FRANCIS XAVIER, MISSIONARY TO THE INDIES (1506-52).
No man, since the days of the Apostles, has been more commended for his
zeal than Xavier. He has been the moon of that “Society of Jesus” of
which Ignatius Loyola was the guiding sun. His privations, heroism, and
success have been the constant theme of the Roman Catholic Church. And
it is impossible to study his life without a conviction that there was
in it a devout and gallant purpose to bless the world.
Our limits and our line of thought alike demand of us that we shall not
attempt, in any exhaustive form, to treat of Francis Xavier from the
theologic or controversial side. He interests us, apart from his
personal character, simply because two Latin hymns have been accredited
to his pen. These have the same opening line,
“_O Deus ego amo Te_,”
but, after this exordium, they proceed quite differently. The second of
them, as we find it placed in Daniel’s collection, has received the
greatest share of esteem, and is known to the entire world of
English-speaking Christians by the admirable translation of Mr. Caswall:
“My God, I love thee, not because
I seek for heaven thereby,” etc.
There is good reason to discredit its authorship, if this be a question
of accuracy with us. Schlosser’s language (Vol. i., p. 407) would
indicate that he regarded it as “generally conceded” to be the
“love-sigh [_Liebesseufzer_] of the holy Francis Xavier.” But no proof
has yet been offered which positively identifies this hymn with its
reputed composer. Its spirit—and that of its companion lyric—is
precisely his own. But so, it may be added, is the spirit of that
touching poem,
“I am old and blind—
Men point to me as stricken by God’s frown,”
the same as that of John Milton, its once reputed author. No true
student of Milton’s times or of Milton’s language was ever deceived by
it; and the innocent and amiable Quaker lady of our own century, who
wrote it, was perfectly guileless in this impersonation of his grief.
But, nevertheless, it passed current for a long time on the strength of
some one’s literary sagacity.
This species of argument is a very common inheritance to the editors of
Latin hymns, from Thomasius and Clichtove downward. But it is quite as
unsafe as to assign
“I am dying, Egypt, dying,”
to the actual Mark Antony when we know it to have been written by
William Henry Lytle, an American, born in 1829 and dying in 1863.
Therefore, it is scarcely proper authoritatively to accredit these hymns
to Xavier, or, indeed, to any other poet. The utmost that we can say for
them is that no one can prove the converse of the proposition, and that
their style and form are appropriate to the period at which he lived. He
is not known to have written other verses. These may have been the only
exudations of that bruised and wounded spirit which have hardened into
amber and thus have become precious to us. And we would prefer to
believe that he truly appears in these lines in such an exquisite mystic
apotheosis rather than to intermeddle with lower questions, and so,
perhaps, prevent any discussion of himself in these pages at all.
We have been prohibited by much the same destructive analysis from
treating of Augustine, who never wrote a hymn, and to whom the _Ad
perennis vitae fontem_ has been wrongly ascribed, for we know it now to
be the undoubted composition of St. Peter Damiani. In this and in other
similar cases where there is any literary question concerned, it may be
worth our while to investigate with great carefulness. As a rule,
however, the internal evidence offered in the hymns themselves will set
us on the true path. They range in structure from the lowest _corundum_
up to the choicest diamond, and are as various as any gems in their
prosodic form and spiritual color. Like these gems, also, they are
notable for varieties of crystallization—the Dark Ages showing imperfect
angles and crude attempts, and the Renaissance exhibiting again the old
sharp-cut classicism of a time anterior even to Hilary and Ambrose.
From the higher critical standpoint, then, these hymns are not
unacceptable as Xavier’s own work. They _feel_ as if they belonged to
his age and to his life. They are transfused and shot through by a
personal sense of absorption into the divine love, which has fused and
crystallized them in its fiercest heat. It is proper to inquire,
moreover, if Xavier did _not_ write them, who _did_? Their author must
have been as much superior to his own circumstances and surroundings as
Xavier was to his; and he must also have been as much possessed by this
same holy zeal. It is absolutely incredible that, with these qualities
given, he should not have been known to us in other relations, and,
sooner or later, identified as the true source of their being. The
sixteenth century was a time when literary knowledge was closer and
keener than it had been in the twelfth, and a hymn of that period could
not be attributed to Heloise without exposing its own fallacy; for in
the _Requiescat a labore_ we have such a comparatively modern lyric,
which Daniel rightly tests and finds wanting. “It seems to me,” he says,
“that this song is the production of a later age.” And he might well say
it, for its crystallization, so to speak, is too accurate, too
many-sided, for it to belong in the twelfth century and to the sad
Abbess of the Paraclete.
