History of the Jesuits Vol2

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HISTORY
T H E J E S U I T S :
FROM TJIE POUNDATION OE' TIIEIR SOCIETY TO IT8 SUPPRESSION
BY POPE CLEMEKT XIV.;
TI[Ell< nllSSIOX'rj TI[ROZ;GIlO UT TIlE IVORLI) ;
'L'nEIR EDUC,kTIOKdL SYSTEM .4ND LITERATURE; WITH THEIR REVIVAL
.iNL) YILRSENT STATE.
AXDREW STEIINMNTZ,
"
lUTllOH fly "TIIE .YOVITIATE,'' THl.: .TESLllT IN IIlE FAHILT."
Iru' TIIREE VOLUMES.
VOL. 11.
LONDON:
1IT.CHXRD BEKTLET, NEW BURLINGTOX STRRET.
PUBLISHER IN ORDJKAKY TO AER MAJESTY.
1848.
CONTENTS TO VOL. 11.
L
. . . . . . . TAEI!
Book V1.or RODERICUS . 1
BOOK VT. on, R.ODERICUS.
Tm
Jesuita have reason to lament, and Catholics in
general, have causc to fcel surprise at, the uncanoi~ical
death-bed of " Saint Ignatius." The disin- lgnatiug
terestcd render may lamcilt the circumstance :
LutheK
but, having attentively observed tlle career of the
foundcr, he will perhaps consider its termination as
perfectly consistent as it was natural. His ambition
had made his religion a lever ; and ~vhenin that mortal
cold blcak agony, ambition palsied and dead within
him, its lever became an object of disgust-as iiivari-
ably to human nature become all the objects and
instruments of passion in satiety, or in the moments
when the icy hand of Death grips the heart that can
struggle no more. It is indeed probable that the laat,
moxqents of Ignatius mere frightful to behold-frightful
from his self-generatcd tcrrors-for, bc it observcil,
I impute no atrocious crimes to tllc man, alt11ougI1
I do believe that the results of his spiritual ambition
entailed incalculable disasters on the humai~r ace and
Christianity, as will be evident in the sequel. To me
it would havc bcen a matter of surprise, had Ignatius
VOL. 11. B
2 HISTORY OF THE JESUITS.
died likc a simple child of the Church. Fortunately for
the cause of truth and the upright judgment of history,
circumstances hindered the invention of a11 edifying
death-bed, by his disciples. Strangers knew all-a
physician was present,. But here I am wrong : one of
them, writing at the end of the seventeenth century, has
contradicted all previous biographers, aid act,ually asserts
that Ignatius died " with the sacraments ! Had his
'?
disciples been permitted to think of the thing, no doubt
we should havc had a glorious scene on paper, painted
by the first biographer for all succeeding generations of
the tribe. But this has been providentially forbidden,
and we are permitted to know that Ignatius died in such
a manner, that, had he lived in the sacramental era of
Jesuit-domination in France, the founder would have
been by the law denied Christian burial. Comparing
t.he accounts given by their respective disciples, Luther's
death is far more respectable than that of Saint Igna-
"
tius," and so consonant wit11 the man's character through
life, that we think it as truly described as that of Igna-
tius, for the same reason precisely. The dominant
thought of the Reformer accompanied him to the end-
the thought of his mighty enterprise ani~natedt he last
word he ~ttered.~H is death was consistent with his
cause : that of Ignatius was not; and there is the
mighty difference. No unqualified admirer of Luther
am I-nor unqualified disparager of Loyola ; but the
"
1 Francisco Garcia, Vida de San ~~nacdieo L oyola. He says : And finally,
full of merits, having received the Messing of *e sovereign podiff and the
sacraments, invoking the name of Jesus, he gave up his bleased spirit with great
peace and tranquillity to him who created him for so much good to the world-
y halmente, lleno de merecirnientos, rtviendo recibido la benedicion de1 Surno
Pontifice, y 10s Sacramentoe, invocando el nombre de Jesus, diir su bendito
espiritu con gran paz y sosiego a1 que para tanto bien del mundo le trio."-
Flw Scvnct. krce~apa rte, p. 518, edit. Madrid, 1675.
