[6] It is well known, that the Dutch, at this time, did every thing in their power to undermine the Portuguese in Japan, and that they fabricated tales of the Jesuits to alarm the government, which, they said, was to be subverted, the emperor to be dethroned, and the people made slaves to the pope. In consequence of these slanders, no Christian was suffered in the empire; when, to preserve their commerce, the Dutch abjured Christianity, and, in proof of their sincerity, consented to tread publicly upon the cross at certain times.

[7] Encyclopedia Britannica.

[8] Spirit of Laws, book v, chap. 14.

[9] Robertson's Charles V, vol. iii, page 224.

[10] See Sully's Memoirs.

[11] This passage is also from the pen of M. Lally Tolendal.--When I was at Paris, in the autumn of 1814, he was engaged on the Life of Charles I, of England. After the return of Bonaparte, Louis XVIII appointed him one of his ministers.

[12] See Letter IV.

[13] This, if well executed, would be a very interesting work, and it is not impossible, that it may be attempted.

[14] See Letter III.

[15] Lord Clarendon, vol. i, page 73.

[16] Hume's History of England, vol. vi, page 297, &c.

[17] Hume's History of England, vol. vi, page 378.

[18] On the subject of the popish plots, see Dr. Milner's Letters to a Prebendary.

[19] As to the judges of those times, see what a picture is drawn of a chief justice by the most celebrated of our historians:--"To be a Jesuit, or even a catholic, was of itself a sufficient proof of guilt. The chief justice (sir William Scroggs), in particular, gave sanction to all the narrow prejudices and bigoted fury of the populace. Instead of being counsel for the prisoners, as his office required, he pleaded the cause against them, browbeat their witnesses, and on every occasion represented their guilt as certain and uncontroverted. He even went so far as publicly to affirm, that the papists had not the same principles which protestants have, and therefore were not entitled to that common _credence_, which the principles and practices of the latter call for. And, when the jury brought in their verdict against the prisoners, he said, 'You have done, gentlemen, like very good subjects, and very good Christians, that is to say, like very good protestants.'"--Hume's History of England, vol. viii, ch. 67, p. 91. See also what the same author says in his third appendix: "Timid juries, and judges, who held their offices during pleasure, never failed to second all the views of the crown. And, as the practice was anciently common, of fining, imprisoning, or otherwise punishing the jurors, merely at the discretion of the court, for finding a verdict contrary to the direction of these dependent judges, it is obvious, that juries were then no manner of security to the liberty of the subject."--Vol. v, p. 458. And, if these be not enough, take conviction from the pen of one of the most penetrating geniuses of the age: "The proceedings on the popish plot," says Mr. Fox, in his History of James II, "must always be considered as an indelible disgrace upon the English nation, in which king, parliament, judges, juries, witnesses, prosecutors, have all their respective, though certainly not equal shares. Witnesses, of such a character as not to deserve credit in the most trifling cause, upon the most immaterial facts, gave evidence so incredible, or, to speak more properly, so impossible to be true, that it ought not to have been believed if it had come from the mouth of Cato: and, upon such evidence, from such witnesses, were innocent men condemned to death and executed. Prosecutors, whether attornies and solicitors-general, or managers of impeachment, acted with the fury which, in such circumstances, might be expected; juries partook, naturally enough, of the national ferment; and judges, whose duty it was to guard them against such impressions, were scandalously active in confirming them in their prejudices, and inflaming their passions. The king, who is supposed to have disbelieved the whole plot, never once exercised his glorious prerogative of mercy. It is said he dared not. His throne, perhaps his life, was at stake."--History of James II, by the right honourable Charles James Fox, page 33.

[20] Fox's History of James II, page 40.