One cannot, however, declare this so positively of Xavier’s two hymns.
In style and composition the first is inferior to the second; but both
have a simplicity and directness of utterance which may easily secure
that pardon which their rhythm is faulty enough to require. If one were
to assign any special date to them, it would naturally be in the
neighborhood of that pathetic little petition which comes from the
prayer-book of Mary Queen of Scots. The _Domine Deus, speravi in Te_ is
pitched in the same key with these. And as Mary lived from 1542 to 1587,
and Xavier from 1506 to 1552, there is certainly room for these two
compositions to have been prepared by another hand, in the days of
enthusiasm over his triumphant successes and of sorrow over his early
death.
With these arguments for and against the authenticity of the hymns, we
must rest content. Bartoli and Maffei, in their Life of Xavier, are
silent upon the subject; and the careful Königsfeld enters the better
hymn in his collection as anonymous. If we retain the reputed authorship
ourselves, it must be, therefore, rather as Christians than as scholars.
But, having done so, we are entitled to speak of Francis Xavier, and of
his life and his work. The date of his birth is apparently fixed by a
manuscript note in Spanish in a family record possessed by the Xaviers,
which places it upon April 7th, 1506. His father was Don John Giasso, a
man of legal acquirements and of good social position. He was at one
time auditor of the royal council under King John III. For a wife he
chose Donna Maria d’Azpilqueta y Xavier, and the child Francis was born
at the castle of Xavier, a few miles distant from Pampeluna in Navarre,
on the southern slope of the Pyrenees. He was the youngest of a large
family, and the castle where he saw the light gave to him the patronymic
by which he is always known. The family were originally called Asuarez,
but altered their name to Xavier when King Theobald gave them this
property. The mother’s title was thus perpetuated in one of her sons,
but there seems to be some confusion still remaining, for a brother of
the missionary was Captain John Azpilqueta, who also apparently had
exchanged his father’s name of Giasso for one of the designations borne
by his mother.
The biographies of Francis Xavier are naturally of a kind to excite the
critical instincts of a scholar. They are, from the original life by
Torsellini, to the latest Jesuit compilation, remarkable for their
enthusiasm and unlimited credulity. It is only in such calmer treatises
as those of Nicolini, Stephen, Venn, and others, that we get the more
just conception of his character. But to be entirely fair to him we
should take him from the picture painted by his co-religionists,
refusing only those things which are manifestly incongruous or absurd.
The work of Bartoli and Maffei may, for example, be regarded as entirely
safe in its general statements.
From the portraits left to us and preserved in the pages of Nicolini and
Mrs. Jameson, we derive a vivid impression of the man’s personal
intensity. His eyes are deep and thoughtful; his nose strong, rather
blunt, and withal sagacious; and his face is that of a mystic. He is
usually represented as gazing upward in religious rapture and his lips
are parted. His features are more rugged and forcible than refined. They
indicate a rude strength of body and of will rather than a delicate and
sensitive nature. Should we have met him personally, he would have given
us the impression of an enthusiast, deeply affectionate and profoundly
loyal to anything like a military organization. These opinions would
have been approved by the fact.
We read that his parents desired to educate him as a cavalier, and that
he was at first instructed at home in the usual topics. But as he showed
zeal and intelligence he was sent, in his eighteenth year, to the
College of Ste. Barbe at Paris. Here he completed the study of
philosophy, received the degree of Master, and began to give instruction
to others. His most intimate friend was Peter Faber, afterward to become
one of the earliest adherents of Ignatius Loyola. And the biographers
are unwearied in their eulogy of Xavier’s and Faber’s purity of life and
morals in the midst of the great temptations of a corrupt city.
To these two young men, ardent of mind and eager in their ambition, now
enters the influence which shapes their destiny. Faber was a Savoyard,
poor and of humble birth, while Xavier was well-to-do and possessed the
haughty spirit of a Spanish grandee. They were, however, kindling each
other up to some scheme of future glory when Ignatius Loyola made his
way to Paris. He had been converted a few years before this and had
already begun to gather proselytes to his opinions. His purpose in
visiting Paris was not merely to avail himself of better facilities for
study, but also to secure more followers. It is not strange to us that
Loyola, with his great sagacity, should have singled out the two
companions and have set himself to win them. Faber’s allegiance, indeed,
it was an easy matter to obtain. But Xavier did not so readily fall in
with the wishes of the great general of the Jesuits.
