I have said that they fiercely resented the attitude of Richelieu; yet, it is curious to note, they took a singular advantage of it in their own interest. One of the articles of the treaty which Richelieu made with the northern heretics provided that after their victories they should respect Jesuit settlements. Crétineau-Joly reproduces a letter in which Louis XIII. reminds his Protestant allies of this provision. The French apologist would have us believe that the agreement was distasteful to the Jesuits themselves,—on this point he quotes no documents,—but we should find it hard to conceive Richelieu making so exacting a demand of the Protestants if the Jesuits were even indifferent to it. It accords only too well with their sinuous and accommodating policy.
Their work of education proceeded in the provinces which were not ravaged by the troops; but even here they met much hostility and had some disastrous experiences. It was during this period, in 1612, that the famous Secret Counsels ("Monita Privata") came to light and drew a large amount of odium upon them. It is the general belief that this book was written by a Polish priest and ex-Jesuit, Jerome Zahorowski, whose bishop proceeded against him on that ground. Since, however, manuscript copies of the work were afterwards discovered in the Jesuit colleges at Prague, Paris, Roermond, Munich, and Paderborn, their critics submit that it was a secret code of instructions issued by the Roman authorities to their professed members, and that Zahorowski merely published what the Society had already circulated in private. This question must still remain open. The occurrence of so many manuscript copies in Jesuit colleges is singular, but it is impossible to prove that any of these were earlier than the printed edition of 1612.
If we regard the contents of the work, we find that it is, in almost every paragraph, a summary of principles and tactics on which the Jesuits actually proceeded in their pursuit of wealth and power; but there is a callousness, at times a cynicism, in this deliberate codification which makes one hesitate to think that it was written by high Jesuit officials. It seems to me that Zahorowski at least recast such instructions as were genuine, and intended to write a satire on Jesuit procedure. It is incredible that the Roman authorities should enjoin the fathers always to settle in wealthy towns, "because the aim of our Society is to imitate Christ, our Saviour, who dwelt mainly at Jerusalem," and it is difficult to believe that they expressly laid it down that "everybody must be brought into a condition of dependence on us," and that wealthy widows must "be allowed to have secret recreation with those who please them." Nearly a fourth of the book is occupied with instructions on the way to conciliate wealthy widows: notoriously, one of the chief sections of Jesuit practice. Much of the remainder is devoted to the conciliation of princes, and the drastic procedure to be taken against apostates. There are few lines which do not describe the well-known procedure of the Jesuits; but, in its actual form, at least, the work seems to be a deliberate and just satire.
A second incident which brought much odium on the Jesuits in the period occurred at Cracow. Here, as at so many places, the University, conscious that the Jesuits wished to win the control of higher education, kept a jealous eye on their school. In 1622 the fathers endeavoured to evade the restrictions placed on them by including in their celebration of the canonisation of St. Ignatius a public discussion of certain theses. The university professors and students prevented them from doing so, and a long and angry quarrel followed. In 1626 a decree of the States-General of Poland (reproduced in the Mercure Jésuite, ii. 312) closed the Jesuit school, and the University sent a formal report to Louvain and other universities, begging them to unite against the intrigues of the Jesuits. This letter, dated 29th July 1627, contains very grave charges against the Society, and considerably strengthened the opposition to them in the university towns of Europe. It complains that the Jesuits sent their pupils in arms against the university students, and, when a riot occurred, induced the King to send troops against the students. As grave trouble occurred about the same time at Louvain, Douai, Liège, Salamanca, and other universities, there was a general concentration of the professors throughout Europe in hostility to the Society. However much we may suspect partiality or exaggeration in their severe charges, it is clear that the Jesuits made unscrupulous efforts to capture the universities.
And this feeling against them was strongly reinforced by their efforts to secure the property of other monastic bodies. We saw how Ignatius himself had set an example by endeavouring to get the estates of the Benedictines in England, and how constantly this charge is made against the Society. In 1629, Ferdinand II. ordered the Protestants of his dominions to restore ecclesiastical property; and we learn from the decree of Pope Urban VIII. that the Jesuits were "the chief authors of the imperial edict." The Benedictines, Cistercians, and Premonstratensians at once began to claim their property, and were not a little agitated when the "chief authors" of the edict succeeded in getting from the Pope an order that they were to share in the division. The Emperor's confessor was, of course, a Jesuit (Lamormaini), and it is admitted by their apologist that they secured the "best part" of the restored property. To cover their lack of moral or legal title to this property, the Jesuits freely reproached the older orders with corruption and decadence, and a war of pamphlets was maintained for many years. From these publications we learn some remarkable stories of Jesuit procedure.
