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Bible Encyclopedias
Jesui, Jesuite
Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature
or (Numbers 26:44). (See ISHUI), 1.
Jesuits,
or the Society of Jesus (Societas Jesu), the most celebrated among the monastic institutions of the Roman Catholic Church.
I. Foundation of the Order. — It was founded by the Spanish nobleman Don Inigo (Ignatius) of Loyola (q.v.). Thirst for glory caused him at an early age to enter the army. Having been wounded, May 20, 1521, during the siege of Pamplona by the French, he turned during the slow progress of his recovery from his former favorite reading of knights' novels to the study of the life of Jesus and the saints. His heated imagination suggested to him an arena in which even greater distinction could be won than in military life, and he resolved henceforth to devote his life to the service of God and of the Church. Having recovered, he first went to the Benedictine abbey of Montserrat, where after a general confession, he took the vow of chastity, hung up his sword and dagger on the altar, and then proceeded to Manresa, where, after a short stay in the hospital, he hid himself in a rocky cavern near the town, in order to devote himself wholly to prayer and ascetic exercises. Here he is believed to have made his first draft of the "Spiritual Exercises" (Exercitia Spiritualia), a work which in 1548 a brief of pope Paul III warmly commended to all the faithful, and to which the thorough soldier-like discipline that characterizes the order of the Jesuits, and the ultra papal system of which they have been the pioneers, are greatly due. As Ignatius himself subsequently states, the idea of a new religious order which was to take a front rank under the banner of Christ in the combat against the prince of darkness likewise originated with him at this time. During a brief pilgrimage which Ignatius made in 1523 to Palestine, he became aware that he utterly lacked the necessary literary qualification for carrying out the plans which he had conceived. Accordingly, when he had returned to Spain, he entered a grammar school at Barcelona, and subsequently visited the universities of Alcala and Salamanca, and at last went to Paris, where he studied from 1528 to 1535, and in 1533 acquired the title of doctor of philosophy.
In Paris Ignatius gradually gathered around himself the first members of the order he intended to found. His first associates were Lefevre (Petrus Faber), from Savoy, Francis of Xavier, from Navarre, and the Spaniards Jacob Lainez, Alfons Salmeron, Nicolaus Bobadilla, and Simon Rodriguez. They were for the first time called together by Ignatius in July, 1534, and soon after, on August 15, the festival of the Assumption of Mary, they took the vows of poverty, chastity, and of making a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, in order to labor in the Holy Land for the conversion of the infidels. In case they should be unable to carry out this project within one year after their arrival in Venice, they would go to Rome and place themselves at the disposal of the pope. On Jan. 6, 1537, Ignatius was joined in Venice by all of his disciples and three more Frenchmen — Le Jay, Codure, and Brouet. All took, two months later, holy orders, but their plan to go to Jerusalem they could not execute, as the republic of Venice was at war with sultan Soleiman II. They consequently went to Rome to await the orders of the pope. Paul III received them kindly, gave to Faber and Lainez chairs in the Sapienza, and requested Ignatius to labor as a city missionary for the improvement of the religious life. In March 1538, the other associates also arrived in Rome, and it was now formally resolved to establish a new religious order. Ignatius was elected to submit their plan to the pope, and to obtain his sanction. This was given on Sept. 27, 1540, in the bull Regimini Militantis ecclesioe, which, however, restricted the number of professi to forty. Three years later (March 14, 1543), another bull, Injunctum Nobis, removed this restriction. Reluctantly Ignatius accepted the dignity of the first general of the order, to which he had been unanimously elected. He entered upon his office on April 17, 1541; and soon after, in accordance with the request of Paul III, the draft of the constitution of the new order was made by him (not, as is often maintained, by Lainez; see Genelli, Leben des heil. Ignatius, p. 212). Before being finally sanctioned, the constitution was to undergo several revisions; but before these were made, Ignatius died, July 31, 1556.
II. Constitutions and Form of Government. — The laws regulating the order are contained in the so-called Institutum (official edition, Prague, 1757, 2 vols.; new edit. Avignon, 1827-38). The work opens with a collection of all the bulls and decrees of the apostolic see concerning the new society. This is followed by a list of the privileges which have been granted to the order, and by the General Examination, which serves as an introduction to the constitutions, and is laid before every applicant for admission. The most important portion of the code, the constitutions, consists of ten chapters, to each of which are added explanations (Declarationes), which, according to the intentions of the founder, are to be equally valid as the constitutions. Next follow the decrees and canons of the general congregations; the plan of studies (Ratio Studiorum), which, however, in 1832 was considerably changed by the general John Roothahn; the decrees of the generals (Ordinationes Generalium), as they were revised by the eighth General Congregation in 1615; and, in conclusion, by three ascetic writings — the Industrioe ad curandos animoe morbos of general Claudius Aquaviva, the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius, and the Directorium, an official instruction for the right use of these exercises. At the head of the order is a general (Proepositus Generalis), who is elected for life, must reside at Rome, and is only subject to the pope. His power is unlimited, as the Council of Assistants has only a deliberative vote. He is, however, bound to the constitutions, which he can neither change nor set aside.
