TEXT OF THE ARIICLE AND REPLY
Thi N[aii . Toronto, Thursday, luly, 5. iSSS.
The Jkslif Bill.
(i). \:\\ï\\sv\n\) and other Jesuit Journals maintain th'tt the apprc priât ion of the Jesuit estates by the British Crt^un in the year 1800 was an " act 0/ spoliation " based on *' the right 0/ conquest" As the law of nations does not recognize the right of the conqueror to seize private or corporate property y the Croicn H'as clearly wrong in appro* pria ting the estates, and Mr. Mercier is of course justified im making
•St it lit ion at this time of the day out of the public chest.
ft
Rkplv :— The general statement of the case against the government is set forth, as I have said, on page S of this pamphlet. For full
developments see 'pages there indicated in the references. For the proofs of the positive claim of the Jesuits on these estates see page 50.
(2). This argument is not, we think, a valid one. The Jesuits were suppressed throughout the world by a Papal bull in 1773, a)id the order everywhere ceased to exist.
Reply : — When the writer appeals to a Papal Brief (it was not a bull) to make good an assertion, he appeals to an instrument unknown outside of Catholic ecclesiastical law, and amusingly arrogates to himself competency of judging in such matters. A "heathen Chinee " in the Court of Arches would cut but a sorry figure ; but the Editor of the Mail no doubt would take kindly to a position as mimitante in a Roman congregation. And if he were not there thoroughly at home, we sha'l at least not be so discourteous as to suppose for an instant that he is not familiar with some of the more widely known canonico-legal principles, for instance : that a disciplinary measure, coming even from the Supreme Head of the Church, requires promulgation to become law. The promulgation of the brief of suppression, rigidly enforced in almost every country in the world and followed by the instant secularization of the members of the Society, was, owing to the opposition of Frederick II, witheld for a time in parts of Germany and absolutely never accompHshed either in Russia or in Canada. The very tenor of the brief however required it. With regard to Canada, it is point of history: " When the Sovereign Pontiff goaded on by earthly rulers abolished the Jesuits, Carleton sought out Monseigneur Briand and enjoined on him to say nothing of the Papal bull (brief), adding that he took upon himself the maintaining of these religious in Canada The bishop wrote to the Sovereign Pontiff that the Jesuits of the Province, full of summission to his will, had shown their readiness to disperse and to set aside the habit of their order, but that it had been determined otherwise until further notice, thanks to an agreement between himself and the secular power. " [I?istitutions de P Histoire du Canada, par Bibaud, jeune^ Senécal et Dafiifl, Montréal, 1855, page 340). That further notice never came.
To effectuate the suppression it was enjoined on all the bishops of the Catholic world, among other things, to take possession of the property of the Jesuits : " Singularum domorum, collegiorum, nee non et locorum hujusmodi et illorum bonorum, jurium et pertinentiarttm quarumcumque jwssessionem nomine S. Sedis appréhendât et retineatT But neither was this, nor were any other of the enactments of the
Brief put in force. The superiors remained at their posts, and continued to exercise control over their subordinates, all of whom retained their habit, name and customs of community life. They were styled Jesuits and acted as such. They administered their estates as any other religious body of men are wont to do. In an official utterance of the 1 8th Nov. 1789, Mgr Hubert speaks of the Estates as " appartenant actuellement aux Jésuites " and further implies that the bishops of Quebec, up to that date, exercised no control over the same.
Chandler and the other royal commissioners, in an official communication of the 23rd January 1788, addressed the body thus: '''Aux Révérends Pères de Glapion, Supérieur, et autres Jésuites en la Province de Québec. De Glapion in his eloquent and dignified protest against a threatened spoliation, addressed to Hugh Finlay, President of the Legislative Council, signs himself: '' Supérieur des Jésuites en Canada.'' Even a poor surviving lay brother, and I had thought until quite lately that they had all long before that date been secularized, signs an important document, dated 13th Jan. 1780, under the eyes of the Vicar General, ^I. Hubert, who signed it with him. — He signs without protest Frère Dcmers, Jésuite. ( See Archives, Hé^tel-Dieu de Québec. )
These and many other well authenticated facts and documents prove conclusively for any canonist that canonicylly the Jesuits were not suppressed in Canada.