At Voltigerode in Saxony some Bernardine nuns had, in 1631, obtained one of the restored houses. The Jesuit fathers persuaded them that the building was unsafe, and, when the nuns retired, claimed it as "abandoned property." The nuns returned, however, and a very lively scene was witnessed. The Jesuits brought the police, and the nuns, who clung valiantly to the seats of the chapel, were physically dragged out of the building. The Cistercian monks afterwards took up the case and secured the expulsion of the Jesuits. At Prague the Jesuits coveted a handsome Cistercian abbey, and persuaded the Emperor that only a half-dozen degenerate monks occupied the vast establishment. An imperial commissary was sent, and found that there were sixty-one monks and thirteen novices in the abbey. The angry Jesuits, who accompanied the commissary, protested that the abbot had put the monastic dress on his farm-labourers; but the Cistercians held their ground and obtained the protection of the Emperor. The Vicar-General of the Order of Cluny reported a large number of these fraudulent attempts of the Jesuits to obtain the property of his monks; and we have civic and ecclesiastical documents relating to great numbers of similar cases in France, Germany, and Switzerland in the early part of the seventeenth century. [21]
When we turn to the missionary field of the Society during this period, we find a remarkable activity which would in itself merit a volume. The casuistic methods of the Jesuits are applied in a singular way to overcome the obstacles to their success, and devices are adopted from which the modern missionary, of any denomination, would shrink with astonishment. The simple fervour of a Xavier had, as we saw, early given way to more calculating methods and political intrigue, but the extent to which this diplomatic procedure was carried in the seventeenth century brought a storm of criticism upon the Jesuits. Here we have only to notice the beginning of the more unusual tactics, and we will in a later chapter consider the missions in the height of their prosperity and irregularity.
An amusing instance of this readiness to adopt questionable, and even downright dishonest, practices in the service of religion is furnished by the mission to the Hindoos. It appears that after all the hundred years of activity in India, with a free and not very delicate use of the Portuguese authority, the results were regarded as meagre and unsatisfactory. Hitherto we have heard nothing but most optimistic accounts of the work of the missionaries in India; but when the hour comes, at the beginning of the seventeenth century, for justifying a new and strange policy, the Jesuits tell us that the effect of the older policy had been slight, and that the high-caste Hindoos smiled with disdain on the crowds of ignorant natives who had, on one pretext or other, accepted baptism. In 1605 the Jesuit Robert de Nobili, an Italian of noble birth and a nephew of Bellarmine, joined the Indian mission and initiated the new policy.
Isolating himself from his colleagues before he became known in India, he made a very close study of the customs and sacred writings of the higher caste Hindoos, learned Tamil and Sanscrit, and after a few years appeared before the people of India as a member of the penitential (or highest) caste of the Saniassi. He lived apart, in a turf hut, and abstained rigorously from flesh and fish. His head was shaved, save for a single tuft of hair, and he had the yellow mark of the caste on his forehead. Dressed in a flame-coloured robe and tiger-skin, with the peculiar wooden sandals of the caste on his feet, he posed in all things as one of the devout Saniassi, and attracted the veneration of the natives. The Brahmans naturally suspected this mysterious addition to their brotherhood, and came to interrogate him. He took oath that he was of high caste,—a quite innocent thing, the Jesuit apologists say, since he was a noble by birth,—and produced a document certifying that he was the Tatuva Podagar Swami whom he pretended to be. This document was itself a gross imposture, and we may be further quite sure that the Brahmans would not pass him, as they did, until he had made very plain professions of belief in the Vedas and the Hindoo gods, and practised the idolatrous rites of his adopted caste.
For a time he lived apart, and was content to edify by the austerity of his life. Then, like his forerunner, the Swedish Jesuit Nicolai, he began to attract a few impressible Brahmans, and cautiously to initiate them to the Christian faith. Other missionaries were now aware of this action, and he was summoned to appear before the archbishop at Goa. From Goa he was, in 1618, sent to justify his conduct before the Inquisition at Rome; and many of his own brethren, including his learned uncle, were scandalised at his flame-coloured robe and painted brow. He maintained that there was no superstition whatever in the practices of the saniassi, and he actually obtained permission from the Pope to return and continue his work on the understanding that the peculiarities of his dress and the rites of his caste had no more than a civic and sanitary significance! Other members of the Society now followed his example, and the imposture continued throughout the seventeenth century. At his death in 1656 it was claimed that Robert had made 100,000 high-caste converts, and that one of his colleagues had made 30,000. In a more precise document, however, we read, at a later date, that one of the most insidious of these Jesuit saniassis baptized nine Brahmans in eight months, and that this was more than his colleagues had done in ten years. The whole questionable episode was little more than an indulgence in the romantic adventure to which his diplomatic principles always disposed the Jesuit. He instinctively loved disguise and palliated deceit. The work in India continued on the old lines. Thousands of children were stealthily baptized, to swell the lists published in Europe; the favour and wealth of the Portuguese were assiduously used; and, as we gather from the letters sent to Europe, a great deal of trickery was employed in order to make the ignorant natives believe that the Jesuits could work miracles and control devils. Coloured lights were cunningly placed at times so as to shine on their statues and altars and create a belief in miracles.