2 See llazlitt's "Life of Luther," p. 350, et seq.
latter is forced upon us as a saint, whilst all admit the
former tn have been oilly a man ; and I confess that I:
like the man bettor than the saint. Both achieved
" great things " by very na,t,~~ramle ans, as we have
seen ; but the latter preterided to an equality ~ i t h
Jesus Christ-Quando el etegno Padre nze pus3 con slla
Hzjb-" When the eternal Father put me 1)esidc his
Son "-and, therefore, I consider him an ambitious im-
postor-like Mohammed and every other, past, present,,
and to come, for we may be sure that the race is not
exhausted utterly. In Luther's writings and actions
there is much to &gust us : in Loyola'a impoaturea
there is much likewise to disgust us : the errors of both
emanated directly from that " religious system of
"
Borne, mhe~~cthee y emerged to their respective achieve-
ment,~.' Antipodes mind-ailtagonists in natural
ill
For instance, bot,h of them talked of incarnat,e devils incessantly tormenting
them. In Hazlitt's a Life of Lither " there are very copious extracts from
Luther's Tischreden or Table-talk on the subject-dl highly characteristic of the
age, as well as the superstitious cast of mind which the reformer never threw
off-so difficult it is to get rid of early associations. The reader remembers that
the Catholics represented Luther as the Ron of nn incubus or devil. The
reformer himself believed the thing possible, nay even states a caee which he
vouches for ! It is one of the lemt immodest and disgusting among Hazlitt's
extracts : "I myself;' says Luther, "saw and touched at Demu a child of this
sort, which had no human parents, but had proceeded from the devil. He wa9
twelve yem old, and, in outward form, exictly resembled ordinary children.
He did nothing but eat, consuming as much every clay ae four he&y labourem
or thresher.s could . . . . . if any one touched &I, he yelled ont like a mad
creature" . . . . It is poeitively horrifying to hear the reformer my : cL I
d dt o the princes of Anhalt, with whom I was st the time, ' If I had thc order-
ing of things here I would have that child thrown into the 3Zoldau at the risk
of being heldits murdercr.' But the Elector of Saxony and t hp~rin wq wpm not
. . . .
of my opinion in the matter . Children like that are, in my opinjon, a
mere mass of fleah and bone, without any soul. The devil ia quite capable of
producing such things," &c. P. 318. The whole chnpt~ri~ r lreadf~~lrllyir g&ting
and humiliating : but Mr. Hazlitt deserves praise for the honourable intagrity
with which he has perfected Itfichelet's garbled performance. Still some of the
devil-matter should hnve been left nut nq too rlisgnntiny and immodest. A sei~te~lce
to that effect would have answered all the purpose of rnnscientious fidelity.
5 2
4 HISTORY OF TIIE JESUITS.
character-diametrically opposed in natural dispositio~l
or organisation, both lived according to the intcrnal or
external inipulses to which they were subjected ; and
frankly, the frcc-living of Luther, as representccl by his
associates, and by no mealis cri~ninalo r excessive, was
3s cnnsistont and necessary in Tmher, as were the
" mortification " axid " self-abnegation and '' chastity
" "
of Loyola, as represented by his discip1es.l Ignn
t,iiie
could not ccrta,inly have succeeded by any other plan in
the given circumstances; and habit made the thing
very easy, m any one may find on trial-with such
views as imperatively required that the founder sliould
not be as other men." Protestants have a~nusedo r
"
deceived themselves and their readers, by comparing
the regenerated" spirits of Luther and Loyob. In so
c'
doing, they debase Luther, and pay a compliment to the
clever inventions of the Jcsuits. To my mind, at least,
Acroording to the Jesuit Bouhour~w, riting in the age of Louis XIV., the
physicians who dissected Ignatius thought him of a phlegmatic temperament,"
although naturally of the most ardent complexion : t. ii. p. 228. This he attri-
butcs to the efForts which Ignatius mndc to restrain hia paasions : but such a
result would appear in conduct, not in the wgaw laid open by dissection, which
are modified by disease, and not by rational, virtuous restraint. In fact, it is
excessive indulgence or excitement which totally alters their natural condition.
Were it not so, morality would be man's exterminating angel. Thank God we
are now-a-days being enlightened on these subjects of such vital importance to
society and religion. But Bouhours garbles the fact to which he alludes. Maf-
feus, an earliey Jesuit, gives a diagnosis of the Jnt's d i w ,s hoving it to have
been simply an induration of the liver, with "three stones found in the vem
Porca, ~cordiigto Reaidus Columbus in his book of Anatomy." Ign. Tim.
p. 158. He meant either gall-stones in the gall-bladder, or solid mwses in the
ducts of the liver, both morbid concretions from the ingredients of the bide. The
vena Porta enters the liver st a furrow of its inferior surface, just where the bile-
duct issues, and it ramifies with the duct throughout the substance of the organ.
Hencc originated the old anatomist's mistake : but the diseed liver is manifest ;
and when we consider how many desperate afflictions result from disease in this
organ, we should excuse many of the saint's extravagancies. Anxious, racking
thoughts will derange the liver; and this derangement once bcgun, entails
demgement in every other organ,-blood and brain evince the dieaster, and
constant misery is the result-doom and fanaticism.
