turned his attention to the Jesuits, and in 1764 the Jesuit priest
Malagrida was burnt alive, not as a traitor, but as a heretic and
impostor, on account of some crazy tractates he had written. The man was
regarded as a martyr, and all communication between Portugal and the
Holy See was broken off for two years, while the Portuguese minister
exerted all his influence with the Courts of France and Spain to procure
the entire suppression of the society, which he hated. The king
supported him consistently, and after another attempt upon his life in
1769, which the minister as usual attributed to the Jesuits, King Joseph
created his faithful servant Marquis of Pombal, by which title he is
best known to fame. The prime ministers of France and Spain cordially
acquiesced in the hatred of the Jesuits, for both the Duc de Choiseul
and the Count d’Aranda had something of Pombal’s spirit in them, and
imitated his policy; in both countries the society, which on its
foundation had done so much for Catholicism and Christianity, was
proscribed, and the worthy members treated with as much rigour as the
unworthy; and finally in 1773 Pope Clement XIV. solemnly abolished the
Society of Jesus. King Joseph did not long survive this triumph of his
minister, for he died on February 24, 1777, and the Marquis of Pombal,
then an old man of seventy-seven, was at once dismissed from office.
[Illustration: BULL FIGHT.
(_From “Les Royaumes d’Espagne,” &c. La Haye, 1720._)]
To analyse the internal reforms and general measures of improvement
introduced into Portugal by Pombal is almost impossible in a single
paragraph, so far-reaching were his endeavours, so unlimited his energy.
He has often been compared with Richelieu, chiefly, it seems, because of
his rigorous suppression of the Tavora plot; but the men whom he really
resembled were the benevolent despots and their ministers who abounded
in Europe before the outbreak of the French Revolution. He firmly
believed that the greatest happiness of a people depended upon the
maintenance of an absolutist monarchy, which could do more good than
representative institutions, and his struggle with the Jesuits was
mainly due to the fact that they were so wealthy and independent,
especially in Brazil, as to hamper the power of the Crown. The class of
statesmen and politicians to which he belonged included such monarchs as
Frederick the Great of Prussia, the Emperor Joseph II., Leopold, Grand
Duke of Tuscany, and Charles III. of Spain, and such great reforming
ministers as Aranda in Spain and Tannucci in Naples; and like them he
believed that real good could only be done by an absolute monarch, who
had the interests of his people at heart. The greatest evidence Pombal
gave of this royal concern for the people was in the famous decree of
May 25, 1773, by which slavery was abolished in Portugal, or rather by
which grandsons of slaves, and all children of slaves born after that
date, were declared free, and which at the same time abolished all
distinctions between “old” and “new” Christians, by which latter term
the descendants of the converted Jews and Mohammedans were still
called, and made all Portuguese subjects alike eligible for civil,
military, and ecclesiastical offices. In Brazil, however, he made no
attempt to put down slavery, believing, like all his contemporaries,
that negroes were made on purpose to be slaves; but even there he
repeated and enforced the edicts against making slaves of the natives of
the country. In matters of internal administration he advocated and
maintained efficiency and economy, and at one blow in 1761 he swept away
more than three-quarters of the petty offices which hampered the
administration of justice. The law courts were made accessible, and
lawsuits cheap; and in 1769 he robbed the Inquisition of its power by
making it an open and public court, subject to the rules which regulated
other courts. In matters of police he showed the same vigour, and by
stern repression prevented the machinery of the law from being used to
further private revenge. He recognized the importance of education, and
reorganized the University of Coimbra in 1772 by abolishing the teaching
of the dark ages which still continued there and introducing the modern
element; and though he expelled the great teaching order of the Church,
he maintained the educational establishments of the Jesuits, and turned
their college at Lisbon into a school for the training of the young
nobility. Of the reforms in the army, which he carried out with the help
of the Count of Lippe-Buckeburg mention has already been made, and he
was equally energetic with regard to the navy, over which department he
placed the most energetic of his subordinates, Martinho de Mello e
Castro. Nor was the great minister careless of more material affairs; he
showed a taste for architecture and building; under his superintendence
the part of Lisbon which had been ruined by the earthquake rose from its
ashes in redoubled beauty, adorned with fine streets, squares, and
buildings, generally designed by the famous Portuguese architect Joaquim
Machado de Castro. He did not neglect to encourage agriculture and
viniculture, which must ever be the source of livelihood of the greater
number of the Portuguese people, and he introduced the silkworm into the
northern provinces, and made special regulations for the management and
encouragement of the bold fishermen of the Beira and the Algarves. In
his attempt to introduce manufactures the Marquis of Pombal was not so