[21] I was unwilling to interrupt the reader at the last quotation from Mr. Fox, but I beg leave here to say a few words relative to the insinuated calumny on the catholic priests of Ireland, to which I then alluded. As I have before observed, it is easy to see, that this attack, under cover of assailing the Jesuits, is aimed at catholics in general. The priests in Ireland are charged, in the pamphlet, with great venality and corruption of morals, and this, the writer says, may be affirmed without the fear of contradiction. To notice this slander is allowing myself to be led from my particular subject into the general one; I will not, therefore, dwell upon it, but, referring the reader to a volume of indisputable authority, though written by a catholic (Dr. Milner's Inquiry into certain vulgar Opinions, Letter xviii), for an interesting account of the Irish clergy and of the Irish poor, I will content myself with extracting a note, or rather reference, from page 182 of the book. "If, gentlemen, you are not under the influence of very gross prejudice, you will, in receiving representations of the necessitous state of Ireland, maturely weigh the allegations of men, who have stigmatized, and still stigmatize as the last of mankind, some of the most deserving and useful men in the community. There are among them preachers and teachers of the first excellence: there are men of profound erudition, men of nice classical taste, and men of the best critical acumen. They are not formed, it is true, to shine in the drawing-room or at the tea-table; nor are such qualifications very desirable in churchmen; for you well know, that the refined manners of fashionable life are often as incompatible with Christian morality, as the grosser vices of the vulgar herd. Their manners are, in general, decent; but their exertions are great, their zeal is indefatigable. See them in the most inclement seasons, at the most unseasonable hours, in the most uncultivated parts, amidst the poorest and most wretched of mankind! They are always ready at a call; nothing can deter them; the sense of duty surmounts every obstacle! And there is no reward for them in this world! The good effects of their zeal are visible to every impartial and discerning mind; notwithstanding the many great disadvantages under which it labours. For instance, you may often find a parish so extensive and populous as to require two or three clergymen properly to serve it, and yet the poverty of the parish is such as to be scarcely able to maintain one in a tolerably decent manner. I could point out many other disadvantages, but I forbear at present," &c.--"After all, the good effects are so conspicuous, that, I repeat it, the lower orders of Irishmen are better instructed in the doctrines of Christianity than the lower orders of Englishmen."

I cannot speak of the catholic priests in Ireland from my own knowledge, but the information I have received, from friends well acquainted with the subject, fully corroborates this character of them. With such a character, already drawn before the public with genuine marks of candour, is it possible that any writer to the public should, in calumniating it, say, that there was no fear of his being contradicted? Was he not contradicted, if I may use the expression, by anticipation? But uncongenial records are useless things, like _stern lights_.

[22] Rapin's History of England, vol. ii, page 344.

[23] Hume says, that Campion was put to the rack, and, confessing his guilt, was publicly executed. The confession of guilt is not so clearly proved as the putting to the rack. In the life of Campion the confession is denied; and what Hume himself says immediately before is strong against the imputed guilt, that he and Parsons were sent to explain the bull of Pius, and to teach that the subjects of Elizabeth were not bound by it to rebel against her.--See vol. v, chap. xli, page 238.

[24] Page 327, edition 1615.

[25] Hume's History of England, vol. viii, chap. lxvii, page 110.

[26] Hume's History of England, vol. v, chap. xxxviii, page 22, &c.

[27] Hume.

[28] Tom. ii, p. 375.

[29] Bayle, article Loyola.

[30] Dupleix's History of France.

[31] An assembly of the clergy was held at Poissy, in 1561, where James Laynez, then general of the Jesuits, refuted the impieties of Beza, in the presence of the French court.

[32] Filles Dieu.

[33] See the Substance of a Speech of Sir John Coxe Hippisley, Bart., &c.

[34] Sir John informs us (ibid. page 37), that "there is evidence fully on record" to show, that Frederic III, of Prussia, acted, with respect to the Jesuits, upon the "same principles which influenced the measures of the empress Catherine." According to the principles I have thought myself bound to ascribe to her, this concurrence is not unlikely; but, it is very unlikely, that he preserved them in his dominions through the sad ambition of showing a power of managing them. He had declared, that he retained them, in order to furnish _the good seed_ to catholic princes, who might one day wish to recover the plant.