II would be difficult to prove in a court of law that they were ever even civilly su])presscd in the Province, and certainly not down to 1791 {see pp. 29, 30). What evidence is there, or can the Editor of the Ma^l adduce, to prove that the Royal Instructions of 1791 were ever promulgated by a decree, or in any legal form ? If there be none, the j)reviously recognized corporation of the Jesuits was never even civilly suppressed.
V. (3). // is cxtremly doubtful if the Jesuits had a le^al title to their estates under the French lah> ichich prevailed here doii.*n to thecontpâesU
Reply:— What is extremely doubtful is that the Editor of the ^faii ever took the trouble to enquire into the matter. The Jesuits had a perfect legal title to their estates, as even any third class lawyer in a police court can understand by consulting pp. 26, 27 and 2^.
(4). All the title existing appears to have been vested in the General of the order ^ n'ho, being an alien not under allegiance to the A'ing of France, could not hold real property either in 1' ranee or in a frenth
colony.
Reply : — I most formally and emphatically deny the truth of the assertion that the title to the property of the Jesuits is vested in the General of the Jesuits at Rome. Like the president or avowed head, of any civil corporation, whose field of action may extend to more than one country (let us take the G. T. R. for instance, whose lines extend into the neighboring States), the General of the Jesuits exercises a certain control over the movable and immovable property of the order. He is not the owner. He cannot take from one house to give to another. His office is to administer, through himself or others, the estates belonging to these separate houses, and may pass contracts only to the advantage and for the utility of these houses. (Constitut. P. IX., C. IV. ; Examen gen., C. I., No. 4; Bulla, Greg XIII, 1582). If the annual income of the colleges, destined, in virtue of the intention of founders or of the provisions of the institute, for the sustenance and clothing of the Jesuits who are their inmates, exceed the outlay, the surplus in each house is to be employed, not in new establishments, but in liquidating outstanding debts or increasing the revenues (Inst, pro admin., tit. pro rect. No. 6). Both Church and State had recognized this right of non-solidarity. For when one house was in penury, its revenues being insufficient, both powers, without taking into consideration the comparative prosperity of other houses, assisted the poorer house with their endowments. They recognised thus their nonsolidarity.
In France down to 1760 no one thought of questioning this nonsolidarity which all religious orders enjoyed in common with the Jesuits. Subsequently it was never assailed in other institutes, it was attacked only in that of Loyola. It was alleged that the general of the society held despotic sway, that he was absolute master of persons and things, and consequently universal proprietor of all the worldly goods of the order. According to the terms of their constitution, this assertion was groundless, but under the influence of certain bitter hatreds it assumed the proportions of a principle.
The legislation of the Institute is nevertheless clear on this point. The General is ranked in the same category as his brethren , if they cannot hold property, in their own right, for having vowed perpetual poverty, neither can he, for the same identical reason. In religious societies it is not the individuals nor the superior who possesses, but the various establishments, as bodies corporate, legally recognized as such before both civil and ecclesiastical law. The text of Loyola's constitutions exhibits every where the General as the administrator and not the proprietor of the Society's possessions. In his administration, which the constitutions (P. IV. c. 11) term superintendence,
as it is he who names the other superiors, who must give him an account of their administration, the General is subject, on all essential points, to the control of general congregations. Without their assent, he can neither alienate nor suppress a college or other establishment, and the breach of this law would be for him a case of deposition, or even expulsion from the society, provided for in the constitutions (P. IX. c. 4.) He is empowered to accept property or donations for the society ; he may, when the intention of the donor is not determined, allot them lo this or that house ; but once they are allotted, it is beyond his po>vers to divert what accrues, or to collect a percentage on the revenues either for his own use or for strangers.
But had it even been the case, as far as France was concerned, at the time of the conquest and after, it certainly was not the General who held possession of the Jesuits' estates in Canada. The merest tyro in jurisprudence is able to apprehend the meaning of the letters patent and of the Royal Instructions. Louis XIV styles the Jesuits : *• Nos chers et bien aimez les religieux de la compagnie de Jésus résidant en notre pays de la Nouvelli' France ". and the Royal Instructions of the i6th September, 1791 ; "the present members of the said society (/. e., society of Jesuits already mentioned) as established at Quebec.'' There is no question here of a sole but of an aggregate corporation : no question of the General of the Society, but of the body established at Quebec. To all intents and purposes, for a Canadian court, the General was a legal nonentity. It was this all important point that Marriot in his bitter hatred feigned to overlook, and that others taking him at his word, have so thoughtlessly ignored.
