popes may have been in former remote periods, they had a very difficult
part to sustain in later times, and that they were often obliged to court
the catholic monarchs, and to yield, that they might not be forced[38].
This was peculiarly the case with Clement XIV, whose philosophical name,
Ganganelli, sir John significantly shoots at us through the rifle of
_Italics_, and it was his {98} avowed policy, even before his elevation to
the pontificate, that the Jesuits were to be sacrificed, in spite of their
innocence, in spite of their religious and moral virtues, in spite of his
own attachment and approbation, to the necessity of preserving the favour
of the monarchs of Europe. "Portugal," says he, "will never give up her
opinion, in which I see other kingdoms that will confirm and support her.
Kings no longer live unconnected with one another, as formerly; they form
friendships, and act in concert; so that, if we are unfortunate enough to
offend one, we may offend all; and, instead of having one enemy to deal
with, we have all Europe upon us[39]."--"Little minds imagine, that one
must be displeased with a certain religious society, if one does not
support them in defiance of kings. But, besides that resisting the
potentates would only multiply storms for them, one would not, through
partiality to them, embroil oneself with all the catholic princes[40]."
This is pretty plain {99} language, but what follows is in more direct
terms, and, I think, is a decisive proof of the motives, which influenced
the writer in the suppression of the Jesuits, when the tiara was placed
upon his head: "Now it is, that we must make use of that wisdom of the
serpent which Jesus Christ recommends to his apostles. It is no doubt
grievous, that a religious brotherhood intended for colleges, seminaries,
and missions, and who have written much on the truths of religion, should
be deserted at a time when incredulity has broken loose with fury against
the religious orders; but the question to be decided before God is, whether
it is better to contend with the sovereigns than to give up a religious
society. For my part, I think, on seeing the storm that gathers howling
from all quarters, and which we perceive already over our heads, that it is
right for us to act ourselves without waiting, and to sacrifice what is
most agreeable rather than incur the anger of the sovereigns, which we
cannot too much dread. Let our holy father, {100} and his secretary of
state, love the Jesuits sincerely, I subscribe with all my heart to the
attachment they have for the society; but I shall always say,
notwithstanding my veneration for St. Ignatius, and the esteem in which his
disciples are held, that it is very dangerous, nay, very rash, to, support
the Jesuits in the present circumstances[41]." These sentiments of cardinal
Ganganelli would not serve well for a pendant to the brief of Clement XIV,
yet, for the sake of truth and justice, they should be always printed
together, and go down side by side to posterity. Where now is "the
formidable array of pontiffs," which show that Ganganelli "is not the
solitary impugner," among popes, of the order of Jesuits? Ganganelli tells
you, that they were tossed on a stormy sea, where they were obliged to
manage their sails dexterously, that they might not sink themselves; and,
in the very rescript which sir John has hung by the side of Pius VII's bull
{101} in his appendix, he declares, that it blew so hard from the four
quarters, France, Spain, Portugal and Sicily (see page 24), that he was
under the necessity of throwing the Jesuits overboard: "Our dear sons in
Jesus Christ," says he, "having made known their _demands_ and _wills_ in
this matter."
Clement XIV vainly flattered himself, that, by making ample concessions to
the importunity of the combined ministers, by persecuting the Jesuits in
detail, contrary to his own conviction, he should, in the end, escape the
necessity of crushing them altogether. It was the policy of Pontius Pilate.
His whole reign was one series of vexatious treatment; even outrages
against them. From the first day of his pontificate they were the only
Christians excluded from access to the common father. His condescension
only betrayed his weakness, and enhardened the ministerial conspirators.
When, at length, he found it impossible to resist them, without incurring
the loss of his states, "he gave sentence, {102} that it should be as they
required[42]." He resorted to the principle of the high priest, in St.
John, chap. ii, verse 50, the expediency of which is so clearly announced
in his Letters[43]. But here three things sorely distressed him: the
incongruity and injustice of condemning the Jesuits without a trial, which
he knew the ministers would not permit; the approbation of their institute
by the council of Trent; and the concurring approbation of the order by
nearly twenty popes, especially the very recent constitution, or bull, of
his immediate predecessor, Clement XIII, solemnly published, and received
by the whole church. The applicants for the destruction of the order
undertook to remove his scruples.
I am obliged to sir John for drawing my attention to Ganganelli's brief,
which I might otherwise have passed over without much {103} scrutiny. He is
of opinion, that it should accompany the bull of the reigning pontiff; but
some connoisseurs may think, that it will show to more advantage exhibited
between the just mentioned bull _apostolicum_ of Clement XIII and that of
Pius VII: it would thus have a pendant on each side, eliciting, by a double
contrast, all the effects of art. The bull apostolicum formed a principal
objection to the grand plan of destruction, not easy to be evaded. It was
so recent, so public, so solemn, so decisive. It was a distinct and
specific approbation and confirmation of the society of Jesus; it repeated
the sentiments of all popes from Paul III; it was solicited by hundreds of
bishops; it was formally communicated to the college of cardinals, and was
applauded by them all; it was accepted by every catholic bishop; it had
every character of a formal judgment of the whole catholic church. Clement
XIV and his advisers dared not to contradict it by another bull; it would
have been a great scandal. The cardinals could not have concurred in it.
The inferior, {104} and less authoritative, mode of _brief_, or private
letter, or rescript, in which it was not usual to consult the cardinals,
was adopted. In this, the difficulty presented by the apostolicum of
Clement XIII is overleaped in a short and peremptory way, by an absurd
declaration of its having been _extorted rather than granted_, without any
proof, and in defiance of the number of circumstances which demonstrate the
contrary. As sir John appears to be unacquainted with this famous
constitution of Clement XIII, published in the beginning of 1765, and as it
is perhaps the best written official document which Rome has, for many
years, sent forth, it shall be inserted in the Appendix in its original
language[44].
The more I consider Ganganelli's rescript, the more am I surprised at the
pitiful attempts made to lay down something like an apology for injustice,
and the more am I disgusted with its want of principle. It opens with a
long narration {105} of the suppression of various small religious
associations by ancient popes, but it leaves us quite in the dark as to the
justice or injustice of those several suppressions. It informs us, that
several complaints had been made, at several times, to several popes, of
the Jesuits; but it omits to tell us, that those complaints had always been
either rejected, or refuted, or disregarded, by those several popes, whose
public acts attest that they were, one and all, friends and supporters of
the society[45]. The brief then recites the _jus_, or leading maxim, on
which the whole procedure hinges, and which, in spite of {106} the Roman
canon, recorded in the Acts of the Apostles, solves the pope's first
difficulty, or scruple, of punishing without trial: it is this; that _the
slow and fallible method of proceeding before courts of justice must be
avoided_; that _reliance must be placed_ WHOLLY _on that plenitude of
power, which popes possess in so eminent a degree, as vicars of Christ upon
earth, and as sovereign moderators of the Christian republic_; and that
_regular orders, which they propose to suppress_, ought not to be allowed
_the faculty of producing any arguments in their defence, or of clearing
themselves from the heavy accusations brought against them_. These are the
words of the brief, as given by sir John in the translation of it in the
Appendix to his Speech; in other words, _the accused may be punished
without being heard_. This requires no comment; every British heart will
suggest a just one.
