History of the Jesuits: Their origin, progress, doctrines, and designs

by G. B. Nicolini

“Nankin, 17th January 1708.”

But if the prelate was well acquainted with all the Jesuitical cunning, he did not know the extent of their wickedness. Soon after De Tournon had sent this letter, he was arrested by order of the emperor (we may well suppose at whose instigation), sent to Macao, and delivered up to the Portuguese. The Bishop of Macao, who was another creature of the Jesuits, loaded him with chains, and threw him into prison. It is highly instructive to read the bull of excommunication which Pope Clement XI. fulminated against the Bishop of Macao for this deed. He complained that a Papal legate had been arrested, “not by pagans, but by Christian magistrates and officers, who, forgetful of his sacred character, of his dignity, &c., had dared to lay their hands upon him, and to make him endure such indignities and tortures that the heathen themselves were horror-struck—ipsis exhorrescentibus ethnicis.”

In the same bull the Pope lets us know that De Tournon, for certain causes, had been subjected to the ecclesiastical censures of the Church, the College, and Seminary of the Jesuits, which leaves no doubt as to the authors of the capture and ill treatment of the prelate, who was used like the worst of criminals, all to gratify the revenge of the Jesuits. To console De Tournon for all these hardships, Clemens bestowed upon him the cardinal’s hat; but, alas! the prisoner did not rejoice long in this high honour. His life was near a close. The ill treatment, and, as many say, the fastings, which he endured, brought his troubles to an end. He died in 1710, at the age of forty-two. Oh! one is almost tempted to implore the vengeance of God upon such sacrilegious men, who, calling themselves Christians—nay, most perfect Christians—condemned to exquisite tortures, and to a most miserable and protracted death, this noble-hearted man, for attempting to purify the religion of Christ from pagan superstition. So perished De Tournon, a man certainly one of the best prelates of the Romish Church. Clement XI. eulogised him in a public consistory, and, as we have said, excommunicated the Bishop of Macao. We shall not add a word of observation; the facts speak clearly for themselves.

We shall now resume our narrative about the Malabar rites, and endeavour to bring it to a speedy conclusion; the facts which we have already reported being more than sufficient to give a very clear idea of the religious teaching of the Jesuits in India, and of their deportment there. Clement XI., in 1719; Benedict XIII., in 1727; Clement XII., in 1734 and 1739, published briefs upon briefs to oblige the Jesuits to submit to the decree of Cardinal de Tournon, but in vain. The Jesuits either refused or eluded obedience to them. And when Clement XII., in 1739, forced them to take a very stringent oath[110] to obey the decree, every Jesuit took it, but no one observed it; finding a specious excuse for not doing so in that doctrine of theirs, then in full force, which declares that “the man who makes an oath with his mouth, without the consent of his mind, is not obliged to keep the oath, because he had not sworn, but only jested.”

At last Benedict XIV. resolved to put an end to the contest, by publishing, in 1741, a terrible bull, in which he calls the Jesuits disobedient, contumacious, crafty, and reprobate men (inobedientes, contumaces, captiosi, et perditi homines), and in which he made such stringent and undoubted provisions, that it was a difficult matter to evade obeying it; and especially after the Pope, by another brief in the following year, commanded that the brief of 1741 be read every Sabbath-day in all the houses, churches, and colleges of the Society.

The influence of the Jesuits in India now began to decline rapidly. Their Saniassi were discovered to be impostors. The war that began shortly after between France and England caused still greater damage; and when their order was abolished in 1773, the Jesuits had little or no influence in India.—These are the principal features of the missions in India, properly so called. In Japan, that turbulent and warlike country, the Jesuits adopted a different and more appropriate method to acquire influence among the people. Throwing away somewhat of their cunning and pretended sanctity, they espoused the cause of one or other of the various parties who were disputing for power, were cherished, respected, and permitted to preach their religion, if the party they sided with were triumphant; persecuted, exiled, and put to death if it were vanquished. The hundreds of Jesuits who are represented to us as having perished martyrs for their faith were oftener executed as unsuccessful conspirators. The Japanese were not so bigoted a race as the Indians, and the Bonzes, their priests, were not all-powerful like the Brahmins. The persecutions they exercised against their dangerous rivals, the Jesuits, could not be successful but when the people and the sovereign were offended against them, not as missionaries, but as defeated malcontents and conspirators. The Jesuits maintained their ground in Japan with various vicissitudes, till they were suppressed. In China, also, they maintained their ground by the same means which opened it for their reception—they conformed themselves to the manners and customs of the people as far as they could, and it appears that they partly succeeded in conquering some of their national prejudices; they were at least supported by the higher classes, who held them in much esteem for their learning, and so much respected that some were made mandarins; and even when the Christians were persecuted as dangerous conspirators, the Jesuits were left unmolested. However, we possess few documents, excepting those of the Jesuit historians relating their own deeds, whereby to ascertain the real truth regarding their condition in that country.

The Jesuits assure us that millions of idolaters were converted by them in all these countries, but their fabulous narrations are contradicted by facts. For, when a statistical account was made in 1760, of all the Christians residing in India and Japan, the number was found to be less than a half of what Xavier alone is said to have converted, and more than one hundred times less than had been accomplished by the united labours of all the Jesuit missionaries. This reminds us of the computation made by a witty person of all the Arabians killed by the French bulletins from 1831 to 1841, which three or four times outnumbered the whole Arabian population.

In all these countries the Jesuits derived from their converts great contributions; but of their traffic more anon.

We have thus given an outline of these celebrated missions, and we are sorry that we cannot extend the recital of them any further. A characteristic fact ascertained from an accurate study of their missions is, that the Jesuit missionaries, with the view of domineering over these countries, altogether regardless of the interests of the Christian religion, slandered and persecuted all other missionaries, even although they were Roman Catholics. And so they do still.