Faber’s conversion was rapidly accomplished. He was supplied with the
_Spiritual Exercises_, which is, of all books, the best adapted to
produce the proper self-abandonment and plastic condition of soul which
befit the neophyte of the Society of Jesus. And this work, composed, say
the Roman Catholic authorities, in the cavern of Manresa with the help
of the Virgin Mary, may be regarded as the keenest instrument by which
men’s lives were ever carved into the patterns designed by a superior
will. We have no space for a discussion of Jesuitism further than to
indicate its methods when they affect the subject before us, but Faber’s
behavior undoubtedly had its weight upon Xavier. The Savoyard took to
fasting with a perfect fury. In his debilitated condition he was the fit
vehicle for spiritual impressions, for ecstasies, and for mystical
dreams. He would kneel in the open court in the snow, and sometimes
allow himself to be covered with icicles. His bundle of fuel he made
into a bed and slept upon it for the few hours of what one biography
“scarcely knows whether to call torture or repose.” In fact, he so
outran the instruction of Loyola, that that keen observer checked him
and prevented what would have reacted against his own designs. “For,”
saith quaint Matthew Henry, speaking of another subject, “there is a
great deal of doing which, by overdoing, is altogether undone.”
Xavier was, however, more important to Loyola than Faber. And Xavier was
of tougher material and harder to reach. Upon him the intense Loyola
bent the blow-pipe flame of his own spirit. He had failed to touch him
by texts or by austerities. He therefore changed his tactics altogether
and began to soften him by praise, by judicious cultivation of his
sympathies, by procuring new scholars for him, and even by attending his
lectures and feigning a deep interest in whatever he did. In short, he
applied flattery and deference in such a way that he insinuated himself
very soon into the confidence of Xavier, and allowed the haughty Don to
recognize the high birth and good breeding which he could also claim.
This was a master stroke. Faber was after all only a Savoyard; but
Loyola was born in a castle, had been a page at the court of Ferdinand,
and had led soldiers into the deadliest places of battle. He had also
the advantage of being Xavier’s senior by fully fourteen years, for his
birth had been contemporaneous with Columbus’s expedition in search of
the new world.
Here, then, the influence of this strong, undaunted, unflinching spirit
began to focus itself upon the young teacher of philosophy. “Resistance
to praise,” says the bitter La Rochefoucauld, “is a desire to be praised
twice.” And to so acute a student of human nature as Loyola it soon grew
evident that he was making progress. This was proved even by the modesty
of Xavier. Therefore he redoubled his energies and utilized that
marvellous power of adaptation, which was his chief legacy to his order,
in obtaining a definite result. He gained ground so fast that Michael
Navarro, a faithful servant of the young scholar, became determined to
break off this dangerous fascination, and even attempted to kill Loyola
in his private apartments. But he, too, was dealing with a brain which
never relaxed its vigilance and with a magnetic personality which felt a
danger, and moved safely, cat-like, through the dark. He was halted and
challenged by the man he came to kill, and being crushed down in
confusion was thereupon treated with magnanimity, and went away
revolving many things in his mind.
This was the power of Loyola—a power which sprang, first of all, from
his peculiar constitution, and, second, from his fanatical ambition. It
has been the key by which the Jesuit has ever since unlocked the doors
of palaces and contrived to whisper in the ears of kings. Its extent has
been that of the civilized and uncivilized world. In the matter of
organization no human fraternity has ever equalled the Society of Jesus.
The germs which we behold at Ste. Barbe in Paris have grown into a tree
whose roots have taken hold on every soil, and whose fruit has dropped
in every clime. The order has invariably employed strategy, intrigue,
ingenuity, and perfect combination to secure its ends. It is, as a
system, far from being either dead or insignificant. And its real
vitality has always sprung from its maxim that its associated members,
vowed to celibacy and to the accomplishment of its purposes, should be
_Perinde ac si cadavera_—absolutely subordinate and dead to any other
will—in the hands of the “general” who is at the head of its affairs. It
has worked, first for itself, second for the Roman Catholic Church, and
third for the proselytizing of the heathen and the heretics. It has
never neglected to procure in every manner the information it needed to
the full extent or to employ its principle that the end to be gained
justifies the means that are taken to gain it. Thus it is the legitimate
outgrowth of the soldier-courtier-fanatic mind of its founder. And this
was the mind which was now spending its splendid resources upon Xavier,
playing with him like a trout upon the hook, until it should land him, a
completely surrendered man, within its own control.
