there was a Jesuit hidden in the
garret or secreted behind the wainscot of the bedroom. They were the
advisers of the leading men of the age, sat in the cabinets of kings,
and were their confessors. They boasted that they were the link between
religious opinion and literature. With implicit and unquestioning
obedience to his superior, like a good soldier, it was the paramount
duty of the Jesuit to obey his orders, whatever those orders might be.
It was for him to go, at the summons of a moment, with his life in his
hand, to the very centre of pagan or of reformed and revolted countries,
where his presence was death by law, and execute the mission intrusted
to him. If he succeeded, it was well; if he should fall, it was also
well. To him all things were proper for the sake of the Church. It was
his business to consider how the affair he had in hand was to be most
surely accomplished--to resort to justifiable means if they should
appear sufficient, if not, to unjustifiable; to the spiritual weapon,
but also to be prepared with the carnal; to sacrifice candour if the
occasion should require, if necessary even truth, remembering that the
end justifies the means, if that end is the good of the Church.

While some religious orders were founded on retirement, and aimed at
personal improvement by solitude, the Jesuits were instructed to mix in
the affairs of men, and gather experience in the ways of worldly wisdom.
And since it is the infirmity of humanity, whatever may be the vigour of
its first intentions, too often to weary in well-doing, provision was
made to re-enforce the zeal of those becoming lukewarm to admonish the
delinquent, by making each a spy on all the others, under oath to reveal
everything to his superior. In that manner a control was exercised over
the brotherhood in all parts of the world. In Europe they had, in a very
short time, stealthily but largely engrossed public education; had mixed
themselves up with every public affair; were at the bottom of every
intrigue, making their power felt through the control they exerted over
sovereigns, ministers of state, and great court ladies, influencing the
last through the spiritual means of the confessional, or by the more
natural but equally effectual entanglements of requited love. Already
they had recognized the agency of commerce in promoting and diffusing
religious belief, and hence simultaneously became great missionaries and
great merchants. With the Indies,