Let us now see how Ganganelli gets over the difficulty arising from the
approbation of the council of Trent. To the eternal disgrace of {107} this
brief, then, we find the operative or suppressing clause made to depend
upon a paltry sophism. Stating the _demands_ and _wishes_ of his dear sons,
the kings and ministers, with the addition of pressing solicitations from
some bishops and other persons, Clement, for a salvo to his conscience,
declares (page 25), "that to choose the wisest course, in an affair of so
much importance, he determined not to be precipitate, but to take due time
to _examine attentively_, _weigh carefully_, and _wisely debate_ upon it."
What was done? "_First of all_," continues the brief, "we proposed to
examine upon what grounds rested the common opinion, that the institute of
the clerks of the company of Jesus had been approved and confirmed in a
special manner by the council of Trent! And we found, that, in the said
council, nothing more was done, with regard to the said society, than to
except it from the general decree respecting other orders. The same council
declared, that _it meant not to make any change or innovation in the
government of the clerks of the company of Jesus, that_ {108} _they might
not be hindered from being useful to God and his church, according to the
intent of the pious institute approved by the holy see_." If the lines in
italics are not an especial approval and confirmation of the institute,
then must I confess, that I know not the meaning of the words _approval_
and _confirmation_. To my understanding they convey a most decided
approbation and confirmation of the institute. Well, what succeeds the
_imprimis_? What does the pontiff next examine, weigh, and debate
attentively, carefully, and wisely? The reader will look in vain for the
second head of wise deliberation; the actuating assertion immediately
follows: "actuated by _so many_ and important considerations," &c. &c., and
_impelled by fear_, for that is the import of the following sentences, "WE
DO SUPPRESS AND ABOLISH THE SAID COMPANY." The only possible apology, that
can be made for Clement, in this rescript, is, that he acted, as lawyers
term it, under duress. After his own avowal, while a cardinal, can any man
doubt, that he {109} imagined that the intrigues going on in France, Spain,
Portugal, and Sicily, against the Jesuits, would prove fatal to the power
of Rome, if the society were protected? The whole of the preamble of his
rescript consists of the approbation of his predecessors, and the appeals
of the intriguers of the nations around him against the Jesuits. At last,
the _Inquisition_[46] of Spain (see page 20), press so strongly, that
Sixtus V determines to examine the matter; but he is saved the misfortune
by death, and his successor, Gregory XIV, approves of the institution of
the society in its utmost extent, confirms their privileges, and ordains
that, under pain of excommunication, all proceedings against the society
should be quashed (page 21). In short, neither in the multifarious
preamble, nor in the short actuating clause, does Clement XIV once advance
an opinion of his {110} own adverse to the society; but throughout lends
himself to the representations of foreign cabals, to which he at last
confessedly sacrifices them.
All, then, that this rescript proves is, that powerful parties prevailed,
in certain states, against the Jesuits, and that Clement XIV,
notwithstanding the _approval_ and _confirmation_ of the council of Trent,
evinced by their declaration, as above cited; notwithstanding the approval
and confirmation of successive popes; notwithstanding his own approval and
regret (all clearly inserted in this rescript); found himself compelled, by
the pressure of unjust and arbitrary power, to withhold his confirmation,
to suppress and abolish a society, to whom he knew it was doubtful, whether
religion and piety or science and letters were more indebted.
Such is the analysis of the luminous brief of destruction, so triumphantly
referred to by sir John Hippisley; such the sanction of peace {111} and
amity with the philosophical ministers, Pombal, Choiseul, Aranda, &c. The
pontifical domain was to be saved; the portions of it already seized,
Avignon, Benevento, Ponte-Corvo, &c., to be restored; the turbulent Jesuits
extinct, harmony and concord were to bless the earth! How were these
glorious prospects realized? Every succeeding year involved the Roman see
in fresh troubles: new invasions of its spiritual and temporal rights
continued to distress the succeeding pontiff, Pius VI, and, at last,
conducted him to death in a dungeon, although, to save his domain from the
grasp of violence, he had consented, that Ganganelli's brief should subsist
unaltered.
It is now evident, that the suppression of the Jesuits was the result of
the conspiracy formed against them; in Spain and Sicily by the Inquisition,
in Portugal by Pombal, and in France by the Jansenists, the parliaments,
and philosophers: how just and wise we have seen; let us now inquire whence
results their restoration {112} by Pius VII. "The catholic world demands,
with unanimous voice, the re-establishment of the society of Jesus. We
daily receive, to this effect, the most pressing petitions, from our
venerable brethren, the archbishops and bishops[47], and the most
distinguished persons, especially since the abundant fruits, which this
society has produced in the above countries (Russia and Sicily), have been
generally known." There is a striking contrast between the simplicity and
direct language of this bull, and the artful and complicated expositions
with which Ganganelli labours in his brief to lull his own conscience, and
to justify, in the sight of others, the act he thought to be necessary. And
why is the re-establishment of the society demanded? From a hope, that they
may counteract the evils, which the neglect of religious education has
suffered to spread over the world, and from a {113} conviction that they
were put down by the disciples of a false philosophy combining with the
vilest of passions. In regard to protestant countries, their principles of
loyalty are conclusive in their favour; and, in spite of the popish plots,
it has been proved, that their religious doctrines never led them, as a
body, to interfere in political affairs. These motives for their
re-establishment, and my last observation, naturally remind me, that it is
time to state the authorities, so highly honourable to the society, which I
have been induced to examine and collect; there are, however, two other
circumstances mentioned by sir John Hippisley, which I cannot pass over
without notice. He objects to students for the priesthood among the Jesuits
being sent abroad, to Sicily, to obtain ordination, instead of receiving it
at the hands of their own national prelates. It appears, by this, that sir
John is not aware that, in an order, it is requisite to obtain ordination
through a superior of the order. {114}
In all religious orders, candidates for priesthood must be presented by
their proper religious superior to some bishop. The prelate may examine the
candidate; and, if he has no canonical objection, he promotes him to orders
on the title of religious poverty; the superior, or the order, remaining
answerable for his maintenance. But no priest of the regulars can assume
any exercise of ministerial functions, in preaching, or administering
sacraments, without licence of the diocesan prelate, who may examine,
suspend, and correct him, incurring thus a certain responsibility. Of this
subjection of regulars to the established prelates, surely, sir John must
have been aware; why, then, endeavour to alarm us with the prospect of
Jesuits colonizing in the south of Italy, for the purpose of overspreading
these islands? I have reason, upon recent inquiry, to suspect, that sir
John has been misled by his Sicilian informer, as to the voyagers for the
priesthood; and the supposed system of seeking {115} furtive ordinations
beyond the seas will vanish before a plain relation of a few trifling
facts. In 1806 an ecclesiastical student, _on account of his health_,
embarked for Naples in a neutral ship, which touched at Palermo, where he
remained, having learned that Buonaparte had seized on Naples: he was
joined, the next year, by another student, who went abroad from the same
motive, that of health. To be of use to their catholic countrymen, whose
number was daily increasing, by the arrival of new regiments, they entered
into holy orders, though, it appears, they were not allowed to officiate as
priests among them. These recovered their health, and returned home. In the
course of the three ensuing years, one priest, and ten students, who were
impressed with a strong desire to study in a catholic university, went
also, at different times, to Palermo, where they experienced a similar
disappointment in their zeal. Two of the students left Sicily before they
were ordained, and one died before ordination, leaving nine, the whole
number {116} ordained. The priest also died abroad. So that, instead of
nineteen, there were altogether only nine, who obtained orders: one of
these is the distinguished president of the new seminary of education in
Ireland. For the last six years, not one catholic student has had a thought
of following their example. Such trifling occasional emigrations of a few
students will neither alarm nor surprise those who know, that, for more
than two centuries, the penal laws have driven all English and Irish
catholics, who were not content to live in ignorance at home, to seek
education abroad; that this had become an invariable custom; and that every
year scores of British subjects went abroad.