[35] The fifth article of the _pacta conventa_, confirmed by the empress's edict of September 5, 1772, runs in these words:--"Catholici utriusque ritus in his provinciis inhabitantes, quae augustissimae Russiarum imperatrici ex pacto convento cesserunt, ad civilem statum quod attinet, omnibus possessionibus bonisquae suis fruentur. In iis vero quae ad religionem spectant, _omnino_ conservabuntur _in statu quo_: videlicet, in eodem libero exercitio cultus et disciplinae suae, cum omnibus templis et bonis ecclesiasticis, _eodem modo_ quo possidebantur cum ii catholici sub dominium majestatis suae imperialis venerunt. Nec majestas sua imperialis nec ejus successores utentur unquam suprema potestate et auctoritate in detrimentum _status quo_ catholicae Romanae ecclesiae in commemoratis provinciis." This fifth article was afterwards formally accepted and agreed to by the empress, the king of Poland, and the pope, in the diet of Poland, September 18, 1773, five weeks after the suppression of the society at Rome. The nuncio Garampi had laboured in vain to obtain the exclusion of the Jesuits from the benefit of it.

[36] Additional note, page 36.

[37] Mr. Plowden, whose book, I am sorry to say, I have not read.

[38] "Popes," says the very pontiff on whom sir John relies, "are pilots, steering almost always through boisterous seas, and, of course, must spread or shorten sail according to the weather."--Ganganelli's Letters, Letter cxii.

[39] Ganganelli's Letters, Letter cxii.

[40] Ibid.

[41] Letter cxii.

[42] St Luke, chap. xxiii. verse 24.

[43] Letter cxii.

[44] Appendix No. I.

[45] Urban VII is placed at the head of the roll of the pontiffs hostile to the Jesuits. If sir John will take the trouble of looking into Sacchinus's History, part v, book x, page 505, he will there read, that, as soon as pope Urban VII was elected, he discharged from prison an innocent Jesuit, whom his violent predecessor, Sixtus V, had confined, publicly declaring him to be free from guilt, and suspicion of guilt. This, says the historian, was the first, and it was also the last, act of government of pope Urban VII, who presently was taken ill, and died on the twelfth day after his election, September 27, 1590.

[46] After this, under the hand of Ganganelli, when pope, what can we think of those, who attempt to mislead the public mind by asserting, that the Jesuits were connected with the Inquisition?

[47] This is directly in contradiction to sir John Hippisley's remark of the influence of the Jesuits being considered as so exceptionable, even by prelates of their own community.

[48] Castera's History of Catherine II.

[49] Clement XIII's Letter of the 9th July, 1763, to the archbishops and bishops of France.

[50] Acts of the Apostles chap. xxv, verse 16.

[51] See page 29.

[52] Spirit of Laws, Book IV, chap. vi.

[53] Dissertation on the Varieties of the Human Species.

[54] Tracts on several interesting Subjects in Politics and Morals.

[55] See the English edition of his work, called "A Relation of the Missions of Paraguay," pages 113, 181, _et passim_.

[56] M. Lally Tolendal.

[57] See the Life prefixed to his Sermons.

[58] Bausset's Life of Fenelon, vol. i, page 21, &c.

[59] Appendix, No. II.

[60] See the Institute, vol. ii, p. 74.

[61] Juan and Ulloa, Vol. II. chap. xv, p. 179 and 180.

[62] Juan and Ulloa, Vol. II, chap. xv, p. 182 and 184.

[63] See Memoirs of the Ministry of Carvalho, Marquis de Pombal.

[64] Barruel's _Histoire du Clerge pendant la Revolution Francoise_, page 152.

[65] Infinite are the false reports, made by interested writers, of the missions of South America. The solid refutation of them may be found in many Spanish works, but more agreeably in the _Histoire du Paraguay_ of Charlevoix, the voyage of Juan and Ulloa, and the _Cristianesimo Felice_ of Muratori, already cited.