Hence all the title to property existing was not vested in the General at Rome.
I shall not enquire at what particular date the disability of foreigners to hold property in France ceased. The thing is also entirely foreign to the subjet, and its inability of proving anything against the Jesuits' claims equally manifest. Who ever said that foreigners, at that period. could hold property in France or England ? Certainly no Jesuit ever maintained it. I shall not begrudge the Editor of the Mail all the comfort he can derive from this harmless assertion.
To make clear the non-solidarity between the different houses of the order in financial matters, I have already recorded on pages 62 and 63 the opinion of eight of the most eminent Parisian lawyers given the 6lh March 1761. What follows will clear up all difficulties in this matter. Protestant countries ignore religious orders, and treat them as civil corporations, or merely recognize. their individual members as enjoying before the law equal rights with other citizens. In Catholir countrie>.
civil legislation was supposed to be enacted so as to harmonize witb canon law, of which the Church was the true expounder. When,. therefore, the decisions of doctors of Sorbonne, or of the advocates of the various parliamentary bodies of France are at variance with canon law. as expounded by the church, such decisions must needs be held as not valid, not only by every Catholic, but hypothetically by every Protestant. That is, if the latter take at all into account canon law, so as to determine the status of a religious order, they must frame their notions in accordance with the declared intention of the Catholic legislator, and the sole authority in the Catholic Church who can canonically establish or suppress religious orders. The Supreme Pontiff approves their rules, declares their vows solemn or simple, modifies if needs be, according to the exigency of the times, their mode of life, and determines their relations with civil society, in contact with which they necessarily come. A professed religious, incapable of possessing property before the church, he may empower to hold real or personal estate before civil law, as, in fact, he does in all Protestant and in most Catholic countries, modernized in the sense of the French Revolution. The common assertion that a mendicant order can hold no property in its own right is at variance with canon law. A mendicant order holds property and has always done so. Or to be more accurate, each separate community owns in its own right the monastery it occupies. The individual religious holds and can hold no property save by a canonico- legal fiction before the civil law of a country which refuses to take cognizance of him otherwise than as a citizen.
Since the Revolution, jurisprudence on these matters has ceased to exist in France. Prescinding from the constitutions of the divers religious societies, constitutions which suppose or establish the nonsoUdarity between houses of the same order, this state of things is supported on other incontestable grounds. It was recognized by letters patent, which in sanctioning each religious establishment, college, monastery, or community, imparted to each its peculiar and distinctive civil existence. These letters patent assured to each the separate and unassailable right of property over its patrimony and domains.
In virtue of similar royal enactments each religious house enjoyed the right of making contracts through its administrator ; that of sueing and being sued, of pleading and being impleaded ; the right of acquiring and accepting donations, pious bequests indefinitely, or with limita^^iOn, as the case might be, was equally conceded. Thus there existed as many bodies corporate as there were houses duly authorized,, and the goods and chattels of the one were never confounded with those of thî other.
This was the case of the Jesuits in Canada, under Frencli rule. A glance at the Letters Patent of Louis XIV and Louis XV still preserved in the provincial archives will convince the incredulous. The Jesuits of Canada, were a body corporate before the conquest (which none will disjjute), at the conquest and after the conquest, down as far even as 1791, (See pages 26 to 30). And if they then ceased so to be, it was by an unwarrantable measure on the part of liie Crown. Their civil status was known and recognized by the Supreme Pontiff, known and recognized by the Imperial Government.