Sir John also objects to the Jesuits' appropriating any pecuniary resource,
arising from the wreck of their society, to the uses of a seminary of
education; he thinks it opposite to the principle, which gave birth to the
institution of Maynooth; and is for seizing, and {117} bestowing on
Maynooth, thirty thousand pounds of their money, which they are said to
have generously transmitted to Ireland, for the establishment of a place of
education (page 39 of the printed Speech). How would this agree with that
spirit of humanity, benevolence, and hospitality, to say nothing at present
of justice, which prompted the genius of Britain to give an asylum to these
persecuted servants of God, against the relentless fury of jacobins and
philosophers? Besides, the institution of Maynooth, and the establishment
intended differ widely: the college of Maynooth is particularly designed
for clerical education; that to which the thirty thousand pounds is to be
devoted is to be a seminary for general learning; an establishment, which
must be attended with most salutary consequences to Ireland, where it will
prevent emigration of the catholic youth, and where, with religion and
knowledge, it will undoubtedly confirm and spread the spirit of _loyalty_.
It would be, I was going to say, madness; it would surely be unwise, to
check, {118} on old worn-out prejudices, the happy growth of a spirit,
which has, in that country, met much to struggle with, and only wants to be
enlightened to show itself as firm and ardent as in any part of the empire.
After all, I have good grounds to know, that sir John is misinformed
respecting the source of the gift of thirty thousand pounds to the new
seminary: _no money has been recently transmitted from the society here to
Ireland_. The sum, on which the new house of education is rising, _was not
secured by the Jesuits from the wreck of the society_: it is, strictly, the
_private property_ of a free Briton. This, I am informed, on good
authority, is the fact; but, supposing it had been saved by the Jesuits
from the ruin of their continental establishments, from which they were so
cruelly turned adrift, and plundered by despots, because they were
Englishmen; nay, supposing every guinea of it had been coined at the mint
of _king Nicolas of Paraguay_, could this authorize sir John to assume the
despotic {119} principle of a foreign minister, a Pombal, a Choiseul, and
to decide at once, _de son chef_, in the land of liberty, that his
unoffending fellow subjects, who, under the safeguard of the laws, are
prosecuting an honourable profession, shall again be stripped and subjected
to arbitrary confiscation? If the Ganganellian maxim, that "the accused may
be plundered without being heard," be tolerated at Rome, in the "_plenitude
of power_, which the pope possesses, as moderator of the Christian
republic," it is far otherwise in this happy land, where men, no longer
persecuted for their religious opinions, maintaining their _sworn_
allegiance to their king, are sure for their persons and property to find
safety in the laws, and protection from the sovereign.
I have spoken of sir John Hippisley's opinions freely; I trust I have not
done it coarsely. I was greatly surprised to find him taking the part he
does. Of Clement XIV I feel inclined to speak more harshly than I have. I
remember being pleased with his Letters when I was a {120} boy, upon the
same principle that I was pleased with the meeting of the _Etats Generaux_,
in 1789, at Versailles, where I was a spectator: a philosophical pope, and
a philosophical senate, were mental _bon bons_, adapted to the puerile
taste of my understanding; but, grown old, I have no relish for either.
Ganganelli degraded the tiara, and helped to prepare the French revolution.
I now return to our authorities. I have anticipated several great names
incidentally, while engaged in canvassing those cited against the Jesuits;
to these I have now to add the empress Catherine of Russia; of many popes,
Clement XIII in particular, and the very destroyer of the society, Clement
XIV; M. D'Eguilles, president of the parliament of Thoulouse; the abbe
Proyart, author of a work entitled, _Louis XVI dethrone avant d'etre Roi_;
Montesquieu, Haller, Muratori, Buffon, Grotius, Leibnitz, Bacon, Frederick
the Great, Johnson, Bausset, Richelieu, Raynal, Juan, and Ulloa; with a
multitude {121} of historians and biographers, to say nothing of the Jesuit
writers themselves. But the most striking testimony in favour of the
society, is a formal judgment given by the bishops of France on certain
articles proposed for their examination, by Louis XV, relative to the
doctrine, the government, the conduct, and usefulness of the French
Jesuits. How any man can withstand such an array of testimony, I am at a
loss to conceive; and still more how he can venture, at this time of day,
to arm himself with the calumnies and horrors of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, to attack a body of men, and a code of regulations,
nowise accountable for the errors and crimes of individuals, at periods
when men, in general, were as inveterate on the score of religious
doctrines, as they have lately been on that of liberty and equality; when
the Catholic and the Hugonot were alike ferocious and cruel, in the
maintenance of their respective systems, though they scarcely equalled the
fury and the horrors demonstrated by the deists, atheists, and democratical
despots, who {122} preceded the settled tyranny, which has been just
overthrown by the united force of Europe. The Jesuits were, indeed, the
great preachers of the Christian religion, such as it had been received for
ages; but they are no more answerable for the opinions on regicide, murder,
and other horrid doctrines of former distracted times, than are the
Washingtons and Franklins for the atrocities of the Robespierres and Marats
in our own days of political insanity.
It will perhaps be thought necessary, that I should give something more
than the illustrious names I have cited; I shall therefore proceed to
prove, that I have not pressed them into the cause of the Jesuits, but
enrolled them on their voluntary appearance. I shall omit those, whom I
have already incidentally quoted, and arrange the others in the order in
which I have mentioned them. {123}
CATHERINE II, OF RUSSIA.
Catherine, when at Mohiloff, found, that the people of that part of her
dominions professed the catholic religion, and that they were very much
attached to the order of Jesuits. She appointed a catholic archbishop of
Mohiloff, and gave him a Jesuit as a coadjutor. She permitted, at the same
time, the establishment of a seminary of Jesuits, the direction of which
was confided to father Gabriel Denkiewitz, appointed vicar-general of his
order. In the year 1783, she sent the archbishop of Mohiloff's coadjutor,
whose name was Benelawski, to Rome, as minister from the court of Russia,
who carried a letter from her to Pius VI, demanding the re-establishment of
the society of Jesuits, which, though at the time disavowed at Petersburgh,
through deference to the Greek Christians, was actually written with her
own hand. The following passages are extracted from the letter: "I know,
that your holiness is under considerable {124} embarrassments. Your dignity
cannot harmonize with politics, so long as politics are at variance with
religion. The motives, which have induced me to grant protection to the
Jesuits, are founded in reason and justice, as well as on the hope of their
becoming useful to my states. This assemblage of peaceable and inoffensive
men shall live in my empire, because, of all catholic societies, they are
the best qualified to instruct my subjects, and to inspire them with
sentiments of humanity and the genuine principles of the Christian
religion. I am resolved to support these priests against every power
whatever; and, in so doing, I only perform my duty, as I am their
sovereign, and look upon them as faithful, useful, and innocent subjects. I
am so much the more desirous of seeing four of them invested with the power
of confirming at Moscow and Petersburgh, as the two catholic churches of
those cities are confided to their care[48]." The pope made the
circumstance {125} known to the French and Spanish ambassadors, who
consulted their respective courts, neither of which, however, chose openly
to interfere. It was an embarrassing situation for Pius VI; the suppression
of the order was too recent; he wished neither to treat the memory of
Clement XIV with disrespect, nor to embroil himself with France or Spain;
and, in complying with the request of Catherine, he acted with
circumspection and without parade. In considering this event, an obvious
remark presents itself: for upwards of thirty years past, the society of
the Jesuits have been established in Russia, yet we hear nothing of that
empire being disturbed either with religious or civil broils, fomented by
them; though I should not be surprised, if, on reflection, the death of
Paul were to be imputed, by the modern conspirators, to their machinations.