[66] See vol. i, page 58.

[67] In 1768, when the Jesuit missionaries from Spanish America arrived at Cadiz, a number of them, natives of northern countries, were shipped off to Ostend, to make their way to their respective homes. Their poor garments were almost worn to rags. A new hat was given to each, with a very small pittance in money, proportioned to the distance to which he was to travel. Those, who came from California, reported, that, before they were brought away from Mexico, the priests, who had been sent into California, to take their abandoned stations, returned in the ship, in which they had been sent out, refusing, one and all, to dwell in such a country.

[68] De dign. et aug. Scient. I. 7.

[69] It was a law of the society, with which the general could not dispense, that no rewards or alms were to be demanded or accepted, whereby the spiritual and literary duties of the institute might seem to be recompensed. Even the usual honorary retributions, attached to spiritual functions, and regulated by the canons, were excluded. Hence, when clergymen of other descriptions had preached a course of sermons in royal chapels, they were usually, and very justly, complimented with some considerable benefice, frequently a mitre: when Jesuits had performed the same duty with success, they were thanked in the king's name, and informed, that his majesty would be glad to hear them another year. Perhaps this law of the Jesuits, and their renunciation of church dignities by vow, were among the motives, which engaged princes to employ them so much in spiritual concerns.

[70] Cardinal de Maury's "Eloge de M. l'Abbe Radonvilliers, prononce le 7 Mai, 1807."

[71] See cardinal de Maury's "Essai sur l'Eloquence, Panegyriques, Eloges, &c." vol. ii, printed at Paris, 1810.

[72] They are found, principally, in the fourth part of their "Constitutions," in the rules of provincials, rectors, prefects of schools, masters, and scholastics, and in their _Ratio Studiorum_.

[73] See the chapter of part x, entitled "De modo quo conservari et augeri totum corpus Societatis in suo bono statu possit," vol. i, p. 445, of the Prague folio edition.

[74] Institute, vol. ii, p. 408, Prague folio edition.

[75] Institute, vol. ii, p. 408, Prague folio edition.

[76] Ibid. vol. i, p. 407.

[77] Ibid. vol. i, p. 408.

[78] Institute, vol. i, p. 373.

[79] Ibid, vol. i, p. 408.

[80] "Filiis suis, ut convenit, compati noverit."--Institutum Const., Pars IX, vol. ii, c. i, p. 4.

"Conferet secum viros, qui consilio polleant, habere, quorum opera in iis quae statuenda sunt . . . uti possit."--Ibid., vol. i, p. 425.

[81] "Vir sit (generalis) . . . in omni virtutum genere exemplum . . . ac _praecipue_ in eo _splendor charitatis_ . . . sit conspicuus."--Institutum Const., vol. i, p. 135.

"Advertendum quod primo in _charitate ac dulcedine_, qui peccant, sunt admonendi."--Ibid. vol. i, p. 375.

[82] "Conferet etiam, circumspecte et ordinate precipaere . . . ita ut subditi se potius ad _dilectionem_ majorem quam ad timorem suorum superiorem possint componere."--Ibid., vol. i, p. 426.

"Ut in spiritu _amoris_ et non cum perturbatione timoris procedatur, curandum est."--Ibid., vol. i, p. 407.

[83] "Juret unusquisque, priusquam det (_suffragium_) quod eum nominat, quem sentit in Domino magis idoneum."--Ibid., vol. i, p. 431.

[84] "Si accidiret ut valde negligens vel remissus esset, &c. . . . tunc enim coadjutor vel vicarius qui generalis officio fungatur, est eligendus."--Institutum Const., vol. i, p. 439.

[85] "Habet ergo societas cum praeposito generali (et idem cum inferioribus fieri possit) aliquem qui accedens ad Deum in oratione, postquam divinam bonitatem consulerit et aequum esse id judicaverit, cum modestia debita ac humilitate, quid sentiat in ipso praeposito requiri ad majus obsequium et gloriam Dei, admonere teneatur."--Ibid., Pars IX, c. iv, n. 4, p. 439.

