Saint Cicero and the Jesuits

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Saint Cicero and the Jesuits

To John W. O’Malley and Rain

Saint Cicero and the Jesuits The Influence of the Liberal Arts on the Adoption of Moral Probabilism

ROBERT ALEKSANDER MARYKS

Institutum Historicum Societatis Iesu

© Robert Aleksander Maryks 2008 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher. Robert Aleksander Maryks has asserted his moral right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work. Published by Ashgate Publishing Limited Gower House Croft Road Aldershot Hampshire GU11 3HR England

Ashgate Publishing Company Suite 420 101 Cherry Street Burlington, VT 05401-4405 USA

Institutum Historicum Societatis Iesu Borgo S. Spirito, 4 00193 Rome Italy

Ashgate website: http://www.ashgate.com British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Maryks, Robert Aleksander Saint Cicero and the Jesuits : the influence of the liberal arts on the adoption of moral probabilism. – (Catholic Christendom, 1300–1700) 1. Cicero, Marcus Tullius – Influence 2. Cicero, Marcus Tullius – Appreciation 3. Jesuits – History 4. Jesuits – Education – History 5. Probabilism – History I. Title 271.5’3 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Maryks, Robert Aleksander Saint Cicero and the Jesuits : the influence of the liberal arts on the adoption of moral probabalism / Robert Aleksander Maryks. p. cm. — (Catholic Christendom, 1300—1700) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-7546-6293-8 (alk. paper) 1. Jesuits—History. 2. Probabilism—History. 3. Jesuits—Education—History. 4. Cicero, Marcus Tullius—Study and teaching—History I. Title. BX3706.3.M37 2008 271’.53—dc22 2007047708 Ashgate Publishing Ltd ISBN 978-0-7546-6293-8

Institutum Historicum Societatis Iesu ISBN 978-88-7041-364-9

Printed and bound in Great Britain by TJ International Ltd, Padstow, Cornwall.

Contents Publishers’ Note Series Editor’s Preface Acknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction 1

2

vii ix xi xiii 1

Early Jesuit Ministries

13

Ministries in the Jesuit Formula Instituti

14

The Consolatory Character of Jesuit Ministries

17

Frequent Confession and Communion

19

Preaching and the Call to Confess

24

Female Penitents

26

Spiritual Exercises and the General Confession

30

Jesuit Penitential Literature

32

“What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?” Jesuit Ethics before the Revolution of Probabilism

49

The First Jesuit Manual for Confessors

49

Authorship of the Directory

52

The Medieval Tutiorism of the Directory

56

The Role of Opinions in the Directory and Later Jesuit Manuals for Confessors

59

The Medieval Tutioristic Background of the Directory

65

Early Jesuit Tutiorism Beyond the Directory

71

Re-definition of the Jesuits

75

Early Jesuit Embryonic Probablism

79

SAINT CICERO AND THE JESUITS

vi 3

4

5

“Christian Virtue and Excellence in Ciceroniam Eloquence” The Jesuit Literary Renaissance and Adoption of Probabilism

83

Lectures on Cases of Conscience in the Ratio Studiorum

84

Classical Rhetoric in the Ratio and Jesuit Ciceronianism

88

Ciceronian Probability

97

Pedro Perpiñan and the Jesuit Rhetoric at the Roman College

101

The Genealogy of Jesuit Probabilism

107

Medina’s Revolutionary Ethical Solution

114

Gabriel Vázquez—the First Jesuit Probabilist

119

Francisco Suárez and the Reflex Principles

123

Probabilism as the Spiritual Sodom: Jansenist Attack Against Jesuit Ethics

127

Blaise Pascal’s Road to Port-Royal des Champs

127

French Jansenism

129

The Provincial Letters as a Political Invective

131

Tirso González de Santalla and Jesuit Probabiliorism

134

Conclusion

145

Bibliography Index

149 163

Publishers’ Note This volume is a co-publication between Ashgate Publishing and the Jesuit Historical Institute. As well as being part of Ashgate’s Catholic Christendom, 1300–1700 monograph series, it is the 64th volume in the Jesuit Historical Institute’s series Bibliotheca Instituti Historici Societatis Iesu.

Ashgate Publishing

Institutum Historicum Societatis Iesu

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Series Editor’s Preface The still-usual emphasis on medieval (or Catholic) and reformation (or Protestant) religious history has meant neglect of the middle ground, both chronological and ideological. As a result, continuities between the middle ages and early modern Europe have been overlooked in favor of emphasis on radical discontinuities. Further, especially in the later period, the identification of ‘reformation’ with various kinds of Protestantism means that the vitality and creativity of the established church, whether in its Roman or local manifestations, has been left out of account. In the last few years, an upsurge of interest in the history of traditional (or catholic) religion makes these inadequacies in received scholarship even more glaring and in need of systematic correction. The series will attempt this by covering all varieties of religious behavior, broadly interpreted, not just (or even especially) traditional institutional and doctrinal church history. It will to the maximum degree possible be interdisciplinary, comparative and global, as well as nonconfessional. The goal is to understand religion, primarily of the ‘Catholic’ variety, as a broadly human phenomenon, rather than as a privileged mode of access to superhuman realms, even implicitly. The period covered, 1300–1700, embraces the moment which saw an almost complete transformation of the place of religion in the life of Europeans, whether considered as a system of beliefs, as an institution, or as a set of social and cultural practices. In 1300, vast numbers of Europeans, from the pope down, fully expected Jesus’ return and the beginning of His reign on earth. By 1700, very few Europeans, of whatever level of education, would have subscribed to such chiliastic beliefs. Pierre Bayle’s notorious sarcasms about signs and portents are not idiosyncratic. Likewise, in 1300 the vast majority of Europeans probably regarded the pope as their spiritual head; the institution he headed was probably the most tightly integrated and effective bureaucracy in Europe. Most Europeans were at least nominally Christian, and the pope had at least nominal knowledge of that fact. The papacy, as an institution, played a central role in high politics, and the clergy in general formed an integral part of most governments, whether central or local. By 1700, Europe was divided into a myriad of different religious allegiances, and even those areas officially subordinate to the pope were both more nominally Catholic in belief (despite colossal efforts at imposing uniformity) and also in allegiance than they had been four hundred years earlier. The pope had become only one political factor, and not one of the first rank. The clergy, for its part, had virtually disappeared from secular governments as well as losing much of its local authority. The stage was set for the Enlightenment. Thomas F. Mayer, Augustana College

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Acknowledgments This book developed out of a doctoral dissertation at Fordham University (New York City) in 2006, entitled “From Medieval Tutiorism to Modern Probabilism: Spoils of Egypt and the Making of the Jesuit Conscience from Loyola to Pascal.” Great thanks go first, thus, to my dissertation adviser W. David Myers and to the members of the dissertation committee: John W. O’Malley, Richard Gyug, Doris Donnelly, and Wolfgang Müller for their comments and suggestions. I thank also other scholars, who provided their helpful insights for selected parts of what would become my book: especially Paul Grendler, Bryant Ragan, Dan Smail, and anonymous readers of the book manuscript. I owe much to the members of the Jesuit Historical Institute in Rome, Thomas McCoog and James Pratt, for their friendly support and hospitality during my three trips there. The Roman research results were efficient thanks also to the accommodating spirit of the team in the Archives and Library of the Institute, especially Mauro Brunello and Nicoletta Basilotta. While writing the book in New York City, the help of many colleagues from Fordham University Libraries in collecting bibliographical sources was indispensable. I thank especially Helena Cunniffe, Christine Campbell, Betty Garity, and Charlotte Labbe. PCS-CUNY Research Grant provided necessary financial support to do research in the archives of Rome in 2007 that allowed me to complete the transformation of my thesis into the following monograph.

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Abbreviations AHSI

Archivum Historicum Societatis Iesu

ARSI

Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu

Chron.

Chronicon

Const.

Constitutions

DHCJ

Diccionario Histórico de la Compañía de Jesús

MHSI

Monumenta Historica Societatis Iesu

Mon

Monumenta

Opp. NN.

Opera Nostrorum

S.J. (S.I.)

Societatis Iesu (of the Society of Jesus)

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Introduction In the beginning was Salamanca. A charming city located in Spanish Castile. It attracted me a few years ago not only for its grandiose Plaza Mayor, where students wearing traditional medieval costumes—distinctive for each university department—sing tunas until late in the night, but also its gorgeous plateresque architecture, especially the University of Salamanca and the Dominican Church of San Esteban. These two buildings would become symbolic for my future research: a new approach to ethics termed Probabilism developed among the sixteenth-century Dominican professors of the Salamancan University, which subsequently would be adopted and adapted by the Jesuits, whose founder Ignatius of Loyola (d. 1556) was jailed in 1527 by the Dominicans of San Esteban for daring to teach the distinction between venial and mortal sins without any theological training. That summer I did not know much about Probabilism. I was fascinated with studying the Jesuit preeminent ministry of sacramental confession (that I describe in its context in Chapter 1) and was chasing Jesuit manuals for confessors. I was already familiar with censuses and bibliographies on the subject, but when I began to explore the sources in Salamanca and later in Madrid, I realized that the Jesuit penitential book production must have been much more extensive than the known traditional bibliographical sources (especially Sommervogel and Palau y Dulcet)1 would suggest. I decided, therefore, to make a more systematic search and compile a census of that production. For this purpose, I went through the printed bibliographies and censuses, and also electronic resources in about 300 libraries worldwide: from Lisbon to Warsaw, from Stockholm to Naples, from New York City to the City of Mexico. The result of this research is the most comprehensive census of Jesuit penitential literature from 1554 until 1650.2 This census offered some very intriguing hints, upon which I built my further research. First of all, it showed that the first and more popular Jesuit confessional manual was Juan Alfonso de Polanco’s Short Directory for Confessors and Penitents. It dominated the printing market from 1554 (when it was first published) until the 1590s, when many other Jesuit manuals began to be published, yielding the editorial boom at the turn of the sixteenth century. From this information two exciting questions were born: why was Polanco’s text so dominant for so many years and what happened at the end of the century to provoke such a huge shift in Jesuit publishing on penance? 1 Charles Sommervogel, Bibliothèque de la Compagnie de Jésus (10 vols, Bruxelles and Paris, 1890–1932); Antonio Palau y Dulcet, Manual del librero hispanoamericano. Bibliografía general española e hispanoamericana desde la invención de la imprenta hasta nuestros tiempos (Barcelona, 1948–1976). 2 See Robert A. Maryks, “Census of the Books Written by Jesuits on Sacramental Confession (1554–1650),” Annali di Storia moderna e contemporanea 10 (2004): [415]–519.

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This is why I focused on the first Jesuit manual for confessors, trying to unfold dramatic differences between this manual, despite its obviously different genre, and the later Jesuit texts that enjoyed major editorial success, such as Francisco de Toledo’s and Hermann Buse[n]mbaum’s. A closer analysis of the content and language of the texts uncovered features of the Jesuit corporate conscience—the way the Directory and the subsequent manuals approached moral problems of a doubtful conscience: the Directory employed the Tutiorism of the major thirteenth-century scholastics, such as Alexander of Hales, Bonaventure, Albert the Great, and Thomas Aquinas. To put it briefly, Tutiorism meant that one should for safety’s sake follow the law rather than the choice of his or her conscience. Those of the post-Polanco generations took a radically different approach and later manuals embraced the moral freedom of a conscience to follow even the less plausible of two probable opinions (Probabilism). As John W. O’Malley observed in his The First Jesuits, Probabilism was “an extraordinarily important shift in approach to conscience and moral questions known to us better through Pascal’s scorn than through serious study.”3 Yet, The First Jesuits and other studies of Jesuit history did not investigate sufficiently the origins, the developments, and the implications of that important shift. The goal of the present book is to fill this gap. The Jesuits were clearly conscious of the existence of tutioristic, probabilioristic (following the more plausible of two probable opinions) and probabilistic approaches to ethics. I show this in Chapter 3 by scrutinizing texts about the way a lecture on cases of conscience had to be conducted in the Jesuit school. These texts are part of the official code of the Jesuit pedagogy known as Ratio Studiorum (1586, 1592, 1599), and of the correspondence on the Ratio between Roman headquarters and the Jesuits in various provinces of the Society of Jesus. The texts deliberately and specifically differentiate between the Latin ethical terms of tutior, probabilior, and probabilis and clearly reflect the important discussions over the employment of various schools of ethics among moralists from the thirteenth century onward. The difference in the ethical approach between the first and the second generation of Jesuits suggests a broader difference between prophetic and humanistic mentalities: “What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?” as Tertullian put it. In Chapter 2, I describe these two divergent mindsets, based not only on Polanco’s Directory, but also on other representative Jesuit texts of the period, such as the Jesuit Constitutions and Diego Laínez’s treatise on women’s clothes and cosmetics, which go much beyond the confessional query of what the Directory understood by “choosing the safer part.” The choice of tracing Tutiorism mainly in Polanco’s Directory and in the Jesuit Constitutions is corroborated by the fact that Polanco was one of the most influential Jesuits: he 3 John W. O’Malley, The First Jesuits (Cambridge, MA, 1993), p. 145. Also James F. Keenan and Thomas A. Shannon in their “Introduction” to Context of Casuistry (Washington, D.C., 1995), p. xv, state that “there is much we do not know—historically, philosophically, or theologically—about casuistry’s origins and sources, its popularity and utility, as well as its infamy and abuses.” See also Richard B. Miller, Casuistry and Modern Ethics. A poetics of Practical Reasoning (Chicago: 1996), p. 4.

INTRODUCTION

3

functioned as the secretary of the Society of Jesus and of the first three superior generals for 26 years. After Loyola’s death in 1556, as Assistant General and Vicar General he played a crucial role in the constitutional crisis that was overcome with the election of the converso Diego Laínez (1512–65). Polanco, himself a converso, contributed to composing the Jesuit Constitutions and was commissioned by Loyola to translate them into Latin. He also participated in the colloquium of Poissy (1562) and in the last session of the Council of Trent (1563). Tracing Tutiorism in these texts left me with two critical questions: why were the first Jesuits so conservative in contrast to some late medieval and early modern streams of ethical thought (Franciscan voluntarism and the School of Salamanca, among others)? What produced the swift transition from Tutiorism to Probabilism, as soon as it was formulated in 1577 by the Dominican Bartolomé de Medina (1527–81) from the School of Salamanca? Answers to these questions—and this is the main thesis of the present book—lie in the re-definition of the Jesuits that occurred after they dedicated themselves to a new ministry of educating youth. As John W. O’Malley argued in his The First Jesuits, this ministry was not considered by the founder Loyola and his companions in the first decade after the foundation of the order (1540). This new ministry required from Jesuit schoolmasters a serious engagement with Greco-Roman culture—called in the Jesuit Constitutions “spoils of Egypt”— in which they would have found some elements akin to their spirituality, especially Ciceronian humanitas and civiltà, along with the rhetorical principle of accommodation. This new requirement soon sparked a fascination with the classics, similar to that which characterized earlier Renaissance humanists, as Paul Grendler showed in his Schooling in Renaissance Italy: literacy and learning, 1300–1600 (Baltimore, 1989). Probabilistic casuistry—a form of moral reasoning aimed at interpreting and solving the practical issues of every-day life posed by the unprecedented changes of the early modern era—is often associated with hypocritical minds and the alleged backwardness of the Counter-Reformation. To quote just a few examples: the Dictionnaire de l’Académie française (1694) defined the term escobar (after the Jesuit probabilist Antonio Escobar de Mendoza) as “Hypocrite, qui résout au mieux de ses intérêts les cas de conscience les plus délicats.” The most stinging invective employed by Fyodor Dostoevsky in The Brothers Karamazov (1880) was “You, [Jesuit] casuist!” These and other condemnations of probabilistic approach to ethics were unaware that this sophisticated system was rooted in classical rhetoric promoted by Renaissance Humanism. Both Renaissance and Jesuit humanists were particularly captivated by Cicero—his prose and the socio-cultural aspect of his rhetorical system—and thus promoted his imitation that often turned into a devotion, hence the title of “saint” given to Cicero in the title of this book. The organization of the curriculum and the predilection for Cicero in the Ratio that I analyze in Chapter

