and disperse themselves so widely among professional pursuits, as to make it impossible to be believed that they were all moving on one point, and all obeying one head. Some were to counsel kings, others were to guide the consciences of ministers of state, others to lead armies, others to declaim in parliaments, and others to harangue at country fairs. They were to preach all theologies-Lutheranism, Calvinism, Arminianism, Anabaptism. They were to be Mohammedan dervishes, Indian Fakirs, and Chinese Pundits. By these counterfeits they would open their way into all circles, and into all countries, and be able to mould and guide opinion, and yet the quarter from which the inspiration came should not be known. Their mission, on which all their efforts were made to concentrate, was to quench the liberties of the new age, corrupt the Churches of the Reformed Faith, undermine the thrones of disobedient kings, convulse non-catholic nations-in short, to break down the world, and, having broken it down, to build it up again, and assume the government of it.

CHAPTER VII.

Spiritual Drill of the Jesuits—Their Oath.

BUT this which we have described was only the outward preparation of the Jesuits. They needed an inward and spiritual training. This, after all, was the main thing. For of what use to them would be those powers of body, and those capacities of intellect, if the soul lacked power to call forth these energies, and direct them to the accomplishment of the great objects of the order?

The Jesuits were to do battle with men filled with the Spirit of God. Loyola well knew that the rank and file of Roman

ists were worthless for such a combat. They would go down in the first onset. He must have men similarly attempered in soul with those with whom they were to do battle. With the Spirit that comes from above he could not fill them, but he could inspire them with his counterfeit.

In this Loyola showed vast knowledge of the human heart. All candidates for admission into his Order he made to pass through a make-believe of conversion. He shut them up apart, that in the silence and partial darkness of their solitary chamber, they might fix their minds, day after day, in close and steadfast meditation on certain prescribed subjects. They were first to dwell in thought on the sins of which they had been guilty. They were next to turn their contemplations on the torments of hell; and to aid their imagination, pictures of the place of woe were hung upon the walls of their apartment. Seen in the dim light, these representations were sufficiently suggestive. Having dwelt long enough on Death, and the solemn scenes that come after it, they were bidden next turn their thoughts to more agreeable subjects. They were to admit the light, and surround themselves with flowers and perfumes; and they were to strive to realise that just as the body was now encompassed with emblems of beauty and joy, so the soul in like manner had entered within the gates of the new paradise. Here was a travestie, stage by stage, of that work of conviction by which the Spirit of God leads the sinner to the Saviour. This was not the awakening of conscience, it was simply the excitement of the imagination: that excitement was brought on by the application of such stimulants as seclusion, darkness, and vivid representations of the place of woe. These in their turn led to ecstacies and visions, and those who were visited with these transports regarded themselves as the special favourites of Heaven. This begat in them pride, and that pride kindled in their bosoms the fire of a fierce

fanaticism against the adherents of that false faith which they had been chosen, as they believed, to combat and crush.

To give the members of his "Order" the utmost conceivable liberty of action: that no tie or sense of obligation, whether springing from Divine or from human authority, should fetter them in waging their great war, Loyola released them from every law save that of the "Constitutions" which he framed for them. These "Constitutions" Loyola had compiled by immediate inspiration. The Virgin descended to dictate them to him, so did he affirm. The members of the Society of Jesus were to know no other code, and obey no other authority. The "Constitutions" were to them in the room of the Biblein the room of Christianity itself. They were to see in their Superior only Christ. They were to hear in his commands the voice of God, and obey as they would God Himself. They were to be in the hands of their General, as a staff, or as a corpse. They must raise no question, even in the innermost recesses of their heart, touching the rightness or wrongness of any command that their General might lay upon them. They had but one duty in reference to it, even to hear it, and execute it. Conscience consigned to a sepulchre; even Self laid in the tomb: the man, if a being without reason, without will, without liberty, could be dignified with that name, now entered the fated circle, and henceforth knew only one thing, the prosecution of that thrice-accursed work which he had been chosen to do. But that work, in his eyes, was the grandest mission that could be assigned to mortal. Its accomplishment would earn for him eternal renown on earth, and the yet more brilliant reward of crowns and sceptres in paradise.

*

*Cæca quadam obedientia. Ut Christum Dominum in superiore quolibet agnoscere studeatis. Perinde ac si cadaver essent, vel similiter atque senis baculus. Ad majorem Dei gloriam.-(Constit. Jesuit, pars VI., cap. 1. Ignat. Epist., &c.)

Fairness, however, requires that we should say that the "Constitutions" enjoin the members of the "Order" not to commit sin unless it be necessary! "Necessary to commit sin!" exclaims the unsophisticated reader. Yes, if it be done for "the greater glory of God." So is it written in the "Constitutions" which Mary descended to dictate to Loyola. In Chapter V. of Part VI. of the "Constitutions," we find the following rule: "No constitution, declaration, or order of living can involve an obligation to commit sin, venial or mortal, unless the Superior command them in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, or in virtue of holy obedience." So then, there are cases in which God may be more glorified by our doing what He has forbidden than by our keeping what He has commanded. The judgment of the "Superior" decides unerringly in all such questions; and when he issues his fiat, the Jesuit is to esteem the act he enjoins a virtue, even though in the codes of the world it should be denounced as a crime, and the doer of it adjudged to be rewarded with a halter!

It remained to give the finishing touch to the Jesuit. Trained in body, disciplined in mind and soul, self surrendered; taught to see only God in his General, and to obey him as a staff obeys the hand in which it is held, there remained but one thing more—one other fetter to be wound around the already sorely manacled man—the awful oath—namely, to "the omnipotent God," and "the Heavenly Hierarchy," &c., which every novitiate was compelled to swear on the threshold of the order, promising prompt, unquestioning, unconditional obedience to his General in all things. With this adjuration resting upon him, he entered and took his place in this army of the dead— dead as a sword is dead when it rests in its scabbard, but alive as a sword is alive when grasped by the hand of a strong man. Yes, "a sword," as has been well said, "whose hilt is at Rome, and its edge everywhere."

We stand amazed at the vastness of this conception. It had birth in the brain of an enthusiast, a self-deceiver, and yet what a perfection and completeness belong to it! What patience, what cool practical sagacity, what organising skill, and what insight into the strength and weakness of human nature, do we see Loyola bringing to the task of carrying out his conception! It is, too, perfectly adapted to its end. All proposals of popes and emperors hitherto had fallen miserably short of the crisis. Loyola's idea was the only one that met the emergency that had arisen. Rome was lost had not Loyola come forward at this juncture with his "Order of Jesus." The conception, bating its monstrous impiety and iniquity, has a depth and a breadth which dazzles and awes, and even stupifies one, appearing but the greater the longer it is contemplated.

CHAPTER VIII.

The Arsenal of the Jesuits-Probabilism, &c.

WHAT armour did Loyola provide for the soldiers whom he sent forth? We have seen what great pains he bestowed on their drill. It was to be presumed that his labour and care on their behalf would not end here. Soldiers without weapons! An army without an arsenal! No; Loyola did not leave his work half done. Weapons in store did he provide, such as were meet for the cunning hands and strong arms of his soldiers-weapons to slay not the body but the soul.

Let us visit the arsenal of the Jesuits. We look round upon its walls with a feeling of amazement and awe. Here hang sword and spear; here hang buckler and shield; here, in short, is a countless array of dreadful instruments, which have been welded in the fire and hammered on the anvil of an infernal logic. Behold the arms of Rome's mighty men! With these