(5) //'ij/VvV/i,'- this point, the British autho'itics found the estates without an ouniei' in 1800, after the death of the Ia.<t sun'iior of the order in Canada ; and, under Brisish law^ the estatei thereupon escheated to the Croicn. There 7i.>as no spoliation or anything remotely resembling it. The property passed to the Croion, like the Mercer estate in this provifice afe^c years ago, oicing to the absence of laicful heirs ; and that 7(>as the end of the matter. It may be worth while, however^ to call attention to one or two facts ichich have an indirect bearing on this branch of the subject. British law has long treated the Society of Jesus as an illegal organization. Blackstoxe, in his well known Commentaries, which icere issued in 1765-9, held it to be such (see under the head of ^^ Mortmain." ) Again, the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829 imposed severe restrictions on the Jesuits and members of other religions orders. This provision is still in force in the United Kingdom ; at least Mr. Ciadstonk implied us much duriwj his controversy on Vaticanism ; 7c>hile in 1875 Mk. Disraeli stated in a speeth that *''' although no proceedings had been taken against Jesuits under the Act " <)/" 1829, he begged it to be under i^tood that the provisions of that *' Act " arc not obsolete^ but, on the contrary^ are reserving powers of law of " which the British Government will be prepared to avail themselves if ^''necessary.'' Thv Act of \Z2() provides that any Jesuit or oth'r member of a religious order coming into the realm tl' it h out a licence, which license shall run for only six months, shall be deemed guilty of mis • demeanour, and sentenced to be banished the country : and if found wuhtn the country at the expiration of three months from the date of the first notification may on a second conviction be sent to gaol. It is arguable, thcrefare, that the British Cro'wn in i Soo 7vas dealing with the property of a society which had not only ceased to exist here, but 'which, according to Klackstone, had no right to exist 'within the realm of Englcmd; though, of course, it may be contended that British law had no font in Canada, rcen at the conquest. The Parliament of Paris by the arret if 1762, the Parliament of Houen in 1764, ar^d the Ircnch King b\ an
^tdict of I ']']'], all decreed the suppression of the order on public grounds. These arrets and edicts, it will be seen, were promulgated after Canada had ceased to be a French possession : nevertheless they serve in conjunction with the Bull of suppression <?/" 1773 to support the view that, apart altogether from the prerogative of escheat, the British Crown ivould have been morally justified in confiscating the property of the order in its newly conquered colony, particularly when it is borne in mind that dhe complaint rwini?ig through the arrets and the Bull was that the Jesuits ivere habitual disturbers of the public repose. The right of .escheat in the case of derelict property is, however, completely fatal to the spoliation theory noiv advanced.
Reply : The most sensible feature in the above lengthy quotation from the Mail is the readiness of the editor to waive the preceding point, for he felt no doubt, after having read over his statement, that it was untenable.
What follows, in as much as it is calculated to affect the i'/rz/z/^ qucesiionis, is equally so. The plea that it is by right of escheat that the government holds the Jesuits' Estates is hopelessly forlorn. I refer the reader back to pages 47-50 and 68, where he will find this -absurd pretension totally demolished.
Furthermore there is no parity between the lapsing of the Mercer estate to the Crown and the case of the Jesuits. In the former, no solemn treaty compact was violated, no obstacles deliberately thrown in the way to prevent the begetting of heirs, with the express intention of ultimately securing the inheritance for the Crown. In the latter, we have all this, and over and above, the fact that it came under the -class of religious or eleemosynary corporations in whose case, when the succession is interrupted, whatever comes by bequest and endowment reverts to the original donors.
But ignorant though he may be of all this, the writer in the Mail instinctively feels that he is not treading on solid ground, he therefore appeals to bigotry and fanaticism. The Jesuits are proscribed in England ! Well what if they be ? Was not Our Lord proscribed, and St Paul and the other Apostles, and the early Christians ? The Jesuits were proscribed by the Iroquois, and on the very soil of the present Province of Ontario they were burnt at the stake. Proscribed in England? It simply shows that there is yet in England, as unfortunately in Canada, an understratum of ignorance and iû tolerance, modern Mohawks, to whom demagogues may occasionally appeal when they wish to secure a political point. But the good sense and intelligence of the ruling classes in England are too strong to allow of these
dormant laws being evoked. The Jesuits there are known and so are all their houses and colleges. They arc respected by respectable Protestants'. The Jesuit astronomer, Father Perry, is intrusted by government wiih important missions, and the Jesuits in India are complimented by Governors for implanting loyalty in the hearts of their l)Lipils (})p. 6i, 62).
