Unluckily for the Christian world, this Molina was a Jesuit; an order little beloved by the others: the Dominicans, especially, raised an outcry against his congruism.
These things being transacted in Spain, the Inquisition took cognizance of the altercation; and had they burned Molina, and a few Dominicans, there would have been an end of the matter, and, for once, this tribunal had done a good piece of service to Christendom. Concomitant concurrence and co-operating grace had a trial at Rome; but the more the parties disputed, the less understood they one another. A monk offered his mediation: but this mediator was less intelligible than the controversists.
The difficulty was not so much the putting an end to the dispute, as to know what the dispute was about. Neither party understood themselves or the other, and, in the mean time, with their free-will, mediate knowledge, complement of active virtue, &c. they ran themselves more and more into darkness.
The bickerings, at length, ceased for want of disputants, there being times when monks sacrifice every thing to indolence. All remained quiet, till one Cornelius Jansenius renewed the contest; yet, instead of inventing any thing, he only disputed behind a huge book, the author of which was named Baius. The Jesuits sollicited the Pope to condemn Cornelius, and by the dexterity of their agents at Rome, carried their point there; but in other parts of Europe, it went against them. The universities, the parliaments, and chiefly the women, profound judges of such things, sided with Jansenius.
A paper war commenced with great acrimony; congruism, by dint of bulky volumes, worsted predestination in some pitched battles: yet the war went on undecided; both parties being now grown powerful, and fighting merely for the honour of victory.
Till then, only private persons had appeared in the field; but now universities declaring themselves, the action became general. No accommodation was so much as talked of, there being no body, or society, in the state, of a power sufficient to compel the two parties to accept of its mediation.
In the mean time, the Molinist bishops drew up a condemnation of Jansenius’s five articles, though, in the opinion of his party, they were no more than what St. Augustine himself had advanced. Several communities of men signed the condemnation; but the nuns, who have nothing to do, and eagerly catch at every opportunity which may bring them into the world again, protested against subscribing; and those of Port Royal distinguished themselves by their firmness, or obstinacy.
I do not wonder that they refused subscribing, but am surprised that their subscription should have been required; it was shewing them a regard, on this affair, which ought not to have been shewn them: on their pertinacious refusal, they were forcibly removed, and dispersed into other convents; whereas the real punishment would have been to have kept them always in the same spot.
The Popes, likewise, from time to time, issued new formularies, which gave an air of greater moment to the quarrel; but they had done much better to have left it to itself, and then Molina and Jansenius would soon have sunk into oblivion; but the court of Rome is ever for being absolute.
In the midst of this war, however, a truce was brought about. Clement IX. a man of good sense and prudence, drew up a set of articles of capitulation, had them signed by the Jansenists, and thus, brought about a peace; but, unhappily, when religion is in the case, war soon kindles again.