4

SAINT CICERO AND THE JESUITS

3 recall the tradition of Renaissance and Jesuit moderate Ciceronianism4—the leading Jesuit humanists, such as Diego de Ledesma (1519–75), Pedro Juan Perpiñan (1530–66), Edmund Campion (1540–81), Francesco Benci (1542– 94), Jacob Pontanus (1542–1626), Giulio Negrone (1553–1625), and especially Cipriano Soáres (1524–93)—author of the standard rhetoric textbook De Arte Rethorica (1562)—emphasized the preeminence of Cicero’s prose. Ciceronian imitation became an important part of the new Jesuit identity after 1548 and perhaps had an influence on non-Western thought as well. It is emblematic that the first book written in Chinese by the Jesuit Matteo Ricci (1552–1610)—the symbol of the Jesuit rhetorical principle of accommodation— was a treatise on friendship Jiaoyou lun (1595), echoing obviously Cicero’s Laelius on Friendship (De amicitia). His later The Memory Palace introduced to Chinese culture the Western rhetorical tradition of Aristotle, Quintilian and Cicero. I believe that we can talk here about a kind of Jesuit literary Renaissance—a Jesuit journey from Jerusalem to Athens. A synoptic comparison (a comparative method of text analysis introduced by the scholars of the New Testament, that I employ in this book many times) of the three superseded versions of the Ratio Studiorum clearly suggests how systematic contact with Greco-Roman literature, and especially with Ciceronian rhetoric built on epistemic premises of probability, may have influenced the Jesuit conscience in the revolutionary transition from medieval Tutiorism to modern Probabilism. The Jesuits instilled this particular “habit” of probabilistic reasoning in the educated elites not only in Catholic Europe but in the European colonies as well through the extensive system of their schools—the largest educational system of the early modern world. I also suggest that another factor that would have molded the Jesuit mind to prefer the probabilistic route was Jesuit spirituality and especially its anthropologically founded principle of accommodation. Through an analysis of the same texts from the tutioristic perspective in Chapter 3, I portray this stage of the making of the Jesuit mind as early Jesuit embryonic Probabilism. How the Jesuits actually adopted and adapted the Probabilism formulated by the Dominican Medina and how it became popular at their Roman College and beyond at the turn of the sixteenth century is the subject of Chapter 4. In it, I reconstruct a genealogy of Jesuit Probabilism by a discussion of the most important Jesuits thinkers in the field, Gabriel Vázquez, Francisco Suárez and Juan Azor. The difference between the desire to accept in moral reasoning what is probable and what is safe(r) fueled the passionate and sometimes even vitriolic conflict between the Jesuits and the Jansenists (and among the Jesuits themselves) since the 1650s. “May the Jesuits kill the Jansenists?” asked the Jansenist Blaise Pascal (1623–62) in his Provincial Letters (1656–57). But should not we rather ask whether it was the Jansenists who may have killed

4 See Marc Fumaroli, L’Âge de l’Éloquence. Rhétorique et “res literaria’ de la Renaissance au seuil de l’époque classique (Genève, 1980), pp. 162–202.

INTRODUCTION

5 5

the Jesuits? Pascal’s was one of the many “brilliantly prejudiced” attacks that proliferated after 1650 against Jesuit probabilistic casuistry and associated it forever with moral laxity and easy virtue. The Jesuits vs. Jansenists conflict was not just a literary exchange between the mathematician Pascal and his Jesuit opponents, but it involved European universities, religious orders, rulers, and the papacy: the University of Paris would condemn some probabilistic authors; the Dominicans and the Jesuit Superior General, Tirso González de Santalla (1624–1705), would promote Probabiliorism against Probabilism; the papacy would condemn some lax probabilistic sentences, but eventually would also disapprove tutioristic Jansenism. The French monarch Louis XIV would persecute the Jansenist nuns of Port-Royal led by Angélique Arnauld (1591–1661) and eventually demolished their convent, yet the anti-Jesuit spirit fed by underground Jansenists would survive in France and in the eighteenth century would fuel the suppression of the Society of Jesus there (1764).6 I describe these conflicts in Chapter 5. One may argue that the tutioristic approach characterizing the first generations of Jesuits could be explained by a sociological claim that any organization in a highly hierarchical framework will be best accepted if it is perceived as a non-innovative, non-threatening, and completely supportive of social structure. However, this sociological claim does not seem to apply to the early Jesuits, whose program (Formula Instituti) submitted to Pope Paul III for approval in the late 1530s was a revolutionary way of conceiving religious life (lack of choir and of defined dress, for example). Their innovative concept of religious life encountered very strong opposition in the pope’s circles and was viewed as a threat to the traditional role of religious orders in the church. On the other hand, the first generation of Jesuits appeared very conservative in their approach to ethics, as this book aims to show. Perhaps Jesuit conservatism in ethics could be explained by the socio-ethnic background of the first Jesuits—it is striking that the most prominent Jesuit casuists, such as Polanco, Laínez, Ledesma, Enrique Enríquez, Gaspar de Loarte, Manuel Sá, Cardinal Toledo and his nephew Suárez, were all born into Iberian converso families.7 Neither can the Jesuit Tutiorism be satisfactorily explained within the historical context of the (Protestant) Reformation and the (so-called) Counter5 The expression belongs to Albert R. Jonsen. See his “Forward,” in Keenan and Shannon (eds), The Context of Casuistry, p. ix. On the anti-Jesuit casuistry polemical literature, especially in France and England, see Margaret Sampson, “Laxity and liberty in seventeenth-century English political thought,” in Edmund Leites (ed.), Conscience and Casuistry in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge, 1988), pp. 72–118, and Martha Marie Houle, The Fictions of Casuistry and Pascal’s Jesuit in “Les Provinciales” (San Diego: University of California in San Diego, 1983). 6 See Dale van Kley, The Jansenists and the Expulsion of the Jesuits from France 1757–1765 (New Haven, 1975). 7 For an interesting parallelism between the Jewish, Muslim, and Christian casuistry, see Albert R. Jonsen, “Practical Reasoning and Moral Casuistry,” in William Schwieker (ed.), The Blackwell Companion to Religious Ethics (Malden, MA, 2005), pp. 53–60.

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Reformation that would delineate clearly the difference between Catholicism and the Protestant reformers. The Dominicans from the School of Salamanca were Catholic and yet their choice of abandoning Tutiorism and espousing Probabilism at the time the Jesuits were sticking to Tutiorism cannot be seen as a result of the confrontation with the Protestants. On the other hand, the strongest attack on Jesuit Probabilism would arrive a century later from the Catholic Jansenists. The hiatus between the tutioristic and probabilistic mentalities represents an important ethical and intellectual dialectic in the history of Western civilization that has persisted until today and, therefore, this book can be of interest not only to scholars dealing with the history of moral theology/ethics or of the Jesuits. But how does this book fit within the historiography on the subject? Although Polanco’s Directory has been studied under various aspects,8 no one has pointed out either its tutioristic features or how Tutiorism was characteristic of the first Jesuits. Neither has anyone systematically studied the subsequent history of Jesuit ethics—how Probabilism was countered by continued Tutiorism or Probabiliorism and to what extent Probabilism took the form of Laxism. Johann Theiner’s important and well-informed study on the history of moral theology shows how this branch of learning developed into an autonomous discipline from lecturing on cases of conscience and highlights the exceptional contribution of the Jesuit educational system and Jesuit moral theologians to this process.9 Strikingly, Theiner’s work does not view this development through the spectacles of Probabilism. The author dedicates a chapter to the Jesuits and the study of law, analyzing the writings of Luis de Molina, Suárez and Paul Laymann; he discusses the Jesuit controversy with the Jansenists (including Pascal), but Theiner makes no reference to Probabilism in the index to his work. Furthermore, several important links are missing from his presentation of Jesuit moral literature, such as the contributions of Loarte, Martino Fornari, Paolo Comitoli, Juan de Lugo, Escobar de Mendoza, Valère Régnault [Reginaldus], and others. In contrast, this book shows that the main contribution of the Jesuits to the development of moral theology lay not in giving this new discipline a classical structure, but in giving it a tremendous shift in the form of Probabilism. Contrary to Theiner’s approach, John Mahoney’s work on the making of moral theology does highlight the importance of Probabilism and its adoption by the Jesuits (causing subsequently divisions within the Society of Jesus).10 Mahoney’s presentation is vague though, and does not reflect different historical stages of that process. Tutioristic reactions against Jesuit Probabilism did come 8 See Luis Martínez Ferrer, La penitencia en la primera evangelización de México (1523–1585) (México, 1998), pp. 65–7 and Wietse de Boer, The Conquest of the Soul. Confession, Discipline, and Public Order in Counter-Reformation Milan (Leiden, 2001), p. 101. 9 Johann Theiner, Die Entwicklung der Moraltheologie zur eigenständingen disziplin (Regensburg, 1970). 10 John Mahoney, The Making of Moral Theology (Oxford, 1987), pp. 135–43.

INTRODUCTION

7

from the Jansenists—as Mahoney correctly shows—but not from them alone: the responses came also from within the Society of Jesus, in which Tutiorism was a dominant system before the Jesuit adoption of Medina’s probabilistic theory. Also aware of the importance of Jesuit Probabilism is Turrini in her La coscienza e le leggi. Morale e diritto nei testi per la confessione della prima Età moderna (Bologna, 1991). She traces the adoption of Probabilism in the early modern books for confession printed in Italy as transition from veritas to opinio. Since she focuses on the Italian printing, Turrini’s investigation on the Jesuit contribution to the process cannot be exact. In fact, after having treated well the early Jesuit probabilist Sá, she jumps thirty years to the German Laymann and his first edition of Theologia moralis (1625) printed in Munich—outside Italy—where she (correctly) finds a larger theorization of Probabilism. Turrini then goes back to Suárez to compare his approach to conscience with Cajetan’s. The next Jesuit moralist treated is the laxist Tommaso Tamburini, who published his Methodus in 1647 in Rome, and then she discusses the anti-probabilist, Enrique Henríquez, Suárez’s master, whose Summa theologiae moralis was issued in Salamanca in 1591. Despite the merits of Turrini’s account, she does not unfold the process systematically. Perhaps for this reason, she misses how Probabilism departed from early Jesuit Tutiorism, although she is very familiar with Polanco’s Directory and other early Jesuit texts. Apart from the problem of chronology in telling the history of Jesuit Probabilism, more importantly this book strongly disagrees with Turrini’s thesis that the adoption of Probabilism would have reflected “the transition from the search for veritas to the triumph of the opinion,” in early modern ethics. It is possible that her conclusion comes from not being aware in her study of the crucial link between early modern casuistry and ancient rhetoric (especially Ciceronian), a link that will be tenaciously highlighted in this book. The Jesuits, who based their rhetoric and casuistry on the Ciceronian and the Academia’s premises of the epistemic theory of probability, believed that morals are not science (as it was meant by Aristotle) and, therefore, must rely on probable arguments rather than truth. This assumption does not mean, however, that the Academia of Carneades, Cicero and the probabilistic Jesuits renounced the search for truth. To the contrary, they were in the same chorus with Cicero, who—although admitting the imperfection of human knowledge of truth—described his philosophical milieu by saying, “We are the men who wish to discover the truth and our discussion has no other purpose than to force to the surface the truth or what most nearly approaches it [emphasis mine].”11 The probable opinions were, thus, not aimed at substituting for truth, as Turrini seems to suggest, but at approaching truth most nearly. 11 Cicero, De partitione oratoria, quoted by Meador, “Skeptic Theory,” p. 348. On the deep concern with the issues of skepticism, doubt, and certitude, in the religious disputes of the sixteenth century, see Charles B. Schmitt, Cicero Scepticus. A Study of the Influence of the Academica in the Renaissance (The Hague, 1972), pp. 58–66.

SAINT CICERO AND THE JESUITS

8

The revolutionary impact of Probabilism does not lie in acknowledging the existence of many, and sometimes infinite,12 opinions on a moral issue, which many medieval and early modern authors already did, but in giving the penitents the consoling and liberating possibility of following in good conscience an opinion that is less “safe” (exposed to a risk of material sin) and/or less plausible, even though it might contradict the advice of their confessors. The significance is moral and personal rather than strictly academic. In this context it is hard to agree with Henry Charles Lea, for whom Probabilism grew out of the incapacity of confessors and penitents to deal with the excess of opinions generated by medieval Scholasticism.13 Probabilism changed the nature of the relationship between the penitent and the confessor, who had now to absolve, not because he could back his decision with the opinion of a safe authority, but because the penitent could claim a probable opinion.14 The confessor was still a judge—as Trent stressed with determination15—but not an unquestionable one, and the penitent was no longer simply a “poor, sinning folk.”16 Of course, not every penitent was prepared to undertake such a discussion. However, it is necessary to bear in mind that the Jesuits were confessors to many major political and ecclesiastical personalities, apart from to their numerous students, lay and clerical—150,000 by 1600 (that corresponds to the population of 12

Complaining about “Babel” of opinions is a topos of penitential literature. See Turrini, Coscienza e le leggi, p. 302: “il passaggio dalla ricerca della veritas al trionfo dell’opinione,” and Henry Charles Lea, History of Auricular Confession and Indulgences in the Latin Church (New York, 1968), vol. 2, pp. 301–2: “Probabilism triumphed and the rule has become firmly established. … It is evident from all this that by the end of the sixteenth century there was impending a total change in the doctrines and practice of the Church with regard to sin and the means of its avoidance and cure. Scholastic theology had multiplied so infinitely the opinions respecting every question … and it was becoming so impossible for either penitent [or] confessor to grope his way in search of the safer or more probable course, that the old theories of tutiorism and probabiliorism were becoming impracticable. Opinions, moreover, evolved by casuistic subtility.” Additionally, it is amazing how uncritical is Edward Peters’s opinion on Lea’s biased writing: “His prose style, developed so as to remove the temptation to make rhetorical arguments and to emphasize the primacy of sources, is essentially that in which scholarly history is still written.” See Edward Peters, “Henry Charles Lea (1825–1909),” in Helen Damico, Joseph B. Zavadil (eds), Medieval scholarship: biographical studies on the formation of a discipline (New York, 1995), p. 89. About Lea’s anticlerical sentiment in his History of Auricular Confession, see Katharine Jackson Lualdi and Anne T. Thayer, “Introduction,” in Katharine Jackson Lualdi and Anne T. Thayer (eds), Penitence in the Age of Reformations (Aldershot, 2000), p. 1. 14 Pascal and the Jansenists were terrified by this conclusion. See Letter V in the Provincial Letters, where the Jesuit Bauny is quoted: “‘When the penitent,’ says Father Bauny, ‘follows a probable opinion, the confessor is bound to absolve him, though his opinion should differ from that of his penitent.’” 15 See, for example, Dionisio Borobio, “The Tridentine Model of Confession in its Historical Context,” Concilium 23.2 (1987): 21–37; Ann T. Thayer, “Judge and doctor: images of the confessor in printed model sermon collections, 1450–1520,” in Lualdi and Thayer (eds), Penitence in the Age of Reformations, pp. 10–29. 16 This is an allusion to W. David Myers’s “Poor, Sinning Folk.” Confession and Conscience in Counter-Reformation Germany (Ithaca and London, 1996). 13

INTRODUCTION

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Rome by that time)—who themselves were trained in casuistry. Probabilism was a sharp departure not only from all medieval casuistry and theology—as Jonsen and Toulmin, and Turrini pointed out17—but also (at least) a partial departure from the Tridentine doctrine on penance.18 The most recent articles on Jesuit moral theology and Probabilism in the mostly Jesuit-authored Diccionario Histórico de la Compañía de Jesús,19 based on traditional bibliographies, are not precise, again, in providing the historical framework of Probabilism. The article on moral theology divides its history into centuries. For the sixteenth century it includes only Polanco’s work and moves to the beginning of the next century with the works of Sá and Toledo. This is incorrect, for the former had published his Aphorisms already in 159220 and the latter’s De instructione was published in 1596,21 preceding Azor’s publications. The article on moral theology places the introduction of Probabilism in the seventeenth century, which is again incorrect, as we have seen above. Diccionario’s authors are right, however, in arguing that the Jesuit interest in the human person and their option for liberty of conscience traditionally associated Probabilism with the Jesuits. The authors of the article are also correct in stating that Probabilism developed fast among the Jesuits and that there was another movement in tandem that promoted use of authoritative opinions, although they do not call it “Tutiorism.” The latter term is used, though, by the author of the article on Probabilism in the same dictionary,22 who indicates how the Jansenists promoted Tutiorism. The article shows that Probabilism, although introduced by a Dominican, was followed by the Jesuits and not by the Dominicans, who later preferred Probabiliorism. According to the author, the main Jesuit representatives of Probabilism were Azor (called “king of casuists”), Suárez, Vázquez, Leonardus Lessius, Laymann, Juan de Lugo, Toledo, and Busenbaum. The list is neither complete nor chronological. The article, again, does not unfold the process of the Jesuit adoption of Probabilism and reactions to it from within the Society of Jesus. The most exhaustive article on Probabilism in the Dictionnaire de théologie catholique by Th. Deman23 quotes only 12 out of 38 of the Jesuit authors from 17 Albert Jonsen and Stephen Toulmin, The Abuse of Casuistry: A History of Moral Theology (Berkeley, 1988), p. 164; Turrini, Coscienza e le leggi, pp. 146–8. 18 That would be an additional argument against the historiographical use of term “Tridentine Reform and Tridentine Age” discussed by O’Malley in his Trent and All That: Renaming Catholicism in the Early Modern Era (Cambridge, 2000), pp. 134–6. 19 Edited by Charles E. O’Neill and Joaquín M. Domínguez (4 vols, Roma and Madrid, 2001), pp. 3739–43, 3745–47. 20 Aphorismi confessariorum ex Doctorum sententiis collecti … (Venetiis, 1592). 21 Instructio sacerdotum ac poenitentium … cum additionibus D. Andreae Victorelli (Venetiis, 1596). 22 DHCJ, vol. 4, pp. 3745–47. 23 Dictionnaire de théologie catholique, contenant l’exposé des doctrines de la théologie catholique, leurs preuves et leur histoire, commencé sous la direction de A. Vacant et E. Mangenot, continué sous celle de E. Amann; avec le concours d’un grand nombre de collaborateurs (Paris, 1908–50), col. 417–619.