We could not give in clearer or more precise terms the relations of the Jesuits with the home Government after 1773 than as we find them described in the Mémoire sur les Biens des Jésuites en Canada. (Montréal, 1874J. /. 74/
"In England the Jesuits, early in the eighteenth century, ho.d begun purchasing chapels and residences with their own funds or what pious Catholics contributed. They not only continued after 1773 the same ministry but they retained their former possessions, which they bequeathed one to another. In 1803, the Fathers of Sionyhurst College, were aftîilialed to those of Russia. They educated younger meml^ers to replace the superannuated, who had until then retained their posts in their original missions On the occasion of a misunderstanding between some Knglish ecclesiastics and the Jesuits of the College, Cardinal Litta, prefect of Propaganda, wrote to .\igr Gibson, Vicar Apostolic of the Northern District, that he should bear )n mind the 22nd Rule laid down by Benedict XIV anent the English Missions. The ternu areas follows : " Let no change be made in the m.itter of foundations, and let both the secular and regular clergy remain in possession of what they actually hold."
"Even after the Brief in 1773, the English Government affected to ignore the existence of fesuiis in Great Britain, the fact of their holding property and of iheir quietly b-j(]ueathing it. It did more, it maintained them in si)ite of the intrigues of secret ngents sent over to England by their enemies in Italy. It was in reference to this that Frederick of Prussia, wiiting to dWlembert, the 7th January 1774, said : *' I am not alone in maintaining the Jesuits, the English and the Empress of Russia are doing as much, and even London is u\. une with the^e States." (Œuvres de d'Alembert, t 17, p. 378).
"In 1762, at the very moment when the parliaments of France were proscribing the Jesuits, and so shamelessly appropriating their possessions, the English were seizing La Marimiijue. Under their protection the Jesuits, established in the island, sold their posstsNions lo British subjects realizing three or four million fran s. Here wa> an instance of the fairness and noble dealing of the English Government in the case of Catholic religious orders.
"The Emperor of China, Rang hi, having been cured of a dangerous complaint by iiernard Rhodes, a Jesuit coadjutor, out of g'"at»tude gave several golden ingots to the Jesuits of IV'kin. i'he sale o\ these realized 200,000 francs. The Superiors of the ni'ssion depoNited the amount with the English East India Company, with the understanding tbat an annual sun of 12.000 francs be piid over to the necessitous missionaries of China and India.
** At the time of the suppression of the Jesuits, the East India Company confiscated the 200,000 francs, and refused to pay the interest of the sum to the Jesuits, which it expended however on hospitals. The ex-Jesuits of Pondicherry made representations in London, and the Governors of the East India Company wrote to their agents that if other governments had been guihy of a serious infraction of the Laws of Nations, there was no reason for the East India Company to follow in their wake. The directors gave orders to have the trust maintained inviolable, and the interest punctually paid. They ordered moreover that the arrears of the previous three years be made good.
"At the death of the last surviving Jesuit at Pondicherry, in 18 13, the Propaganda decided that the interest should thenceforth be expended on the Chinese missions.
"It is clear therefore that England acknowledged that the suppression of the Society authorized no one to seize upon its estates. These funds were made use of according to the intention of the donors for the maintenance of the Jesuits, and at the demise of the last. Propaganda, considering that the fund was ecclesiastical property given for the mission of Chma, placed it in the hands of the Chinese missionaries." Of whom, we might add, the present Jesuits form a very considerable portion.
One word novv' about Blackstone's Commentaries, and the importance a great English jurisconsult and statesman attached to them as bearing on the Canadian question.
Blackstone published the first volume of his commentaries in 1765. Thurlow, who was created Lord High Chancellor of England in June 1778, presented his report to the King on the 22nd of January, 1773, and delivered his speech in the House of Commons in 1774. He was thoroughly conversant with the doings and decrees of the parliaments and courts in question, and was probably more familiar with Blackstone's utterances than the Editor of the Mail Tmd myself; and nevertheless he emphatically declares that the capitulations and treaty are binding on the King. And in what sense? "That every Canadian should have the full enjoyment of all his property, particularly the religious orders of the Canadians." That the treaty " was made in favor of religion, made in favor of the several religious orders." (pp. 44, 45.)