successful; the Portuguese are not a manufacturing people, and the
system of protection which he enforced only roused the opposition of
English merchants, who protested against it as a breach of the Methuen
treaty, and made manufactured articles dearer than they had been during
the first half of the century. Yet some of the native industries which
he established or protected were not unworthy of his care, and the
glass-works of Leiria, the lace of Vianna, and the potteries of Aveiro
enjoyed a great and deserved reputation. In commercial matters he showed
the result of the lessons he had learnt during his official residence in
London, for he founded the Royal Bank of Portugal in 1751, and
established the Oporto Wine Company, against which infraction of their
monopoly the English wine merchants loudly inveighed. He encouraged
trade with Brazil by granting concessions to the gold seekers and
planters of that great colony; and the importation of gold, sugar, and
tobacco brought back to Lisbon some of the prosperity of the sixteenth
century. In Asia he was clear-sighted enough to perceive that any
attempt to contend for a share of the Indian or the spice trade was
bound to be of no avail; but he was the first of Portuguese statesmen to
perceive the value of the little settlement of Macao in the Canton
river. Most of the Chinese trade, which had been yearly growing in
value, was in the hands of the factory of the English East India Company
at Canton, but the jealousy of the Chinese Government was such that the
Company had no assured position there. But Macao was a free port; most
of the factors and writers of the East India Company resided there, and
Pombal, seeing that the tea trade passed through Portuguese territory,
greatly encouraged it, and took care that it should pay due toll to the
Portuguese authorities and contribute to the wealth of the Portuguese
Crown. Nor was the great minister insensible to literature and the fine
arts. He founded the “Arcadia de Lisboa” in 1757, for the propagation of
the teachings of the school of the French encyclopædists; and it was
under his influence and protection that Diogo Barbosa Machado compiled
his “Bibliotheca Lusitana” and Damião Antonio de Lemos wrote his
“Historia de Portugal,” a work which stands midway between the naïve
annals of Bernardo de Brito and Antonio Brandão, and the modern
scientific histories of Alexandra Herculano and Rebello da Silva. Of
music he was particularly fond; he persuaded the king to build the opera
house at Lisbon, and to invite the famous singer Caffarelli, the
confidant of the King of Spain, to sing there, and to him was dedicated
the best Portuguese opera, the “Alessandre nell’ Indie” of David Peres.
Such were some of the reforms, schemes, improvements, and tastes of the
great minister; they made him the friend of his sovereign and the adored
of the people; but, on the other hand, his persecution of the Jesuits
and his rigorous treatment of the leading noblemen, whom he had often
imprisoned without trial, made him many personal enemies, and when his
patron died he knew that his own fall was at hand. King Joseph had died
without male issue, and was succeeded on the throne by his eldest
daughter, Donna Maria Francisca, who had married in 1760 her own uncle
Dom Pedro, a younger brother of King Joseph. By this arrangement it was
hoped that all disputes as to the accession would be avoided; the
husband and wife were crowned together, and coins were struck in the
joint names of Maria I. and Pedro III. Both the king and the queen were
feeble and weak-minded, and the reins of government fell into the hands
of the widow of King Joseph, Donna Marianna Victoria, a fanatical
Catholic who had always resented the influence of Pombal and opposed his
policy. By her advice the great minister was at once dismissed from
office and ordered to send in his accounts, while his enemies were
released from prison. Their names will show how powerful was the enmity
he had to expect, for among them were Dom Miguel de Annunciacão, Bishop
of Coimbra; Dom João Amberto de Noronha, Count of San Lourenço; Dom João
de Almeida Portugal, Marquis of Alorna, a former Viceroy of India, and
brother of the Marquis of Tavora; Dom Martinho de Mascarenhas, son of
the executed Duke of Aveiro; Dom José, illegitimate brother of the late
king and Grand Inquisitor of Portugal; Antonio de Andrade Freire, the
Chancellor; Dom Frederico de Sousa Holstein; and Dom João de Braganza,
Duke of Lafoẽs. These men at once surrounded the new sovereigns and
gave utterance to complaints against Pombal; the proceedings in the case
of the Tavora plot were reversed, and the prosecution of the late
minister pressed on with bitter hostility. Yet his enemies hardly dared
to condemn such a benefactor to his country to any severe penalty, and
after being driven about from pillar to post for four years, the old
man, now more than eighty years of age, was condemned to be banished
twenty leagues from Court. Had his relentless persecutor, the widow of
King Joseph, been alive, his punishment would doubtless have been more
severe, and, as it was, the queen dared not pass such a light sentence
until after her mother’s death. The old minister did not long survive
his disgrace, and died at Pombal on May 8, 1782, at the age of
eighty-three. To the credit of Pedro and Maria let it be admitted at
once that in consideration of his father’s long and eminent services the
young Marquis of Pombal was fully confirmed in all the honours and
estates which had been conferred upon the minister by King Joseph.
