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Rh worked by the Jesuits since the beginning of the seventeenth century.

The operations of the society extended not only to the capital and its neighborhood, but to northern regions. They partly held possession of Durango, Sonora, and Sinaloa, and from those points extended their missions into the unknown territory of California. Occasionally efforts were made in some districts by other orders, and by the secular clergy, to deprive them of their predominating influence; but by ably conducted intrigues, or even open resistance against episcopal orders which they regarded as encroaching upon their privileges, they contrived to maintain their claims. With equal success they always regained the ground temporarily lost by revolts of the natives, and at the close of the seventeenth century were steadily extending their dominion toward the north.

At the same time, while their efforts were chiefly in that direction, they lost no opportunity to establish houses and colleges in other provinces, well aware that if the education of the young could be brought under their control their influence would be greatly extended. Thus arose their establishment at Zacatecas, and later the one at Guadalajara, both of which became among the most prominent in the country. In the adjoining province of San Luis Potosi, there had been but two fathers during the early part of the century; nevertheless their work was so successful that in 1623 a college was founded, and notwithstanding some temporary opposition it prospered. A marked triumph was moreover secured by the order in Guanajuato, when the city, in 1616, chose San Ignacio de Loyola