Moreover, and I once more repeat it, the penal laws, and the common law as such do not hold in the colonies (see p. 46). So that the act of 1829, irrespective of its coming seventy years too late to affect the capitulation of 1760, has no more binding force here than it would have in Cath;iy.
The French laws spoken of were also subsequent to the cession, and have as much bearing on our subject as the present Fiench laws
of conscription would have on the actual obligations of the descendants of the original French colonists in our midst. And yet after solemnly rehearsing these dire enactments, as if they were pregnant with great consequences for his cause, the Editor coolly turns around and informs us in an aside : " though, of course, it may be contended that British law had no force in Canada, even at the conquest 1 " This is worthy of a comedian, but not of an honest member of the press, who is supposed to enlighten his readers and civilize them up to the standard of modern requirements, among which may bè reckoned, and not as the least. Christian brotherly-love, and an unswerving attachment to justice, as one of God's divine attributes and man's noblest virtues.
It is equally futile to drag in the Brief of 1773 in palliation for the seizure of the Jesuits' Estates, for that spoliation was a foregone conclusion from the beginning as we have shown at page 68. The right based on conquest was alone invoked (see page 50). So that "the right of escheat in the case of derelict property is " not " completely fatal to the spoliation theory advanced."
Therefore, to sum up in a few words what precedes : the Government had no right by Escheat to the Jesuit Estates (p. 47). They were a recognized corporation (pp. 26, 30), and a body corporate cannot be destroyed, not its franchises diminished by the ruler in virtue of his royal prerogative alone (p. 48). The inhibition to receive new members was an unwarrantable suppression of its frachises, issued in view of the ultimate advantage to accrue to the Crown from a broken succession /p. 3). The Government in point of fact issued such inhibition (p. 49). 'Jlierefore the Government's title through escheat was untenable. This the Government tacitly acknowledged as it never put forward this ])lea either at the seizure or transfer of the Estates (see page 50). It was Marriot's suggestion entertained probably at first but subsequently never acted upon.
'Hie Jesuits on the contrary have a i)ositive claim on these their former Estates (p. 50).
Nota. — The reader will be kind enough to correct a staiomcnt made on j)age 61. Sir Richard Tremple was not Vice-Roy of India. He became Governor of Bombay in May 1S77. The address was delivered previous to his leaving the Bengal Presidency.
(6). To try the whole matter by the test n/ ana/ojiv, if the Masonic or Oranï:;e body in Quebec were tû cease to exist tomortow, and 1/ its real /property in default of rightful owners were appropriated by the Crown, can anybody suppose that, eighty-srcen years after such an occurrence, the Quebec Le^i.<lature could be induced to ^rant compensation to
another and a wholly differ e)it set of men callijig themselves Orangemem or Freemasons ; and to recognize the right of some Grand Master residing at Vienna or Rome to dictate to the Government of the day as to the modus operandi of the restitution; more especially if it were demonstrable that other civilized natio7is had refused domicile to the organization referred to because of its pernicious principles ?
Reply : — In attempting " to try the whole matter by the test of analogy " the writer in ihe 'Mail is singularly infelicitous in the choice of his terms of comparison. Unless his intention be not to prove anything in particular, but merely to hound on the Masons and the Orangemen in this attack against the Province of Quebec in the free exercise of its clearly defined rights. I say Quebec advisedly, as its legislature was unanimous in passing the Bill. But as we have not to busy ourselves about the intentions of men, which we leave to the Searcher of hearts, let us see if there be, what he should have proved, any parity or analogy in the hypothesis.
The Jesuits were and are a body corporate (pp. 26-30). In the province of Quebec the Orange association is certainly not incorporated. (We say nothing of Ontario, as the Mail speaks of the Province of Quebec). So that, in default of rightful heirs, their property would lapse to the Crown as that of private individuals only. Of the vast body of Masons in Quebec there is but one branch incorporated, generally termed that of Blue Masonry. I hazard this appellation, and the J/cz// will be lenient, I hope, as I am not thoroughly versed in the lore of the brethren of the mystic tie. However I invite the Editor to consult the records and he will find that I am substantially correct.
The Orangemen therefore are out of the question. What now about those Masons who are incorporated in the l^rovince ?