[86] See Part IX, chap. iv, of the Constitutions, entitled "De auctoritate vel providentia quam Societas habere debet erga praepositum Generalem," vol. i, p. 439.

[87] Ibid.

[88] "Erit etiam summi momenti, ut perpetuo felix societatis status conservetur, diligentissime ambitionem, malorum omnium in quavis republica vel congregatione matrem submovere."--Institutum Const., vol. i, p. 446.

"Qui autem de ambitione hujusmodi convictus esset, activo et passivo suffragio privetur, ut inhabilis ad eligendum alium (generalem), et ut ipse eligatur."--Ibid., vol. i, p. 430.

[89] Institutum Const., vol. i, p. 490.

[90] Institutum Const., vol. i, p. 422.

[91] When Dr. Priestley went to Paris, to enjoy personally the happy improvement of human affairs, at the conclusion of the eighteenth century, the glorious star of reason was culminating. He was known to be a materialist, consequently very naturally taken for an atheist, or at least a naturalist, if I may use the expression, and the arms of the fraternity were open to receive a man so highly distinguished for his chemical discoveries. They eagerly entered into discourse with one, who had denied man a soul, and, after pouring forth their own sublime theories of eternal sleep and energies of nature, they gave him a pause to utter _his_ sublimities; and presently the room echoed with laughter and information that the doctor _believes: Le docteur croit, le docteur Priestley croit_. Some, who had not heard the conversation, ran to inquire what he believed. _Comment! croit-il l'immortalite de l'ame? Point de tout; il convient que l'homme n'a point d'ame. Bien! que croit-il donc? Il croit, l'immortalite du corp. Que diable! quelle bizarerie! Mais, chez docteur, expliquez nous cela_. The doctor discoursed on matter, and necessity, and of Jesus Christ as a mere man. Finding that he believed _something_ their astonishment was great; and, for some time, _le docteur croit_ was a bye-word.

[92] Genie du Christianisme, tom. viii.

[93] By his edicts on this subject, the youth of France were to be brought up at his schools throughout the empire; these schools, in every town and village, were all dignified with the appellation of university, the masters of which were appointed by the principal of the school at Paris, and to be under his control. The mathematics and a military spirit were ordered to be the chief things attended to: all boys, of whatever age, wore uniforms and immense cornered hats.

[94] A writer in the Times, cited in the Quarterly Review of Oct. 1811, p. 302.

[95] The Jansenistical apostate monk, Le Courayer, alleges a powerful motive to enforce this doctrine: it is this; "By destroying the credit and reputation of the Jesuits, Rome must be subverted: and when this is once effected, Religion will reform itself."--_Hist. du Conc. de Trente, ed. d'Amsterdam_, 1751, p. 63.

[96] That the ministers Pombal, Choiseul, Aranda, Tanucci, &c. should have adopted this summary mode of execution at Lisbon, Paris, Madrid, Naples, &c. creates now little surprise, devoted as they were to the views of the philosophers.

[97] It will be readily allowed, that the form of limited monarchy is best calculated to insure the happiness of subjects. Besides this general advantage, many other features of the Jesuits' institute strongly conspired to produce union of minds and hearts among the members. One main cause of it, however, was accidental, and extrinsic to their government and statutes. This was the unceasing pressure of unmerited outward hostility, which, of course, closed them into a more compact phalanx. In the last persecution, a thousand stratagems were devised to create disunion among them, and to engage them to solicit their own dissolution. Their enemies were everywhere disappointed and enraged. They were reduced to assassinate the body, which they could not decompose. In every country, they employed merciless soldiers, and still more unfeeling lawyers, to tear off the Jesuits' cassocks; and everywhere they found the country watered with the Jesuits' tears. Jesuits were everywhere fond of their profession. Can this be a crime?