In another sphere and under other influences, Xavier might have been a
far different person. He, at least, was sincere in his devotion to the
cause. He identified Jesuitism with Christianity and Loyola with Jesus
Himself. Hence his character and labors have blinded many persons to the
methods which he used and to the results which he sought.
It must be sufficient for us that Ignatius Loyola had now gotten the
mastery of Francis Xavier so perfectly that he could be “applied to the
_Spiritual Exercises_, the furnace in which he [Loyola] was accustomed
to refine and purify his chosen vessels.” A sister of the future
missionary had become one of the Barefooted Clares, and had aided in
dissuading her father from interference. And now we behold Xavier
praying with hands and feet tightly bound by cords; or journeying with
similar cords about his arms and the calves of his legs until
inflammation and ulceration ensued. There were now nine of these
converts, but this man outdid the others in his austerities, and finally
travelled on foot with them to meet Loyola at Venice in 1537. The
society had really been formed on August 15th, 1534, at Montmartre near
Paris, and this was but its natural outward movement.
At Venice, on January 8th, 1537, they again met their leader and were
assigned for duty to the two hospitals of the city. That of the
“Incurables” fell to Xavier’s share, and we read that with the morbid
devotion characteristic of a devout student of the _Exercises_, he
determined now to conquer his natural repugnance to disease. In the
course of his duties he had an unusually hideous ulcer to dress for one
of the patients. And the authentic history relates that “encouraging
himself to the utmost, he stooped down, kissed the pestilent cancer,
licked it several times with his tongue, and finally sucked out the
virulent matter to the last drop.” (Bartoli and Maffei, p. 35.) There
could be nothing worse than that certainly. And a man who had resolutely
sounded this deepest abyss of self-abandonment was marked for the
highest honor that the new society could bestow. We cannot doubt
Xavier’s sincerity, but the gigantic horror of this performance is of a
sort to place the man who has achieved it upon an eminence apart from
less daring minds. It was Loyola’s way of facing human nature and
forcing it to concede the supreme self-devotion of his followers. The
world looks with amazement upon such actions, but when it sees them, it
yields a kind of stupefied allegiance to those who have thus rushed
beyond the bounds. And to a close analysis there is as much concealed
spiritual pride about this nastiness as there is an unnecessary shock
given to the sense of decency. Thus, as Mozoomdar says, in his _Oriental
Christ_, “Instead of abasing self, in many cases it serves the opposite
end.” It “imposes a sort of indebtedness upon Heaven” (p. 66). Yet the
poor wretch who felt those lips upon his awful wound could not but
worship the frightful hero who plunged into such nauseous contact with
his loathsomeness.
Yes, this was and is the power of it all. It was and it is the key-note
of much that is potent with the world. When Victor Hugo pictures Jean
Valjean in the toils of the Thenardiers laying that white, hot, hissing
bar of iron upon his arm and calmly standing before them while they
shrink—ogres as they are—from the stench and the sight, he merely uses
this same element. Whatever, in short, among us brings out the old
savage nature; whatever plunges outside of the conventionalities, the
proprieties, or even the common decencies of life; whatever defies the
lightning, or dares the volcano, or tramples upon the coiled serpent,
that is the thing which controls the world.
It is worthy of note that this is not a Christian but a Jesuit act. It
is born of that exaggerated sentimentalism which chooses to go beyond
Christ and His apostles in its fallacious abnegation of self. But
wherever such acts are performed they rank as the marks of saintship and
as the _stigmata_ of a crucifixion which proudly places itself on the
same Golgotha with another and nobler cross. The records, not merely of
Xavier’s life, but of the lives of the saints, swarm with these
creeping, slimy frogs of Egypt, raised up by enchanters of the human
mind to make Pharaoh believe them to be equal to a far higher
Providence. And if we say little in these pages about such strange
developments and morbid growths of piety, it need not be forgotten that
they existed, and that they have been fostered and encouraged by the
Roman Church. The Breviary, for instance, commends a roll of
self-flagellators who used the whip upon their naked backs, and Xavier
heads the list with his iron flail. Cardinal Damiani, who wrote one of
our loveliest hymns, introduced this fashion of scourging in 1056, and
the holy nun, St. Theresa, after such exercises and an additional repose
upon a bed of thorns, was “accustomed to converse with God.” [_Aliquando
inter spinas volutaret sic Deum alloqui solita._] This topic, with its
allied suggestions, is altogether out of our present scope; but in order
to see Xavier as he was, we must appreciate to what extent his spirit
was subdued before his belief.