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the census. According to Deman, the first (and very tentative) probabilistic Jesuit moralist would have been Juan Azor (Institutiones morales, 1600). But he never mentions Sá, who in his Aphorismi confessariorum published in Venice already in 159224 (even before the publication of Vázquez’s and Suárez’s works on the subject) adopts Probabilism, as even Pascal pointed out in his Provincial Letters.25 The work, although the smallest in size, was the third most published among the Jesuit manuals, reaching at least 80 editions. Its French translation was published in Paris in 160126 and 160327 and in Lyons in 1627.28 It had pan-European circulation: it was printed in Lyons and Cologne (11 editions in each), Rome (10), Brescia (9), Douai (8), Venice (7), Antwerp (5), Paris (5), Madrid, Rouen, Tarvisio and Turin (2), Alcalá, Barcelona, Pamplona and Valladolid (1). This information coming from the census should convince the reader of Sá’s importance, although it does not diminish that of Azor, whose work in huge three separately printed volumes in folio had at least 51 editions. Deman also does not treat other prolific moralists who enjoyed great editorial success. He overlooks the most published Toledo (Intructio sacerdotum, 1596: 166 editions), Régnault (De prudentia, 1610: 15 editions; Praxis fori poenitentialis,29 1616: 22 editions, Tractatus de officio poenitentis,30 1618: four editions; Instructio brevis,31 1619: one edition) and Vincenzo Figliucci [Filliucci] (Questiones morales,32 1621, and its Appendix, 1625: 20 editions; Synopsis theologiae moralis,33 1626: four editions; and Brevis instructio,34 1626, one edition). More systemic and comprehensive is Angelozzi’s list.35 However, besides lacking many minor authors, it does not quote two very important ones, 24

Manuel Sá, Aphorismi confessariorum ex Doctorum sententiis collecti (Venetiis,

1592). 25

See Letter V. Les Aphorismes des confeseur (Paris, 1601). 27 Les Aphorismes des confeseur ... Reveus, et corrigez et augmentez en ceste derniere edition (Paris, 1603). 28 Les Aphorismes des confeseur ... Et reveu selon l’exemplaire corrigé par le M. du Palais sacré de Rome ... (Lyon, 1627). 29 Praxis fori poenitentialis ad directionem confessarii in usu sacri sui muneris … (Lugduni [Lyon], 1616). 30 Tractatus de officio poenitentis in usu sacramenti poenitentiae. Nunc primum in lucem prodit, suis Indicibus illustratus (Lugduni, 1618). 31 Instructio brevis et dilucida ad usum sacramenti poenitentiae. Nunc primum publici iuris facta (Venetiis, 1619). 32 Quaestionum moralium tomi duo priores quibus in hac nova editione ... Appendix posthuma ... ([Lugdun]i, [1621]). 33 Synopsis theologiae moralis ad formam cursus, qui in Collegio Romano Societatis Jesu praelegi solet … (Herbipoli [Würzburg], 1626). 34 Brevis instructio pro Confessionibus excipiendis, cum adjuncto interrogatorio pro Confessionibus longioris temporis … (Ravenspurgi [Württemberg], 1626). 35 Giancarlo Angelozzi, “L’insegnamento dei casi di coscienza nella pratica educativa della Compagnia di Gesù,” in Gian Paolo Brizzi (ed.), La “Ratio studiorum”. Modelli culturali e pratiche educative dei Gesuiti in Italia tra Cinque e Seicento (Rome, 1981), pp. 159–62. 26

INTRODUCTION

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Juan de Lugo, who was considered by Alfonso Liguori the greatest theologian after Aquinas, and Escobar y Mendoza, the main target of Pascal’s attack. Again, since Angelozzi’s list is based on the traditional bibliographical sources, some corrections must be made to the information it provides. Margaret Sampson, in her article on seventeenth-century English political thought,36 quotes some of our Jesuit authors, such as Etienne Bauny, Régnault, Escobar y Mendoza, Lugo, Thomas Sánchez, Layman, and Azor. Her selection, however, is far from complete and representative, omitting such important authors as Sá, Toledo, Figliucci, Comitoli, among others. The most information she provides regards the French authors, but—on the basis of the census—it has to be corrected. The first edition of his Compendiaria Praxis difficiliorum casuum dates from 1619, not from 1622, by which time five other editions had appeared. De prudentia was published in 1610 in Lyons before its 1611 edition in Brescia and it had its first French translation edited in Lyons in 1614. The first edition of Praxis fori poenitentialis is from 1616, and before the 1622 edition Sampson mentions, it had nine other editions. In addition, Régnault is author of Tractatus de officio poenitentis in usu sacramenti poenitentiae (Lyons, 1618) and Instructio brevis et dilucida ad usum sacramenti poenitentiae (Venice, 1619). It is true that he published his Praxis in single-volume form, but I do not think its format was “accessible,” since it was printed in folio and had almost 800 pages. Surely, it was smaller than huge editions by Azor, Lugo or Figliucci, but much less accessible than Toledo’s or Sá’s. The review of these few selected works on the subject should suffice to justify the publication of the present book, which begins with the description of early Jesuit ministries with a special focus on the preeminent ministry of sacramental confession (Chapter 1); analyzes Polanco’s Directorium and Jesuit Tutiorism (Chapter 2); tells the story of the Jesuit engagement with classical education (Chapter 3); suggests how Cicero may have catalyzed the Jesuit adoption of Probabilism (Chapter 4); and finally concludes with the history of the Jansenist and Jesuit anti-Probabilism in the second half of the seventeenth century (Chapter 5). Let us, then, begin ab ovo.

36 Margaret Sampson, “Laxity and liberty in seventeenth-century English political thought,” in Leites (ed.), Conscience and Casuistry, pp. 77–8.

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CHAPTER 1

Early Jesuit Ministries Ministry is the key word to understand who the first Jesuits were. Contrary to biased ideas circulating among scholars and being printed in many college textbooks, the Society of Jesus was founded to perform a defined list of consuetudinary ministries (consueta ministeria), such as ministries of the Word of God and works of mercy, but not to engage in academic education (“education of children and unlettered persons in Christianity” was quite different) or to counter Protestantism, which did become part of Jesuit activities, but only a decade after the order’s foundation in 1540. Even then, those consuetudinary ministries continued to be pivotal and were, thus, at the core of Jesuit self-understanding. As Loyola’s close associate, Jerónimo Nadal (1507–80), argued authoritatively, the Jesuit consuetudinary ministries did not evolve after the Society was founded, but determined its vocation and goal already at the Society’s inception.1 In order to interpret correctly the impact of the Jesuits on early modern Catholicism (some important aspects of which we shall track in this book) and beyond, it is necessary first to explore and analyze Jesuit documents that portray their self-understanding through ministries. This kind of hermeneutics, initiated by O’Malley in his The First Jesuits, challenges the approach of historians who study Jesuit history predominantly from the institutional perspective (Jesuit scholars included). But the history of Jesuit ministries, as we shall see, often shows a significant discrepancy between the Society of Jesus (and other religious orders) and ecclesiastical institutional developments that were often based on conciliar documents. In this context, historiographical periodization of sixteenth-century religious history into pre-Tridentine and post-Tridentine eras does not fully reflect the complexity and variety of Catholic initiatives of the period. The documents of the Council of Trent (1545–63) could have been barely helpful in the building of the Jesuit identity, for they focused on the hierarchical Church—Trent was a council of pastors and not of men religious.2 And the Jesuits were not pastors, if not when exceptionally coerced by the pope to except parishes or bishoprics in virtue of their special vow of obedience.3 Indeed, they usually excluded from their service those 1 Mon Nadal, vol. 5, p. 823: “… accidentalia et Societati adventitia, sed tamquam substantialia et cum ipsa Societate nata, sine quibus [ministeriis] nec finis nec vocatio nec institutum constare potest.” 2 See John W. O’Malley, “The Historiography of the Society of Jesus,” in John W. O’Malley (ed.), The Jesuits. Cultures, Sciences, and the Arts 1540–1773 (Toronto, 1999), pp. 3–37; John W. O’Malley, Trent and all that, especially pp. 77–8 and 127–8. 3 The recent General Congregation 34 still reiterated that the Superior General of the Society “continue in dialogue with the Holy See regarding the Society’s tradition to resist nominations to the episcopacy” (Decree 6, part VIII).

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ministries that were typically performed by pastors: baptisms, marriages, and funerals. Trent did not address ministries (whose explosion characterized the period) if not that of preaching, but even that was treated in reference to bishops rather than to men religious. Trent did put a stress on the priesthood, but the first Jesuits identified themselves more by the type of ministries they performed than by their sacerdotal distinctiveness. Their religious identity came before the sacerdotal one. True, the final incorporation of a Jesuit into the Society was made not in virtue of his priestly ordination, but in virtue of his final religious vows.4 Nevertheless, the preeminent Jesuit ministry was administering sacramental confession, which was exclusively a sacerdotal ministry. Other ministries, such as spiritual conversation, preaching, sacred lectures, teaching Christianity, assisting the dying, missions to the countryside, or giving Spiritual Exercises, in which the first Jesuits indefatigably engaged—regardless of whether they were priests or not—were the satellites of the central ministry of sacramental confession, whose administrators possessed the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven. Ministries in the Jesuit Formula Instituti The importance of ministries results from the foundational document of the Society, Formula Instituti. It was a fruit of deliberations by Loyola and his first companions during their stay in Rome in 1539, after their plans of departing for Jerusalem to proselytize among Muslims had vanished due to the war la Serenissima allied with Charles V was unsuccessfully waging against the 4 Reading the decree 6 of the 34th General Congregation of the Society of Jesus (1995) “The Jesuit Priest: Ministerial Priesthood and Jesuit Identity,” in Documents of General Congregation 34 (http://www.companysj.com/gc34/gc34synops.html) that claims the inspiration of the origins ([158]), one can remain surprised by the fact that the text does not cite any sources that expressly describe the priest identity of the first Jesuits. Loyola’s letter to the fathers sent to Trent, the only reference to original documents cited in the chapter “Our tradition” ([173]), speaks rather about the customary ministries that had been already made part of the Formula Instituti: visiting the sick and instructing the children, which are not exclusively sacerdotal ministries. The Jesuit sources never expressly speak about “sacerdotal ministry” of Loyola and his first companions (the expression used in the decree [166]). Instead they treat the customary ministries (ministeria consueta), characteristic of the Institute of the Society, that were performed either by a novice (“novitii ministerial Societatis obeunt omnia” [Mon Nadal, vol. 5, p. 771]), or a scholastic (“non negliguntur ministeria Societatis” [Mon Nadal, vol. 5, p. 772]), or a lay brother, or a priest. The papal bulls incorporated the Formula Instituti that listed specific activities for all members of the Society and not for Jesuit priests only, as the cited decree claims ([167]). The embarrassment of the authors of the decree to find adequate citations in the original sources (also in the Constitutions) comes from the surprising fact that there is very little on priesthood. This data is in contrast with the fact that at the birth of the Society in 1540 nearly all the Jesuits were priests. The authors of the decree betray anachronistic hermeneutics in their approach to the sources. Instead of asking the documents themselves what they can tell us about the Jesuit priesthood, they selectively quote those sources to confirm their a priori conceived ideas. This kind of hazardous hermeneutics applied to biblical studies led in the past to absurd and dangerous conclusions.

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Ottoman Turks (1537–40). The goal of this ministerial manifesto was to draw the main features of this nascent religious group for papal approval. In its primeval version it was divided into five chapters and, therefore, known as Quinque Capitula. With some minor changes this document was incorporated into the papal bull, Regimini Militantis Ecclesiae (1540), which officially recognized the Society of Jesus as a new religious order. As the Jesuits were gaining their ministerial experience, Loyola and his close collaborators at the Jesuit headquarters continued to update the Formula. Its version that became part of the re-approval bull, Exposcit debitum (1550), of Pope Julius III testifies to a subtle yet significant shift in the Jesuit ministerial orientation within the first decade. Whereas the 1540 Formula indicated the Society’s goal as “the propagation of the faith and the progress of souls in Christian life and doctrine,” the 1550 version added “defense” to the propagation of the faith. Yet, both versions indicated ministries by which that purpose had to be achieved. The latter Formula appended the mode that should characterize all the Jesuit ministries: they had to be performed without any financial reward (gratis omnino). It is noteworthy that in spite of the 1550 version’s adjustment, it does not betray any Counter-Reformation attitude, which truly did determine the spirit of the Council of Trent that was attended by a few yet prominent converso Jesuit theologians.5 A synoptic glimpse at the two versions of the Formula Instituti can be helpful in noticing the differences and similarities mentioned above.

5 Diego Laínez and Alfonso Salmerón participated in the Council of Trent in 1546. The two went back there in 1563, accompanied by Juan Alfonso de Polanco and Jerónimo Nadal. On the participation of Jesuits in the Council of Trent see Mario Amadeo, “La Compañía de Jesús y el Concilio de Trento,” Estudios 74 (1945): 420–33; Antonio Astráin, “Los españoles en el Concilio de Trento,” Razón y fe 3 (1902): 189– 206 and 289–303; James Brodrick, “The Jesuits at the Council of Trent,” The Month 154 (1929): 513–21 and 155 (1930): 97–108; Jacobus Laínez, S.I., Disputationes Tridentinae ad manoscriptorum fidem edidit et commentariis historicis instruxit Hartmanus Grisar, S.I. (Oeniponte, 1886); Kazimierz Piwarski, “Sobór Trydencki i jezuici,” in Kazimierz Piwarski (ed.), Szkice z dziejów papiestwa (Warszawa, 1958), pp. 45–97; and Mario Reguzzoni SI, “Un contributo alla storia della pedagogia. I gesuiti a Trento,” Civiltà Cattolica (1989): 260–65.

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Regimini militantis Ecclesiae, 1540

Exposcit debitum, 1550

Whoever wishes to serve as a soldier of God beneath the banner of the cross in our Society, which we desire to be designated by the name of Jesus, and to serve the Lord alone and his vicar on earth, should keep in mind that once he has made a solemn vow of perpetual chastity he is a member of a community founded chiefly for this purpose: to strive especially for the progress of souls in Christian life and doctrine, and for propagation of the faith by the ministry of the Word, by Spiritual Exercises, and works of charity, and specifically by the education of children and unlettered persons in Christianity.