[98] After some search I have discovered, that Jerom Zarowicz, or Zarowich, was the name of the discharged Polish Jesuit, who forged and published the _Monita Secreta_ in 1616. Subsequent editions, as might be expected, were swelled with fresh matter. Henry a Sancto Ignatio, a Flemish Carmelite friar, and an avowed partisan of the Jansenists Arnaud and Quesnel, trumpeted forth the _Monita_ in his _Tuba Magna_, a violent invective against the Jesuits, which he printed at Strasburg in 1713, and again in 1717, just at the period when Quesnel was condemned by the famous bull _Unigenitus_.

While the minister Pombal was persecuting the Jesuits in Portugal, Almada, his agent at Rome, filled that capital and all Italy with outrageous libels against the suffering victims, composed and distributed chiefly by a knot of friars of different orders, who were in his pay, and printed at the press of Nicolas Pagliarini. Some of the former were banished, and the latter was condemned to the galleys. His punishment was remitted by the meek pontiff Clement XIII, and the culprit escaped to Lisbon, where he was employed, honoured, and rewarded by Pombal. I have before me two of these libels, printed in 1760, of which, one is an Italian translation of the _Monita Secreta_, preceded by a preface of 137 pages, and followed by a long appendix. The performance, like that of Laicus, is a wild, incoherent assemblage of impostures and insults, all written, as the author acknowledges, _con uno stile basso e andante_, because he professes to write for the lower classes of readers, _per illuminare il minuto populo_. In fact, his manner and language are almost as low and groveling as those of that eminent adept in the _stile basso e andante_, Laicus of the Times.

[99] Not having elsewhere met with this monstrous calumny, I incautiously ascribed the invention of it to Laicus. But in one of the Italian libels, mentioned in the last note, the writer, having informed the _minuto populo_ of Italy, that the Jesuits are professed poisoners, gives the proof in these words: "Perhaps pope Innocent XIII was snatched from us by Jesuitical barbarity. There would be no doubt of it, if only the surgeon of that pope, who is still alive (in 1760), would be pleased to declare, that the Jesuits had infused poison through the sore in the old pontiff's leg. But he is silent, through dread of the Jesuits' vengeance." This is called _illuminating the minuto populo_. Laicus catches the ray, and reflects it, with lustre improved, upon our _minuto populo_, when he assures them, that Innocent XIII _was UNIVERSALLY UNDERSTOOD to have been murdered by the Jesuits_. Such is the progress of genius.

[100] See Letter II.

[101] Ibid.

[102] See Letter II.

[103] See Letter II.

[104] Ibid.

[105] See Letter II.

[106] Ibid.

[107] See Letter II.

[108] See Letter III.

[109] Voltaire, in his History of Louis XIV, had the assurance to write, that our king James II was a Jesuit. Abbe Millot, a pitiful imitator of Voltaire, who had been dismissed from the society of the Jesuits, obtained a seat in the French academy, and published _Elemens de l'Histoire de France_. In this meagre work, not to be outdone by his master, he has the impudence to advance, that St. Louis IX, king of France, was a Dominican friar. All this passes for history with certain readers, who are not quite among the _minuto populo_.

[110] See Letter III.

[111] Urban VIII was elected pope in 1625. I have before me an authentic list of all the superiors of the Jesuits in England from 1623 downwards to 1773, in which no name like Stillington appears.

[112] See Letter III.

[113] Pope, indeed, has contradicted the calumny in his energetic verse,

_Where London's column, pointing at the skies,_
_Like a tall bully, lifts the head, and lies._

In spite of which, the column is still allowed to disgrace the first city in the world, though it totters, and daily nods destruction around it.--_Ed._