The constitution provides for the deposition of a general in particular cases by the General Congregation, but the case has not yet occurred. For the administration of the provinces into which the order is divided the general appoints provincials for the term of three years. Several provinces are united into an assistentia, which is represented in the council of the general by an assistant. There were in 1871 five assistants for Italy, France, Spain, England, and Germany. The assistants are appointed by the General Congregation, but in case of the death or a long absence of an assistant the general can substitute another, with the consent of the majority of the provincials. Subordinate to the provincial are the praepositi, who govern the houses of the professed, and the rectors, who govern the colleges and the novitiates. They are likewise appointed by the general. At the head of the minor establishments (residentioe) are "superiors." Each of these officers has by his side a consultor to advise, and a monitor to watch and admonish him.
As in every religious order, the members are divided into priests and lay brothers (Coadjutores temporales). The latter take the simple vows after a two-years' novitiate, and the solemn vows after having been in the order for at least ten years. Those candidates who, on entering the order, leave their future employment entirely to the disposition of their superiors, are called Indifferentes; but, according to a decree of the General Congregation, their final destination must be assigned to them at least within two years. The candidates for the priesthood are, during the first two years, Novitii scholastici; then, after binding themselves to the order by taking simple vows, they become Scholastici approbati, devote themselves for several years to classical and philosophical studies, and are for some time employed as teachers or educators in the colleges, before they begin the study of theology, which lasts for four years. After the completion of the theological course they are ordained priests, and now enter into a third novitiate, the sole object of which is to increase their zeal. At the end of this novitiate the candidate is admitted to the solemn profession of the vows, and enrolled either in the class of the professed or that of the spiritual coadjutors. Only the former class, the professed, who take the fourth vow of an unconditional obedience to the pope, possess the full rights of members of the society.
The professed of a province every third year meet in a provincial congregation, and out of their midst choose a procurator, who has to make a report on the affairs and condition of the province to the general. On the death of a general the Provincial Congregation elects two deputies, who, together with the provincials, constitute the General Congregation, which elects the new general. In this General Congregation the supreme legislative power is vested; it can be called together on extraordinary occasions by the general, and, in case the latter neglects his duty, by the assistants. Thus the order bears the aspect of military aristocracy, and never, during the whole history of the Church of Rome, have the popes had in their service a body of men so thoroughly disciplined. "Before any one could become a member, he was severely and appropriately tested in the novitiate. Of the actual members, only a few choice spirits reached the perfect dignity of the professed, from whom alone were chosen the principal officers, the superiors and the provincials, constituting a well-organized train of authorities up to the general. Every individual was powerful in his appropriate sphere, but in every act he was closely watched and guarded lest he should transcend his proper limits. So perfect was the obedience inculcated by a long course of discipline, and strengthened by every spiritual means, that a single arbitrary but inflexible will controlled every movement of the order in all parts of the world. Although every individual possessed no more will of his own than the particular members of the human body, he expected to be placed in precisely that position in which his talents would be best developed for the common benefit: in exercises of monastic devotion, in literary and scientific pursuits, in the secular life of courts, or in strange adventures and eminent offices among savage nations" (Hase, Church History, § 383).
III. History from 1540 to 1750. — On the death of Ignatius the General Congregation could not meet immediately, as the Spaniards, who were at war with the pope, blocked up the roads to Rome. On June 19, 1557, Jacob Lainez, the most gifted member of the order, was elected the second general of the order. The constitutions were once more revised, and unanimously adopted; but the pope (Paul IV) disliked several of its provisions, and in particular wished to have the general elected for a term of only three years, and an observance of the canonical hours. The Jesuits had to submit in the latter points, but when the aged pope soon after died they returned to their original practice. The society spread rapidly, and numbered at the death of Lainez (Jan. 19, 1565) eighteen provinces and 130 houses. During the administration of the two following generals, the Spaniard Francis Borgia (1565-72) and the Belgian Mercurian (1572-80), the order was greatly favored by the popes, and new provinces were organized in Peru, Mexico, and Poland. The fourth General Congregation, on Feb. 19, 1581, elected as general the Neapolitan Claudius Aquaviva (1581-1615), a man of rare administrative genius, who successfully carried the society through the only internal commotion of importance through which it has passed, and who, next to its founder, has done more than any other general in molding its character.
The leading Spanish Jesuits, mortified at seeing the generalship, which they had begun to regard as a domain of their nationality, pass into the hands of an Italian, meditated an entire decentralization of the order and the hegemony of the Spaniards at the expense of the unity and the monarchical principle. The plan met with the approval of Philip II; but the energy of pope Sixtus V, who took sides with Aquaviva, foiled it. Under Clement VIII the Spaniards renewed their scheme, and the commotion produced by them became so great that in 1593 the fifth General Congregation (the first extraordinary one) was convoked. The Spaniards hoped that Aquaviva would be removed, but again their designs were defeated, and the centralistic administration of the general sustained. The administrative crisis was followed by violent doctrinal controversies. The book of the Portuguese Jesuit Molina involved the order in a quarrel with the Dominicans, and a work (published in 1599) in which the Spanish Jesuit Mariana justified tyrannicide raised a storm of indignation against the society throughout Europe, although Aquaviva, in 1614, strictly forbade all members of the order to advance this doctrine. During the administration of Aquaviva (about 1680) the order numbered 27 provinces. 21 houses of professed, 287 colleges, 33 novitiates, 96 residences, and 10,581 members. During the administration of the Roman Mutius Vitelleschi (1615-45) the order celebrated its first centenary (1640).