Loyola was pel.fectly in~ioce~iotf all the distinctive
spiritualily ascribed to him in his " Bpiritual Exercises "
and Coristitutions ; or, at the most, that spirituality has
come down to us? filtered and clarified b j his clever
followers, who extracted from Loyola's c~uden otions of
spirituality a curious essence, just as modern chymists
have extracted quinine from thc bark cinchona, which
they introclucod into Europc, and made so lucrative at
first.' The determined will of the Jcsuits was the true
legacy of Ignatius-like that of the Sarace~lbs equeathed
by Mohammed. On the contrary, Luther was essen-
tially a theorist ; his German mind and feelings madc
him such ; and the essential characteristics of that
theory prevail to tlic prescm t llour-most prornincntly
vigorous where mcu elljoy tllc greatest fieedom, press
forward most intently in tllc march of human destiny,
ever inindfi-11o f God and their fellow-men-whilst duty
is the watchword of the great and the little. We have
not derived all thc advantages which Providence offered
to mallkind at thc claw11 of thc Protestant movement.
We have not bccn blessed aa we might have bcen,
because since then mc have modified everything : illstcad
of pressing forwarcl, we have been urgcd back to tllc
things of Rome-every step in which direction is an
approaclr to mental darkness and sentimental blindness.
When thcre shall be absolutely nothing in our religious
and moral institutions to suggest its Bo~narol rigin, thcn
shall the hand of I'rovidence bc no longer shortened,
and its blessings will be commensurate with our corpo-
real health and vigour, mental refinement, and moral
1 The introduction of this medicind bark to Europe took I)llsce in 1640.
Cnder the name of Pulvis Jc.?uiticus the Jesuits vended itJ end derived a large
revenue from the trade. It is said that the Jesuits were the fimt to discover its
efficacy in fcvers. Quinine is a purified form of the drug.
6 IIISTORY OF THE JESUITS.
~bectitude-the thee perfections destined for man. But
this must be the result of enlightei~me~lBt. y persecution,
by intolerance, you canllot effect it. If poor hypo-
chondriac will have it that his head is made of lead,
would you persecute and kill him for his idea ? Perse-
cution on account of religion is pretty much ,as reason-
. .
nb]e zEd 2s C!c~atj:an-]i~e, Jjl?ljgjitc;i puMic Gpn;9E,
~loul-ishth e love of country, and human nature, with the
power of God, will do the rest.
Theil founder died thus uncanonically-wilhuut conxo-
lation-without absolution-it is even doubtful whether
. thc messenger. was in time to get thc pope's
lT,.... r-
ltiluYsW w 1a8Lj Ld- indulgence or passport, by proxy : for we are
glorified. expse~8Iyt old that the 8on of Obedience had
put off the matter to the following day ; and as
" "l
Igmtius expired one hour after sunrise, according to
Maffeus, or two hour8 after, according to Baz.toIi, the
time, even with Bai.toli7s provident enlargement, was
doubtless much too early for a papal interview : the very
old pope, who was, from his uvud regimen, probably a
heavy sleeper, was not likely to be stirring at that early
hour of the dromjr morn. But the Jesuits were resolved
to makc up for the disaster. Romc, me are told, rang
with the ~umour-" The Saint is dead." The body was
exposed-devotees rusllcd in crowds, kissing his feet and
llailds ; applying their rosaries to his body, so as to make
them miraculou+and begging for Ioclts of his lair or
shreds of his garments imbued with the same quintes-
sen~c.~T hey gave out that "when he expired, his
glo~iouss oul appeared to a holy lady called Margarita
Gillo, in Rologna, who was a great benefactress of tlie
Company, and that Ilc said to her : ' Mnrgaritrt, I am
1 Re in proximan1 luccni di1ata."-iliaJ. p. 1.50.
2 Ibid. Bouhours ~visi.lyg a~*blctsh e event.
going to Heaven, behold I comine~ldt he Company to
your care ;' and he appeared to another devotee who
wished to approach the saint, but the saint would not
let him ; and to many other persons he appeared with
"
his breast open, and displaying "his heart, whereon w-ere
'
engraved, in letters of gold, tho sweet name of JESUS!
"
By all these proceedings the Jesuits motived or encou-
raged a cruel, reckless mockery of the most sacred event
venerated by Christians. They overshot the mark,
however. The apotheosis of Ignatius was ovcrdone.
The pope resolved to put an extinguisher on the confla-
gration-and there was enough to provoke any man
who felt the least solicitude for the hononr of religion.
They gave out that Bobadilla, mllo was ill, no sooner
entered the room where tllc corpse lay, than lie mas
cured-which turns out to be contradicted by the fact
that he was for some time after an invalid at Tivoli, as
the thoughtless biographers and historians depose !