On the contrary, the internal tranquillity of that country was never more
apparent, and the improvement of the mind has made rapid strides. The
placing of the Jesuits in her dominions is a proof of the {126} sagacity of
Catherine, and I doubt whether Russia was ever more indebted to any
sovereign than for this step, which was at once magnanimous, wise, and
popular.
CLEMENT XIII.
I should not have thought of enrolling a pope among the authorities in
favour of the Jesuits, it being natural to suppose, that every pope was a
friend to the society, had I not found a list of them arrayed against them
by sir John Hippisley, on the authority of Ganganelli's rescript. Now, that
the sovereign pontiffs interfered in the proceedings and writings of the
members of the society; that they blamed them for the dissentions in which
their zeal involved them with their enemies in all parts of the world; and
that they have condemned some of the fanatical (for this is a term as
appropriate to catholic as puritan zealots), I say some of the fanatical
maxims formerly preached by individuals is not denied, and has {127} been
already noticed in these pages; and this is all that can be gathered from
the rescript; but that this renders the popes _impugners_ of the order is
far from being the fact, and for this reason it is I have been induced to
cite this pontiff, as well as his successor, in the catalogue of
authorities. By the word _impugner_, I presume, that sir John means
_assailant_; now, that the disapproval of some casuists, and the blaming of
untimely or misplaced zeal of some of the society was no assailing of the
order, the following words of Clement XIII, addressed to the archbishops
and bishops of France, will, I think, sufficiently prove: "But the thing,
which gives the deepest wound to the public weal, and to the faithful,
which is the greatest insult to the apostolic see and to you, is the
persecution they have raised against the society of Jesus, which has ever
supplied the church with many able champions, and now, by the credit of a
prevailing faction, is oppressed and dissipated. Its institute, that
institute, which the Roman catholic church, {128} assembled in the council
of Trent, approved of; that institute upon which our predecessors have
bestowed so many solemn encomiums; which has hitherto found protection and
received the most signal marks of favour from the kings of France; that
institute, which you yourselves, not so much out of gratitude as from a
principle of equity, have celebrated and publicly declared, that it was of
very singular service to you in your respective dioceses, is now loaded
with antiquated and groundless calumnies, is treated as a pest, which had
crept into the church, and is publicly burned with all the marks of
infamy[49]."
GANGANELLI.
Enough has been said of Clement XIV, in the foregoing pages, to entitle me
to place him among the authorities in favour of the Jesuits, {129} though
the solemn act, by which he extirpated the order, may be said to involve
him among their assailants. The motives and grounds of that act are clear,
and his private opinion of the order is no less manifest. Men, who approve
of this act of Clement, are not aware that they are approving of a corrupt
maxim, with which the enemies of the Jesuits calumniate the society.
Besides, the destruction of the order was a certain evil, and the good to
arise from it, the security and inviolability of the holy see, was far from
being a certain consequence; the contrary has been proved by subsequent
events. The growth of one generation sufficed to strip the tiara of the
veneration due to it, and to threaten every crown in Europe with ruin.
Philosophical universities and academies were every where, on the
continent, substituted for the colleges of the Jesuits; religion and reason
no longer went hand in hand in education; the latter, with all her spurious
offspring, was held up as the grand object and distinguishing character of
man; the former was neglected, {130} or ridiculed, and soon lost even its
name in that of superstition. In 1773, Clement XIV abolished the order: in
1793, a king of France was beheaded; Reason was deified, and altars erected
to her in various countries; anarchy followed impiety; demons were chosen
to rule, or rather to confound all order. A successor of Ganganelli was
torn from Rome, to die in captivity; and others have, since, been degraded
into tools of the most absolute and heathenish tyranny that ever existed on
the earth. It is very evident, therefore, that the preservation of the
power of Rome did not depend upon the destruction of the order of the
Jesuits, but, rather, that the rescript of 1773 was a warrant for the
imprisonment, if not the death, of Pius VI, and the subsequent overthrow of
the holy see. That rescript was, therefore, the result of a short-sighted
policy. It is impossible to read Ganganelli's Letters, and deny that he was
highly intellectual, virtuous, religious, and amiable; nor would I confound
the philosophy which he cultivated, with that which is {131} destructive of
religious hope and political order; but his whole conduct, in the affair of
the Jesuits, proves, that his soul was not formed to the honours of
martyrdom, as he was ready to act against his own conviction, and to
sacrifice principle to convenience; a maxim peculiarly impugned by Jesuits,
and by catholics in general.
In addition to the proofs of his good opinion of the society already given,
I will here insert a passage to be found in the twelfth volume of the
Annual Register. In addressing the courts of Paris, Madrid, and Naples,
after his elevation to the pontificate, he states, that, "in regard to the
Jesuits, he could neither blame nor annihilate an institute, which had been
applauded and confirmed by nineteen of his predecessors; that he could the
less do it, because it had been authentically confirmed by the council of
Trent; and that, by the French maxims, the general council was above the
{132} pope: that, if it was desired, he would call a council, in which
every thing should be discussed with justice and equity, and the Jesuits
heard in their own defence; that he owed to the Jesuits, as to all the
religious orders, justice and protection; that, besides, the states of
Germany, the king of Sardinia, and the king of Prussia, had written to him
in their behalf; and that he could not, by their destruction, content some
princes, without displeasing others." Nevertheless, without calling a
council, without hearing their defence, he destroyed them; and, certainly,
it will ever be a matter of astonishment, that, in a cause of such
magnitude, a Roman pontiff, whatever motives may have impelled him to
pronounce the suppression, could so far assimilate himself with the
ministers of Portugal, Spain, Naples, and France, as to overlook that
primary maxim, which Rome, whether Pagan or Christian, had in all ages
respected: "It is not the manner of the Romans to deliver any man to die,
before that {133} he, which is accused, have the accusers face to face, and
have licence to answer for himself concerning the crime laid against
him[50]."
The writer of some anecdotes annexed to his Letters, relates one, which
shows the notoriety of the fact, that his suppression of the Jesuits was
not the effect of a bad opinion of the order: as it is applicable to the
subject I will insert it here. "While the bells were ringing, and cannon
firing, to celebrate his exaltation, the general of the Jesuits observed,
with a sigh, _there tolls our passing-bell_. Not," says the writer, "that
Ganganelli was _hostile_ to the Jesuits, but because he thought it was
_necessary_ to attend to the representations of the sovereigns."
THE PRESIDENT D'EGUILLES.
This gentleman was the Aristides of the French magistracy. I have already
mentioned {134} him, when speaking of Monclar's _Compte Rendu_[51]. His
opinion of the persecution of the society will be seen in the following
passage, which was addressed by him to Louis XV. "If the church be
incessantly outraged, by the judgments passed against the institute of the
Jesuits, the throne is still more pointedly attacked, upon the two
principal motives, which instigate the enemies of the Jesuits to work their
destruction. The first of these motives is, plainly, to deprive a society,
which is entirely devoted to the interests of its king, of the education of
youth; but more especially of the youth of the nobility. The second, which
is equally as dangerous, is, to astound all the other bodies of the kingdom
by the terrible fall of that, which seemed the most unlikely to be shaken;
and thus to make them sensible, that the hatred of the parliaments is more
to be dreaded than the protection of the king to be coveted."