It need hardly be said that the fall of Pombal left many aspirants to
his high place. The three Secretaries of State, Martinho de Mello e
Castro, Thomas Xavier de Lima Brito, Viscount of Villa Nova de Cerveira,
afterwards Marquis of Ponte de Lima, and Ayres de Sá e Mello; the
Intendant of the Treasury, Pedro José de Noronha, Marquis of Angeja; and
the Intendant of Police, Diogo Ignacio de Pina Manique, had all been
trained in official work by Pombal, and were all eager to succeed their
master in power. None of them, however, were successful, for the great
nobles who had been recalled to Court were determined to have no such
supreme ruler again over them, while they were too jealous of each other
and too inexperienced in affairs to take office themselves. Matters went
on therefore at the commencement of the new reign much as they had done
under the management of Pombal; his spirit remained amongst the
ministers, and in such measures as the commercial treaty with Russia,
the lighting of Lisbon by oil lamps, and the abolition of imprisonment
for debt, the impulse he had given to all reforms is clearly to be seen.
The “Arcadia de Lisboa” was indeed allowed to disappear, but in its
place the Duke of Lafoẽs established the “Academia Real das
Sciencias” in 1779, which did even better work for literature by its
publication of the works of the early Portuguese chroniclers. In
carrying out these measures the king and queen had little share; Pedro
III. was a silly and vicious man, and Maria Francisca was a woman of
weak intellect, completely subservient to her confessor, Ignacio de San
Caetano who found her greatest happiness in raising vast sums of money
and sending them to the Latin convent at Jerusalem. The only important
event in which they took a part was their conference with the Court of
Spain at Badajoz in 1785, when an arrangement was come to about the
disputed frontier in South America; and when Dom John, the second son of
Pedro and Maria, was betrothed to Donna Carlotta Joaquina,
grand-daughter of Charles III. of Spain. In the following year Pedro
III. died, and his death, followed as it speedily was by those of her
confessor and of her elder son, Dom José, who had married his aunt,
Donna Maria Benedictina, completely upset the small amount of intellect
possessed by Maria Francisca. It was observed in 1788 that she was quite
unfit to transact any business; and in 1792, when the progress of the
French Revolution was setting all Europe in a blaze, Dom John found it
necessary to take the management of affairs into his hands, though he
was not declared regent until 1799.
To turn from the history of Portugal in the eighteenth century to the
history of the Portuguese possessions in India is a melancholy task; for
these possessions instead of being a source of pride were a source of
expense and anxiety to the home government, and they were maintained
rather from a recollection of ancient greatness and as a base for
mission work than for any actual advantage derived from them. In 1739
Bassein, the “Capital of the North” as it was called, a city which had
been second only to Goa in commercial and political importance, was
captured by Chimnājī Apā, a Marātha general, after a three
months’ siege, and with it fell Thana and all the possessions of the
Portuguese on the north-west coast except Daman and Diu. In 1741 the
Marāthas and the Bhonslās of Sawantwārī over-ran the country
round Goa and threatened the city, but in the moment of difficulty, the
Marquis of Louriçal arrived with twelve thousand men, and first defeated
the Marāthas at Bardez, and then made Khem Sawant, the ruler of
Sawantwārī, tributary. His successes were followed by those of the
Marquis of Castello Novo, who captured Alorna, Tiracol, Neutim, Rarim,
and Satari; and the Marquis of Tavora, who took Sadashivgarh.