Whoever desires to serve as a soldier of God beneath the banner of the cross in our Society, which we desire to be designated by the name of Jesus, and to serve the Lord alone and the Church, his spouse, under the Roman pontiff, the vicar of Christ on earth, should, after a solemn vow of perpetual chastity, poverty, and obedience, keep what follows in mind. He is a member of a Society founded chiefly for this purpose: to strive especially for the defense and propagation of the faith and for the progress of souls in Christian life and doctrine, by means of public preaching, lectures, and any other ministration whatsoever of the Word of God, and further by means of the Spiritual Exercises, the education of children and unlettered persons in Christianity, and the spiritual consolation of Christ’s faithful through hearing confessions and administering the other sacraments. Moreover, he should show himself ready to reconcile the estranged, compassionately assist and serve those who are in prisons or hospitals, and indeed to perform any other works of charity, according to what will seem expedient for the glory of God and the common good [emphasis mine].6

6

There is nothing revolutionary about the list of ministries presented in both

6 “Quicunque in Societate nostra, quam Iesu nomine insigniri cupimus, vult sub crucis vexillo Deo militare et soli Domino ac Ecclesiae ipsius sponsae sub Romano Pontifice Christi in terris Vicario servire; post solemne perpetuae Castitatis, Paupertatis et Obedientiae votum, proponat sibi in animo se partem esse Societatis ad hoc potissimum institutae, ut ad fidei defensionem et propagationem et profectum animarum in vita et doctrina Christiana, per publicas praedicationes, lectiones et aliud quodcunque verbi Dei ministerium, ac spiritualia exercitia, puerorum ac rudium in Christianismo institutionem, Christifidelium in confessionibus audiendis ac caeteris Sacramentis administrandis spiritualem consolationem, praecipue intendat; et nihilominus ad dissidentium reconciliationem et eorum qui in carceribus vel in hospitalibus inveniuntur piam subventionem et ministerium, ac reliqua charitatis opera, prout ad Dei gloriam et commune bonum expedire visum erit, exequenda gratis omnino et nullo pro suo in praedictis omnibus labore stipendio accepto, se utilem exhibeat.”

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documents, for the Jesuits were heirs of a long medieval tradition that had had its roots in the IV Lateran Council (1215) and in the ministries of the mendicant orders. Yet, the Jesuits gave them a new importance and proposed a new way of performing them. This new style was non-traditional (praeter morem; [ministeria] insolita) and, thus, often encountered strong resistance (nimia circumspectio et cautela) within some ecclesiastical circles.7 One of the predominant features of this new style was the focus on spiritual consolation. The Consolatory Character of Jesuit Ministries Spiritual consolation had a very special place in Jesuit spirituality and ministries.8 It had to permeate all ministries, as the Formula Instituti (quoted above) stated. Nadal explained well what the Formula meant by that: These words—“especially spiritual consolation”—refer to all the primary ministries of the Society. They at the same time mean that we are not to be content in those ministries only with what is necessary for salvation but pursue beyond it the perfection and consolation of our neighbor. For spiritual consolation is the best index of a person’s spiritual progress. The word especially means that there are other ends we must pursue, but this one in the first place, as our primary intention and goal. If we do not have time and resources for both this and the others, we should omit doing them, and apply all our energies to this one.9

See “Formulas of the Institute of the Society of Jesus Approved and Confirmed by Popes Paul III and Julius III,” in The Constitutions of the Society of Jesus and their Complementary Norms (St. Louis, 1996), pp. 3–4. 7 Chron., vol. 2, pp. 208–9, § 91. See also Giancarlo Angelozzi, “Interpretazioni della penitenza sacramentale in età moderna” Religioni e Società 2 (1986): 76; Boris Ulianich (ed.), Ricerche sulla confessione dei peccati a Napoli tra ‘500 e ‘600 (Napoli, 1997), p. 12; Ulderico Parente, “Aspetti della confessione dei peccati nella Compagnia di Gesù a Napoli tra XVI e XVII secolo,” ibid., pp. 134–9. 8 See Robert A. Maryks, “‘Consolatio’ nel ministero di confessione dei primi Gesuiti,” in M. Hinz, R. Righi, D. Zardin (eds), I Gesuiti e la Ratio Studiorum (Roma, 2004), pp. 211–27. 9 “Quod ultimo loco in his primariis Societatis ministeriis ponitur, ut ad ‘spiritualem consolationem praecipue intendat’ Societas, primum quidem refertur ad supra dicta omnia munia; simul exponit non esse illa ad necessarium dumtaxat fructum referenda, sed ita nobis esse enitendum ut necessaria quae sunt ad salutem animarum ea quidem persequamur primum; neque tamen iis simus contenti, sed ad perfectionem contendamus et animarum consolationem. Solet enim esse indicium alicuius perfectionis spiritualis consolatio et ad perfectionem aspirare. Quod vero addit ‘praecipue’, intendat, primum ostendit alia esse quibus intendere debeamus; sed haec primo loco, primaria intentione et studio, esse nobis agenda; haec aliis esse praeferenda; et si tempus ad alia simul et ad haec gerenda non sufficeret, illa omittenda, his intendendum; praeterea intensionem et diligentiam innuit maiorem his esse ministeriis adhibendam” (Nadal, Exhoratio 6, [66], in Mon Nadal, vol. V, p. 862; trans. by John O’Malley in his “Some Distinctive Characteristics of Jesuit Spirituality in the Sixteenth Century,” in O’Malley, J. Padberg, V. O’Keefe (eds), Jesuit Spirituality. A Now and Future Resource (Chicago, 1990), pp. 19–20. See also Nadal’s quite unknown Annotationes in diploma confirmationis Iulii III, which was a sort of an update to Formula Instituti, published by Manuel Ruiz

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The same consolatory portrait of the Jesuit confessor is transparent in many other writings of the first Jesuits. Pierre Favre (1506–40), one of the very first Loyola’s companions, wrote in his spiritual journal, the Memoriale: With great devotion and new depth of feeling, I also hoped and begged for this, that it finally be given me to be the servant and minister of Christ the Consoler, the minister of Christ the helper, the minister of Christ the redeemer, the minister of Christ the healer, the liberator, the enricher, the strengthener. Thus it would happen that even I might be able through him to help many—to console, liberate, and give them courage; to bring to them light not only for their spirit, but also (if one may presume in the Lord) for their bodies, and bring as well other helps to the soul and body of each and every one of my neighbors whomsoever.10

Nadal, the converso interpreter of Loyola’s spirituality, encouraged the Jesuit confessor to offer himself to the penitent with confidence as the sponsor of his conscience in front of God,11 to show magnanimity,12 and to exercise Christ’s and Church’s mildness (mansuetudo).13 The penitent had to be fed with a sweet hope, and his exhortations had to be done agreeably (suaviter).14 The Jesuit confessor was not only judge and physician—according to the terminology of the Councils of Lateran IV and Trent—but first of all father, because he substitutes for God-Father (pater et iudex in persona Dei)15—himself the omnipotent physician and compassionate Samaritan (ipse omnipotens medicus et misericors Samaritanus), who “pours wine of blame and oil of consolation with discretion, according to the condition of the penitent,” as a converso disciple of Juan de Ávila (1500–69) and later a Jesuit, Gaspar de Loarte,16 beautifully wrote.17 Jurado in his “Nadal y Polanco sobre la Fórmula del Instituto de la Compagñía de Jesús,” AHSI 47 (1978): 225–39. 10 Quoted in O’Malley, “Some Distinctive Characteristics,” p. 20. 11 Mon Nadal, vol. 5, p. 841. 12 Ibid., p. 853. 13 Ibid., p. 854. 14 Ibid., pp. 837 and 853. 15 Ibid., p. 854. 16 Gaspar Loarte (1498–1578) was rector of the colleges in Genoa and Messina and member of the Penitentiary in Rome and Loreto. Author of numerous popular devotional books, such as Esercitio de la vita Christiana (Genoa, 1557), Instuttione et avisi, per meditare la Passione di Christo (Rome, 1570), [Trattato] delli rimedii contr’il gravissimo peccato della bastemmia (Venice, 1573), Istruttione e avvertimenti per meditar i misteri del Rosario (Rome, 1573), Trattato delle sante peregrinationi (Rome, 1575), Antidoto spirituale contra la peste (Genoa, 1577). See DHCJ, pp. 2402–3. 17 Gaspar de Loarte, De instructione confessariorum (Mechliniae, 1822), p. 33: “Increpationis vino, oleoque consolationis pro poenitentium conditione cum discretione uti poterit.” The manual was published for the first time in Italian (Avisi di sacerdoti et confessori (Parma, 1579). The confessor’s portrayal as Christ-Samaritan recalls Antoninus’s Curam illius habe (1472) and La breve instruttione by Bartolomé de Medina (see Turrini, Coscienza e le leggi, pp. 198 and 208). See also Loarte’s introduction to his Conforto de gli afflitti–a book dedicated entirely to the topic of consolation: “né mi pare che sia di piccola importanza aiutare, & consolare gli afflitti, anzi credo esser cosa importantissima; peroche oltre di essere opera di misericordia

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Juan Alfonso de Polanco was proud to refer in his Chronicon to the fact that the confessing ministry of Jesuits was so marked by its consolatory feature that people used to call them not Company of Jesus, but Company of Holy Spirit [the Consoler].18 Indeed, the Jesuits strove to bring consolation to their penitents as frequently as they could. Frequent Confession and Communion The most distinctive feature of the Jesuit paramount ministry of sacramental confession was their tenacious insistence on its monthly or even weekly frequency. The frequent confession campaign went far beyond the requirement established by the official Church—after the Omnis utriusque sexus of the IV Lateran Council (1215), that was reiterated by the Council of Trent during its session on Eucharist in 1551, all Christians were expected to communicate after having confessed all their serious sins once a year in private sacramental confession to their own pastor.19 The adamant call for frequent confession from ambones, convents, hospitals, prisons, streets, and squares would have invited devotes to receive the Holy Communion (Eucharist) more frequently, a practice that would later be abhorrent to the Jansenists, who never felt worth enough to communicate, even though frequent Communion was already practiced by the primitive Church that they glorified so much. To Jesuits the Communion was rewarding but it was not an award. It was rather a viaticus—Christ’s sustenance on the Christian pilgrimage in intimate con-union with Him.20 These two different

tanto principale, & tanto raccomandata da Dio, è cosa dalla quale depende in gran parte la salute de gli uomini.” 18 Chron., vol. 1, p. 200, § 2. 19 Conciliorum Oecomenicorum Decreta (Freiburg, 1962), pp. 245–6: “Omnis utriusque sexus fidelis, postquam ad annos discretionis pervenerit, omnia sua solus peccata saltem semel in anno fideliter confiteatur proprio sacerdoti, et iniunctam sibi paenitentiam pro viribus studeat adimplere, suscipiens reverenter ad minus in Pascha Eucharistiae sacramentum, nisi forte de consilio proprii sacerdotis ob aliquam rationabilem causam ad tempus ab eius perceptione duxerit abstinendum: alioquin et vivens ab ingressu ecclesiae arceatur et moriens christiana careat sepultura. Unde hoc salutare statutum frequenter in ecclesiis publicetur, ne quisquam ignorantiae caecitate velamen excusationis assumat.” 20 See for example, De frequenti usu sanctissimi Eucharistiae Sacramenti Libellus, per R. P. Christophorum Madridium Doctorem Theologum Societatis Iesu (Romae, 1557). On its editions—very often added to the Breve directorium by his converso confrere Polanco–see, Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 5. col. 278; Nicoló Bobadilla, Libellus de laudabili et fructuosa, frequenti aut quotidiana sacrosanctae Eucharistiae sumptione. See its analysis in V. Dente, “Il libro di un gesuita su la comunione frequente”, La Civiltà Cattolica 84.3 (1933): 453–65, 568–77 and 84.4 (1933): 258–71; Paul Dudon, “Le «Libellus» du P. Bobadilla sur la communion fréquente et quotidienne”, AHSI 2 (1933): 258–79. Nadal noticed the reciprocity of the two sacraments as follows: “Illa duo sacramenta potissimum spectant ad finem Societatis: salus proximi procurata per confessionem, perfectio per communionem. Ex his patet

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anthropological visions would fuel the Jansenist-Jesuit controversy in the midseventeenth century that we shall follow in the last chapter of this book. As the most esteemed by Loyola and the first Jesuits devotional book, Imitation of Christ, by Jean Gerson (1363–1429) and the tradition of the Devotio moderna prove, the Jesuits were not the first advocates of frequent confession and Communion,21 yet they channeled their energies and took advantage of their institutional web to inculcate this new practice. They delivered sermons and wrote devotional books to powerfully advocate it. The simple but deeply impressed reason why the Jesuits insisted so much on frequent confession and Communion was their unchallenged belief that these

quam apostolica sint ministeria Societatis” (Nadal, Exhortatio coloniensis, [23], in Mon Nadal, vol. 5, p. 788). See also Parente, “Aspetti della confessione,” pp. 133–45. 21 Jean Gerson recommended it even on a monthly basis or on the occasion of major liturgical holidays. See D. Catherine Brown, Pastor and Laity in the Theology of Jean Gerson (Cambridge, 1987), pp. 57–8. The same propagation of frequent confession was advocated by Savonarola (see Girolamo Savonarola, Operette spirituali (Roma, 1976), vol. 2, pp. 187–94 and 329–35), Bonsignore Cacciaguerra (see Romeo De Maio, Bonsignore Cacciaguerra. Un mistico senese nella Napoli del Cinquecento (Milano-Napoli, 1965), and Tullio Crispoldi (see Adriano Prosperi, Tribunali della coscienza. Inquisitori, confessori, missionari (Torino, 1996), 259). On the history of sacramental confession after the decree of 1215, see Henri Charles Lea, History of Auricular Confession and Indulgences in the Latin Church (Philadelphia, 1896); Groupe De La Bussiere (eds), Pratiques de la confession. Des Pères du désert à Vatican II. Quinze études d’histoire (Paris, 1983), pp. 73–273; Roberto Rusconi, “I francescani e la confessione nel secolo XIII,” in Francescanesimo e vita religiosa dei laici nel ‘200. Atti dell’VIII Convegno Internazionale. Assisi, 16–18 ottobre 1980 (Assisi, 1981), pp. 251–309; Roberto Rusconi, “Dal pulpito alla confessione. Modelli di comportamento religioso in Italia tra 1470 circa e 1520 circa,” in Paolo Prodi and Peter Johanek (eds), Strutture ecclesiastiche in Italia e in Germania prima della Riforma (Bologna, 1984), pp. 259–315; Roberto Rusconi, “De la prédication à la confession: transmission et contrôle des modèles de comportement au XIIIe siècle, in Jean Boutier (ed.), Faire croire. Modalités de la diffusion et de la réception des messages religieux du XIIe au XVe siècle. Table ronde organisée par l’Ecole française de Rome, en collaboration avec l’Institut d’histoire médiévale de l’Université de Padoue (Rome, 1981), pp. 67– 85; Roberto Rusconi, “Ordinate confiteri. La confessione dei peccati nelle Summae de casibus e nei manuali per i confessori (metà XII–inizi XIV secolo),” in L’aveu. Antiquité et Moyen Âge. Actes de la table ronde organisée par l’École française de Rome avec le concours du CNRS et de l’Université de Trieste. Rome 28–30 mars 1984 (Rome, 1986), pp. 297–313; Lester K. Little, “Les techniques de la confession et la confession comme technique”, in Boutier (ed.), Faire croire, pp. 87–99; Nicole Bériou, “La confession dans les écrits théologique et pastoraux du XIIIe siècle: médication de l’âme ou démarche judiciaire?,” in L’aveu. Antiquité et Moyen Âge, pp. 261–82; P.-M. Gy, “Les définitions de la confession après le quatrième concile du Latran”, in L’aveu. Antiquité et Moyen Âge, pp. 283–96; John Bossy, “The social history of confession in the Age of Reformation,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 25 (1975); Angelozzi, “Interpretazioni,” pp. 73–87; Thomas Tentler, Sin and Confession on the Eve of the Reformation (Princeton, 1977); Dionisio Borobio, “Il modello tridentino di confessione dei peccati nel suo contesto storico,” Concilium 23/2 (1987): 42–64; Jean Delumeau, Il peccato e la paura. L’idea di colpa in Occidente dal XIII al XVIII secolo (Bologna, 1987); and Pierre Legendre, Gli scomunicati. Saggio sull’ordine dogmatico (Venezia, 1976).