This was the man, tested and edged and tempered, to whom was now
committed the “salvation of the Indies.” It was during the papacy of
Paul III., the same Pope who excommunicated Henry VIII. of England. And
Xavier, who had practised many austerities both in life and in behavior,
was at first sent to Bologna, while Loyola, with Faber and Laynez, went
to Rome. It was subsequently at Rome that Xavier had his famous vision,
in which he awoke crying, “Yet more, O Lord, yet more!” for he fancied
that—as the Apostle Paul once did—he had beheld his future career and
was glorying in trials and persecutions. Especially did he often have a
dream in which he seemed to be carrying an Indian on his shoulders and
toiling with him over the roughest and hardest roads. And when at last
Govea, the Rector of the College of Ste. Barbe, happened to be in Rome,
Ignatius and his companions were brought by him to the notice of John
III. of Portugal, and the king desired to have six of them for use in
India. The Pope did not show any special desire to secure their
services, and when the question came up he referred it to Ignatius to
decide it as he pleased. That sagacious general objected to taking six
from ten and leaving only four to the rest of the world, for his
ambition now extended to the orb of the earth. He accordingly chose
Rodriguez and Bobadilla for India, men who were evidently well selected,
for the first became a great propagandist in Portugal, and the other was
a decided obstacle to the Reformation in Germany. When Rodriguez,
however, fell ill with an intermittent fever Xavier naturally occurred
to Loyola as the proper substitute. He therefore commissioned him for
the service, and the worn and wasted ascetic patched up his old coat,
said farewell to his friends, and having craved the Pope’s blessing, set
off from Rome with the Portuguese Ambassador, Mascarenhas, on March
16th, 1540. He started in such poverty that Loyola took his own
waistcoat and put it upon him, and he left behind him a written paper of
consecration to the society, expressing in it his desire that Loyola
should be its head, with Faber as alternate, and in which he took the
vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience to the order under whose
auspices he was going forth.
At the Portuguese Court in Lisbon, both Xavier and his companion were
diligent in their religious work. The morals of the capital were quite
reformed, and when it came time for the ships to sail to the East the
king would only spare Xavier and detained Rodriguez, by the advice of
Loyola, further to improve the affairs at home.
Xavier now sailed as Nuncio with papal commendation and with a poverty
of outfit which had its due effect upon his companions on board the
ship. The vessel itself was one of those great galleons of Spanish or
Portuguese origin, carrying often a thousand persons, and having from
four to seven decks. They were huge, unwieldy constructions and were
generally freighted with large amounts of rich merchandise. The course
was that pursued by Vasco da Gama—around the Cape of Good Hope and into
the Indian Ocean—and the voyage often lasted beyond eight months. It is
quaintly related of travellers by these precarious sea-paths that they
used to take their shrouds and winding-sheets with them in case they
died by the way.
The company on shipboard was as bad as the provisions, which were often
execrable. The peninsular sailors never had the art either of discipline
or of storing a ship and supplying what was needful for a voyage, as the
English sea-kings had it. Hence their vessels were great floating
caravansaries of human beings, full of the scum and offscouring of
society—with lords and ladies on the quarter-deck, and robbers and
murderers, harlots and gamblers down below. The crew was as prompt as
that of Jonah’s ship to cry upon their gods whenever the wind blew. Such
inventions as the ship’s pump, the chain-cable, and the bowsprit were
not known to them. And when we see Sir Richard Grenville in the little
Revenge fighting fifteen great Dons for as many hours, or Sir John
Hawkins beating his way out of the harbor of Vera Cruz when the _Jesus_
of Lubec was lost by Spanish treachery, we see how utterly cumbrous and
awkward these galleons were when compared with English vessels.
Sickness also, in the form of fevers and scurvy, was very frequent. And
there was such laxity of discipline that a six months’ voyage generally
turned the great hulk into a hell of misery and riot. Here, therefore,
Xavier was in his element. He slept on the deck; he begged his own
bread, and the delicacies pressed upon him by the captain he divided
among the neediest of the poor sufferers; he invented games to amuse
those who were inclined toward amusement; and by degrees he commingled
his sympathy and friendly offices with the necessities of the crew and
passengers until they called him the “holy father.” He constantly
preached, taught, and labored in this manner until he finally succumbed
to an epidemic fever which broke out when they were not far from
Mozambique. Here he was landed and for a time was in hospital, at length
completing his voyage to India in a different ship from that in which he
had first embarked.
