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

by G. B. Nicolini

Many were the trials the Jesuits had to encounter after the death of Loyola. The moment he expired, the professed members who were at Rome appointed Lainez Vicar-General, although he was at the time dangerously ill, fixing, at the same time, the month of November for the election of the new General. No objection could be raised against the nomination of Lainez, he being without contradiction the most prominent living member of the Society. The difficulties only began when the Vicar-General adjourned the General Congregation sine die. Lainez was constrained to take this step because Philip II. of Spain had forbidden any of his subjects to leave his dominions, as he was then at war with the Pope.

Since that fatal epoch in which Clement VII., for the benefit of his family (the Medici), had betrayed the glory and destinies of Italy into the hands of the house of Austria, the unfortunate peninsula (if we except Venice) became an imperial fief, and the subsequent popes the Emperor’s chief vassals. Paul IV., although worn out with years, conceived the bold idea of freeing Italy from the Austrian yoke. “He would sit,” says Ranke, quoting Navagero, “for long hours over the black, thick, fiery wine of Naples, his usual drink, and pour forth torrents of stormy eloquence against these schismatics and heretics—accursed of God—that evil generation of Jew and Moor—that scum of the world, and other titles equally complimentary, which he bestowed with unsparing liberality on everything Spanish.”[112] And so intense was his hatred against the house of Austria, that he made a strict alliance with the Protestant leader, Albert of Brandenburg, and formed his regiments almost entirely of Protestants, to fight against a Roman Catholic king. And, as if this were not enough, the Pope, the so-called chief of Christianity, made proposals to Soliman I., the great enemy of the Christian name, to enter into an alliance with him, in order to destroy the ultra-Roman Catholic and bigoted Philip II.

The Spanish Jesuits thus prevented from going to Rome, the General Congregation, as we have said, was postponed. This began the strife. Private ambition broke forth, and threw the community into great confusion. The revolt was headed by the violent Bobadilla. He prevailed upon Rodriguez, Brouet, and two or three others, to join him in reproaching the tyranny and despotism of Lainez. They pretended that he had no right to possess, alone, the supreme authority, which ought to reside in all the surviving founders of the order till a General was elected. Pamphlets were addressed to the Pope, accusing the Vicar-General of entertaining the design to repair to Spain for the purpose of holding the Congregation, and of establishing the seat of the order in that country. The Pope, upon this announcement, became furious; he thundered imprecations against the Society; and when Lainez presented himself to have an audience, he refused to see him, and ordered him to give up, within three days, all the constitutions and ordinances of the Society, with the name of every professed member resident at Rome, and forbade any one of the latter to leave the capital. The storm, it is evident, was gaining strength, but Lainez was an expert and skilful pilot. Inferior to Loyola in natural gifts, in firmness of character, in boldness and energy, he was his superior in cunning, in reflection, in patience. Ignatius, the imperious ex-officer, in the same circumstances, would have scourged Bobadilla, dismissed some rioters from the Society, and obliged the others to fall at his feet and ask forgiveness. The politician Lainez avoided combat in an open field, hoping to gain the battle by stratagem. He quietly and stealthily got possession of all Bobadilla’s writings on the subject,[113] learned from them what were his enemies’ projects, prepared his means of defence accordingly, detached Rodriguez and Brouet from Bobadilla’s interest by caresses and promises, sent the latter to reform a convent of Franciscan friars at Foligno, and condemned Gorgodanuz, the most pertinacious of the rebels, to say one pater noster and one ave Maria! When a cardinal related this fact to the Pope, Paul crossed himself as at something strange and prodigious.[114] Sacchini pretends that the Pope made the sign of the cross, being filled with wonder at the blindness of the rebels; but assuredly Paul was struck at the supremely cunning policy of the Vicar-General.[115]

The revolt was, however, subdued, the Pope appeased, and soon after the war was also brought to an end. The Duke of Alva, that sanguinary and ferocious butcher of the Belgians, conqueror of the Papal troops and of the allied armies, entered vanquished Rome, craved for an audience of the Pontiff, threw himself at his feet, and implored his forgiveness for having dared to fight against him. What a strange piece of contradiction is man!

The peace established between King Philip and the Pope made a free passage between Italy and Spain. The fathers arrived in Rome, and the General Congregation met on the 19th of June 1558.

On the 2d of July, while the fathers were on the point of proceeding to the election of the General, Cardinal Pacheco presented himself to the conclave in the Pope’s name, and after some trifling compliments, said he was ready to act as secretary and teller of the ballot. We cannot imagine the reason Paul had for taking such a precaution, unless he was afraid lest Borgia should be elected General—Borgia, the companion, the friend of Charles V. and of his son. The Cardinal, however, took his place among the fathers, and prepared to act as secretary. The schedules, which had been put into an urn by each elector, having been withdrawn and examined, the Cardinal announced that Lainez was elected by a majority of 13 to 7. He was in consequence proclaimed General, and the Jesuits went in one after another to pay him homage, and to kiss his hands on their bended knees.