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sacraments were safe and facile, yet the only way of reaching salvation. There was no salvation outside the Church (Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus) that claimed to be the only dispenser of Christ’s grace through sacraments. This is why the Jesuit confessors ran wherever there was an immediate danger of death: to prisoners, soldiers, slaves, and the sick. That was the case, for example, of some Corsicans that were afraid of the invading Turk: When [the fleet of the Turks came near the shoreline of Bastia], it provided a precious opportunity for Christians: prayers were offered and every day witnessed confessions, Communions, and almsgiving, along with great contrition for sins. … In the course of fleeing the attack of the barbarians, they spread Christian doctrine and the frequent use of confession and Communion and encouraged people to prepare themselves for death.23

The Jesuits felt privileged to be frequent intermediaries in man’s road to salvation. For Nicolás Bobadilla (1509–90), one of Loyola’s youngest first companions, confession and preaching were “weapons of the Jesuit combat” (arma nostrae militiae),24 and for Nadal—“the foremost weapon to fight the vices both ours and of our neighbors.”25 In its frequent use the latter saw a reformation of Christianity and a remedy to heal consciences.26 Polanco’s Chronicon, written in the 1570s as a sort of first Jesuit chronicle, recounts innumerable examples of Jesuit engagement in the administration of sacramental confession and Communion, for he considered them “apposite and integral” (propria et germana) to the Society.27 That idea was confirmed by the Jesuit practice. Pierre Favre and Diego Laínez introduced the new custom of frequent confession and Communion in Parma during their apostolate there in 1540: 22 “Salus proximi est nobis nostris ministeriis procuranda, fratres, impense; et id quidem facimus si proximum a peccatis mortalibus liberemus et Deo reconciliemus in Christo; huc nervi omnes nostri intendendi, ne pereant animae, pro quibus salvandis Deus homo factus est, vitam hanc nostram mortalem vixit, improperia et cruciatus sustinuit acerbissimos, crucifixus, mortuus et sepultus est. Sed quibus praesidiis hoc conabimur? Ministerio verbi Dei et sacramentorum.” (Nadal, Exhortatio 5, [17], in Mon Nadal, vol. V, p. 811). See also Chron., vol. 2, pp. 201–2, § 79: “magistratus et officiales locorum ad communionem etiam ipsi accedebant, et magna cum hilaritate affirmabant talem viam tamquam securam et facilem perveniendi ad beatitudinem non esse prius intellectam eam, inquam, qua utebatur Societas, homines ad confessionem et communionem octavo quoque die exhortando [emphasis mine].” 23 Ibid., vol. 3, p. 106, § 199; trans. by John Patrick Donnelly (ed.), Year by Year with the Early Jesuits. Selections from the Chronicon of Juan de Polanco, S.J. (St. Louis, 2004), p. 272. 24 Chron., vol. 1, p. 155, § 94. 25 “Arma principalia ad expugnanda vitia, tum nostra tum proximi” (Mon Nadal, vol. 5, p. 851). 26 Mon Nadal, vol. 5, p. 860. 27 Chron., vol. 1, p. 109, § 48: “Anno Domini 1543 ineunte, Romae, praeter consueta et Instituto nostro germana ministeria, concionandi, sacramenta Confessionis et Communionis ministrandi, catechismum docendi, spiritualia Exercitia tradendi, inter discordes pacem conciliandi, et alia huiusmodi pietatis opera exercendi, erga catechumenos charitas eminuit”. See also ibid., vol. 2, p. 211, § 96.

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As these same fathers kept working in the Parma vineyard, through general confessions leading to the frequent use of penance and Holy Communion. … Although toward the end of Lent preachers attacked the frequent use of the sacrament of confession and Communion as a novelty at that time, they achieved absolutely nothing, because at Parma and in the ten or twelve surrounding villages (in which Father Laínez stirred up the people even by one sermon and all the while made himself available for confessions), observers could note progress and improvement in the lives of many of the people who communicated frequently; the lives and pious deaths of these frequent communicants made their spiritual progress so obvious that the evidence of their own eyes refuted the preachers [who disparaged frequent Communion], without Ours’ having to say a word.28

The latter was successful in propagating this bold practice also in Padua,29 Brescia30 (1543), and Florence31 (1547). Francisco de Villanova was able to convince the nobility of Lisbon about the advantages of the new approach to the two sacraments: The majority of the nobility often came to the church of Saint Anthony for confession and Communion, so that they might receive [these sacraments] every eighth day or, what was less common, once a month. By now this was not regarded as an innovation at the royal court, for it had become customary.32

An efficient way of assuring the frequent reception of the sacraments of confession and Communion was founding or reforming lay confraternities, whose members would have subscribed to the new custom. Silvestro Landini (1503–54), for example, “established a Confraternity of the Body of the Lord in almost all villages [where he operated] and inculcated the practice of weekly or semi-weekly Communion—or at least he forbade [members of the Confraternity] to defer its reception beyond the first Sunday of the month.”33 The Jesuits, who operated in Macerata, exerted the members of the Confraternity of St. Jerome, so that “at the sound of a bell, the members began to assemble for devotional prayers at fixed hours every day, to receive Communion once a month, and to exhibit generosity and devotion toward the needy.”34 When the Jesuits shifted their ministerial focus onto youth education after the opening of their first school in Messina (1548), the traditional ministries listed in the Formula did not exhaust their priorities. To the contrary, schools and their environment provided new and numerous “souls” to be exercised Chron., vol. 1, p. 83, § 13; Donnelly, Year by Year, p. 3. “Et paulatim sacramentorum Confessionis et Communionis frequentatio, etiam inter multos viros primarios inducta est” (Chron., vol. 1, p. 112, § 51). 30 “Aliqui, qui decem et quindecim annos confessi non fuerant, a gravibus peccatis recesserunt; multi etiam tepidi incalescere in Dei obsequio, et frequenter ad Sacramenta accedere coeperunt” (ibid., vol. 1, p. 130, § 70). 31 “Ad sacramentum confessionis et Communionis maior solito frequentia” (ibid., vol. 1, p. 228, § 185). 32 Ibid., vol. 1, p. 104, § 45; Donnelly, Year by Year, p. 17. 33 Ibid., p. 152. 34 Ibid., p. 418. 28 29

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in the new sacramental practices. One of the first reports from Messina itself was informing the Roman headquarters that the population of the Sicilian city was so impelled by Jesuit sermons to confess frequently that the fathers could not provide an appropriate response to the demand, even though they were confessing incessantly from early morning to late in the night.35 Messina’s students themselves were required to examine their consciences daily and to confess every month.36 Some college founders, like King John III of Portugal, saw the frequent confession so beneficial to youth’s pious life that they required students to confess even every eighth day.37 According to Polanco, if there were any doubts about the “sacred consuetude” of frequent confession and Communion, they must have been coming from the devil himself: Among their [Jesuits’] achievements [at Valencia] was fostering frequent confession and Communion. The devil resented these developments and led some people to have doubts [about them]. Thus it happened that one preacher recommended their frequent use, and other attacked it. As a result, a mighty archbishop became aware of this, he called together nearly all the theologians of the city during the Lent of this year, in order to settle this question after he had heard their opinions. Shortly afterwards he had an announcement proclaimed throughout the city that he himself would preach elsewhere on that day, and he himself preached for two hours. … He praised the frequent use of Communion and granted general permission to everybody to communicate every Sunday. If some wanted to communicate daily, they should not do so without consulting him; taking into account their desires, he was not going to deny permission when it contributed to the glory of God and their own advantage.38

35 “Populus autem excitatus concionibus, tam frequens ad sacramentum Confessionis accedebat, ut iam confessarii nostri tam amplae messi colligendae non sufficerent, quamvis aliquando a primo mane usque ad multam noctem in ea functione desudarent” (Chron., vol. 1, p. 285, § 244). 36 Ibid., vol. 1, p. 368, § 414. 37 “Quos octavo quoque die veneris confiteri volebat, ut aetate crescentes, bonam pie vivendi consuetudinem retinerent” (ibid., vol. 1, p. 87, § 22). 38 “Cum inter praecipuos fructus, frequens confessionis et communionis usus esset, daemon, cui ea displicebant, in dubitationem quosdam adduxit; quo factum est ut frequentiam illam unus concionator commendaret, alius quidam improbaret; unde magnus rumor in populo propter hanc controversiam fuit excitatus. Quod cum Archiepiscopus animadverteret, in quadragesima huius anni theologos fere omnes urbis convocavit, ut quaestionem hanc eis auditis constitueret; ac postmodum per urbem promulgari fecit, quod die dominica in octava Paschae, ipse in cathedrali Ecclesia concionaturus esset, et quid in ea controversia tenendum esset, explicaturus. Cum autem eo die alibi concionem ullam haberi prohibuisset, duas ipse horas est concionatus et ut erat vir non solum pietate, sed etiam doctrina et dono verbi insignis, officio suo egregie perfunctus est, ac demum frequentem usum communionis laudavit, et generalem omnibus facultatem, ut singulis dominicis diebus communicarent largitus est; et si qui vellent quotidie communicare, ne se inconsulto id facerent; ipsorum enim desideriis consideratis, se facultatem, cum ad Dei gloriam et ipsorum utilitatem foret, non negaturum. Genuit autem tam concio, quae sana et optima doctrina plena fuit, quam haec ipsa facultas magnam in eis consolationem, qui ad frequenter confitendum

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Preaching and the Call to Confess The closest associate of confession was preaching whose main goal was to elicit in hearers contrition (or, at least, attrition) for sins and desire to confess them. It is to be noted that in the sixteenth century preaching was often performed outside the mass, which the first Jesuits used to say as briefly as possible by eliminating chanting and music from it, so that they could have more time for other ministries. The new relationship between these ministries was well formulated in the Jesuit Constitutions: Because the occupations, which are undertaken for the aid of souls are of great importance, proper to our institute, and very frequent; and because, on the other hand, our residence in one place or another is so uncertain, they will not regularly hold choir for the canonical hours or sing Masses and offices. For those whose devotion urges them to hear such will have no lack of places to satisfy themselves, and our members ought to apply their efforts to the pursuits that are most proper to our vocation, for the glory of our Lord.39

Indeed, the reliable Polanco refers to the fact that the Jesuits Antonio de Aráoz (1515–73) and Diego de Eguía (1488–1556) were so engaged in hearing confessions in Barcelona that they did not have enough time to celebrate mass.40 To another Jesuit, certain Giovanni, administering confession to the slaves of Spanish Ceuta in North Africa constituted an impediment to celebrating the sacrifice of mass.41 The famous artistic representations of Loyola in liturgical vestments by Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640) are, therefore, historically misleading.42 Nadal preferred to depict his confreres with the evangelical image of sowers and reapers. Reapers were confessors who collected the harvest of sowerpreachers.43 This close association of sacramental confession with the ambone was not a Jesuit invention: it resulted from the tradition of the mendicant orders, especially the Dominicans, whose proper name was the Order of Preachers (Ordo Praedicatorum).44 Indeed, the Dominican Bartolomé de Medina in his popular Breve instruttione de’ confessori (Salamanca, 1579), pointed et communicandum erant propensi, et quae ad magnam Dei laudem cessura videretur.” (ibid., vol. I, p. 308, § 267; Donnelly, Year by Year, p. 83). 39 Const. [586]. 40 “Aliquando Missae Sacrificio locum non relinquebant” (Chron. vol. 1, p. 103, § 44). 41 “Sacrificio Missae impendebatur” (Chron., vol. 1, pp. 329–30, § 290). 42 See, for example, Rubens’s The Vision of St. Ignatius of Loyola (1617) in Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria. 43 “Ut concionator multitudini concionatur et seminat, ita confessarii, et illi qui versantur cum hominibus, colligunt” (Nadal, Exhortatio coloniensis [19], in Mon Nadal, vol. 5, p. 786). 44 Rusconi, “Dal pulpito alla confessione,” pp. 259–315 and Turrini, Coscienza e le leggi, p. 196: “Non è possibile concepire la produzione manualistica a stampa tra Quatro e Cinquecento senza tenere presente il legame allora molto stretto tra predicazione e confessione.”

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out that the preacher’s job was to call and that of confessor to receive. An interesting representation of this exclusively Catholic sacramental symbiosis was a later piece of church furniture built as a combination of ambone on the top and confessional box at the bottom, as we can still see it today in the Barnabite Church of San Carlo ai Catinari in Rome. Our chronicler Polanco reported, for example, that in Alcalá “many people were influenced by [Jesuit] sermons and frequented the sacrament of confession and Communion, and other people after making the Spiritual Exercises wanted to make their general confessions.”46 After Alfonso Salmerón (1515–85), who was accompanying Laínez to the Council of Trent, “had given his last sermon at Bassano, in which he urged his hearers to frequent Communion, more than a hundred persons began this pious practice.”47 The Jesuit novelty consisted in extending their preaching beyond the ambone—they called the people to confess in the squares of cities and towns, in jails and hospitals, in sermons and private conversations. Those who did the job of the sowers were not priests alone, but also Jesuit students and lay brothers. Polanco reported in one of his circular letter, for instance, that in the wake of their “going fishing,” Jesuit students from the Roman College brought about four hundred people into the church for confession.48 But the Jesuits did not want to sow only in view of harvest. Nadal proposed to his confreres to sow while collecting harvest: to preach during sacramental confession. “This other ministry of the Word of God would have a form of a private sermon delivered after the confession of sins, in which the confessor would either point out the gravity of those sins, or instigate fear and terror, or feed the soul with the sweet hope.” The goal of this unique kind of preaching was to obtain true contrition that would lead the penitent to the constant desire of avoiding sins and improving spiritual life.49

“L’ufficio del predicatore è il chiamare, quello del confessore il ricevere.” Chron., vol. 2, p. 121, § 287. 47 Donnelly, Year by Year, p. 47. 48 Polanci Complementa, vol. 1, pp. 209–10. 49 “Est aliud verbi Dei ministerium, quod etiamsi in confessione fiat, non attinet tum ad interrogationes, sed versatur quasi in privata quadam concione ubi, auditis peccatis, illorum gravitas exponitur; hinc incutitur timor ac terror, illinc dulci spe alitur animus confitentis. Et haec quidem magnam habent amplitudinem. Nihil enim est affectus qui hic vel non possit vel etiam debeat moveri. Et habet quidem hoc genus illud privilegium, nam alia huiusmodi ministeria cum sacramento coniuncta non sunt. Hoc est coniunctum; nam in confessione, ad parandum animum peccatoris ut contritionem concipiat, fit a confessario, qua confessarius qui est absoluturus sacramentaliter. Quare excellens erit illic efficacia; ut ea, quae cum sacramentis coniuncta sunt, maiorem accipiunt virtutem, maioris sunt meriti, efficaciae, utilitatis. In quo genere ea sunt quae fiunt omnia in confessione, praeter partes sacramenti: orationes quae imponuntur, ieiunia, eleemosynae; orationes item quae in missa leguntur; quae cum aliorum sacramentorum administratione adhibentur. Ad has privatas (ut ita dicam) conciones cum fructu habendas magnum studium ponere debent nostri sacerdotes, utpote ex quibus praeparentur ad veram contritionem, Christo propitio, paenitentes et ad verum et constans propositum vitandi peccata omnia, totam rationem vitae in 45 46

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26

This new Jesuit approach to confession and the role of preaching within it encouraged the spiritual direction of penitents—sacramental confession became not only a place to confess sins, but also a place to ask and receive spiritual advice. In spite of the spread Jesuit misogyny, spiritual direction would have promoted simultaneously the most frequent, the most intimate, and the most risky of encounters between celibate Jesuit confessors and women. Female Penitents The first Jesuits were so adamant in propagating frequent confession and Communion also among women that they did not hesitate to jeopardize their good reputation: A leading man [in Venice] who has shown himself a friend of the Society tried to persuade Father André that Ours should not hear the confessions of any women; for seemingly he wanted to safeguard our good reputation among the senators of that republic and our security. But since this task of administering the sacraments of confession and Communion was so apposite and integral to our Institute, Father André de Freux judged that we should not follow that friend’s advice, and Father Ignatius agreed with his position. From this we could still easily conclude not only how carefully we must avoid anything that militates against our good reputation, but also how we must proceed [even] in these good endeavors with caution and great skill.50

The Jesuit missionaries in Brazil went even further. They employed indigenous women as interpreters, when confessors had troubles understanding their penitents. One of them boldly reported to Rome that those women were even better confessors than himself.51 This liberal approach to female penitents would become a double-edged weapon in the Jesuit relationship with women. The propaganda of the consolatory character of frequent confession that, as we have seen, the first Jesuits rhetorically advocated in spite of its unpopularity in some church circles, changed dramatically their relation to women. Many women of different social status flocked to seek from Jesuit confessors not only absolution, but also spiritual conversation and direction.52 Certainly, women did not seek with Jesuit confessors only spiritual progress, but also a human contact offered by a benign, understanding and learned melius commutandam.” (Nadal, Exhort. 6 [19], in Mon Nadal, vol. 5, pp. 837–8. See also Nadal, Exhortatio coloniensis [20], in Mon Nadal, vol. 5, p. 787. 50 Chron., vol. 2, p. 211, § 96; Donnelly, Year by Year, p. 157. See also Chron., vol. 2, p. 258, § 200: “Quod ad Sacramentum confessionis attinet, nec pauci nec vulgares homines a nostris iuvare Ingolstadii coeperunt immo et mulieres ad confessionem nostri admittebant, cum linguae difficultas eos prius deterreret.” 51 “Credo che sia un confessore migliore di me” (O’Malley, The First Jesuits, p. 152.) 52 See Jodi Bilinkoff, Related Lives. Confessors and their female penitents, 1450– 1750 (Ithaca and New York, 2005), especially pp. 19–20.