The eighth General Congregation, on Jan. 7, 1646, elected as general the Neapolitan Vincenz Caraffa. On January 1 of this year pope Innocent X had issued a brief, according to which a General Congregation was to be held every ninth year, and the administration of the superiors was limited to three years. The latter provision was repealed by Alexander VII (Jan. 1, 1663); the former did not take effect until 1661, as the short administration of the generals Vincenz Caraffa († June 8, 1649), Francis Piccolomini († June 17, 1651), and Aloys Gottifredi had practically suspended it. On March 17, 1652, the General Congregation for the first time elected as general a German, Goswin Nickel, of Julich, to whom, on account of his great age, the eleventh Congregation, on June 7, 1661, gave Paul Oliva as coadjutor, with the right of succession. Oliva was general for more than seventeen years, and was succeeded by the Belgian Noyelle (1682-86) and the Spaniard Thyrsus Gonzalez (1687-1705). Pope Innocent XI was unfavorable to the order, and in 1684 the Congregation of the Propaganda forbade it to receive any more novices; but in 1686 this decree was cancelled by Innocent himself. Gonzalez caused considerable excitement by publishing a work against the doctrine of Probabilism, which had been generally taught by the theologians of the society. He was succeeded by the generals Tamburini (1706-30), Retz (1730-50), Visconti (1751-55), Centurione (1755-57), Ricci (175873); under the latter the order was suppressed (1773). The order during all this time had steadily, though not rapidly increased in strength. It numbered in 1720, 5 assistants, 37 provinces, 24 houses of professed, 612 colleges, 59 novitiates, 340 residences, 157 seminaries, 200 missions, and 19,998 members, among whom were 9957 priests. In 1762, the order had increased to 39 provinces, 669 colleges, 61 novitiates, 176 seminaries, 335 residences, 223 missions, and 22,787 members, among whom were 11,010 priests.
Soon after the establishment of the order, the pope, the bishops, and those monarchs who were opposed to the Reformation recognized the Jesuits as the most efficient organization for saving the old Church. Thus the spread of the order was rapid. At the Council of Trent the Spanish ambassadors declared that their king, Philip II, knew only two ways to stay the advance of the Reformation, the education of good preachers, and the Jesuits. Calls were consequently received from various countries for members of the order, but, as they not only opposed Protestantism, but defended the most excessive claims of the popes with regard to secular governments, they soon encountered a violent resistance on the part of those governments which refused a servile submission to the dictates of the papacy. In many cases the bishops sided against them, as the Jesuits were found to be always ready to extend the papal at the cost of the episcopal authority. This was especially the case in the republic of Venice, where the patriarch Trevisani showed himself their decided opponent. Subsequently, when they defended the interdict which Paul V had pronounced against Venice, they were expelled (in 1606), and not until 1656 did pope Alexander VII succeed in obtaining from the republic a reluctant consent to their return. At the beginning of the 18th century the Piedmontese viceroy in Sicily, Maffei, expelled them from that island, because they were again the most eager among the clergy to enforce a papal interdict. Nowhere did the order render to the Church of Rome so great services as in Germany and the northern countries of Europe, where Protestantism had become predominant. While taking part in all the efforts against the spread of Protestantism, they labored with particular zeal for the establishment of educational institutions, and for gaining the confidence of the princes. In both respects they met with considerable success. Their colleges at Ingolstadt, Munich, Vienna, Prague. Cologne, Treves, Mentz, Augsburg, Ellwangen, and other places became highly prosperous, and attracted a large number of pupils, especially from the aristocratic families, most of whom remained throughout life warm supporters of all the schemes of the order. Under emperor Rudolph II the Jesuits established themselves in all parts of Germany. At most of the courts Jesuits were confessors of the reigning princes, and invariably used the influence thus gained for the adoption of forcible measures against Protestantism.
At the instigation of the Jesuits a counter reformation was forcibly carried through in a number of provinces in which Protestantism, before their arrival, appeared to be sure of success. Thus, in particular, Austria, Syria, Bavaria, or Baden, were either gained back by them or preserved for the Church of Rome, and from 1648 to 1748 they are said to have persuaded no less than forty-five princes of the empire to join the Roman Catholic Church. As advisors of the princes, they became to so high a degree involved in political affairs that frequently even the generals of the order and the popes deemed it necessary to recommend to them a greater caution. They were called into Hungary by the archbishop of Gran as early as 1561, but there, as well as in Transylvania, the vicissitudes of the religious wars for a long time prevented them from gaining a firm footing. When, however, the policy of the Austrian government finally succeeded in breaking the strength of the Protestant party, the Jesuits became all powerful. In 1767 they had in these two countries 18 colleges, 20 residences, 11 missionary stations, and 990 members.