{135}
ABBE PROYART.
In his work entitled "Louis XVI dethroned before he was King," speaks of
the Jesuits in these words: "The Jesuits, considered only in the light of
public teachers, were, during their existence, the first supports of the
throne."--"The destruction of the Jesuits was the ruin of the precious
edifice of national education, and gave a general shock to public
morality." The abbe, from his many testimonies in favour of the Jesuits,
being suspected to be one of their order, openly declares, "that he never
belonged to the society, and that he owed them only truth and justice, for
that he was not even indebted to them for his education."
VOLTAIRE.
I have already cited Voltaire, but I place him in the list here, for the
purpose of inserting some farther extracts from his Letters. When {136} he
was solicited by the Jansenistical magistrates to join with them in
accusing the Jesuits of the crime of regicide, he gave this remarkable
answer, in his Letter to the Atheist Damilaville: "I should rouse posterity
in their behalf, if I accused them of a crime, of which Europe, and Damiens
himself, have acknowledged them innocent." Writing, in 1765, three years
after the suppression of the Jesuits, to the same Damilaville, he thus
exults in the realized expectations of D'Alembert: "Victory declares for us
on every side. I can assure you, that, in a short time, the rabble alone
will remain under the standard of our enemies." In subsequent letters he
declares, that "a general revolution was making its appearance in every
quarter; that philosophy was gaining strength in the north of Germany; that
similar revolutions were taking place in Poland, Italy, and Spain." Such
was the rapid effect of the substitution of philosophical to religious
education! However borne away by the charms of {137} philosophy, Voltaire
was greatly attached to the Jesuits, and had the highest opinion of them:
this he fully expresses in a letter to father de la Tour, principal of the
college of Louis le Grand, where he was himself educated, which has been
already cited.
MONTESQUIEU.
Montesquieu, mentioning the government of Paraguay, then under the guidance
of the Jesuits, as an instance, among other extraordinary institutions
formed to exalt nations to virtue, alludes to the imputed ambition of the
society to govern; to which he replies, "but it will ever be a glorious
ambition to govern men by rendering them happy. It is glorious to the
society to have been the first to give, in those regions, the idea of
religion united with humanity. By repairing the devastations of the
Spaniards, they have begun to heal one of the {138} most dangerous wounds
the human race ever received. They have drawn wild people from woods,
secured them regular maintenance, and clothed their nakedness; but even,
had they done no more than add to the stock of industry among men, that
would have been doing a great deal[52]."
BUFFON.
"The missions," says this celebrated natural philosopher, "have formed more
men, in the barbarous nations, than the victorious armies of the princes,
who subjugated them. It is only in this way, that Paraguay has been
conquered: the gentleness, the good example, the charity, and the exercise
of virtue constantly maintained by the missionaries, made their way to the
hearts of the savages, and conquered their distrust and their ferocity.
They {139} would frequently come, of their own accord, and beg to be made
acquainted with the law, which rendered men so perfect; to that law they
submitted and entered into society. Nothing can do more honour to religion
than to have civilized those nations and laid the foundations of an empire,
with no other arms than those of virtue[53]."
HALLER.
"The enemies of the society," says Haller, "disparage their best
institutions: they accuse them of inordinate ambition, on seeing a kind of
empire formed by them in distant regions; but what plan can be more
delightful, or more advantageous to humanity, than to assemble human beings
scattered widely among the gloomy forests of America, to win them from the
savage state, a state of wretchedness, to put an end to their cruel and
destructive wars, to {140} enlighten their minds with the truths of
religion, and to form them into a society like the state of mankind in the
golden age? Is this not taking up the character of legislator for the
happiness of men? The ambition, that produces so much good, cannot but be a
laudable passion. No virtue ever attains that purity, which men are apt to
exact; but neither is any virtue disfigured by the passions, while these
serve to promote the general happiness[54]."
MURATORI.
It is hardly necessary to observe, that Muratori's character for talents,
piety, and virtue, stands very high in the estimation of the learned. He
was a celebrated Italian writer, a fellow of the chief academies of Italy,
of the royal society of London, and of the imperial academy of Olmutz, and
he was consulted as the oracle of {141} the age by the literati of Europe.
He was born in 1672 and died in 1750. He was unconnected with the society
of the Jesuits, and the high praises he bestows upon them could, therefore,
only have been dictated by a just esteem and admiration. The following
extracts are from his work entitled, _Il Cristianessimo felice nella
missioni de Padri della Compagnia di Gesu nel Paraguai_; a work which may
serve as a commentary on the edicts, declarations, and manifestoes, of the
court of Portugal under the dictatorship of Pombal. "I could wish, that
some one among the enemies of the church of Rome, who carry their aversion
to the Jesuits so far as to asperse the zeal of those admirable
missionaries, and their purity of intention, in the laborious functions,
which they discharge among the infidels, would only accompany them awhile
in their apostolic excursions, to see and examine what they do, and what
they suffer for the salvation of souls. He would undoubtedly, and that very
soon, lay aside former prejudices, and, perhaps, what he had seen would
suffice {142} to make him renounce his error." After enumerating, briefly,
the charges against the Jesuits of America, such as their making themselves
petty princes; engrossing the commerce of Paraguay; becoming dangerously
wealthy and powerful; bribing governors; robbing the Indians, under cover
of pleasing God, &c. &c., he says, "This is an abstract of the defamatory
reports spread about the world, either by word of mouth, or printed libels,
against the missionaries of Paraguay. I will advance nothing without clear
proofs. I am not afraid of affirming, that all these imputations are
calumnies and detestable forgeries, suggested by envy and malice." He then
proceeds to prove them to be such[55].
{143}
GROTIUS, LEIBNITZ, BACON.
This triumvirate of religion and genuine philosophy were friends and
admirers of the Jesuits; they are cited or referred to in the following
Letters, I shall therefore be satisfied with naming them here.
FREDERIC THE GREAT.
"Frederic," says the elegant scholar already twice quoted[56], "in spite of
his sceptical vanity, appeared sometimes to be convinced of the dangerous
principles of all those false philosophers, whose adulatory attentions he
was weak enough to be pleased with. In one of these moments, in which his
good sense retained the ascendency over his self-love, when the news
reached him of the proscription of the Jesuits in France, by the
confidential agents of supreme authority: 'Poor souls,' said he, 'they have
destroyed the foxes, which defended them from the jaws of the {144} wolves,
and they do not perceive that they are about to be devoured.'" Whomever the
king of Prussia meant by the wolves, it is well known, that the same
parliament that devoured the Jesuits in 1764, were equally disposed to
devour the episcopal body in 1765.
DR. JOHNSON. DEAN KIRWAN.