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male, who might be different from what married, unmarried or widowed women were accustomed to find in often subjugated, paternalistic or lonely circumstances. The first Jesuits were aware of this element and unsurprisingly stressed the necessity of caution. This caution was not unusual and can be seen in a broader early modern tendency to discipline the senses, but it seems the Jesuits carried it to logical extremes. Although the manuals for Jesuit confessors did not dedicate special paragraphs to the category “women,” they nevertheless described the way the Jesuits should follow when confessing women. The first official Directory for Jesuit confessors (1554) advised them to avoid any visual contact with (especially young female) penitents and warned them to be cautious in asking those questions that would lead to temptation. Loarte, in his Avisi di sacerdoti et confessori, published in Parma in 1579, advised that [The penitent] will [confess] at the side of the Confessor, so they cannot look at each other, especially if [the penitent] is a woman, who always, as long as it is possible, must be heard publicly in provided for that confessionals. If it were not possible for the occasion, the confessor would accommodate himself as far as he can to the side of the penitent, putting his hand on his cheeks, so they cannot neither see nor touch each other. It has to be also noticed that the confessions of the wealthy, especially of women, must be heard and received always publicly in churches or in consecrated places.

In the little known Prudente confessor, published probably in Seville in 1644, Juan Rodríguez wrote that the Jesuit confessor has “[to talk to women] with more modesty and less words. … He should show affability without opening the door to enemies of chastity. The sight of women is not a minor [enemy], in particular that of young ones, when they talk about their infidelities, [describing] thousand circumstances.” Interestingly, the duty of the sacristan in Jesuit churches was to police the “protection of senses” (custodia sensuum) of Jesuits confessing women. The increasing concern about avoiding visual and physical contact with penitents must be seen also in a broader context of Jesuit rules of modesty, which would not allow to look at another confrere in his eyes or to touch him (Noli me tangere!). Luís Gonçalves da Câmara (1520–75) noted in his Memoirs that “Father Ignatius hardly ever looks at anyone in the face. He wants others to observe this rule rigorously.”53 Prudence advised the Jesuit superiors to set at some point a limit of age (37) for the confessors of women. They were warned not to confess sick women in their homes, unless accompanied there by a fellow Jesuit. Of course, this prudence was also aimed at avoiding cases of sexual harassment (solicitatio ad turpia).

53 Gonçalves da Câmara. Remembering Iñigo. Glimpses on the Life of Saint Ignatius of Loyola. The “Memoriale” of Luís Gonçalves da Câmara. Translated with introduction, notes and indices by Alexander Eaglestone and Joseph A. Munitiz, S.J. Leominster/St. Louis, 2004, # [361].

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Yet, the language the first Jesuits used to describe their relationship with women reveals much more than a justifiable requirement of prudence: it demonstrates gender bias about women in general and about their spiritual capacity in particular. Polanco observed that women had to be treated like children in encouraging them to answer confessor’s questions sincerely, completely and liberally. Women had to be confessed as briefly as possible. Loarte seems to be bothered that women obstinately asked in confession to be examined by questions instead of reciting their sins by themselves. Laínez in his treatise on women’s cosmetics—that we shall analyzes in detail below— defined women as less reasonable in judgment and weaker (molliores) than men.54 In the letters exchanged between the Roman curia and the Jesuits spread worldwide, the care of women was often considered an impediment to their other duties and major benefits: “que no se empachen con mujeres.” Some of the first Jesuits saw their ministry to little women (mulierculae) as obnoxious and annoying, although they satisfied sometimes regretfully many influential—and therefore helpful for their ministries—women (“nobles señoras muy devotas de la Compañía”) and many less influential prostitutes (“las mujeres erradas”). A description of the Jesuit ministry among women in Polanco’s Chronicon betrays the Jesuit concept of women’s role in church and society: [Paschase Broet] has such spiritual impact on many young women that some of them eagerly sought to enter a religious order. Some aspired to [a life of] virginal purity, and some after careful deliberation bound themselves to this by vow. Paschase declared that their devotion and progress in prayer, to which they applied themselves day and night, defied description. They fasted several times a week and chastised their bodies in other ways, so much so that they needed a bridle to keep them from going beyond [reasonable] limits. Among the other virtues, their obedience shone forth, for they did not want to deviate from the advice of their spiritual father by the width of a fingernail, as the expression goes. There were also widows who strove to imitate Anna, who was dedicated to prayer and fasting; the chaste Judith; and Tabitha, who was very devoted to works of piety. They gave themselves over to prayer and fasting and proved themselves mothers to the poor; you might see them in the morning praying fervently before the holy Sacrament for two hours; when some left, others took their place at the Church of Saint Lucy … Many married women, including some from the city’s nobility, also frequently approached the sacrament of confession and Communion. They were a source of admiration and edification for all in their bearing and dress, for they had put aside their pearls, silk dresses, necklaces—in short, their ostentatious adornments.55

Women’s adornments and cosmetics were important subjects of the first Jesuits’ apostolic concern. Loarte in the quoted Avisi di sacerdoti et confessori advised the Confessor “not to admit … women who give scandal by curled hair, face 54 Diego Laínez, De fuco et ornatu mulierum [14], in Laínez, Jacobus, S.I., Disputationes Tridentinae ad manoscriptorum fidem edidit et commentariis historicis instruxit Hartmanus Grisar, S.I. (Oeniponte [Ratisbon], 1886). 55 Donnelly, Year by Year, p. 151.

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make-up and by other vanities…, and to admonish them with discretion, so that they approach with modesty and both internal and external decency that is appropriate to this act and place, and [only] then he will be ready to hear their confessions.” Yet, many women took spiritual advantage from their encounters with Jesuit confessors. Through the Jesuit stress on examining conscience and on benefits of general confession—the final aim of the first week of the Exercises—female penitents were trained to have deeper insights into their conscience and to reflect seriously on the way God was guiding their lives, as Teresa of Ávila (1515–82)56 and Mary Ward (1585–1645)57 testified. However, an equally interesting question can be asked: what kind of benefits did the Jesuits receive from those encounters? In a letter written to the misogynist Loyola on 16 June 1545, Juana de Cardona, who forced her Jesuit director to make the complete Spiritual Exercises twice, and eventually asked to enter the Society, but was refused by Loyola and died serving the poor in a hospital of Valencia, wrote: “Let not Your Reverence fear my woman’s weakness, because, when the Lord sets his hand, he makes the weak strong; and when he removes his hand, the strong becomes weak.”58 The frequent contact with women in sacramental confession changed the Jesuit view on women and, therefore, made them transcend some gender restrictions ingrained in their spirituality. The official edition of the Directorium to Spiritual Exercises, published in tandem with the Ratio Studiorum in 1599, in a special paragraph dedicated to women, reveals that the Jesuits, although not yet totally free of gender bias, were gradually recognizing women’s spiritual equality: Not much time should be spent on ignorant and unlettered persons, and they should not be given the complete Exercises. … This applies also to women, who occasionally ask to make the Exercises. The same 56 See Alberto Risco, “Una opinion sobre los tres primeros confesores jesuitas de santa Teresa de Jesús (Cetina, Prádanos, B. Álvarez),” Boletín de la Real Academia de la historia 80 (1922): 462–9; Félix Rodríguez, “Santa Teresa de Jesús y sus consejeros jesuitas,” Manresa 59 (1987): 309–11. See also Joaquín Montoya, L’amore scambievole e non mai interrotto tra S. Teresa e la Compagnia di Gesù (Lucca, 1794); Cándido Dalmases, “Santa Teresa y los Jesuitas. Precisando fechas y datos,” AHSI 35 (1966): 347–78; Ugo de Mielesi, “Teresa d’Avila e i Padri della Compagnia di Gesù,” La Civiltà Cattolica 133 (1982): 234–43; Alban Goodier, “St. Teresa and the Society of Jesus,” The Month 168 (1936): 395–405; Ignacio Iglesias, “Santa Teresa de Jesús y la espiritualidad ignaciana,” Manresa 54 (1982): 291–311; Enrique Jorge, “San Francisco de Borja y Santa Teresa de Jesús,” Manresa 46 (1974): 43–64; Enrique Jorge Pardo, “Santa Teresa de Ávila y la Compañía de Jesús en el siglo XVI,” Razón y fe 166 (1962): 293–306; Manuel Prados Muñoz, “Santa Teresa y la Compañía de Jesús,” Manresa 54 (1982): 75–8; 57 See José María Javierre, “La jesuita Mary Ward: mujer rebelde que rompió moldes en la Europa del XVII (Madrid, 2002); María Pablo-Romero, “La espiritualidad ignaciana de María Ward fundadora del I. B. V. María (1585–1645),” Manresa 55 (1983): 149–69. 58 Ugo Rahner (ed.), Saint Ignatius Loyola. Letters to Women (Freiburg, 1960), p. 307.

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method should be followed with them as with persons of little education. However there may be cases of women who possess such good judgment and capacity for spiritual things, and sufficient leisure at home, that they can make all or most of the Exercises in full form. There is nothing to prevent this [emphasis mine].

Spiritual Exercises and the General Confession The importance of the “pious and salvific consuetude” of frequent confession and Communion was rooted in the dynamics of the Spiritual Exercises—the most important “manual” of Ignatian spirituality. Its first part (the so-called first week) is dedicated to meditations on sin, whose goal was to incite contrition (or, at least, attrition)59 leading to sacramental general confession. It marks a cleansed entrance into the second part of the Exercises and into a new chapter of life. In a discourse to Jesuit students, Nadal—who himself experienced the power of general confession that helped him to make major life decisions60— stressed that what is contained in the first week of the Exercises would very much benefit a good preparation to confess.61 This conviction came from the interpretation of the role of confession in the life of the Jesuit founder. The converso Jesuit, Pedro Ribadeneyra (1526–1611), in his official biography of Ignatius of Loyola described the latter’s sojourn in the Benedictine monastery of Montserrat as follows: “We of the Society of Jesus ought to say thanks to our Lord that our blessed Father [Ignatius], cast away from the waves and turmoil of the world, arrived to such a good port and ran into such a good confessor.”62 From the so-called Autobiography, an account of Loyola’s life dictated by himself to Câmara, we come to know that Loyola arrived to Montserrat from his native Loyola in 1522 and there he made his sacramental confession for his whole life (thus, “general”).63 Ribadeneyra’s remark on the good confessor reveals the importance that Loyola’s experience had for the Jesuit spirituality and ministry. Loyola inserted the practice of general

59 The distinction between contrition and attrition and the sufficiency of the latter to be absolved in sacramental confession would provoke repugnance of the Jansenists, but it was sanctioned by the Council of Trent, whose authority they often claimed. 60 In his Diary, Nadal accounts two circumstances, in which he made general confession: the first one while still in his native Majorca that prompted him to departure for Rome; the second one during the Spiritual Exercises with Loyola in Rome that impelled him to become a Jesuit: “Attulit mihi fructum prima hebdomas: sum confessus generaliter P. Ignatio. Post confessionem dixit Pater Deum ita velle, ut, quemadmodum potentiis nostris abusi sumus, ut contra eius voluntatem faceremus, sine illius gratia; ita, recuperata per sacramentum poenitentiae gratia, potentiis uteremur ad vitae emendationem” (Mon Nadal, vol. 1, pp. 16–17, § 44–5). 61 Nadal, Exhortatio 5 [17], in Mon Nadal, vol. 5, p. 811. 62 Mon Ribadeneyra, vol. 2, p. 505. 63 Autobiography [17].

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64

confession into his Spiritual Exercises that were composed basically during his stay in Manresa near Montserrat in the year that followed his pilgrimage to the Benedictine sanctuary. It became Loyola’s means to conquer a new way of life for his disciples in Spain and later new companions at the University of Paris.65 Unsurprisingly then, the Jesuit Constitutions prescribed general confession for Jesuit students every six months, “because of the many benefits it entails,”66 and the practice became an intrinsic element of Jesuit ministries. For instance, When [Father Estrada went to Montepulciano in Tuscany], several Sienese followed him; and after he had assisted them with the Spiritual Exercises and heard their general confessions, remarkably benefiting their souls thereby. … As a result, did many persons (among them several doctors) themselves profit from the Spiritual Exercises, but, despite all that he could do to resist their importunities, they piously urged this young man to give public lectures on the Gospels and then to deliver sermons. … He gave these lectures before such a large and enthusiastic audience of all classes of people and met with so much success that both men and women undertook a serious reformation of their lives and behavior. [As a result,] the poor who were in the greatest need were given help; confraternities were set up for teaching disadvantaged boys and girls and for other worthy purposes; and the frequent use of the sacraments of confession and Communion was introduced.67

The complexity of administering confession to the growing number and variety of Jesuit penitents impelled the Society to write manuals for confessors, devotional books for penitents, and textbooks for students of cases of conscience. The Jesuits were not the first to write such books: they inherited a long medieval and early modern tradition of penitential literature, but no other religious institution spent more time and energy in engaging in such an immense penitential book production. Spiritual Exercises [44]: “En la general confessión, para quien voluntarie la quisiere hacer, entre otros muchos, se hallarán tres provechos para aquí. El primero: dado que quien cada un año se confiesa no sea obligado de hacer confessión general, haciéndola hay mayor provecho y mérito, por el mayor dolor actual de todos pecados y malicias de toda su vida. El segundo: como en los tales exercicios spirituales se conoscen más interiormente los pecados y la malicia dellos, que en el tiempo que el hombre no se daba ansí a las cosas internas, alcanzando agora más conoscimiento y dolor dellos, habrá mayor provecho y mérito que antes hubiera. El tercero es consequenter que estando más bien confessado y dispuesto, se halla más apto y más aparejado para rescibir el sanctíssimo sacramento; cuya recepción no solamente ayuda para que no caya en peccado, mas aún para conservar en augmento de gracia; la qual confessión general se hará mejor inmediate después de los exercicios de la primera semana.” 65 They experienced such a big spiritual benefit from this practice that they became its main propagators in their ministry: Favre proposed it “more than anything else” as the foundation for a new and happier life (Mon Fabri, pp. 119–20) and Francis Xavier recommended it to his penitents (Mon Xavier, vol. 2, pp. 89–90). See also O’Malley, The first Jesuits, p. 138. 66 Const. # 98. 67 Chron., vol. 1, p. 81, § 10; Donnelly, Year by Year, p. 2. 64

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Jesuit Penitential Literature Between 1554 (when the first manual for confessors was published) and 1650 (when approximately the Jansenists began their campaign against this literature), 39 Jesuit authors wrote 58 different works on sacramental confession, resulting in at least 763 editions altogether.68 The following is an alphabetical list of the 39 authors’ first editions: 1.