To be enabled to give a satisfactory solution, several questions should yet be answered. Are they regarded by the law as coming under the heading of religious or eleemosynary corporations? Wastheir property acquired by donation, the donors having in view and specifying praiseworthy and legitimate ends ? Did the Crown debar them from receiving new members i?ifraudem legis ? Was the Government, in assuming the proprietorship, in good faith at the inception, or was it, owing to some protest previous to the seizin, placed in the position of a malce fidei possessor from the beginning. Were these protests kept up at reasonable intervals during the eighty-seven years i^ etc., etc.
When these and many other queries have been answered satisfactorily^ the next question would be, whether that " wholly^different set of men.
calling themselves Freemasons" are revived by a new charter with the express intention of preserving the old corporation (pp. 50, 51,) with which, we will suppose, as in the case of the Jesuits, they were bound by some unbroken tangible tie, either within or without the limits of the Province, and which taken alone, without giving them an absolute civil legal right to the estates in question, may serve at least as a means of identification.
I should not then ask, as the Editor, " can any body suppose that the Quebec Legislature could be induced to grant compensation ?" For Legislatures, as I think the Editor has lived long enough to know, do not always do the legal thing, but I ask what 7iwuhi the Legislature be expected to do in strict iei:;a/ity ?
Since the article of the Mai/ was written many months have elapsed, and during the interval the Ottawa Government has declared its intention of not disallowmg the Bill. This was an act of mere justice. And for that act, though it be looked upon as demanded by justice, the Society of Jesus feels grateful, and will not allow its gratitude to be lessened by any consideration of what might have been the policy of the Federal Government in so doing. This would be going beyond its sphere and would be an entering on the arena of politics, which the Society eschews.
The present is a fitting occasion to revert to the efforts of some of the friends of the opposition in the Province of Quebec. They have industriously endeavoured to spread an ill-defined rumour that the Society had taken sides in the politics of the Province. This insinuation, for it never assumed the proportions of a specific accusation, is wholly groundless. The Su})erior of the order in Canada, in the columns of the Montreal press, issued a formal declaration to the contrary dated the 4th of February of the i)resent year. It was perhaps unnecessary, bu* the object was to dispel the uneasiness arising from the supposition that the order was allowing itself to be dragged into the whirl of party strife. Now, if the Society were called upon to define its attitude with regard to public affairs wholly secular, it could not better determine its stand than by saying that it reciprocates the feelings attributed to its friends in the above mentioned declaration : *' The society of Jesus, as a fixed principle, should hold itself aloof from politics, and what proves that we have been faithful to this rule is that we have always numbered sincere and devoted friends among eminent men belonging to every shade of party j^olitics not inimical to the Church.'* I mean to say that the Society identifies itself with no purely political party, but that such men, specified in the declaration, will always find
in the Society, according to the measure of its feeble resources, unfeigned sympathy and support.
But this sympathy howewer impartially it be yielded, cannot reasonably stand in the way of an expression of well earned gratitude, one of the noblest impulses of the human heart. And when friends have risked as public men their popularity with the unthinking and unreasoning masses of a sister province, in not hesitating to do and dare in what they rightly deemed an act of justice, and which in a small measure at least may redound to the advantage of the Society, is it necessary to state that these men have laid the Society under lasting obligations ?
But we are fully aware that, we owe gratitude also to those who, during their administration silently but effectually prepared the way, and contributed in no slight degree to the working out of the present solution. It were a breach of confidence, we thought, to thank them by name. But since our silence has been misinterpreted it is but fair that the public should know that we are not unmindful of their good services. Circumstances, over which the Society had certainly no control, prevented the further realization of their plans. They may not rightly have gauged the importance of the support upon which they could count coming from every class of persons in the Province of Quebec, but we know that their intentions were honest and their friendship sincere.
It is consequently to the entire Province, irrespective of party, that we are indebted ; and though we may share eventually but in a very inferior degree in the benefits of the restitution, made however in view cf a wrong done the Society, our keen appreciation of its good-will will be the same as if the entire sum were to be allotted to us.