Scattered through his story, both then and afterward, we have accounts
of various miracles, of his exhibition of a spirit of prophecy, and
eventually of his raising the dead. These demand a moment’s
consideration. He is said, for instance, to have predicted the loss of
the _San Jago_, in which he sailed from Portugal and which was wrecked
after he left her. He did the same with one or two other vessels and
assured several persons of their own impending death or misfortune.
Sometimes he was observed to speak as though he were holding
conversation with unseen companions, and he was apparently conscious of
events which were afterward found to have occurred at the very time in
distant places. There is also a series of phenomena connected with the
“gift of tongues” in his case, by which this power appears to have been
intermittent, or at least dependent to a great degree upon a remarkable
intensity of scholarship and keenness of analysis combined with a
powerful memory. It is not claimed that he exercised this gift in such a
manner as “to converse in a foreign tongue the moment he landed in this
foreign country.” And then there is a further class of remarkable
experiences connected with fevers and diseases and the raising of the
dead.
Of these latter miracles it may be well to treat first. He is said to
have raised up Anthony Miranda, an Indian, who had been bitten by a
cobra; to have restored four dead persons at Travancore; to have
resuscitated a young girl in Japan and a child in Malacca, and to have
actually brought to the ship, alive and well, a lad who had fallen
overboard and been apparently lost. These incidents are related with
great gravity by the biographers and are accepted by the faithful as
being strictly true. To impugn them is as if one impugned the
Scriptures. Nevertheless there is an opening for scepticism in sundry
cases, and it may be that we shall do well to agree with the saint’s own
statement made to Doctor Diego Borba. “Ah, my Jesus!” he answered, “can
it be said that such a wretch as I have been able to raise the dead?
Surely, my dear Diego, you have not believed such folly? They brought a
young man to me whom they supposed to be dead; I commanded him to arise,
and the common people, who make a miracle of everything, gave out the
report that a dead man had been raised to life.” For the rest, we may
well believe that the same exaggeration and lack of scientific attention
to details have accompanied the various accounts, in some such manner as
appears in the little sketch of his personal characteristics which a
young Coquimban named Vaz has given to us. This enthusiastic admirer
describes his going afoot with a patched and faded garment and an old
black cloth hat. He took nothing from the rich or great unless he
applied it to the uses of the poor. He spoke languages fluently without
having learned them, and the crowds which flocked to hear him often
amounted to five or six thousand persons. He celebrated Mass in the open
air and preached from the branches of a tree when he had no other
pulpit. But of this healing of the sick and raising of the dead we are
not offered any better testimonials than the “Acts of his Canonization.”
Moreover, in a manner quite contrary to the experiences recorded in the
Gospels, these various miracles seem to be looked upon as the decisive
stroke of Christian policy. Upon their occurrence tribes and kingdoms
bow before the truth—a thing which did not happen at the tomb of
Lazarus, or before the walls of Nain, or within the house of Jairus. In
those cases the evangelists are content to tell us that the influence
was limited and confined to a very moderate area.
Yet when we come to the cures of sick people, to the singular
predictions, and to the exalted condition into which Xavier must often
have been lifted, we must allow to the man a very high degree of
mystical and mesmeric and even clairvoyant power. We are wise enough
nowadays to observe the influence of a devoted personality, as when
Florence Nightingale traverses the hospital wards at Scutari, or David
Livingstone moves through savage tribes, to his dying hour at Lake
Lincoln. And when profound Church historians will not altogether
discredit the miracles of the Nicene Age which Ambrose and Augustine
relate, it causes us to be charitable even toward the miracles of
Bernard of Clairvaux, who recorded at large his own sense of uneasiness
respecting his power of curing the sick. But it somewhat relieves the
mind when the very chapters which relate these experiences of St.
Francis Xavier, mention also that a crab came out of the sea and brought
him his lost crucifix, and that after he had lived in a certain house
two children and a woman fell out of the window at different times and
received not so much as a single bruise, though they dropped from an
immense height upon the sea-wall. The credulity which includes such
palpable absurdities must surely have exposed itself to misstatements
and exaggerations in other directions.
