Page:Cambridge Modern History Volume 2.djvu/687

 seized a favourable opportunity of bringing before the Society the question whether a mere informal order of a Pope was binding on them; but they considered it better to bring the matter directly before Pius IV, who revoked the order of his predecessor so far as that was necessary. The Papacy thus gave way in its first struggle with the Society which was to be so often more a master than a servant.

It has been necessary to describe at considerable length the early history of the government of the Society, in order to show how gradually it revealed its true nature to the world, and that absolutism did not triumph without considerable opposition in the Society itself. The new institution, however, from its very beginning, was the expression of the principle of blind obedience to authority. Other Orders had inculcated it as a virtue; but none had provided so searching a discipline by which complete ascendancy could be attained over its disciples. Moreover its purpose was not merely to produce Christian humility and the spirit of self-denial in the individual. It was to make each member a ready instrument for the purposes of the Society in its warfare with the world. A practical object was always the end in view-the triumph of the Church over hostile forces, the conquest of the hosts of Satan whatever form they might assume. A perpetual warfare was to be waged, and success could only be obtained by faithful obedience to orders. The theory of this discipline is developed in the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius, a work of genius in devotional literature. Though it owes its form to a considerable extent to the Exercitatorio de la vida espiritual of Dom Garcia de Cisneros, the Benedictine Abbot of Mont-serrat, published in 1500, which Ignatius no doubt found in use at the convent at Montserrat during his stay there, and to the writings of mystics such as Gerard Zerbold of Zutphen and Mauburnus (Johannes Momboir), members of the Brotherhood of the Common Life, which he probably met with during his stay in Paris, yet it is no mere compilation. The spirit which breathes through its pages differs from that which distinguishes most mystical writings, in that the absorption of the soul in God is not to be the end of action but the source of inspiration for further work. The moral paralysis of pantheism, the danger of all mystics, is avoided. According to the plan of the work the meditations are divided into four main divisions or weeks. In the first period the course of the meditations is conducted so as to produce in the neophyte a kind of hypnotism, a passive state in which he will be ready to receive the impressions that it is desired to make upon him. In the second week the glories of the Heavenly King and the privileges of His service are set before the disciple. The armies of Christ and Satan are contrasted, and the demands that God makes upon men are set forth. The third and fourth weeks are devoted to meditation upon the sacred story, the life and passion of Christ, and the enormity of human sin; and finally the eternal joys of heaven are set before the disciple. To