It is very common to speak of superstition as a shade in the character of
Johnson; and, no doubt, a modern philosopher will object to the authority
of one so bigoted as to declare, "that monasteries have something congenial
to the mind of man." Such objections, however, shall not divert me from
enrolling him here; for, the opinion he expressed relative to the
destruction of the Jesuits was the result, not of any superstitious motive,
but of that penetration, which was not to be blunted by the opposition of
prejudices. Mrs. Piozzi tells us, that, when he was at Rouen, "he conversed
with the abbe Rofette about the destruction of the Jesuits, and condemned
{145} it loudly, as a blow to the general power of the church, and likely
to be followed with many and dangerous innovations, which might, at length,
become fatal to religion itself, and shake even the foundations of
Christianity." With Dr. Johnson let me place Dean Kirwan, who often
declared, that he imbibed the noble ambition of benefiting mankind in the
college of the English Jesuits, at St. Omer's[57].
BAUSSET.
Bausset, bishop of Meth, in a Life of Fenelon, published so lately as the
year 1809, passes a comprehensive and eloquent eulogium on the society, of
which the following sentences form but a part: "Wherever the Jesuits were
heard of they preserved all classes of society in a spirit of order,
wisdom, and consistency. Called, at the commencement of the society, to the
education of the principal families of the state, they {146} extended their
cares to the inferior classes, and kept them in the happy habits of
religious and moral virtue."--"They had the merit of attracting honour to
their religious character, by a severity of manners, a temperance, a
nobility, and a personal disinterestedness, which even their enemies could
not deny them. This is the fairest answer they can make to satires, which
accuse them of relaxed morality."--"These men, who were described as so
dangerous, so powerful, so vindictive, bowed, without a murmur, under the
terrible hand that crushed them[58]."
JUAN AND ULLOA.
The very names of these travellers suggest the virtues and the praises of
the Jesuits. It was from their volumes that Robertson took his account of
the settlement of Paraguay, and I do not think it necessary here to extend
their testimony.
{147}
RICHELIEU.
When the four ministers of Charenton presented very heavy accusations
against the Jesuits to Louis XIII, cardinal Richelieu answered them all:
for the sake of brevity, I shall extract only his reply on the charge of
regicide. "As to what you say of their doctrine, with respect to the power
they attribute to the pope over kings, you would have spoken very
differently of it, if, instead of learning it from the _private writings_
of a few particulars, you had collected it from the mouth of their general,
who, in the year 1610, made a public and solemn declaration, by which he
not only disapproves, but forbids all those of his order, under very severe
penalties, to teach or maintain it lawful, under what pretext of tyranny
soever, to attempt upon the persons of kings and princes." {148}
ABBE RAYNAL.
To the foregoing testimonies, let us add that of one of the bitterest
enemies of Christianity. "The magnificence of the ceremonies," says Raynal,
"attracts the Indians to the churches, where they find pleasure and piety
united. There it is that religion is amiable, and it is at first in her
ministers that she there gains love. Nothing equals the purity of the
morals, the mild and tender zeal, the paternal solicitude, of the Jesuits
of Paraguay. Every pastor is truly the father, as well as the director of
his parishioners. There his authority is not felt, for he orders,
prohibits, and punishes, only what is punished, prohibited, and ordered by
the religion, which all of them, as well as he, worship and cherish."--"A
government in which nobody is idle, nobody works to excess; in which food
is wholesome, plentiful, and impartially partaken by all the citizens, who
are conveniently lodged, conveniently clothed; in {149} which old persons,
widows, orphans, and the sick, find a succour unknown in any other part of
the globe; in which every one marries according to inclination, and without
interest; and where large families are a comfort, without a possibility of
becoming a burthen; in which the debauchery inseparable from idleness, that
equally corrupts opulence and poverty, never accelerates the degradation,
or rather the decline of human life; in which factitious passions are never
excited, and well-regulated desires never thwarted; in which the advantages
of commerce are enjoyed; without danger of contagion from the vices
attendant on luxury; in which well-stored magazines, and mutual gratuitous
succours among nations, rendered brothers by the same religion, afford a
secure resource against the want that the uncertainty or inclemency of the
seasons may produce; in which criminal justice has never been under the
melancholy necessity of condemning a single criminal to death, to ignominy,
or to punishment of any duration; and in which the very name of a tax or of
a lawsuit is {150} unknown." Listen, I pray, to this account, from a
quarter so unsuspected, of "the _slavery_ in which the Jesuits held the
Indians of Paraguay, and the _atrocities_ which they exercised there;" for
such is the language of their assailant, whom one must be surprised to find
unacquainted with the writings of such an author as Raynal.
THE BISHOPS OF FRANCE.
There are forty-five names of bishops subscribed to a reply made by them to
certain articles proposed for their examination by Louis XV. Their judgment
is given at considerable length, and the testimony of it is too valuable to
be abridged. I have already referred the reader to the document, printed at
length, in the Appendix, at the end of this volume; to enable him, however,
to judge here of the importance of it, I will insert the articles in this
place. {151}
The first is: "Of what use the Jesuits may be in France; the advantages or
inconveniences that may attend the various functions, which they exercise
under our authority."
The second: "How the Jesuits behave, in their instructions, and in their
own conduct, with regard to certain opinions, which strike at the safety of
the king's person; as, likewise, with regard to the received doctrine of
the clergy of France, contained in the declaration of the year 1682; and,
in general, with regard to their opinions on the other side of the Alps."
The third: "The conduct of the Jesuits, with regard to their subordination
to bishops; and whether, in the exercise of their functions, they do not
encroach on the pastoral rights and privileges."
The fourth: "Whether it may not be convenient to moderate and set bounds to
the {152} authority, which the general of the Jesuits exercises in France."
The replies fully substantiate the utility of the society, the purity of
their doctrine, the regularity of their conduct, and the consistency of
their government with their duty to their king and country[59].
Such, then, is the nature of the authorities, that rank in favour of the
Jesuits; and the reader, by comparing them with the inveterate and corrupt
spirits, which have been dragged from obscurity to destroy them a second
time, will be able to estimate their respective value, and the motives of
the new conspirators against them.
Perhaps enough has incidentally appeared, in the preceding pages, to inform
the reader of the {153} chief crimes imputed to the society of the Jesuits,
and to satisfy his mind of the falsehood of the imputations, as well as of
the baseness and wickedness of the means contrived for attaching them upon
those devoted victims. Many of the imputations are also removed in the
following Letters. And when I consider, that the judgment of the bishops of
France affords, on these points, a complete refutation of the slanders
which have been lavished upon the society, I feel, that I should be wasting
time, and abusing the attention of my reader, with unnecessary repetition.
A brief notice, however, of some of the principal charges against the
society, may not be unacceptable here. Let us inquire into those of
ambition, commerce, and sedition.
In the searches which I have made, it appears to me, both from narrative of
facts, and from reasoning on the nature of things, that the society of the
Jesuits have been most basely slandered, as well as inhumanly treated. What
{154} was their ambition? The glory of God, and the edification of man.
But, say their enemies, how were these pursued? and were they always the
real objects? The Jesuits are accused of shaping their course to the
richest and most commodious countries; with extending the limits of the
church to enlarge the circle of their commerce; with preaching sedition;
with raising, on the cross, a throne to their ambition rather than to
Christ. What do we learn from reason, and from fact? The roads to all
ecclesiastical honours, all political employments, are shut to Jesuits, who
renounce the former by a formal vow, and are prohibited the latter by the
most rigorous penalties[60]. The countries, where we hear of Jesuits, are
inhabited by cannibals, by Hurons, Iroquois, Canadians, Illinoise, Negroes,
Ethiopians, Laplanders, Tartars; they are barren deserts, eternal snows,
burning sands, gloomy forests; there did these _ambitious_ men live on wild
herbs and bitter {155} roots, and cover themselves with leaves, or the
skins of wild beasts; there did they run from cave to cave by day, and
sleep at night in the hollows of rocks. Are these the abodes of luxury and
wealth? It is indeed a glorious ambition to make men happy, to teach, and
to save: such is the ambition displayed by the Jesuits, and the throne they
raised on the cross was one of faith, hope, and charity.
