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 inst.i.tute by the council of Trent; and the concurring approbation of the order by nearly twenty popes, especially the very recent const.i.tution, 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 pa.s.sed 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 _apostolic.u.m_ 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 apostolic.u.m formed a princ.i.p.al 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 apostolic.u.m 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 circ.u.mstances which demonstrate the contrary. As sir John appears to be unacquainted with this famous const.i.tution of Clement XIII, published in the beginning of 1765, and as it is perhaps the best written official doc.u.ment 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 a.s.sociations 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 inst.i.tute 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 G.o.d and his church, according to the intent of the pious inst.i.tute approved by the holy see_." If the lines in italics are not an especial approval and confirmation of the inst.i.tute, 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 inst.i.tute. 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 a.s.sertion 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 inst.i.tution 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 a.n.a.lysis 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 pet.i.tions, 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 pa.s.sions. 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 circ.u.mstances mentioned by sir John Hippisley, which I cannot pa.s.s 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 t.i.tle of religious poverty; the superior, or the order, remaining answerable for his maintenance. But no priest of the regulars can a.s.sume 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 inst.i.tution 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 G.o.d, against the relentless fury of jacobins and philosophers? Besides, the inst.i.tution 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 a.s.sume 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 coa.r.s.ely. 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 antic.i.p.ated several great names incidentally, while engaged in canva.s.sing 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 ent.i.tled, _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 mult.i.tude {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 ill.u.s.trious 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 pa.s.sages are extracted from the letter: "I know, that your holiness is under considerable {124} embarra.s.sments. 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 a.s.semblage 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 circ.u.mstance {125} known to the French and Spanish amba.s.sadors, who consulted their respective courts, neither of which, however, chose openly to interfere. It was an embarra.s.sing 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 circ.u.mspection 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 _a.s.sailant_; now, that the disapproval of some casuists, and the blaming of untimely or misplaced zeal of some of the society was no a.s.sailing 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 inst.i.tute, that inst.i.tute, which the Roman catholic church, {128} a.s.sembled in the council of Trent, approved of; that inst.i.tute upon which our predecessors have bestowed so many solemn encomiums; which has. .h.i.therto found protection and received the most signal marks of favour from the kings of France; that inst.i.tute, which you yourselves, not so much out of grat.i.tude 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 ent.i.tle 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 a.s.sailants. 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, subst.i.tuted 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 superst.i.tion. 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 pa.s.sage 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 inst.i.tute, 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 p.r.o.nounce the suppression, could so far a.s.similate 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 pa.s.sing-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 pa.s.sage, which was addressed by him to Louis XV. "If the church be incessantly outraged, by the judgments pa.s.sed against the inst.i.tute of the Jesuits, the throne is still more pointedly attacked, upon the two princ.i.p.al 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 n.o.bility. 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 ent.i.tled "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 a.s.sure 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 subst.i.tution 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, princ.i.p.al 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 inst.i.tutions 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 inst.i.tutions: 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 a.s.semble 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 pa.s.sion. No virtue ever attains that purity, which men are apt to exact; but neither is any virtue disfigured by the pa.s.sions, 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 ent.i.tled, _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 G.o.d, &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].
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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 superst.i.tion 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 superst.i.tious 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 n.o.ble ambition of benefiting mankind in the college of the English Jesuits, at St. Omer"s[57].
BAUSSET.