We come now to an important admission which the Editor of the Mail would do well to bear in mind in the midst of the senseless clamor he has contributed to excite :
// is reported from Ottawa that an effort is bei?tg made to secure the disallowance of the compensation bill^ which has just passed its third reading. Beyond question, however, the Quebec Legislature is well within its rights in passing the Jesuit Incorporation Act of last year. Disallowance could only be invoked, therefore, on the ground that the establishment and endowment of the Jesuit order in Canada was contrary to the public interest ; and this course a Gov ernor-in-Cou7icil free frojH clerical entatigUments would probably not hesitate to pursue. But it is useless to look for resolute action from either political party where clerical interests are involved.
Reply : I have nothing to say about the Governor-in-Council, I shall leave that to the Mail ; I fully concur in opining that the Que-
bec Legislature is well within its rights. Let me add however, that with regard to the ground for disallowance, there will be little danger on that score if the Mail and its congeners keep within the legimate region of facts, and refrain from trotting out some bugaboo from the columns of a favorite encyclopaedia.
Their stock-in-trade is no novelty, but the main staple is no doubt the loose i)rinciples of the Jesuits. And in dealing with this class of Pharisees an anonymous writer on the same subject in 1828 very appositely says :
*'It is anything but natural to api)ly the priticiples of severity exclusively to one's self while encouraging laxity in others. Quite the reverse is the every day occupation of many who feign to take offence at the principles of the assumed lax Ethics of the Jesuits. To this the world bears witness, and worldly as the world is, it is scandalized and scoffs, while good men are heart sore. But after all to consider things in the light of common sense, it will be always acknowleged less surprising to find rigorism preached by those who live loosely, than to see laxity preached by those who practice rigori^m. The former is all down-hill work, and is prevalent enough in uur day. The latter mode offers no inducement. Nothing is to be gained by it either in (}od's sight or the world's. It would be to work out one's own damnation at great labor and cost, with not one compensating feature ; it would be to go to perdition by the narrow gate. Such a plan was never limned according to the promptings of self-indulgence, and to have invented it, the Jesuits must have been made of ditTerent ihiv fi\)in tluit of other mortals."
Were the true principles of Jesuit Kthics on mental reservation or prevarication adopted by their adversaries, many a church, which a month or so ago (for it was the general complainti were all but empty, would have remained so, and many a column of the fanatical press, now teeming with sensational and blood-thirsty harangues, would have remained blank and unsullied, though the net profits would have been considerables less.
The best that can be hopeJ for is that Sir John Macponaip sha// set his face against the plea no7c bein^ eoiertly put forward, that inasmuch as the Jesuits preached the Gospel here for two hundred years prior to the conquest, and that the rrirnue from these estates. 7cas applied bet'iceen 1841 and 1867 A» the purpose of education in Vppfr as well as in Lo7ver Canada, to Protestant as well as to Roman Caiholic schools and colle^^es, therefore the payment of the $400,000 j^r anted ^V Mr. ^1kk(. 1ER (/.v compensation should be assumed by the Federal treasury.
And thus the Mail closes its artirle. Ihc contents of this last para-
graph do not concern us. The Mail kept up for a while its desuitory fire, but no new arguments were brought to bear on the Jesuit position. Little by little the champion of anti-Catholic causes was lulled to sleep. Months after, it again awoke to a sense of danger. It espoused the cause of the Evangelical Alliance. The worthy members of this organization had, in the meantime, been painfully made aware that their meeting-houses were about empty, and that something thrilling must be put on the boards to draw a house. The old Jesuit hobby was brought down from the garret, the dust and cobwebs reverentially removed, and with a fresh coat of paint it was found that it might yet do good service. When it has served its term, and its usefulness is gone, it will be again stowed away, to be held in reserve for some future occasion. Renascentur mendcia.
For an answer to the popular objections, now being urged for the hundredth time against the Ethical Code of the Jesuits, we refer the consciencious searcher after truth to Brownson's Essays, New-Yêrk^ Sadlier. 1858 : " Thornweirs Ansiver to Dr. Lynch:'' Can what is philosophically trne be theologically false? p. 180. And for what concerns more particularly the Jesuits : The end justifies the means, Frobabilism, The Jesuit Oath, etc., pp. 186 to i^?> passim.
Does the End justify the means? American Catholic Quarterly Review, Jan 1888, p. 119; Catholic K^e^iiew, Neiu-York, Jan, 21 ; Feb. 4 j Mardi 10, 1888.