With respect to commerce. By the canons of the church, it is forbidden to
ecclesiastics, and, certainly, for good reasons. Commerce is a profession,
a pursuit, to which men devote their time, for the purpose of obtaining a
livelihood, and of amassing fortunes. It is a pursuit inconsistent with the
habits and duties of the ministers of religion. This is the imputation
meant to be thrown on the Jesuits, and which Pombal, their great enemy, and
the enemy of every virtue, endeavoured to fix upon them. It was not
difficult for them to repel this charge. They had a depot at Lisbon, where
{156} they kept effects, which served them instead of money. These things
were sold, as a proprietor of land would sell his corn, to support the
brothers of the order in America, who, having no income, could only be
supplied with commodities, in those savage countries. If this did not
militate against the spirit that prohibits commerce to priests, as little
did the kind of traffic which was superintended by the missionaries in
Paraguay, and which was, in fact, a species of piety. With what delight
does one read the account of it, in the Voyage of Juan and Ulloa. "The
Jesuits take upon them the sole care of disposing of the manufactures and
products of the Guaranies Indians, designed for commerce; these people
being naturally careless and indolent, and, doubtless, without the diligent
inspection and pathetic exhortations of the fathers, would be buried in
sloth and indigence. The case is very different in the missions of the
Chiquitos, who are industrious, careful, and frugal; and their genius so
happily adapted to commerce, as not to stand in need of any factors. {157}
The priests in the villages of this nation are of no expense to the crown,
the Indians themselves rejoicing in maintaining them, and join in
cultivating a plantation, filled with all kinds of grain and fruits, for
the priest; the remainder, after this decent support, being applied to
purchase ornaments for the churches. That the Indians may never be in any
want of necessaries, it is one part of the minister's care to have always
in readiness a stock of different kinds of tools, stuffs, and other goods;
so that all who are in want repair to him, bringing, by way of exchange,
wax, of which there are here great quantities, and other products. And this
barter is made with the strictest integrity, that the Indians may have no
reason to complain of oppression, and that the high character of the
priests, for justice and sanctity, may be studiously preserved. The goods
received in exchange are, by the priests, sent to the superior of the
missions, who is a different person from the superior of the Guaranies;
and, with the produce, a fresh stock of goods is laid in. The {158}
principal intention of this is, that the Indians may have no occasion to
leave their own country, in order to be furnished with necessaries; and, by
this means, are kept from the contagion of those vices, which they would
naturally contract in their intercourse with the inhabitants of other
countries, where the depravity of human nature is not corrected by such
good examples and laws[61]." This is the commerce, the only commerce
carried on by the Jesuits; a commerce, that the apostles themselves would
have maintained as a duty. I speak of the society, and of their spirit as a
body; for I am not ignorant of the scandal which was brought upon them by
the conduct of P. Lavalette, who, under pretence of augmenting the revenues
of St. Peter's, ruined the mission at Martinique, and the cause of the
Jesuits in France. What numerous body can be answerable for every
individual of it? The circumstances attending the conduct of Lavalette are
not very clear; but to contend {159} for his innocence is not necessary to
the character of the order, the purity and integrity of which, however,
derive a new demonstration from the very effect produced by his misconduct,
be the guilt of that what it may, for it exonerates all the other Jesuit
missionaries from the charge of trading. This charge had long existed,
previous to Lavalette's affair: long before had hatred been upon the watch,
and calumny active: long before had both the old and new world been full of
Jesuit missionaries, and every where were they exposed to the scrutinizing
looks of their enemies: no sooner was Lavalette denounced, than all eyes
were turned upon him, and immediately all Europe rang with his name.
Scarcely had that of the bold navigator, who discovered, or that of the
sanguinary captain, who conquered America, travelled so rapidly, or with so
much noise. Innumerable libels issued from the press, and nothing equalled
the celebrity of the subject. What is the evident inference? This: that,
although their enemies were so vigilant in observing, so skilful in {160}
detecting, so eager to expose such of the missionaries, who, in spite of
their institute, should become merchants, yet Lavalette was the only one
that had ever afforded them a shadow of proof for such a charge.
The accusation of preaching sedition, and sowing the seeds of revolt, is
equally unmerited. It is true, that the Jesuits were assiduous in
preventing all personal intercourse between the Indians and the Spaniards
and Portugueze, for which they were charged with a seditious intention of
throwing off the Spanish government. I know not that the throwing off of
governments should shock modern philosophers, or the modification of
religion disturb their brain; but I know, that very different motives are
assigned for this assiduity of the Jesuits, in excluding the Europeans from
the Indians; motives, which merit honour here and crowns of glory
hereafter. The reader will thank me for communicating them in the simple
and affecting language of the Spanish travellers last cited. "The {161}
missionary fathers will not allow any of the inhabitants of Peru, whether
Spaniards or others, Mestizos or even Indians, to come within their
missions in Paraguay. Not with a view of concealing their transactions from
the world; or that they are afraid lest others should supplant them of part
of the products and manufactures; nor for any of those causes, which, even
with less foundation, envy has dared to suggest; but for this reason, and a
very prudent one it is, that their Indians, who being as it were new born
from savageness and brutality, and initiated into morality and religion,
may be kept steady in this state of innocence and simplicity. These Indians
are strangers to sedition, pride, malice, envy, and other passions, which
are so fatal to society. But, were strangers admitted to come among them,
their bad examples would teach them what at present they are happily
ignorant of; but should modesty, and the attention they pay to the
instructions of their teachers, be once laid aside, the shining advantages
of these settlements would soon come {162} to nothing; and such a number of
souls, who now worship the true God in the beauty of holiness, and live in
tranquillity and love (of which such slender traces are seen among
civilized nations), would be again seduced into the paths of disorder and
perdition."--"Hence it is, that the Jesuits have inflexibly adhered to
their maxim of not admitting any foreigners among them: and in this they
are certainly justified by the melancholy example of the other missions of
Peru, whose decline from their former happiness and piety is the effect of
an open intercourse[62]." It is also true, that the Indians did revolt, if
that term can be applied to an act rendered unavoidable by the horrid
avarice and despotism, which had conspired to sacrifice these happy and
innocent tribes; but so far were the Jesuits from being instigators of the
revolt, that they were in danger of being the victims of it, of which they
were well aware. The facts would form a long and interesting {163}
narrative; but it is only necessary, at present, to state a few
particulars. A notion had been generated in the imagination of Pombal, the
Portugueze minister, that, in the region of those happy settlements, there
were mines of gold, unknown to the inhabitants. On these he cast his eyes,
and commenced an intrigue for exchanging that territory with Spain, for
others, at the immense distance of three hundred leagues. This being
effected, he resolved, that the whole Indian population of Paraguay should
be transported. The Jesuits were ordered to dispose the people to
transmigrate. They, at first, ventured to represent modestly the difficulty
of such a removal, and to conjure the officers of government to consider,
what an undertaking it was, to transport, over such wildernesses, thirty
thousand souls, with their cattle and effects, to a distance of nearly a
thousand miles: they were sharply told, that obedience and not
expostulation was expected. The consequences present a history, that might
draw tears from the most obdurate. Now would have been the time for the
{164} Jesuits to establish their empire, had the project imputed to them
been founded. What was their conduct? Rather than become rebels, these
faithful and humble subjects laboured earnestly to prevail upon the Indians
to obey the mandate. Their exertions, however great, were not satisfactory,
and new commands for haste were issued; a few months were allowed for an
undertaking, which, if it could be executed at all, required years. This
precipitation ruined the whole. The poor creatures, who were to be torn
from their habitations, driven to extremities, began to distrust their own
missionaries, and suspected them of acting in concert with the officers of
Spain and Portugal. From that moment they looked upon them only as so many
traitors, who were seeking to deliver them up to their old inveterate
enemies. In the course of a short time, peace, order, and happiness, gave
way to war, confusion, and misery. Those Indians, previously so flexible,
so docile, insensibly lost that spirit of submission and simplicity, which
had distinguished them, {165} and they every where prepared to make a
vigorous resistance. The contest lasted a considerable time, during which
the Indians experienced some success, but were ultimately defeated; some of
them burnt their towns and betook themselves in thousands to the woods and
mountains, where they perished miserably. After surveying all the plains,
searching all the forests, digging all the mountains, sounding all the
lakes and rivers, to establish the limits of the country, no mines were
found, and the director of the scheme, Gomez, finding himself the dupe of
his mad imagination and puerile credulity, wished it possible to conceal
his shame and prevent his disgrace, by having the treaty between the two
courts annulled. He even descended so low as to beseech the Jesuits
themselves to endeavour to effect the annulling of it. They, of course,
paid no attention to the entreaties of a man, whose insatiable avidity had
caused the ruin of thirty thousand of their fellow creatures; and it was
not till Charles III succeeded to the crown of Spain, that the treaty,
{166} of which he had never approved, was annulled. There was now an end to
the war in Paraguay, so fatal to its once happy, pious, and virtuous
population, who, in consequence of it, lost not only their property, but
their innocence, their piety, their docility, their gentleness, their
simplicity, which were superseded by European debauchery, hypocrisy, and
perfidy; vices that formed a new and almost insurmountable obstacle to the
progress of religion, in those immense regions, where, for so many years,
it had flourished[63].