They said that a girl diseased with "King's Evil was
"
cured bj- being touchcd wit11 a sllred of t,l~cs aint's
garments-though other biographers tell us that the
Brothers would not permit any to be taken ! " The
flowers and rose8 which were on his body gave health to
many diseased ; ancl when his body was translated,
there was heard in his sepulchre, for the space of two
days, celestial music-a harmony of sweet voices ; and
witl~irl mere seer1 lights, as il were r.es~.~lendelslila 1.s.
The devils p~~blishehdi s death and great glory-God
1 "TJue~oq uc cspiri, San Ignacio se apericib su aha gloriosa i una santa
seiiora llamada Margarita Gi110, clue eshva en Bolonia, y eva muy benefactora
.
de lo Cumpafiia, t la qurtl din0 17fmrgm1-ito yo nbc voy rc.Z Cklo, 7rbirad pue 08
er~comendoZ L~C ompa6ia. Tambien se apericib a Juan l'ascual su devoto, y que-
riendose llegar a1 Santo, se lo estorbo . . . . . Hase aparecido ~nuchasu ezes,
trayendo el pecho abicrco, y en el curuun euculpido con letraa de oro el dulcu
nombre de Jesus," &c.-Garcia, zcbl supri, f. 518.
8 HlSTORP OF THE JESUITS.
thus forcing them to magnify him whom they abhorred I"
Nor was this all. "A clelnolliac woman being exorcised
at Trepana, in Sicily, God forced tmhed evil to say t,liat
his cncmy Ignntius was dead, and was in Heaven
between the other founders of religious Orders, St.
Dominic and St. Francis."' This was the grand point
Garcia, (di s y i . Hc also tcJls us that Ignatius dscd at least a dozen dead
men to life-pol, lo pncnos doze-one in Mrtnreza, two at ,Munich, mother at Bar-
celona, &c. ; some dkr death, and others during his lifetime. See the disgusting
nnrrativeb in this Jesuit's Life of the Founder." Even Bouhoure gives some
vile instances, And yet Ribedeneyra, i11 hiu,frut edition of the Lie of Ipa-
tius," gave no nliraclee-nay, the last chapter enters into a long, windy, and
most atsurd Jisqui~ition,o n the subject of miracles in general, tending ta their
"
decided dispnrgcrncnt-finishing off as it does \vith these words : But niimclt:~
may be performed by saints, by guilty men, by wicked sinners--ma i mitacoli
pornono ben esser fatg coai da Santi, come da rei, e da mall-agi peccatori."
I?. 509. Ilia introda~onto the wbjtot at on- con~eyst he oertainty LLal no
mention was sn yet d eof the invented miracles-Iet alone the fact that them
were ww performed, which is, of course, lJle fact. He eays : But who doubts
tbt them s;ll be some rucn who will wonder, will be astuw~dwl,r uld will ask
why, these things being tm~e( na they are without doubt), stiIl Ignatius performed
no miracles, nor has God wished to display and exhibit the holiness of this IIis
scrvant, with signs md supel-natural attestations, ns Ha has done usually ivitli
mny other saints ? To such rnen I answer wicll the apostle : 'Who knows the
secrcts of God ? or who is made his adviser 1 ' " P. 565. Thereupon he launches
into a boisterous occao of fi-othy Loaating about &e Company and its achieve-
ments--and tIie lnendncious miracles of Ignatius's sons all ovcr the world, con-
ehding thuu : '(These things I hold for the greatest and rnost stupendous
miraclee." P. 583. Now this same Ribadeneyra was an inseparable companion
of Ignatius, an eyc-witnew of all his actions : his first edition was published in
1572,jfftem ycam elapsed-no miracles appeared in the edition of 1587-nor in
the Italian edition of 1506, which I quote, although the chapter is impudently
entitled " Ofthe miracles v,lrich God optrated by ?&m eam," referring the title to
the Lnatitute, kc. But when the Jeauits began to think it neccswy to hve a
saint to compete with Benedict, Dominic, Francis, kc., then they induced this
u~~~~puJlesouuit st o pbliah miracles in 1613, wl~icli Ile did in what he
titled, Another shorter life, with many find new miracles ; and he got
$'
rid of the incongruity by saying that the m~raclesh ad not been mmi~udm rt
appwed when he previouvly wrote1 Truly, he would have at lwt mentioned
thii fact, en pwmt, in his elaborate disparagement of miracles in general. After
this, mireeles foll tlriclr as hopg as you will find in all Jesuit-histories. The
~redulousM ban Butler gives II now on this Jesuitical transaction," rtnd his
remarks are all that the most gullable devotee can desire on the subject.
a Saints' Lives," July 31. Sce Rasiel dc Selvn, tlrst. dc l'adnlirablc Darn lnigo,
for some sensible remarks OJI the subject, ii. p. 200.