It is far pleasanter for us to follow Xavier from his arrival at Goa,
May 6th, 1542, to the fisheries of Cape Comorin; thence to Malacca, and
so to the Banda Islands, Amboyna, and the Moluccas in 1546; again to
Malacca in 1547; to Ceylon and back to Goa in 1548, and finally to
Japan. In 1551 he planned a visit to China, but was disappointed, and at
the moment when he was hoping to accomplish a great purpose he died on
the island of San Chan, December 22d, 1552, at the early age of
forty-six years.
Closely studying himself and his methods we find him greatly and always
devout, his breviary, however, being his Bible. He prayed much and
labored incessantly. His charity to small and great was untiring. He
would go through the streets ringing a little bell and calling people to
come to religious worship, being frequently attended by a throng of
children who seem to have loved him and been beloved by him. He had
noble and sweet and modest traits in his character. But we often notice
the reliance he places on baptism—sometimes conferring this rite until
his arm dropped from weariness. And we observe how much of the wisdom of
the serpent can be discerned in his ways with the people whom he desired
to secure.
The indefatigable exertions of Xavier are above all praise. He never
appears to have slackened in his zeal, nor does he ever show hesitation,
doubt, or uncertainty of any kind. On one occasion when roused by a
great crisis he displayed a military authority worthy of Loyola himself.
He stood once in front of an invading host of Badages and forbade them
to attack the Paravans, shouting to them, “In the name of the living God
I command you to return whence you came.” No wonder that the
semi-barbarous people were affected by this fearless and singular
presence, and spoke of Xavier as a person of gigantic stature dressed in
black and whose flashing eyes dazzled and daunted them.
But upon other occasions he was gentle and amenable to every agreeable
trait in his companions. He could even take the cards from a broken
gamester, shuffle them to give him good fortune, and send him back to
try his luck with fifty reals borrowed from another passenger. The man’s
success is thereupon made a basis for his penitence. And so with the
wicked cavalier of Meliapore, whose friendship he gained by being
unconscious of his vices until the time for exhortation arrived. In
these and similar instances we cannot fail to observe a thorough
knowledge of human nature, and a Jesuit’s keen power of using it for his
own purposes.
He was not always prospered in his enterprises. Once at least he
literally shook off the dust from his shoes against an offending tribe.
At another time he was wounded by an arrow. But, as a rule, he had a
complete moral victory in whatever he undertook. In one of his letters
he speaks of the people being maliciously disposed and ready to poison
both food and drink. But he will take no antidotes with him, and is
determined to avoid all human remedies whatsoever. It is in such superb
examples of his absolute trust in God that he presents to us the really
grand side of his character. He did not know what fear was, and as for
death, he was too familiar with daily dying to be concerned at it. His
personal faith was such as to beget faith in others, as when an
earthquake interrupted his preaching upon St. Michael’s Day, and he
announced that the archangel was then driving the devils of that unhappy
country back to the pit. This was said so earnestly as to produce a
profound conviction of its truth and to remove all alarm from his
audience.
But when we are asked to believe that the two Pereiras ever beheld him
elevated from the earth and actually transfigured, or when it is stated
that he lifted a great beam as though it had been a lath, we must be
excused for being doubtful of the statement. There is nothing more
destructive of religion than superstition, and nothing which kills faith
like credulity. Xavier, with all his false notions, was a most sincere
and even majestic figure—a hero of the faith, who shows us the power of
a thoroughly devoted spirit unencumbered by any earthly tie and
unobstructed by any earthly want. The entire self-immolation of this
career constitutes its amazing power. It is the missionary spirit
carried to its loftiest height.
Perhaps one of his most ingenious ways to secure the good-will of his
companions was by endeavoring to excite their benevolence. He would
encourage them to little acts of kindness and would repay these by
similar favors and services. Particularly he used persuasion rather than
denunciation, and personal efforts rather than general harangues. He was
“all things to all men,” going “privately to those of reputation,” as
Paul, his great model, was wont to do. He once wrote: “It is better to
do a little with peace than a great deal with turbulence and scandal.”