Acosta, José de69

Confessionario para los curas de Indios: con la instrucion contra sus ritos y exhortacion para ayudar a bien morir; y summa de sus privilegios; y forma de impedimentos de matrimonio compuesto y traducido en las lenguas quichua y aymara por autoridad del Concilio Provincial de Lima del año 1583. En la ciudad de los Reyes, por A. Ricardo, 1585; 4°, [4], 27, 16, 24.

68 The census does not contain the commentaries to the part on penance of Aquinas’s Summa, although they were largely diffused and are important for the history of penance (see for example, Suárez, Sánchez). 112 editions in the census are held by the Bibliotèque Nacional of Paris (BNP), followed by the Biblioteca Nacional de Madrid (BNM)–92, and the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich (BSM)–78. This distribution does not follow any precise logic. The first volume of the Spaniard Azor’s Institutiones from 1600, which is preserved in the largest number of copies (42) was printed in Rome and is held mostly by Italian (30 copies) and Spanish (9) libraries. However, the 15 copies of his second volume printed in Lyons (1610) can be found only in Spanish libraries. Every copy of the Italian Vincenzo Bruno’s Brevis tractatus printed in Cologne (1599) are in German libraries only, and the copies of the French Régnault’s De prudentia printed in Lyons (1611) can be found in France (5 copies), Germany (5) and Spain (4). The only copy of Bruno’s Breve trattato printed in Rome in 1628 I was able to find in the remote library of Skokloster (near Stockholm in Sweden). Of course, other editions can be found by random research in private libraries, but I doubt they would change dramatically the picture provided by my census. Although the majority of volumes were printed in Italy, the biggest number of editions is held today by Spanish libraries (at least 513 out of 760). Italian libraries keep about 338 copies. The city with the largest quantity of editions is Madrid (135) with its 13 libraries that hold copies that are listed in the census. This data indicates that to have a more exact picture of Jesuit book production one must collect information (at least) at the pan-European level and not to limit research to a single country. In the U.S., scholars can consult some of the volumes (often in microform format) mainly at Boston College Library (36 editions), Georgetown University Library in Washington DC (12), and Saint Louis University Library Pius XII in Saint Louis MI (7). 69 José de Acosta (1540–1600) was most likely of Jewish origins. Missionary in Peru since 1571. Professor of theology in the college of St. Paul and at the University of St. Marc in Lima. Author, among others, of the famous De Procuranda Indorum salute and Historia moral y natural de las Indias. See DHCJ, pp. 10–12.

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2.

33

70

Agostini, Giuseppe

Nucleus casuum conscientiae, sive brevis notitia eorum, quae scitu vel necessaria, vel valde utilia sunt in primo ingressu ad audiendas confessiones. Panormi, typis Jo. Baptistae Maringi, 1638. 16°. 3.

Agostini, Giuseppe

Summula materiarum omnium, quae intra latitudinem casuum conscientiae continentur. Cum appendice tractatus brevissimi omnium censurarum. Romae, apud Grignanum, sumptibus Joannis Succetti, 1640. 32°, p. 323. 4.

Agostini, Giuseppe

Nuova et breve instruzione per chiaramente intendere qualsi voglia materia appartenente al confessore. Con l’aggiunta di un sommario di tutte le censure et un essamine de confessori volgarizata da d. Melchior Sardio can. reg. del Salvatore. In Venetia, appresso i Giunti, 1641. 24°, p. 354, [4]. 5.

Azor, Juan71

Institutionum moralium, in quibus universae quaestiones ad conscientiam recte, aut prave factorum pertinentes breviter tractantur. Pars prima-tertia. Romae, apud Aloysium Zannettum, 1600–1611, fol., p. [16], col. 1690, p. [47]; p. 752; [12], col. 1222, [40]. 6.

Bagot, Jean72

De Poenitentia dissertationes theologicae. In quibus ex SS. Patribus antiquus circa poenitentiam Ecclesiae ritus explicatur, & hodiernus vindicatur… Parisiis, apud viduam Nicolai Buon, sub signo S. Claudii, 1646. 8°, p. [16], 544, [20].

70 Giuseppe Agostini (1573–1643) was born and died in Palermo (Sicily). He taught theology in Lyons, Avignon and Palermo. See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 1, p. 69. 71 Juan Azor (1536–1603) before entering the Society studied philosophy in Alcalá. As a Jesuit he taught there philosophy and Hebrew. At the same University he studied (1561–65) and then taught theology (1568–71) and cases of conscience (1571– 79). Thereafter he was moved to Rome where he taught theology (1579–95) and was responsible for the final redaction of the Ratio Studiorum (see DHCJ, p. 316). 72 Jean Bagot (1591–1664) was a professor of philosophy and theology in La Flèche and Paris (1626–39), revisor of Jesuit books in Rome (1639–43), prefect at the Clermont in Paris (1643–53), confessor of the young Louis XIV and superior of the casa professa in Paris. He wrote against Jansenism in his Apologeticus fidei. DHCJ does not mention his De Poenitentia dissertationes theologicae. See DHCJ, p. 323.

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Bardi, Francesco73

Disceptationes morales de conscientia in communi, recta, erronea, probabili, dubia et scrupulosa: opus omnibus non modo confessariis, poenitentibus, verumetiam utriusque iurisconsultis perutile. Panormi, apud Cirillum, 1650. fol. p. [24], 351, [33]. 8.

Bauny, Etienne74

Theologia moralis. Paris, apud Michaelem Soly, 1645. f. [13], p. 815. 9.

Bertonio, Ludovico75

Confessionario muy copioso en dos lenguas, Aymara, y Española, con una instruccion a cerca delos siete Sacramentos de la Sancta Yglesia, y otras varias cosas, como puede verse por la Tabla del mesmo libro. Por El Padre Ludovico Bertonio Italiano del Compañia de Iesus ... Impresso en la casa del Cõpañia de Iesus de Iuli enla Provincia de Chucuyto. Por Francisco del Canto. 1612. 8°, p. 350 [i.e. 342]. 10.

Bresser, Martin76

De conscientia libri VI ad omnigenas conscientias dirigendas idonei. Antverpiae, apud Viduam Ioannis Cnobbari, 1638. 8°, p. [24], 742, 39. 11.

Bruno, Vincenzo77

Trattato del sacramento della penitenza con l’esame della confessione generale, e con una meditatione della santissima comunione. In Venetia, pel Gioliti, 1585. 12°.

73 Francesco Bardi (1583–1661) taught philosophy and theology. See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 1, p. 898. 74 Étienne Bauny (1575–1649) was a professor of moral theology at Clermont in Paris for sixteen years. His Somme des péchés were put on the Index for its laxism. Teased by Pascal (Provincial Letters) and Hallier (Théologie morale des Jésuites). Also his Pratique du droit canonique and De sacramentis et personis sacris were put on the Index. His Theologia moralis is not quoted by DHCJ (p. 373). 75 Giovanni Luigi Bertonio (1557–1625) was a missionary in Peru and Bolivia. He wrote several works in the language aymara (the grammar of which was published in Rome). See DHCJ, p. 424. 76 Martin Bresser (1587–1635) taught theology in Louvain and Bruges. See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 2, p. 133. 77 Vincenzo Bruno (1532–94) was the rector of Collegio Romano (1571–74, 1586–89) and a spiritual director there. He also wrote the popular Meditazioni sopra i principali misteri della vita di Cristo (Venice, 1586). See DHCJ, p. 562.

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12.

35

Bruno, Vincenzo

Breve trattato della confessione per le persone spirituali che frequentano questo sacramento. Aggiuntovi un’epistola di San Bernardo della perfezione della vita spirituale. In Siena, appresso Luca Bonetti, [1571–1609]. 8°, p. 32. 13.

Busen[m]baum, Hermann78

Medulla theologiae moralis facili et perspicua methodo resolvens casus conscientiae et variis probatis auctoribus concinnata. Münster, 1645. 14.

Comitoli, Paolo79

Responsa moralia: in VII libros digesta: quibus, quae in christiani offici rationibus videntur ardua ac difficilia, enucleantur … cum indice rerum praecipuarum quae hoc volumine responsarum moralium continentur. Opus nunc primum in lucem editum. Lugduni, sumptibus Horatii Cardon, 1609. 4°, p. [76], 846. 15.

De Bonis, Emerio80

Trattato del Santissimo Sacramento dell’altare … con un altro trattato della santissima messa … et con uno specchio di confessione … di nuovo riveduti et ampliati per il medesimo. In Roma, presso Giacomo Tornieri, 1590. 12°, p. 240. 16.

De la Puente, Luís81

Directorio espiritual para la confessión, comunión, sacrificio de la misa, Sevilla, 1625. 17.

Diaceto, Giacomo82

Esame per la confessione generale di tutta la vita, e da molto tempo, con un breve sommario per le confessioni ordinarie, ed ultimamente s’è aggiunto un

78 Hermann Busembaum (1600–68) was a professor of moral theology in Cologne and Münster and confessor of the bishop-prince there. Because of his teaching on tyrannicide, the Medulla was condemned by the Parliament of Paris in 1757. See DHCJ, p. 578. 79 Paolo Comitoli (1545–1626) was renown for his competence in the classical languages. He was also a professor of moral theology in Venice (1590–99), Piacenza (1599–1601), Bologna and Forlì (1601–10). See DHCJ, pp. 874–5. 80 Emerio de Bonis (d. 1595) was a rector of many colleges. See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 1, p. 1727. 81 Luís de la Puente (1554–1624) taught philosophy and theology. 82 Giacomo Diaceto from Palermo died in 1678.

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esame per le confessioni delle persone religiose del p. Giacomo Diaceto della Compagnia di Gesù. In Roma, presso Francesco Cavalli, 1645. 12°. 18.

Escobar y Mendoza, Antonio83

Summula casuum conscientiae. Pampelone, apud Joannem de Oteiza, 1626. 16°. 19.

Escobar y Mendoza, Antonio,

Examen de confessores y practica de penitentes, en todas las materias de theologia moral. En Pamplona, por Juan de Orteyza 1630, 16°, fol. 155. 20.

Escobar y Mendoza, Antonio

Liber theologiae moralis viginti et quatuor Societatis Jesu Doctoribus reseratus … Lugduni, Sumpt. Haered. P. Prost, Philippi Borde, & Laurentii Arnaud, 1644. 8°, p. [44], 854, [11]. 21.

Fernández de Córdoba, Antonio84

Instructio confessariorum tribus partibus. Granatae, in officina Martini Fernandez Zambrano, 1621, 12°. 22.

Figliucci [Filliucci], Vincenzo85

Quaestionum moralium tomi duo priores quibus in hac nova editione ... Appendix posthuma ... [Lugdun]i, [Iacobum Carddon & Petrum Cavella]t, [1621]; fol., p. [44], 750, [72]. 23.

Figliucci, Vincenzo

De casibus conscientiae … Romae, 1625.

83 Antonio de Escobar y Mendoza (1589–1669) was the confessor of the duke of Osuna. He was one of the main targets of Pascal’s attack (quoted 67 times in his Provincial Letters). See DHCJ, p. 1259. 84 Antonio Fernández de Córdoba (1559–1634) was born in Cordova and died in Granada. See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 3, p. 657. 85 Vincenzo Figliucci (1566–1622) was a professor of moral theology (1600–04, 1604–13) in the Collegio Romano. He was also a member of the Penitentiary at St. Peter’s Basilica. Four of his sentences were condemned as lax in 1665 and 1679. He was targeted by Pascal. See DHCJ, p. 1416.

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24.

37

Figliucci, Vincenzo

Ad duos priores tomos Quaestionum Moralium Appendix posthuma de Statu Clericorum … Lugduni, Sumtibus Iacobi Cardon et Petri Cavellat, 1625; fol., p. [14], 255, [14]. 25.

Figliucci, Vincenzo

Compendium quaestionum moralium. Ab ipsomet confectum. In partes tres distributum. Cui accessit Instructio pro confessariis eiusdem auctoris. Pars prima-[tertia]. Romae, apud haeredem Bartholomaei Zannetti, sumptibus Io. Baptistae Brugiotti, 1626. 12°, p. [12], 947. 26.

Figliucci, Vincenzo

Synopsis theologiae moralis ad formam cursus, qui in Collegio Romano Societatis Jesu praelegi solet … Herbipoli, Typis ac sumptibus Joannis Volmari, 1626, 12°. 27.

Figliucci, Vincenzo

Brevis instructio pro Confessionibus excipiendis, cum adjuncto interrogatorio pro Confessionibus longioris temporis … Ravenspurgi, apud Johannem Schroterum, 1626, 24°, 185. 28.

Fornari, Martino86

Institutio confessariorum … Romae, apud haeredes Aloysii Zannetti, sumptibus Jo. Pauli Gellii, 1607, [in fine:] Romae, apud Haeredes Aloysii Zannetti, 1606. 12°, p. 236. 29.

Fornari, Martino

“Tractatus de sacro Ordine”, in Toledo Francisco, Instructio sacerdotum ac poenitentium, Romae, 1608. 30.

Funes, Martín de87

Speculum morale et practicum, in quo medulla omnium casuum Conscientae continetur pro confessariis et penitentibus extructum, et ex methodica doctrina

86 Martino Fornari (1547–1612) taught moral theology in Padua, Naples and Rome. See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 3, p. 889. 87 Martín de Funes (1560–1611) studied in Salamanca and taught theology in Graz (Austria) 1587–95 and then in Milan. Later on he went as a missionary to Colombia. DHCJ (p. 316) does not mention his Speculum morale.

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38

Martini Funes Hispani ... desumptum ... Cologne [Cologne], Ant. Boetzer, 1590. 12°. 31.

Giustinelli, Pietro88

Stimolo alla confessione. Brescia 1609, 16°. 32.

Giustinelli, Pietro

Modo breve e facile per confessarsi bene, massime generalmente, con alcuni documenti utilissimi per disporsi a vivere e morire in gratia di Dio. Milano, Filippo Lomazzi, 1610. 24°. 33.

Giustinelli, Pietro

Luce del cieco peccatore. Per convertirsi a Dio. Oue si tratta della somma malitia, bruttezza, e danni grandissimi, presenti, e futuri del peccato mortale, e veniale. In Trento, per Santo Zanetti, stamp. episc., 1637. 8°, p. 38, 416. 34.

Henríquez, Enrique89

Theologiae Moralis Summa, tribus tomis comprehensa. Tomus primus. Salmanticae, ex Officina J. Fernandez, 1591, fol., p. [4], [7], [9], 595, [27]. 35.

Laymann, Paul90

Theologia moralis in quinque libros partita, quibus materiae omnes practicae, cum ad externum ecclesiasticum, tum internum conscientiae forum spectantes ... explicantur ... Monachii, Formis Nicolai Henrici, 1625. 4°, p. 476. 36.

Loarte, Gaspar

Conforto de gli aflitti. In Roma, appresso Vincentio Accolto, fratelli, 1574, 12°, c. [7], 167, [2].

88 Pietro Giustinelli (1579–1630) was the rector of the college in Castiglione. See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 3, p. 1485. 89 Enrique Henríquez (1536–1608) lectured on cases of conscience in Monterrey and Salamanca (1563–66). He was a professor of theology in Cordoba (1573), Granada (1574) and Seville (1576), where he examined St. Teresa of Jesus. Difficulties of the approval of his Summa Theologiae Moralis by the 5th General Congregation (1593–94) caused his temporary transfer to the Dominicans. DHCJ (pp. 1900–901) defines him as “fiel seguidor del espíritu y métodos de la Escuela de Salamanca.” 90 Paul Laymann (1574–1635) before entering the Society studied law in Innsbruck. He taught moral theology in Munich (1609–25) and canon law in Dillingen.

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37.

39

Loarte, Gaspar

Avisi di sacerdoti et confessori. Parma, apud Sethum Viottum, 1579. 12°, [10], 317, [9]. 38.