In Poland, Petrus Canisius appeared in 1558 at the Diet of Petrikau; about twenty years later the favor of king Stephen Bathori empowered the Jesuits to found a number of colleges, and to secure the education of nearly the whole aristocracy. John Casimir, the brother of Vladislav IV, even entered the order on Sept. 25,1643, and, although not yet ordained priest, was appointed cardinal in 1647; yet, after the death of his brother, he became king of Poland (1648-68). The Jesuit Possevin was in 1581 sent as ambassador of Gregory XIII to Ivan IV of Russia, and subsequently the Jesuit Vota made a fruitless attempt to unite the Greek with the Roman Catholic Church. Peter the Great, in 1714, expelled the few Jesuits who at that time were laboring in his dominions. In Sweden, in 1578, the Jesuits induced the king, John III, to make secretly a profession of the Roman Catholic faith; and queen Christina, the daughter of Gustavus Adolphus, was likewise prevailed upon in 1654, by the Jesuits Macedo and Casati, to join the Church of Rome; but, with regard to the people at large, the efforts of the Jesuits were entirely fruitless. To England, Salmeron and Brouet were sent by Ignatius. They were unable to prevent the separation of the English Church from Rome, but they confirmed James V of Scotland in the Roman Catholic faith, encouraged the people of Ireland in their opposition to the English king and the Anglican reformation, and, having returned to the Continent, established several colleges for the education of Roman Catholic priests for England. Elizabeth expelled all the Jesuits from her dominions, and forbade them, upon penalty of death, to return.
During her reign the Jesuit Campion was put to death. In 1605 father Garnet was executed, having been charged with complicity in the Gunpowder Plot, which had been communicated to him in the confessional. In 1678 the Jesuits were accused by Titus Oates of having entered into a conspiracy against Charles II and the state, in consequence of which six members of the order were put to death. The first Jesuits who were brought to the Netherlands were some Spanish members of the order, who, during the war between France and Charles V, were ordered to leave France. The bishops showed them, on the whole, less favor than in the other countries, and the magistrates in the cities, on whose consent the authorization to establish colleges was made contingent, generally opposed them; but they overcame the opposition, and in the southern provinces (Belgium) soon became more numerous and influential than in most of the other European countries. They attracted great attention by their attacks upon Bajus and the Jansenists, both of whom were condemned at Rome at their instigation. In the northern provinces (Holland) stringent laws were repeatedly passed against them, and they were charged with the assassination of William of Orange, as well as with the attempt against the life of Maurice of Nassau, but both charges were indignantly denied by the order. In France, where the Jesuits established a novitiate at Paris as early as 1540, they encountered from the beginning the most determined opposition of the University and the Parliament, and the bishop of Paris forbade them to exercise any priestly functions. In 1550 the cardinal of Lorraine obtained for them a favorable patent from Henry II, but the Parliament refused to record it. In 1561 Lainez received from the Synod of Poissy the concession that the Jesuits should be permitted to establish themselves at Paris under the name of "Fathers of the College of Clermont."
This college, which was sanctioned by Charles IX in 1565, and by Henry III in 1580, attained a high degree of prosperity, and in the middle of the 17th century numbered upwards of 2000 pupils. In the south of France the Jesuits gained a greater influence than in the north, and were generally regarded as the leaders in the violent struggle of the Catholic party for the arrest and suppression of Calvinism. They were closely allied with the Ligue, but general Aquaviva disapproved the openness of this alliance, and removed fathers Matthieu and Sommier, who had been chiefly instrumental in bringing about the alliance, to Italy and Belgium. The Jesuit Toletus brought about the reconciliation between the Ligue and Henry IV, who remained a warm protector of the order. Nevertheless, Jesuits were charged with the attempts made upon the life of Henry by Chastel (1594) and Ravaillac (1610), as they had before been charged with complicity in the plot of Clement (1589) against Henry III. The Parliament of Paris instituted, accordingly, proceedings against the Jesuit Guignard, who had been the instructor of Chastel, sentenced him to death, deprived the Jesuits of their goods, and exiled them from France. Henry IV was, however. prevailed upon to recall them, continued to be their protector, and again chose a Jesuit as his confessor. The same office was filled by members of the order during nearly the whole reigns of Louis XIII, Louis XIV, and Louis XV, and through the royal confessors the order therefore did not cease to exercise a very conspicuous influence upon the policy of the kings both at home and abroad. The connivance of these confessors with the scandalous lives of the kings did more than anything else to undermine the respect for the Roman Catholic Church, and for religion in general, among the educated classes.
To Rome, however, they rendered invaluable services by heading the opposition against Louis XIV and the bishops when the latter conjointly tried to enforce throughout the Catholic Church of France submission to the four Gallican articles, and after effecting a full reconciliation between Rome and Louis, by securing the aid of the secular arm for arresting the progress and averting a victory of Jansenism, which had obtained full control of the best intellects in the Church of France. In Spain, which had been the cradle of the order, its success was remarkably rapid. As early as 1554 three provinces of the order (Castile, Aragon, and Andalusia) had been organized. They were, however, opposed by the learned Melchior Canus; in Saragossa they were expelled by the archbishop, and the Inquisition repeatedly drew them before their tribunal as suspected of heresy. But the royal favor of the three Philips (Philip II, III, and IV) kept their influence unimpaired. In Portugal, Francis Xavier and Simon Rodriguez visited Lisbon on their way to India. They were well received by the king, and Rodriguez was induced to remain, and became the founder of a province, which soon belonged to the most prosperous of the order.