[114] It must be acknowledged, that this calumny has been too hastily placed to the credit of Laicus. He has not the honour of the invention. Calumny it certainly is. Whoever knows the angry temper of the parliament of Paris, in 1757, when their opposition to the king, and their fury against the archbishop De Beaumont and the Jesuits, were wound up to an uncommon height, must allow, that they would have been delighted with the detection of the slightest symptom, the most distant presumption of guilt, in any Jesuit. The wretched culprit Damiens was frequently interrogated with this view. He constantly denied that he had any accomplice, but owned, that he had conceived the idea of his crime, from frequently hearing the table talk of members of the parliament, on whom he waited; his design being, as he pretended, only to make the king more attentive to the voice and complaints of the people. Notwithstanding the certainty of this, one of the above mentioned Italian libels, written _per il minuto populo_, informs them roundly, that the Jesuits were accomplices of Damiens, and that two Jesuits were _privately_ hanged for it in the _Bastille_. But why was not Laicus equally trusted with the secrets of that state prison? Possibly he has learned this lesson from his oracle Coudrette. He cannot however glory in the invention.

[115] It may be suspected, that Coudrette is really the writer, to whom, suppressing his name, Robertson so often refers his readers, in his account of Jesuits, in the Life of Charles V. Perhaps he was ashamed to name such an author. But he had already forfeited his title to historical impartiality, by acknowledging, that his unfavourable account of the Jesuits is derived from the _Comptes Rendus_ and _Requisitoires_ of La Chalotais, attorney general of the parliament of Bretagne, who, not less than Coudrette, was truly _un ennemi acharne des Jesuites_.

[116] "They," said Dr. Johnson, "who would cry out _Popery_ in the present day, would have cried _Fire_ in the time of the deluge."

[117] See Letter V.

[118] See Letter V.

[119] See Letter V.

[120] The preservation of the society of Jesus in the Russian empire, in spite of innumerable solicitations, schemes, and intrigues employed to procure its suppression, would form a curious morsel of _particular_ history, highly honourable to the court of Petersburg and creditable to the Jesuits.

[121] The French League.

[122] Si acciderit aliquod ex peccatis (avertas id Deus), quae sufficiunt ad praepositum officio privandum, simul atque res per sufficientia testimonia, vel ipsius affirmationem constaret, juramento adstringantur assistentes ad id societati denuntiandum.--Cap. V. art. iv, p. 440.

[123] Et si res devulgata et communiter manifesta esset, non expectata quatuor assistentium confirmatione, provinciales alii alios vocando convenire debent, et ipso primo die quo in locum hujusmodi congregationis ingredientur, ubi aderunt quatuor qui convocarunt, cum aliis congregatis, rem is aggrediatur cui omnia notoria sunt, et accusatio dilucide explicetur. Et postquam auditus fuerit praepositus, foras egredi debebit, et antiquissimus ex provincialibus simul cum secretario aut alio assistente, de lata re scrutinium faciat, et primo quidem an constet de peccato quod objicitur, deinde an ejusmodi sit ut propter id officio privari debeat; et idem suffragia promulget, quae ut sufficiant duas tertias partes excedent; et tunc statim de alio eligendo agatur, et si fieri potest, non inde prius egrediatur quam societas praepositum generalem habeat.--Ibid. p. 440.

[124] Prima ad res externas pertinet vestitus, victus et expensarum quarumlibet, quae omnia vel augere, vel imminuere poterit societas prout praepositum ipsum ac se decere et Deo gratius fore judicabit et tunc societatis ordinationi acquiescere oportebit.--Cap. IV, art. ix, p. 439, tom. i.

[125] Numero autem hujusmodi assistentium quidem quatuor......... et quidem illi ipsi esse poterunt de quibus supradictum......... quamvis autem res graviores ab iis tractandae sint, statuendi tamen facultas, postquam eos audierit, penes praepositum generalem erit.--Cap. VI, art. i, p. 444, tom. ii.

[126] Est item penes praepositum generalem omnis facultas agenda quosvis contractus emptionum aut venditionum quorumlibet bonorum temporalium mobilium tam domorum quam collegiorum societatis, et imponendi aut redimendi quoslibet census super bonis stabilibus ipsorum collegiorum, in eorumdem utilitatem et bonum, cum facultate sese liberandi, restituta pecunia quae data fuerit. Alienare autem aut omnino dissolvere collegia vel domos jam creatas societatis sine generali ejus congregatione praepositus generalis non poterit.--Cap. III. col. ii, p. 336, tom. i.

