THE MORAL TEACHING OF THE JESUITS.
THAT the old pernicious doctrines of invincible ignorance, equivocation, mental reservation, and secret compensation are still firmly held and steadily taught by the disciples of this society, is clearly shown by a late work complied by M. Paul Bert, the leading speaker against them, in the summer of 1879, before the Chamber of Deputies. His book is a simple translation, with notes, of one of the works of the late Father Gury, for years professor of moral science in a Jesuitic college, the burden of exposing his order being thus cast upon the father himself. The works of this father are widely circulated both among the Jesuits and the common priests, and the accuracy of the translation can be easily tested by reference to the Latin original. The following extracts from the book, with comments by the Christian Union, will give something of an idea of the nefarious practices of this professed "Society of Jesus":— "In regard to invincible ignorance, that we may establish our assertions, look at this example, cited by Father Gury, of the confession of Florine: 'I have told a lie, but I do not think I sinned because a weighty motive impelled me; it was to excuse my cousin and save him from a severe punishment.' What is the decision of the Jesuit? Not only that Florine should be held free from the sin of lying, on account of her invincible or innocent ignorance, but that she has done well and acted in accordance with the divine will. The immediate wrong, the falsehood, is not opposed to the will of God, he says, 'for although it may be opposed to the primary divine will, it is not opposed to the secondary divine will, by which God commands or grants us something, in supposing our invincible ignorance.' Hence we are led to infer that God himself willed the lie, and accepted it as so much virtue on the part of his invincibly ignorant child. The element of truth in this reasoning renders it all the more dangerous to those who cannot foresee the results of its application and detect the hidden snare. "So it is, to take a more extreme case, with the confession of Adalbert. 'Wishing to kill my enemy Titus, I have killed my friend Caius.' The Jesuit not only excuses the penitent from all sin in this regard, but holds that, not having been able to foresee the death of Caius, his ignorance is a sufficient reason why he should not be bound to make restitution to the bereaved family. Thus we have numerous examples of approved acts of equivocation and mental reservation, although we should hardly expect them after the emphatic declaration of Father Gury, that 'it is never permitted to lie, not even in view of an advantage, for we must not do evil that good may come.' These are excellent words, but we soon find that there is, to the Jesuitical mind, a wide borderland between falsehood and truth, where a good Catholic may store nearly all his property in safety. The man who comes into an inheritance and hides his money, to save it from his creditors, does not offend against the truth in declaring that he has concealed nothing, because he has concealed nothing, 'in the sense according to which they have a right to ask him. So, in replying that he has concealed nothing, it is as if he had said he had committed no act of injustice toward his creditors, since it is only in this sense that the judge and the creditors can question him.' So when, in the custom-house, in answer to the official inquiry if he carries goods subject to duty, he replies, 'I have nothing,' it is evident to a Jesuit, though perhaps not to the custom-house officer, that he means, 'I have nothing that573I myself need make known. It is your business to look instead of questioning me.' Father Gury cautiously adds, however, with a touch of the inevitable policy of the order, that ecclesiastics should tell the truth, to avoid a scandal in case they should be detected in their denial, and the affair become noised abroad. "The examples of secret compensation are yet more distinct. The righteousness of this act is not only openly taught in the Moral Philosophy, but enforced by a number of supposed cases, like that of Augustus, who, sentenced by the judge to pay to Antonius a debt which he, though lacking the legal proof, had already paid in full, obeys the judge and then secretly steals the same amount from Antonius. It is well, says the Jesuit; he only takes his own again. So Mark, a servant, breaks by accident a costly crystal vase, and his angry master deducts its value from his wages. Mark has the sympathy and approval of Father Gury in the system of petty pilfering from his master by which he quietly and safely fills up the aching void in his pocket. Further than this, we have the case of a citizen, whose donkey is stolen by night, but the beast, escaping from the thieves, breaks into neighboring fields and does damage for which the judge sentences his master to pay. The citizen accordingly pays, but regards the decision as unjust, since he could not have prevented the occurrence, and so resorts to secret compensation, by helping himself not only from the goods of his neighbor's, but also from the public treasury. The Jesuit sanctions his course. "Such is the spirit of the whole book. The pure moral laws are upheld to those who may find it convenient to obey them; but where money or reputation or any worldly prosperity is concerned, the loop-holes of lying and theft and uncharity are sprinkled with holy water. This accommodating character of Father Gury's morality shows far more clearly in the practical cases cited than, at first sight, in the principles of the 'Compendium.' We are directly taught, indeed, that it is permitted to 'recommend a lesser wrong to one determined to commit a greater,' that a promise of marriage may rightfully be broken, if one of the parties come into possession of such a fortune as to arouse reasonable hopes of securing a richer partner; that it is not contrary to the law of kindness to 'wish a temporal ill to your neighbor, or to rejoice in it, for a good end,' and other similar moral lessons; but, for the most part, the Philosophy abounds in definitions and divisions and cross-divisions, until the sense becomes bewildered in a multitude of words. Conscience, for instance, branches into the vincible or invincible conscience, the certain or doubtful, the scrupulous or relaxed, the probable or improbable, and these, in turn, have their own ramifications, until the reader grows secretly hopeful that, however much he may sin against one kind of conscience, he will have plenty of varieties left to carry him through."