IV. Suppression of the Order (1750-73). — In the middle of the 18th century the order was at the zenith of its power. As confessors of most of the reigning prince and a large number of the first aristocratic families, and as the instructors and educators of the children, they wielded a controlling influence on the destinies of most of the Catholic states. At the same time they had amassed great wealth, which they tried to increase by bold commercial speculations. Both influence and wealth they used with untiring energy, and with a consistency of which the history of the world hardly knows a parallel, for the development of their ultra papal system. In point of doctrine, extermination of Protestantism, and every form of belief opposed to the Church of Rome, and within the Church blind and immediate submission to the doctrinal decision of the infallible pope; in point of ecclesiastical polity, the weakening of the episcopal for the benefit of the papal authority, the defense of the most exorbitant claims of the popes with regard to secular government, and a controlling influence upon the popes by the order — these were the prominent features of the Jesuit system. As the Jesuits were anxious to crush out everything opposed to the Roman Catholic system, as they understood it, it was natural that all these elements should, in self defense, combine for planning the destruction of so formidable an antagonist. As the Jesuits had attained their influential position chiefly through the favor of the princes, the same method was adopted for crushing them.
The first great victory was won against them in Portugal. Sebastian Jose Calvalho, better known under the title (which he received in 1770) of marquis of Pombal, probably the greatest statesman which Portugal has ever had, was fully convinced that commerce and industry, and all the material interests of the country, could be successfully developed only when the monarchy and the nation were withdrawn from the depressing connection with the hierarchy and the nobility, and that the first step towards effecting such a revolution was the removal of the Jesuits. Opportunities for disposing the king against the order soon offered. In Paraguay, a portion of which had in 1753 been ceded by Spain to Portugal, an insurrection of the natives broke out against the new rule. The Jesuits, according to their own accounts, had established in Paraguay a theocratic form of government, which gave them the most absolute power over the minds of the natives. They were therefore opposed to the cession of a portion of this territory to Portugal, and spared no efforts to prevent it. When, therefore, the natives rose generally in insurrection, it was the general opinion that an insurrection in a country like Paraguay was impossible without at least the connivance of the order.
The Jesuits themselves denied, however, all participation in the insurrection, and asserted that the provincial of the order in Paraguay, Barreda, in loyal compliance with the order of the general, Visconti, had endeavored to induce the natives to submit to the partition of the country. Pope Benedict XIV was prevailed upon to forbid the Jesuits to engage in commercial transactions (1758), and the patriarch of Lisbon, who was commissioned by the pope to reform them, withdrew from them all priestly functions. An attempt to assassinate the king (Sept. 3, 1758) supplied an occasion for impeaching them of high treason, as the duke of Aveiro, when tortured, named two Jesuits as his accomplices. The two accused denied the guilt, and the writers of the order generally represent the whole affair as arranged by Pombal in order to give him a new pretext for criminal proceedings against the order. On Sept. 3, 1759, a royal decree forever excluded the order from Portugal and confiscated its property. Most of the members were, on board of government ships, sent to Italy; and one of their prominent members, Malagrida, was in 1761 burned at the stake. The pope, in vain, had interceded for them; the nuncio had to leave the country in 1760, and all connection with Rome was broken off.
In France the numerous enemies of the order found a welcome opportunity for arousing public opinion against it in the commercial speculations of the Jesuit Lavalette, the superior of the mission of Martinique. When, in the war between France and England, his ships were captured, his creditors applied for payment to father De Sacy, the procurator general of all the Jesuit missions in Paris. He satisfied them, and instructed Lavalette to abstain from speculations in future. When Lavalette disregarded these instructions, and when, consequently, new losses occurred, amounting to 2,400,000 livres, Sacy refused to hold himself responsible. The creditors applied to the Parliament, whose jurisdiction was (1760) recognized by the Jesuits. The Parliament demanded a copy of the constitution of the order for examination. On April 18, 1761, a decree of Parliament suppressed the congregations of the Jesuits; on May 8 the whole order was declared to be responsible for the debt of Lavalette; on August 6 the constitution of the order was declared to be an encroachment upon Church and State, twenty- four works of Jesuit authors were burned as heretical and dangerous to good morals, and the order was excluded from educational institutions. A protest from the king (Aug. 29, 1761), who annulled these decrees of the Parliament for one year, was as unavailing as the intercession of the majority of the French bishops and of pope Clement XIII. Other Parliaments of France followed the example given by the Paris Parliament: on April 1, 1762, eighty colleges of the order were closed; and on August 6 a decree of the Parliament of Paris declared the constitution of the Jesuits to be godless, sacrilegious, and injurious to Church and State, and the vows of the order to be null and void. In the beginning of 1764 all the members were ordered to forswear their vows, and to declare that their constitution was punishable, abominable, and injurious. Only five complied with this order; among them father Cerutti, who two years before had written the best apology of the order. On Nov. 26, 1764, Choiseul obtained the sanction of the king for a decree which banished the Jesuits from France as dangerous to the state. Clement XIII, the steadfast friend of the order, replied to the royal decree on Jan. 8, 1765, by the bull Apostolicam, in which he again approved the order and its constitution.