[127] Cum autem quidquam privatae utilitatis ex redditibus quaerere vel in suum usum convertere non possit, est valde probabile quod majori cum puritate ac Spiritu constantius ac diuturnius procedat in iis quae ad bonum regimen collegiorum ad majus Dei ac Domini nostri obsequium provideri convenit.--Cap. I, tit. i, p. 392.

[128] Transferre vel differre domos vel collegia jam creata, aut in usum societatis professae redditus eorum convertere praepositus generalis, ut in 4 part. dictum est, non poterit.--Cap. IV, art. xlviii, p. 438.

[129] De his vero quae societati ita relinquuntur ut ipsa pro suo arbitratu et regat et disponat (sive illa bona stabilia sint; ut domus aliqua vel proedium non alicui certo collegio ab eo qui disponit, relinquit determinare applicatum vel annexum, sive mobilia cujusmodi sunt pecunia, triticum et quoevis alia mobilia) idem generalis disponere poterit, aut vendendo, aut retinendo, aut huic vel illi loco id quod videbitur applicando, prout ad majorem Dei gloriam senserit expedire.--Cap. III, art. vi, p. 437. col. ii, tit. 2.

[130] Declaratum est ut haec bona tantum in eadem provincia et non alibi generalis debeat distribuere, pag. 493, item, pag. 702, ibid. eadem provincia in qua, 1 cap. 30, partis constitutionum distribuenda esse dicuntur bona nostrorum quae illi societati dare volunt, intelligenda est, in qua sunt ipsa bona, non autem in qua quis societatem ingreditur, aut versatur. Sumitur autem provinciae nomen more societatis, prout scilicet uni praeposito provinciali subest.

[131] Quod si in eadem provincia plura sint dominia diversis principibus subjecta, adjecit congregatio diligenter servandam esse eamdem constitutionem ut scilicet in transferendis hujusmodi fratrum nostrorum bonis ex uno Dominio in aliud ejusdem provinciae societatis, ratio haberetur regum, principum et aliorum potestatum, ne in eis causa ulta offensionis detur, sed ad majorem aedificationem omnium et spiritualem animarum profectum et gloriam Dei omnia cedant.--Tom. i. p. 511.

[132] Sexta locum habet in quibusdam casibus (quos speramus per Dei bonitatem, aspirante ipsius gratia, nunquam eventuros) cujusmodi essent peccata mortalia in externum actum prodeuntia, ac nominatim, copula carnalis: vulnerare quemdam: ex redditibus collegiorum aliquid ad proprios sumptus assumere: vel pravam doctrinam habere. Si quid ergo horum acciderit, potest ac debet societas (si de re sufficientissime constaret) eum officio privare, ac si opus est, a societate removere. In omnibus prae occulis habendo quod ad majorem Dei gloriam et universale bonum societatis fore judicabitur.--Cap. XII, art. vii, p. 440, tom. i.

[133] Page 215, tome iv, des Memoires du Clerge.

[134] Page 451 du meme volume.

[135] Maximes et Reflections sur la Comedie, ed. de 1674, p. 138, 139.

[136] Henry IV finished the letter, which he deigned to the general assembly, with these words: "Vos hortamur ad retinendam instituti vestri integritatem et splendorem."

* * * * *

Corrections made to printed original.

Page 104. "It opens with a long narration": 'uarration' in original.

Page 107. "the addition of pressing solicitations": 'additition' in original.

Page 320. "sounded in the present times": 'preset' in original.

Page 338. "et praedecessorum nostrorum": 'praedecessorm' in original.

Page 361. "profess obedience to all their superiors' commands": 'to to' (over line break) in original.

<pre id="pg-footer">