But the Portuguese Government had no desire to make fresh conquests
which it would need fresh supplies of money from home to defend, and the
Count of Ega was ordered to surrender most of the conquered towns to
their former owners. Meanwhile commerce had entirely deserted the
Portuguese possessions, which were given over to the Church; and Captain
Hamilton in his travels, after speaking of the poverty of the Portuguese
inhabitants, says that he counted no fewer than eighty churches and
convents in Goa, and that there were no less than thirty thousand
priests in the city and territory. Revenue there was none, and the two
thousand European soldiers who defended the ancient capital of
Alboquerque had to be paid out of the Portuguese treasury. The last blow
was given to what little commerce still remained by Pombal’s suppression
of the Jesuits, and in 1759 “Golden Goa,” which had become unhealthy and
ruinous, was left to priests and monks, and the seat of government was
removed to Panjim. Pombal, with his practical insight, saw that nothing
was to be made out of the Portuguese possessions in India, and spent all
his efforts in Asia in promoting the prosperity of Macao; and in 1794,
when Portugal was in difficulties in Europe, the Viceroy of Goa asked
for the protection of English troops, and Goa was garrisoned by the
English East India Company throughout the continuance of the great war
with France.
Very different was the history of Brazil during this century: while
India was a source of expense, Brazil was the great source of wealth to
the Portuguese treasury, and was to be the refuge of the royal family
when it became impossible for it to remain longer in Lisbon. Throughout
the century there was a steady influx of immigrants to Brazil from
Portugal, and the population of the great colony rapidly increased in
numbers. Most of these immigrants settled down as sugar or tobacco
planters, and the labour upon the plantations was completely in the
hands of the negro slaves, who were imported in vast numbers. The trade
in slaves was kept entirely in the hands of Portuguese merchants, in
spite of the efforts of the English slavers, and was not only looked
upon as a lucrative calling, but as the chief employment for the
Portuguese sailors. It was this trade alone which made it worth while
for the Portuguese Government to keep up its establishments on the coast
of Guinea, and Pombal encouraged it as the only means of supplying
Brazil with labourers. The slaves in Brazil were not treated unkindly;
their masters were bound to feed them; and were not only allowed, but
were obliged to sell them their liberty, on the offer of a certain fixed
sum of money. These freed slaves and the mulattoes, who were very
numerous, often accumulated considerable wealth, and were treated as
citizens in every respect, except that they could not hold any civil or
municipal office. They were even enrolled as soldiers, but the mulatto
regiments were kept distinct from the European, and officered from among
the wealthy members of their own class. The native Brazilians were
treated even more favourably, and by the great decree of 1755 they were
not only forbidden to sell themselves as slaves, but were made citizens
in every respect, and allowed to receive their education at the
University of Coimbra. The importance of the discovery of gold in the
interior has been mentioned, and the revenue to the Portuguese Crown
from the king’s fifth, in spite of much fraud, was estimated at £300,000
a year. The opening up of the interior led, about the year 1750, to the
conquest of the Paulist Republic. This curious little state had been
formed round the city of St. Paul about the commencement of the
eighteenth century by fugitives from Brazil and from the more oppressive
Spanish Governments of Chile and Peru. The town was originally founded
far up in the heart of the virgin forests beyond the jurisdiction of the
Portuguese and Spanish officials, where the inhabitants led a wild,
romantic life, tempered only by lynch law. But by degrees the march of
civilization brought them in contact with the Portuguese Government, and
the discovery of diamonds in the vicinity led to the suppression of the
little republic. This discovery of diamonds further increased the wealth
of the Portuguese Crown, and in addition to the royal right to every
diamond above twenty carats weight, the king was estimated to make an
income of £100,000 a year by a contract entered into with a syndicate of
English diamond buyers. Nor were other precious stones lacking, for
rubies, emeralds, and topazes were all discovered in such large
quantities in the latter half of the eighteenth century as to seriously
lower their price. The great colony was ruled most wisely; only a few of
the superior officers were sent from Portugal, and most offices were
filled from among the settlers themselves. It was not even found
necessary to send troops from Portugal, for a regular army of sixteen
thousand men, and a militia of over twenty thousand were easily raised
and paid in the country itself. The only troubles which beset the colony
were caused by the indefiniteness of its boundaries, and Portugal found
it necessary to yield much territory, which has since developed into
wealthy and prosperous republics to the encroachments of Spain. Its
importance was recognized by the title of Prince of Brazil granted to
the eldest son of the King of Portugal since the days of John IV., and
it became a safe refuge for the exiled royal family when events in
Europe made it necessary for it to fly from Lisbon.