In Spain, Aranda, the minister of Charles III, was as successful as Pombal in Portugal and Choiseul in France. During the night from Sept. 2 to Sept. 3, 1768, all the Jesuits of the kingdom, about 6000 in number, were seized and transported to the papal territory. When the pope refused to receive them, they were landed in Corsica, where they remained a few months, until, in 1768, that island was annexed to France. They were then again expelled, and this time found refuge in the papal territory. In Naples from 3000 to 4000 Jesuits were seized in the night from Nov. 3 to 4,1767, by order of the regent Tanucci, the guardian of the minor Ferdinand IV, and likewise transported to the States of the Church. The government of Parma seized the Jesuits on Feb. 7, 1768, because the pope, claiming to be the feudal sovereign of Parma, had issued a brief declaring an order of the Parmese government (the Pragmatic Sanction of Jan. 16, 1768) null and void, and excommunicating its authors. All the Bourbon courts took sides in this question with Parma, forbade the publication of the papal brief, and when Clement XIII refused to repeal it, France occupied Avignon, and the government of Naples Benevent and Pontecorvo. At the same time, the grand master of the Knights of St. John, Fonseca, was induced to seize the Jesuits of Malta and transport them to the Papal States. When Clement XIII, who had steadfastly refused the demand of the Bourbons to abolish the order of the Jesuits for the whole Church, died, on Feb. 2, 1769, there was a severe struggle in the conclave between the friends (Zelanti) and the enemies of the Jesuits. The demands of the French and Spanish ambassadors to pledge the new pope that he would abolish the order were firmly repelled by the College of Cardinals; but, on the other hand, the ambassadors succeeded in securing the election of cardinal Ganganelli (Clement XIV), who, while before the election he was regarded by both parties as a friend, soon disclosed an intention to sacrifice the hated order to the combined demands and threats of the Bourbon courts. The reconciliation with the courts of Portugal and Parma was obtained by making to them great concessions; the brother of Pombal was appointed cardinal; the general of the Jesuits, Ricci, was alone, among all the generals of religious orders, excluded from the usual embrace; and when he solicited the favor of an audience he was twice refused. Papal letters to Louis XV (Sept. 30, 1769) and Charles III (Nov. 20) admitted the guilt of the Jesuits and the necessity of abolishing the order, but asked for delay. When, on July 4, 1772, the mild Azpura had been succeeded as ambassador of Spain by the more energetic Joseph Monino (subsequently count of Florida Blanca), other measures against the order followed in more rapid succession. In September the Roman college was closed, in November the college at Frascati. At last the brief Dominus ac Redemptor noster (which had been signed on July 21, at three o'clock in the morning) announced on August 16 to the whole world the abolition of the order, on the ground that the peace of the Church required such a step.
IV. From the Abolition of the Order until its Restoration, 1773-1814. — The suppression of the order in the city of Rome was carried through with particular severity by a committee of five cardinals and two prelates, all of them violent enemies of the order. The general, Ricci, his five assistants, and several other Jesuits, were thrown into prison, where they had to remain for several years. Pius VI confirmed the decree of abolition, and did not dare to release the imprisoned Jesuits; when, finally, they were released, they had to promise to observe silence with regard to their trial. Some of them took the demanded oath, but others refused. The general, Ricci, had previously died, Nov. 24, 1775, emphatically asserting his own and the order's innocence. The brief of abolition was received with great satisfaction in Portugal. Spain and Naples were dissatisfied because they wished a bull of excommunication (as a more weighty expression of the papal sentence) instead of a brief. In Germany, where the empress Maria Theresa had long opposed the abolition of the order, the brief was promulgated, but the Jesuits, after laying down the habit of the order, were allowed to live together in their former colleges as societies of secular priests. In France the brief was not officially promulgated, and the Jesuits, otherwise so ultra papal in their views of the validity of papal briefs, now inferred from this circumstance that the order had not been abolished in France at all. In Prussia Frederick II forbade the promulgation of the brief, and in 1775 obtained permission from Pius VI to leave the Jesuits undisturbed.