Having shown the pious nature of the ambition, which inflamed the zeal of
the Jesuits; the paternal nature of the commerce, which consisted in
necessary commodities, taken in barter for the provision of their
establishments, and not in rich products, of various countries, freighted
on wealthy speculations; and having {167} shown also that their conduct, in
excluding Europeans from the Paraguay settlements, was not the effect of a
seditious disposition, I should now conclude this chapter, did I not, as I
proceed, feel more and more a desire to remove the prejudices, which an
extraordinary combination of passions and talents, operating on the
progress of human affairs, has spread over the character of men, who appear
to me to have been actuated by the sublimest motives, such as might be
attributed to angels; the glory of God, and the benefit of mankind. The
picture drawn by the abbe Barruel of one of the ex-Jesuits, who was
murdered at Avignon, in one of the revolutionary massacres, is a genuine
and convincing representation of a celestial spirit, which never could have
been nourished in a corrupt society, which must have owed its qualities to
an exalted one. This portrait cannot but be viewed with love and
admiration, and the reader would think an apology for placing it before him
superfluous. {168}
"Avignon and the Comtat had been declared, by the assembly, united to
France. Jourdan, surnamed _Coup-tete_, was at Avignon with his banditti.
The unfortunate persons shut up in the prisons were devoted by him to
death. An immense pit was opened to serve as their grave, and loads of sand
were carried thither to cover the bodies. There were six hundred prisoners
in the castle: the hour was fixed for putting them to death and throwing
them, one after the other, into the pit. There was, at Avignon, a virtuous
priest, one of those men for whom we feel, on earth, a veneration, like
that paid to the saints in heaven. His name was Nolhac; he had formerly
been rector of the noviciat of the Jesuits at Thoulouse, and was now eighty
years old. For thirty years he had been the parish priest of St.
Symphorien, a parish, which he had taken in preference, from its being that
of the poor. During all these years, spent in the town, he had been the
father and refuge of the indigent, the consoler of the afflicted, the
adviser and friend of the {169} inhabitants, and he would not listen to
their entreaties, to quit the place, on the arrival of the jacobins with
Jourdan and his banditti. He could never resolve to leave his parishoners,
deprived of their minister, in the beginning of the troubles of the schism,
and far less to leave them, deprived of the consolations of religion, while
under the tyranny of the banditti. Martyrdom, the glory of shedding his
blood for Jesus Christ, for his church, or for the faithful, were, to him,
but the accomplishment of desires and wishes, which, all his life, had been
formed in his soul, and with which he knew how to inspire his disciples,
when he was directing them in the paths _of perfection_. His life itself
had been but a martyrdom, concealed by a countenance always serene, and
always beaming angelic joy, with peace of conscience. His body, clothed
with the hair-shirt, had needed the strong constitution, with which nature
had endowed him, to support him under the mortifications, watchings, and
fasts he endured, through all the activity of a minister and the austerity
of {170} an anchorite. Daily at prayer and meditation long before light;
daily visiting the sick and the poor, whom he never left without
administering, together with spiritual consolations, temporal comforts,
confided to his hands by the faithful; always poor as to himself, but rich
for others, it was at length time to consummate the sacrifice of a life
wholly devoted to charity and to his God.
"M. Nolhac, whom the banditti themselves had hitherto held sacred, was sent
prisoner to the castle the very day before that on which the six hundred
victims were to be put to death. His appearance among those unhappy
persons, who all knew and revered him, was that of a consoling angel; his
first words were those of an apostle of souls, sent in order to prepare
them for appearing before the judge of the quick and the dead: 'I come to
die with you, my children: we are all going together to appear before God.
How I thank him for having sent me to prepare your souls to appear at his
{171} tribunal! Come, my children, the moments are precious; to-morrow,
perhaps to-day, we shall be no longer in this world; let us, by a sincere
repentance, qualify ourselves to be happy in the other. Let me not lose a
single soul among you. Add to the hope, that God will receive myself into
his bosom, the happiness of being able to present you to him, as children
all of whom he charges me to save, and to render worthy of his mercy.' They
throw themselves at his knees, embrace, and cling to them. With tears and
sobs they confess their faults: he listens to them, he absolves them, he
embraces them with that tenderness, which he always manifested to sinners.
He had the satisfaction of finding them all impressed by his paternal
exhortations. Already had that unspeakable pleasure, that peace which only
God can give, as in Heaven he ratifies the absolution of his minister on
Earth, taken place of fear on their countenances, when the voices of the
banditti were heard calling out those, who were to be the first victims,
for {172} whom they waited at the gate of the fort. There, on the right and
on the left, stood two assassins, each having an iron bar in his hands,
with which they struck their victims, as they came out, with all their
force and killed them. The bodies were then delivered to other
executioners, who mangled the limbs and disfigured them with sabres, to
render it impossible for the children and friends of the persons to
distinguish them. After this, the remains were thrown into the infernal
pit, called the ice-house. Meanwhile, M. Nolhac, within the prison,
continued exhorting and embracing the unhappy prisoners, and encouraging
them to go as they were called. He was fortunate enough to be the last, and
to follow into the presence of his God the six hundred souls, who had
carried to Heaven the tidings of his heroic zeal and unshaken
fortitude[64]."--Nolhac was a Jesuit!
* * * * *
{173}