In literature the Portuguese writers of the eighteenth century followed
and imitated the French authors of the reigns of Louis XIV. and Louis
XV. instead of striving to develop the characteristics of their own
nation. The “Academia Real de Lisboa,” the “Academia Real de Portugal,”
the “Arcadia de Lisboa,” and the “Academia Real das Sciencias,” which
succeeded each other at short intervals, were all attempts to imitate
the French Academy and its offshoots, and though they did good work in
encouraging research and rewarding literary endeavour, they failed, as
such institutions generally do fail, to produce great writers and
thinkers. At the beginning of the eighteenth century, before the
academies exercised their influence, the only literary productions in
Portugal were lyric poems of no great merit, which were much admired by
the members of numerous little literary clubs resembling the Italian
arcadias, and which were chiefly imitations of the forms of verse most
in vogue in France and Italy. But during the rule of Pombal a more
healthy spirit appeared; the works of the French encyclopædists and
their contemporaries were studied instead of tricks of versification,
and a new departure was made alike in poetry and prose. The new poets
did not confine themselves to lyrics; they attempted epics, dramas, and
eclogues, all more or less based upon an imitation of the French, but
yet possessing a more truly national ring than the lyrics of their
predecessors. All these poets were not lovers of Pombal; the great
minister was too heedless of hurting their susceptibilities and too
sparing of his pensions for that; and the best known among them, Antonio
Diniz da Cruz e Silva, who was termed the Portuguese Boileau, vehemently
attacked the great man after his fall. The influence exerted by this
poet on the progress of Portuguese literature was, however, slight
compared to that of his successors, Francisco Manoel de Nascimento and
Manoel Maria Barbosa du Bocage, whose followers under the names of the
“Filintists” and “Elmanists” preached freedom from the rigour of the
French canons of criticism, and adherence to national forms. Epic poetry
was not neglected, though none of its writers can compare with the great
Camoens, whose “Lusiads” were several times reprinted with notes during
this century. The fame of the great Portuguese epic was indeed spread
abroad throughout Europe; it was translated into French by Duperron de
Castera and by the French critic La Harpe; into Dutch by L. S.
Pieterzoon; and into English by Mickle who, as a translator of their
master-poet, was cordially received at the Portuguese Court in 1780. Nor
was the drama forgotten; the Portuguese stage was held by tragedies
after the French classical model, the subjects of which were generally
borrowed from the annals of the country, of which the titles of the
three tragedies of Du Bocage, “Viriato,” “Affonso Henriques,” and “Vasco
da Gama,” may be cited as a proof. In prose, the most valuable work was
done in history, and the editions of the old Portuguese chroniclers, Ruy
de Pina, Azurara, Fernão Lopes, and Acenheiro, edited for the “Academia
Real das Sciencias,” by José Correa de Serra still remain the standard
editions. Nor was science neglected in the country of Pedro Nunes;
Bartholomeu de Gusmão is asserted to have discovered ballooning in
1709, years before the Montgolfiers commenced their experiments; and
the botanists Felix de Avellar Brotero and Antonio Correa da Silva, to
mention but one department of scientific activity, were well known
throughout Europe, and were members of most of the scientific societies
of the time. In the arts mention has already been made of David Peres,
the musical composer, and of Joaquim Machado de Castro, the architect;
the latter was in addition the best sculptor of his country, and
Domingos Antonio de Sequeira, as a painter, will compare favourably with
most of the contemporary artists in Europe.