Soon, however, to please the Bourbon courts, the Prussian Jesuits were requested to lay aside the dress of the order, and Frederick William II abolished all their houses. In Russia Catharine II also forbade the promulgation of the brief, and ordered the Jesuits to continue their organization. The Jesuits reasoned that, since the brief in Rome itself had not been published in due form, they had a right to comply with the imperial request until the brief should be communicated to them by the bishops of the dioceses. This official communication was never made, and Clement XIV himself, in a secret letter to the empress, permitted the continuation of the Jesuit colleges in Russia. When the archbishop of Mohilev, in 1779, authorized the Jesuits to open a novitiate, Pius VI was prevailed upon by the Bourbon courts to represent the step taken by the Russian bishop as unauthorized; orally, however, as the Jesuits maintain, he repeatedly confirmed what officially he had disowned. Thus the Jesuits attempt to clear themselves from the charge of having disobeyed the pope, by charging the latter with deliberate duplicity. The Russian Jesuits were placed under the vice-generals Czerniewicz (1782-85), Lienkiewicz (1785- 98), and Careu (1799-1802). The brief of Clement XIV was in 1801 repealed by Pius VII, so far as Russia was concerned, and the next superior of the Russian Jesuits, Gabriel Gruber (1802-5), assumed the title of a general for Russia, and since July 31, 1804, also for Naples. The successor of Gruber, Brzozowski (1805-20), lived to see the restoration of the order by the pope. Soon after (1815) the persecution of the order began in Russia; Dec. 20, 1815, they were expelled from St. Petersburg, in 1820 from all Russia. In other countries of Europe the ex-Jesuits had formed societies which were to serve as substitutes of the abolished order. In Belgium the ex-Jesuits De Broglie and Tournely established in 1794 the Society of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, which, after its expulsion from Belgium, established its center in Austria. In accordance with the wish of the pope, and through the mediation of archbishop Migazzi, of Vienna, this society, under the successor of Tournely († 1797), father Varin, united, on April 8, 1799, with the Baccanarists (q.v.), or Fathers of the Faith of Jesus. Under this name Baccanari (or Paccanari), a layman of Trent, had, in union with several ex-Jesuits, established in 1798 a society in Italy, which, after the union with the Society of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, made considerable progress in Italy, France, Germany, and England. Most of the members hoped gradually to smooth the way for a reunion with the Jesuits in Russia; but as Baccanari, who in the meanwhile had become a priest, did not appear to be in sincere sympathy with this project, he was abandoned by many members and by whole houses. In 1807 he was even arrested by order of Pius VII, but the French liberated him in 1809, since which year he entirely disappears. The last house of the society, that of St. Sylvester, in Rome, joined the restored Jesuits in 1814.
V. History of the Order from its Restoration in 1814 to 1871. — Soon after his return from the French captivity, Pius VII promulgated (Aug. 7, 1814) the bull Sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum, by which he restored the order of the Jesuits for the whole earth. Father Panizzone, in the name of the general of the order, Brozowski, who resided in Russia, received back from the pope the church Al Gesu, in Rome. When Brozowski died, the order had to pass through a severe trial. The vicar general, father Petrucci, in union with father Pietroboni, tried to curtail the electoral freedom of the General Congregation, and his plans were supported by cardinal Della Genga; but the other members invoked the intervention of the pope, and, freedom of election having been secured, elected as general father Fortis, of Verona (1820-29), who was succeeded by father Roothan, of Amsterdam (1829-53), and father Becks, a Belgian (elected July 2, 1853). Within a few years after the restoration the order had again established itself in all parts of Italy. Ferdinand III, in 1815, called them to Modena; and the ex-king of Sardinia, Emanuel IV, entered the order in 1815; he died in 1819. The fear which the election of cardinal Della Genga as pope in 1823 caused to the order proved to be ungrounded, for the new pope (Leo XII) was henceforth the warm patron of the Jesuits, and restored to them the Roman college (1824). They were expelled from Naples and Piedmont in consequence of the revolutionary movements in 1820 and 1821, but were soon restored. In 1836 they were admitted to the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom, and in Verona cardinal Odescalchi in 1838 entered the novitiate, but died in 1841.
General Roothan witnessed the expulsion of the Jesuits from all Italy, and even from Rome, in 1848, but he lived to see their restoration in Naples and Rome in 1850. The war of 1859 again destroyed the provinces of Naples and Sicily; in 1866 also Venice. In Spain, Ferdinand VII, by decree of May 15, 1815, declared the charges which former Spanish governments had made against the Jesuits false. The revolution of 1820 drove them from their houses, and on Nov. 17, 1822, twenty-five of them were killed; but when the insurrection was in 1824 subdued by the French, the Jesuits returned. In the civil war of 1834 they were again expelled; in Madrid a fearful riot was, excited against them by the report that they had poisoned the wells, and fourteen were massacred. On July 7, 1835, the order was abolished in the Spanish dominions by a decree of the Cortes. Since 1848 they began silently to return, but the law, which had not been repealed, was again enforced against them by the revolution of 1858. Only in Cuba they remained undisturbed. To Portugal the Jesuits were recalled by Dom Miguel in 1829, and in 1832 they received the college of Coimbra, where they numbered the great-grandson of Pombal among their pupils.
