What a poor idea these two generals give of the authority, the prestige exercised by them over the Community! what a contrast with their predecessors! How different would Loyola, Lainez, or even Acquaviva have acted! When a General of the Order, aware of the evils which have invaded the Society, can find no remedy but in complaints, the Society must inevitably perish; and so it happened to the Jesuits.
Piccolomini, who succeeded Caraffa in 1649, and Gottifredi, who succeeded this last in 1652, were men without any energy or capacity, perhaps less jealous than the two former Generals of the purity and morality of the order; and, in their short administrations, they could do nothing but witness its increasing corruption.
Here it is to be remarked, that in the election of the General, the choice of the congregation now invariably fell upon a person without character or authority, that the fathers might have no master over them; and when the next General, Goswin Nickel, attempted to assert, in part, his authority, he was soon made aware that the times of Loyola and Acquaviva were gone by.
Nickel, elected General in 1652, was a rude and obstinate man. He did not, indeed, contemplate any very deep or searching reforms; he suffered things to proceed, on the whole, as they had previously done; but it was his habit to insist on the observance of his orders with peculiar obstinacy, without having any regard to the feelings of others, and he offended so grievously the self-love of the aristocratic part of the Society, that the General Congregation of 1661 adopted measures against him, such as, from the monarchical character of the institution, could hardly have been supposed possible.[312] The Congregation, desirous of setting Nickel aside, and yet unwilling to pronounce a deposition, applied to the Pope for permission to elect a vicar-general, and Innocent X. not only granted their request, but pointed out for the office his friend Oliva, who was accordingly elected. Then the Congregation, having decided that the vicar-general should possess a primitive power, independent of the General, the authority of the latter was wholly superseded, and entirely transferred to the vicar; so that, when some Jesuits went to pay their respects to Nickel, he, in a lamentable tone, said to them, “I find myself here entirely abandoned, and have no longer power to do anything.”[313]
It is curious, if not instructive (the veracity of the Jesuit historians being very well known), to listen to Crétineau’s account of this transaction. “Nickel,” says the French historian, “felt that he was growing old, that his infirmities no longer permitted him to govern with the required vigour; he begged of the Jesuits to discharge him from a responsibility too great for him, by giving him an assistant; and they acceded to his prayers.”[314] Nickel survived his disgrace three years, and Oliva became General.
Oliva was descended from a noble family of Genoa, where his grandfather and his uncle had respectively been Doge of the republic. In Oliva the Jesuits found at last a chief according to their hearts. He worshipped a repose interrupted only by political intrigues, and the pleasures of the table.[315] He spent a great part of his time in the delicious villa near Albano, where he occupied himself with the cultivation of the rarest exotics. When in Rome, he retired to the noviciate of St Andrea, where he seldom condescended to give audience. He never went out on foot. He lived in a most sumptuously and elegantly adorned apartment, enjoying the pleasures of a table furnished with the most select delicacies, such as would have tempted the appetite of a Vitellius.[316] He was only studious of enjoying the position he held, and the power he had obtained. Reserving for his particular attention matters of political importance, he left the affairs of the Society to the entire management of subordinate officials; and from that moment it may be said that every individual (we speak of persons of some consequence, for in every society there are simpletons always ready for obedience) became, in a great measure, his own master. Not that the interests of the Society were neglected; on the contrary, they were never so prosperous.
The members of every religious community are individually great in proportion to the greatness of the society to which they belong, and the esteem in which it is held by the public. This of itself induces every individual member to seek with all his powers the aggrandisement and the splendour of his order; and if this is true of any other association, it is pre-eminently so of the Society of Jesus. The Jesuits of the seventeenth century worshipped the Order with as much idolatry as their predecessors, and, to serve it, were always ready to act the part of hypocrites, deceivers, perjurers, miscreants; but every one served it (except in great general emergencies, in which they all acted in union) according to his own views and his own affections, some of them assuming even an absolute independence; as, for example, Annat, Lachaise, Letellier, &c.
Under Oliva’s government, the Society acquired an immense political importance. Some years before his death, Oliva published his correspondence, which extended to almost all the monarchs of Europe, in which, indeed, he shews himself a consummate politician, and deeply engaged in most serious and important affairs. This already awakened some interest, and made people look upon the Order as a good auxiliary in political intrigues. Besides, the fact that the Jesuits were confessors to all the Roman Catholic sovereigns, and that through them the General had it in his power to become acquainted with the most secret dispositions and plans of these sovereigns, rendered his friendship of inestimable value, and an object to be eagerly sought for by the most potent princes. Again, the confessor, having less or more, but always a great influence over his royal penitent, became also a great personage in the country where he exercised his functions. Annat was a mediator between the great king and the Pope; and Alexander VII. thanked him for his good offices by a brief.[317] Lachaise and Letellier were possessed of still more power than Annat. The Court of Rome itself, at such an epoch, was obliged to succumb to the influence of the Order; and if any Pope, in an unlucky moment, ventured to oppose them in any of their contrivances, he was soon obliged to retract his orders, and to confess implicitly that he had done wrong. The Jesuits call this epoch the golden age of their Society; but we should rather call it the iron one, since it was during this epoch of splendour and glory that they departed furthest from the principles of their institution, and so prepared their own ruin. Possessed of very great wealth, enjoying an immense credit and influence with all classes of society, they yielded to the temptations peculiar to such a situation; and, disregarding every rule of prudence, and the restraints of public opinion, they gave themselves up to the lust of power and riches—prosecuting their ambitious projects by the most questionable means, and thinking of nothing else but reaping the advantage of the position they had attained. As few dared now to oppose them, and as the people were silent on their vices, they thought that these vices were now overlooked; and this encouraged them still more to persist in their reprehensible conduct. It was during the seventeenth century that the Jesuits, lifting up for a while the thick veil of hypocrisy under which they had perpetrated their crimes, allowed the world to penetrate into the heart of their conduct, and to discover what they really were. In vain, when they perceived they were known, did they pull down the veil again. Their faces had been observed, and ever after they were to be recognised, under whatever mask they attempted to conceal themselves. It was during the seventeenth century that they gave to their traffic a scandalous development, and that they set themselves up as dangerous rivals to the largest establishments. It was during the seventeenth century that they set all the other religious orders at defiance, and awakened in them sentiments of hatred and jealousy, which are not yet extinguished. It was during the seventeenth century that they abused, more scandalously than ever, the credulity of their votaries. The example which we are going to quote in this particular will serve for many.
Among the manuscripts in the British Museum, there is a passport given by the Jesuits in 1650, for the consideration of 200,000 florins (£10,000), to Hippolite Braem of Ghent, promising to defend him against all infernal powers that might make attempts upon his person, soul, or goods. Here is a translation of this strange document:—