On April 14th, 1552, he set sail from Goa for Malacca where a pestilence
was raging. This delayed him awhile from China, and he was held back
still longer by the envious quarrellings of those who aspired to the
honor of attending him on his voyage. Xavier was reduced to the
necessity of producing the papal authority which constituted him Nuncio,
and of threatening with excommunication Don Alvaro Ataïde, the most
troublesome person. In addition to this difficulty he found himself
insulted and reviled in the open street, but accepted everything with
meekness and patience; which, however, did not prevent his finally
excommunicating Ataïde in the regular form. The vessel on which he
embarked was manned mostly by those in the pay of Ataïde, but he did not
shrink from the voyage. The voyage itself is decorated with many
legends, as might be expected. The saint is reported to have changed
salt water into fresh; to have rescued a child from death in a
miraculous manner, and to have become suddenly so much taller and larger
than those about him as to have been compelled to lower his arms when he
baptized the converts. They sailed from Chinchoo to San Chan, an island
in which the Portuguese had some trading privileges. It was here that
Xavier uttered a prediction which may serve to explain other singular
occurrences. He would seem to have possessed more than an ordinary
amount of medical skill in diagnosis, and looking earnestly upon an old
friend named Vellio, he bade him prepare for death whenever the wine he
drank _tasted bitter_. This might easily be from either of two
causes—poison, or a disorganized state of the system. And it is recorded
that the result fulfilled the prophecy. Nor is there much doubt that
Vellio’s entire faith in the prediction helped on his death.
From San Chan Xavier now proposed to cross to China. He arranged to be
smuggled thither in a small boat, but the residents of San Chan, English
as well as Portuguese, became alarmed at the consequences which they
foresaw from this desperate scheme of intrusion into the forbidden
empire. And to crown all his woes he fell sick with a fever, from which,
however, he convalesced in a fortnight. He was now more anxious than
ever to go on with his project. But all the Portuguese ships had sailed
back again except the Santa Cruz, on which he had arrived. And now he
was truly deserted and neglected. He had scarcely the bare necessaries
of life, sometimes being deprived entirely of food. The sailors were
mostly in Ataïde’s pay and inimical to his purpose. At length he became
convinced that he would himself soon die, and so would often walk in
meditation and prayer by the seashore gazing toward the prohibited
coast.
At this time the young Chinese Anthony was his only hope as an
interpreter; and he was now deprived of the services of the merchant and
his son who had agreed to row him over to Canton. They had deserted him,
and only Anthony and one more young lad remained true to the dying
missionary. On November 20th the fever again seized him after he had
celebrated Mass. He was taken to a floating hospital, but being
disturbed by its motion he begged to be landed. This was done and he was
left upon the beach in the bleak wind. A poor Portuguese named George
Alvarez then took pity on him and removed him to his own hut of boughs
and straw. Rude medical care was given him, but on December 2d, about
two o’clock in the afternoon, he had reached the limit of his life. His
latest words were, _In te, Domine, speravi—non confundar in aeternum_—O
Lord, I have trusted in Thee, I shall never be confounded, world without
end.
Thus died Francis Xavier, for ten years and seven months a missionary in
the most dangerous and deadly regions of the earth. At the date of his
death he was of full and robust figure in spite of his privations, with
eyes of a bluish-gray, and hair that had changed its dark chestnut color
somewhat through his toils and sufferings. His forehead was broad, his
nose good, and his expression pleasant and affable. His beard, like his
hair, was thick, and his temperament was nearly a pure sanguine.
They buried him first at San Chan, then removed him to Goa, where in
solemn procession they conducted his mortal body to its final rest. But
his right arm was taken off and it is to be observed that “the saint
seems not to have been pleased at the amputation of his arm,” which,
however, did not prevent the Jesuit, General Claude Acquaviva, from
insisting upon the mutilation.
Down to the present time his memory has received many honors. Churches
have been erected, prayers have been offered, and much religious worship
has been transacted in his name. But to us who are looking upon him from
another angle altogether, there are apparent in him a piety, a zeal, a
courage, and a “hot-hearted prudence” (to quote F. W. Faber’s words)
which arouse our admiration. And in the two hymns which bear his name we
are able to discover that fine attar which is the precious residuum of
many crushed and fragrant aspirations, which grew above the thorns of
sharp trial and were strewn at last upon the wind-swept beach of that
poor Pisgah island from which he truly beheld the distant Land.
O DEUS, EGO AMO TE.
O Lord, I love thee, for of old
Thy love hath reached to me.
Lo, I would lay my freedom by
And freely follow thee!
Let memory never have a thought
Thy glory cannot claim,
Nor let the mind be wise at all
Unless she seek thy name.
For nothing further do I wish
Except as thou dost will;
What things thy gift allows as mine
My gift shall give thee still.
Receive what I have had from thee
And guide me in thy way,
And govern as thou knowest best,
Who lovest me each day.
Give unto me thy love alone,
That I may love thee too,
For other things are dreams; but this
Embraceth all things true.