After the overthrow of Dom Miguel, the laws of Pombal were again enforced against them by Dom Pedro, and ever since they have been excluded from Portugal. In France a number of bishops expressed, immediately after the restoration of the order, a desire to place the boys' seminaries under their charge, and Talleyrand declared himself in favor of their legal restoration, but the king did not consent. Nevertheless, the number and the influence of the Jesuits steadily increased, and they labored with particular zeal for the restoration of the Church of Rome by means of holding "missions." They reestablished the "congregations" among the laymen, and other religious associations. In 1826 they had two novitiates, two residences, and eight colleges, the most celebrated of which was St. Acheul. La Mennais in vain endeavored to gain the Jesuits for his revolutionary ideas. As all the liberal parties, and even many Legitimists, like count Montlosier, united for combating the Jesuits, royal ordinances of July 16, 1828, took from the Jesuits all their schools, and limited the number of pupils in the boys' seminaries to 20,000. The revolution of July, 1830, dissolved all the houses of the order, and drove all the members out of France; but gradually many returned, and Ravignan, in Paris, gained the reputation of being one of the first pulpit orators of his country. On motion of Thiers, the Chamber of Deputies, in 1845, requested the government to abolish the order in France; but the government preferred to send a special ambassador (Rossi) to Rome in order to obtain the suppression of the Jesuits from the pope. Gregory XVI declined to make any direct concessions, but the general of the order deemed it best to reduce the number of members in France in order to evade the storm rising against the order. The revolution of 1848, the government of Louis Napoleon, and the revolution of 1870, left them undisturbed, and they were allowed to erect a considerable number of colleges in the four provinces into which France is divided. In England the Jesuits continued, after the abolition of the order, to live in common. In 1790 they received from Thomas Weld the castle of Stonyhurst, which soon became one of the most popular educational institutions of the English Roman Catholics. In 1803 they were allowed to join the Russian branch of the order.
In Belgium the Fathers of the Faith joined in 1814 the restored order. The Dutch government expelled the Jesuits, but they returned after the Belgian revolution of 1830, and soon became very numerous. The Jesuits who in 1820 had been expelled from Russia, came to Gallicia, and opened colleges at Tarnopol and Lemberg. Others were called to Hungary by the archbishop of Colocza, and father Landes made his appearance in Vienna. As they secured the special patronage of the emperor and the imperial family, they gained a great influence, and were, as in all other countries, regarded by the Liberal party as the most dangerous enemies of religious and civil liberty. They were therefore expelled by the revolution of 1848, but returned again when the revolutionary movement was subdued, and received from the Austrian government in 1857 the theological faculty of the University of Innspruck. To Switzerland eight Fathers of the Faith were in 1805 called from Rome by the government of Valais. They soon broke off the connection with Baccanari, and in 1810 were incorporated with the society in Russia. After the restoration of the order, they soon established colleges in other Catholic cantons, particularly in Freiburg, Lucerne, and Schwytz. When the government of the canton of Lucerne, on Oct. 24, 1844, resolved to place the episcopal seminary of the city of Lucerne under the charge of the Jesuits, two volunteer expeditions (Dec. 1844, and March 1845) were undertaken for the purpose of overthrowing the government of Lucerne, but both were unsuccessful. As most of the Protestant cantons demanded the expulsion of the Jesuits from the whole of Switzerland, those cantons which either had called Jesuits to cantonal institutions or which patronized them (namely, Lucerne, Uri, Schwytz, Unterwalden, Zug, Freiburg, and Valais) strengthened a separate alliance (the "Sonderbund"), which had already been formed in 1843, and appointed a council of war for the emergency of a civil conflict. In September, 1847, the Federal Diet decreed the dissolution of the Sonderbund and the expulsion of the Jesuits, and when the seven cantons refused submission, the Sonderbund war broke out, which, in November, 1847, ended in the defeat of the Sonderbund and the expulsion of the Jesuits. The revised federal constitution of Switzerland forbids the establishment of any Jesuit settlement. From the German States, with the exception of Austria, the Jesuits remained excluded until the revolutionary movements of 1848 established the principle of religious liberty, and gained for them admission to all the states, in particular to Prussia, where they established in rapid succession houses in Munster, Paderborn, Aix-la-Chapelle, Cologne, Bonn, Coblentz, Treves, and other cities. They gained a considerable influence on the Catholic population in particular by holding numerous missions in all parts of Germany.
The membership of the order, during the period from 1841 to 1866, increased from 3566 to 8155. At the beginning of 1867 the numerical strength of the order was as follows:
| Assistants District | Province | Members | Priests |
| 1. Italy | 1. Rome | 483 | 245 |
|
| 2. Naoles (scattered) | 352 | 194 |
|
| 3. Sicily (scattered) | 222 | 141 |
|
| 4. Turin (scattered) | 292 | 173 |
|
| 5. Venice (scattered) | 223 | 128 |
| 2. Germany | 1. Austria | 443 | 160 |
|
| 2. Belgium | 602 | 260 |
|
| 3. Gallicia | 185 | 70 |
|
| 4. Germany | 653 | 260 |
|
| 5. Holland | 263 | 95 |
| 3. France | 1. Champagne | 566 | 224 |
|
| 2. Paris | 650 | 306 |
|
| 3. Lyons | 702 | 316 |
|
| 4. Toulouse | 546 | 271 |
| 4. Spain | 1. Aragon (scattered) | 492 | 144 |
|
| 2. Castile (scattered) | 708 | 183 |
|
| 3. Mexico (scattered) | 18 | 10 |
| Copyright Statement These files are public domain. Bibliography Information
McClintock, John. Strong, James. Entry for 'Jesui, Jesuite'. Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature. https://www.studylight.org/encyclopedias/eng/tce/j/jesui-jesuite.html. Harper & Brothers. New York. 1870.  Ads FreeProfile |