The Congregation then proceeded to dispose of other business. There was first of all a discussion as to whether or not the Constitutions should be modified. This was answered in the negative. It must be observed, however, that Lainez, in the margin of the 16th chapter of the fourth part of the Constitutions, where it is prescribed that in the School of Theology the scholastic doctrine of St Thomas shall be explained, had inserted a declaration, “that if any book of theology could be found more adapted to the times, it shall be taught.” An historian very judiciously remarks, that Lainez appears already to have formed the project of establishing a new doctrine, which was propounded by Molina soon after. The original manuscripts, which were written by Ignatius in Spanish, were next confronted with the Latin version by Polancus. The latter was approved of, and ordered to be printed by the press of the Roman College, and this was immediately executed—the first edition of the Constitutions bearing the date of 1558.

But whilst in the middle of their legislative labours, they were startled by the arrival of Cardinal Trani, who announced to them that it was the Pope’s pleasure that they should perform the choral office, like all the other monastic orders, and that the office of General should only last for three years. The Jesuits remonstrated, and spoke of their Constitutions, and of the papal bull that had been issued in their favour. The cardinal answered that the commands of his holiness must be obeyed. The Jesuits got up a memorial, and Lainez and Salmeron went to present it to the Pope. Paul received them freezingly; and at the first observation of Lainez, exclaimed, “You are contumacious persons. In this matter you act like heretics, and I fear lest some sectarian should be seen issuing from your company. But we are firmly resolved to tolerate such disorders no longer.”[116] This was the second time that Lainez had been abruptly and arrogantly apostrophised by Paul. When he visited him after he had been chosen Vicar-General, he received the volleys of insult which the Pope poured upon him with the greatest submission. But it seems that his patience at this time gave way, and he boldly answered, that he had not sought of his own accord to be made General, that he was ready to give up the office at that very moment, but that his holiness knew well that the fathers, in proceeding to the election, had intended to name a General for life, according to the rules of their Constitutions; for the remainder, “we teach,” added he, “we preach against the heretics; on that account they hate us, and call us Papists. Wherefore your holiness ought to give us your protection, and evince toward us the yearnings of a father, rather than find fault with us.”[117] This was the substance of Lainez’s answer, shaped by the Jesuit historians into a more humble and respectful form. But the irascible and obstinate Paul was unmoved by his appeal. He told Lainez that he would not accept of his resignation, that his orders must be executed, and then dismissed him and his brother envoy. Paul was fierce and vindictive, and not to be trifled with. He had accused his own nephews in a full consistory, and banished them and their families from Rome. His greatest desire was to see the Inquisition at work. Ranke says that he seldom interfered in other matters, but was never so much as once absent from presiding every Thursday over the Congregation of the Inquisition. Having such a man to deal with, the Jesuits were forced to submit to perform the choral office, consoling themselves with the hope that the next Pope would be more lenient toward them; nor were they disappointed. Medici, the successor of Paul, who took the name of Pius IV., shewed himself more favourable to the Company of Jesus; not for love of them, but out of hatred to his predecessor, who had been his enemy.[118] Although he was of a mild and cheerful disposition, he made a fearful example of the nephews of the deceased pontiff. Their crimes assuredly deserved punishment; but as it was not in the disposition of Pius to be cruel or revengeful, he was doubtless instigated to act in this case with unwonted rigour. But who his instigators were, or whence he derived the malignant and retributory inspiration on which he acted, it would be difficult to determine. We only know that the Jesuits had been persecuted by the Caraffas from the beginning, and that “Pius IV.,” as Crétineau affirms, “shewed himself from first to last to be more favourable to the Jesuits than even Paul III. had been.”[119] The Jesuits, it is certain, had then great influence at the Court of Rome. Cardinal Caraffa and the Duke of Palliano, nephews to the late Pope, along with two of their relatives, were condemned to death. They were denied their own confessors, and Jesuits were called in as their spiritual comforters. Crétineau says, that the Duke of Palliano asked Lainez to send him a Jesuit confessor, while the detractors of the order think that they intruded themselves, to witness the agony and death of their enemies. We let our readers judge for themselves. The unfortunate culprits were executed during the night of the 6th and 7th August 1561. The cardinal never for a moment suspected that they would execute the sentence upon him. He tried to delay his execution by lingering with his confessor. “Make an end, my lord, we have other business on hand,” exclaimed an officer of police. A few minutes longer, and the cardinal was a corpse.

The Society now seemed upon the whole to be in a prosperous condition, and increased rapidly. Lainez did not exercise his authority with an iron hand, like Loyola, but he had great tact, and knew how to govern a community by cunning policy. Some mishaps, however, befel the Society. In Grenada, a Jesuit confessor refused to give absolution to a woman till she had revealed the name of her accomplice in the sin which she had confessed. This made a great noise. But the Jesuits, supported by the archbishop and the Inquisition, braved the opinion of the public so far, that one of them, John Raminius, declared from the pulpit, as an established doctrine, “that although in general no sin of the most holy confession ought to be revealed, there may, nevertheless, be circumstances in which the confessor may oblige the penitent to discover the accomplice of the sin, or to give up the names of the persons infected with heresy, permitting him (the confessor) to denounce the person or persons to the competent tribunal.”[120]

This of itself shews clearly enough the inviolability of the secret of confession, yet we must say that these gentlemen have made great progress since, for now, without asking the penitent’s permission, they betake themselves at once to the officers of police.[121] However, it is only the sins committed against religion or politics which never fail to be disclosed; the ruffian and assassin need not apprehend that their crimes will be brought to light.