Lugo, Juan de91

Disputationes scholasticae, et morales, de sacramentis in gener de venerabili Eucharistiae sacramento et de sacrosancto missae sacrificio ... Lugduni, Sumpt. Iacobi & Petri Prost., 1636; fol., p. [12], 598, [14]. 39.

Maldonado, Juan92

Summula … cuilibet Sacerdoti Confessiones Poenitentium audienti … Lugduni, apud Haeredes G. Rovillii, 1604, 12°, p. [8], 404, [32]. 40.

Maldonado, Juan

Summum Casuum conscientiae ... collecta per Martinum Codognat. Lugduni, heredes Guilielmi Rovilii, 1604, 12°, p. 40, 404. 41.

Pinelli, Luca93

De sacramento poenitentiae, Coloniae, 1607, 12°. 42.

Polanco, Juan94

Breve directorium ad confessarii ac confitentis munus recte obeundum, Romae, apud Antonium Bladum, 1554. 8°, c. 92, [4].

91 Juan de Lugo (1583–1660) studied law (1599, 1601–03) and theology (1607– 11) in Salamanca. He was a professor of theology at the Collegio Romano 1621–42 and was created cardinal in 1643. He wrote the important De iustitia et iure. See DHCJ, p. 2438. 92 Juan Maldonado (1534–83) taught theology in Salamanca before entering the Society and in Paris—after. See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 5, p. 403. 93 Luca Pinelli (1543–1607) was a professor of theology in Ingolstadt and Pont-àMousson. He authored numerous devotional writings, such as Gersone della perfetione religiosa (Naples, 1601). DHCJ (pp. 3138–9) does not quote his De sacramento poenitentiae. 94 Juan Alfonso de Polanco (1517–76) was the secretary of the Society of Jesus since 1547. DHCJ (pp. 3168–9) mentions his Directory only in the bibliography. Polanco’s role in the Society and his manual will be analyzed in detail in the next chapter.

40 43.

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Régnault, Valère [Reginaldus]95

De prudentia et caeteris in confessario requisitis … tractatus. Nunc primum in lucem editus. Lugduni, sumptibus H. Cardon, 1610. 8°, p. [20], 491, [25]. 44.

Régnault, Valère

Praxis fori poenitentialis ad directionem confessarii in usu sacri sui muneris … Lugduni, sumptibus H. Cardon (ex Typographia Iacobi du Creux alias Molliard), 1616, fol., p. [12], 749, [30]. 45.

Régnault, Valère

Tractatus de officio poenitentis in usu sacramenti poenitentiae. Nunc primum in lucem prodit, suis Indicibus illustratus. Lugduni, sumpt. H. Cardon, 1618; 12°, p. [22], 690, [30]. 46.

Régnault, Valère

Instructio brevis et dilucida ad usum sacramenti poenitentiae. Nunc primum publici iuris facta. Venetiis, apud Andream Baba, 1619. 12°, p. [36], 497. 47.

Régnault, Valère,

Compendiaria Praxis difficiliorum casuum conscientiae In tres partes distincta … Moguntiae, sumptib. Petri Henningii Bibliop … Excudebat Ioannes Volmari, anno 1619. 8°, p. [12], 130, [6]. 48.

Rodríguez, Juan96

Prudente confessor, y resolucion de graves dificultades, que en la administracion del S. Sacramento de la penitencia se ofrecen con personas de qualquier estado … Impresso en [Sevilla?], en casa de L. Estupiñan, 1644; 4°, [4], f. 60.

95 Valère Régnault (1549–1623) was a professor of moral theology in Dole (France) for 20 years. He was attacked by Pascal, but considered classical for Liguori. See DHCJ, p. 3327. 96 It is not certain whether this author is the same Juan Rodríguez quoted by Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 6, pp. 1970–74, since there is no mention of Prudente confessor.

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49.

Sá, Manuel de

41

97

Aphorismi Confessariorum … Venetiis, 1592, 12°. 50.

Sánchez, Juan98

Selectae et practicae disputationes rerum passim in administratione sacramentorum eucharistiae et poenitentiae occurrentium, Illephonsi Martin, 1624. p. [653]. 51.

Sánchez, Tomás99

Opus morale in praecepta Decalogi seu Summa casuum conscientiae. Matriti, apud Ludovicum Sánchez, suis sumptibus & Ioannis Hafreij, 1613. Fol. p. [24], 1287, [74]. 52.

Santarelli, Antonio100

Tractatus de haeresi, schismate, apostasia, sollicitatione in sacramento poenitentiae, et de potestate Romani Pontificis in his delictis puniendis; cum duplici indice disputationum, & rerum refertissimo … Romae, apud haeredem Bartholomaei Zannetti, 1625. 4°, p. (24), 644 (28). 53.

Suárez, Francisco101

Enchiridion casuum conscientiae. Brixiae, apud Bartholomaeum Fontanam, 1628. 4°, p. [8], 517, [1].

97 The converso Manuel de Sá (1528–96) was asked by Loyola to examine the Jesuit Constitutions before their promulgation. He was a professor of theology and exegesis at the Collegio Romano (1556–1572). DHCJ (p. 3454) mentions his Aphorismi only in the bibliography. 98 See Palau, Manual, # 294198. 99 Tomás Sánchez (1550–1610) was more famous for his De sancto matrimonii sacramento. He became one of the main targets of Pascal and Bayle. Two of his sentences were censured by Robert Bellarmine and consequently corrected on request of the Superior General Acquaviva. See DHCJ, pp. 3489–490. 100 Antonio Santarelli (1579–1649) taught moral theology. See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 7, p. 579. 101 Francisco Suárez (1548–1617) studied law (1561–64) and theology (1566–70) at Salamanca. Then he taught theology at the Collegio Romano (1580–85) and Alcalá (1585–92). He published, among others, De Incarnatione (1590), De mysteriis vitae Christi (1592), De Sacramentis (1595), Disputationes Metaphisicae (1597)—the main expression of his philosophical thought, De Poenitentia (1602), De auxiliis (1603), De virtute et statu Religionis (1608–09), De Legibus (1612)—for which is considered the father of international law, and Defensio fidei catholicae (1613). His philosophicaltheological system is called Suarism. See DHCJ, pp. 3654–6 (where there is no mention of his contribution to Probabilism) and 3658–62.

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42 54.

Tamburini, Tommaso102

Methodus expeditae confessionis tum pro confessariis tum poenitentibus in quibus omnes fere conscientiae casus ad poenitentiae sacramentum … enodantur. Opusculum authoris primum. Romae, typis Manelphi Manelphii, 1647. 12°, p. 361. 55.

Tellier, Jean103

Tavola utilissima a’ confessori et penitenti tradotta dall’originale latino da Francesco Grandi. In Rimino, appresso Giovanni Simbeni, 1583. 4°, c. [16]. 56.

Toledo, Francisco de104

Instructio sacerdotum ac poenitentium … cum additionibus D. Andreae Victorelli. Venetiis, apud Petrum Mariam Bertanum, 1596. 8°, p. [8], 746, [46]. 57.

Valdivia, Luís de105

Doctrina christiana y cathechismo en la lengua allentiac, que corre en la ciudad de S. Juan de la Frontera, con un Confessonario [sic], Arte, y Bocabulario breves. Lima, 1607. 58.

[Zamberti, Carlo] 106

Casuum conscientiae singulis mensibus praeteriti anni 1636 [-1637, 1639-1641] in congregationibus archipresbyteralibus diocesis Bononiensis discussorum decisiones. ab admod. rever. p. theologiae moralis in Metropolitana Bononi[a]e lectore hoc anno [1637-1638, 1640-1642] editae. Bononiae, typis haeredis Victorii Benatii, s.d. [ma 01637-1642]. 4°, 5 vols. 102 Tommaso Tamburini (1591–1675) taught moral theology since 1636. DHCJ (p. 3698) incorrectly calls him “un pionero en el desarrollo de la doctrina del probabilismo.” 103 Jean Tellier was born about 1545 in Evreux. He entered the Society of Jesus in Rome in 1562, where he also died in 1579. See Mario Scaduto, Catalogo dei Gesuiti d’Italia 1540–1565 (Roma, 1968), p. 144. 104 Francisco de Toledo Herrera (1532–96) was of Jewish origins. He studied theology at Salamanca under Domingo de Soto, where he subsequently taught philosophy (1557–58). After joining the Jesuits, he taught philosophy (1559–62) and theology (1562–69) at the Collegio Romano. From 1569 he was a theologian of the Roman Penitentiary. He was created the first Jesuit cardinal in 1593. See DHCJ, pp. 3807–8. 105 Luís de Valdivia (1561–1642) taught theology in Lima and was a missionary in Peru. See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 8, p. 377. 106 Carlo Zamberti (1596–1650) taught theology in Bologna. See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 8, p. 1455.

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The majority of the authors (18 or 46 per cent of the total) were Iberians. The second largest group was represented by Italians (14 or 35 per cent).107 Five of the listed authors were French-speaking (almost 13 per cent) and three of them came from the German states (nearly eight per cent). The biographies of the authors indicate that many of them were influential personalities in the government of the Society of Jesus, at the courts of popes, kings, princes, and bishops. Their way of moral reasoning, therefore, may have affected Catholic consciences far beyond the classroom and the ministry of confession.108 Most of these college professors wrote long treatises on moral theology— often manuals for their students, such as Institutiones moralium by Azor, Theologia moralis by Bauny, Medulla theologiae moralis by Busenbaum, Questiones morales by Figliucci, Summae theologiae moralis by Henríquez, Theologia moralis by Laymann, Disputationes scholasticae by Lugo, and Praxis fori poenitentialis by Régnault. Others wrote books on confessional praxis addressed directly to confessors, as was often expressed in the subtitle. Agostini wrote in his Brevis notitia that he considered it very useful especially for apprentice confessors (valde utilia sunt in primo ingressu ad audiendas confessiones). Novice confessors were also the readers of Figliucci’s Brevis instructio pro confessionibus excipiendis. The purpose of these manuals was to instruct the confessor on what was the necessary knowledge (scientia) to administer the sacrament. That is how to distinguish mortal from venial sins, what are confessor’s good qualities, and what canon law states in that regard, so the ministry can be done properly, beneficially, and well (recte, fructuose, and bene). It is with this purpose in mind that Polanco’s, Giustinelli’s and De la Puente’s manuals were called directories (directoria, directori); Fernández de Córdoba’s, Loarte’s, Giustinelli’s and Toledo’s instructions (instructions, istruzioni); Agostini’s information (notitiae); Diaceto’s and Escobar’s exams (esami examen); Fornari’s education (institutio); Loarte’s annotations (avisi) or mirror (speculum); Polanco’s rule (regola);109 Régnault’s practice (praxis); and Sá’s aphorisms (aphorismi). Other authors provided specific treatises on the sacrament of confession and of order, such as Bruno (Breve trattato del sacramento della penitenza), Pinelli (Del sacramento della penitenza), and Fornari (Tractatus de sacro ordine). Régnault and Rodríguez focused on confessors’ qualities, especially 107 This is an important hint for research on the late medieval and the early modern background of the Jesuit notion of penance and the ministry of confession, for the most complete treatment of pre-Reformation penance literature by Thomas N. Tentler (Sin and Confession on the Eve of the Reformation (Princeton, 1977) precisely excludes Iberia and Italy, and so we must be careful not to generalize on the basis of his account. Tentler’s work deals, however, with authors such as Jean Gerson, Peter Lombard and Antoninus of Florence, who were read by the early Jesuits, and the latter is one of the few expressly quoted by the first Jesuit book on confession (Polanco, Directory, p. 74). 108 See also Robert Bireley, The Jesuits and the Thirty Years War: Kings, Courts, and Confessors (Cambridge, 2003). 109 This is an Italian translation of his Directorium.

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on prudence (prudentia): De prudentia et caeteris in confessario requisites … tractatus and Prudente confessor, respectively. The works dedicated to the particular kind of confession called “general” are Bruno’s Trattato del sacramento della penitenza con l’esame della confessione generale (1585), Giustinelli’s Modo breve e facile per confessarsi bene, massime generalmente (1610), Fernández de Córdoba’s Tercera parte de la Instrucion de confessores, y penitentes … para hacer bien una confesion general (1622) and Diaceto’s Esame per la confessione generale di tutta la vita (1645). The multi-edited Loarte’s Conforto de gli aflitti (1574) stresses the consolatory feature of confession so characteristic of the Jesuit ministry, as we have seen above. The span of time (not constrained to the sixteenth century) in which these devotional works were printed shows the continued interest of Jesuits in the spiritual and devotional side of the sacrament. It is probable that these authors tried to balance the overwhelming casuistic production, the “abundance of which”—to quote Loarte—“makes us indigent” (eorum copia nos inopes reddat).110 The Jesuit authors were well aware of this profusion and many of them assured the reader that their books would have been short and easy, and thus useful. Polanco’s Directorium and Bruno’s Trattato, Agostini’s Notitia, Figliucci’s Instructio pro Confessionibus excipiendis, and Régnault’s Instructio were brief (brevis); and the latter’s La Pratique—“succincte.” Diaceto’s Esame per la confessione generale contained a summary for confession that was “brief.” Toledo presented his cases “briefly.” Busenbaum’s treatise on moral theology and Funes’s Speculum morale were called “medulla” (marrow). A few authors recalled in their titles the medieval tradition of summas—Escobar y Mendoza entitled one of his work Summula casuum conscientiae and Maldonado—Summula casuum. Sometimes Toledo’s Instructio was called Summa casuum conscientiae, which indicates how medieval and modern traditions continued to intermingle. Henríquez was the first author (1591) to use the term “moral theology.” Some of the Jesuit theology professors also wrote books of spiritual advice, such as de la Puente and Régnault. The latter—together with Figliucci—was the author who wrote the largest number of different books dedicated to sacramental confession (five). Agostini wrote three, and a few other (Bruno, Escobar y Mendoza, Giustinelli, and Loarte)—two. Other authors listed in the Census wrote just one book on the subject. The “scientific” feature of the major part of this literature was confirmed by the high number of volumes printed in folio (at least 18 per cent). Almost 24 per cent were issued in duodecimo, nearly 19 per cent in octavo, and at least 18 per cent in quarto. The number of editions printed in 24° were 43 and in 32°—nine.111 The largest work, in spite of its declaration of shortness in the subtitle,112 is Azor’s three-volume Institutiones printed in folio on almost 110 111

Gaspar Loarte, De Instructione Confessariorum (Mechliniae, 1822), p. [6]. I could not gather information about the format of 81 editions (about ten per

cent). 112 Institutionum moralium, in quibus universae quaestiones ad conscientiam recte, aut prave factorum pertinentes breviter tractantur. Certainly it was short in comparison

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3,000 pages. The smallest ones are the two guides for confessors printed in 32°: Agostini’s Brevis notitia and Sá’s Aphorismi. Seventy seven per cent of the total production was issued in Latin, ten per cent in Italian, seven per cent in French and only five per cent in Spanish, which is surprising, given that the overwhelming majority of authors were Spaniards. The predominance of Latin shows the preferred reader of this literature—confessors and students, although the subtitles often explained that the penitents were their readers as well.113 An obvious consideration has to be borne in mind, however: confessors were at the same time penitents. Yet, many manuals were translated into vernacular languages. The book that was translated most often was Loarte’s Conforto de gli afflitti, which was issued in Latin, French, Spanish, and German. Polanco’s Directorium was the only book translated into Illyric and Slovenian languages and one of the only two translated into Portuguese.114 The only book translated into English was Bruno’s Breve trattato del sacramento della penitenza. It had four English editions. Interesting from the linguistic point of view were a few books written in both Spanish and Amerindian languages, such as Acosta’s Confessionario para los curas de Indios translated into Quichua and Aymara (Lima, 1585), Valdivia’s Confessionario—into Allientac (Lima, 1607) and Bertonio’s Confessonario— into Aymara (Chucuyto [Bolivia], 1612). Jesuit penitential books were printed in at least 61 cities. The most productive place for printing was neither Rome (74 editions) nor Venice (113), but Lyons (121). More editions were issued in Cologne than in Brescia (68/63), and far more in Paris (38), Rouen (37), Antwerp (34), Douai (29), and Madrid (22) than in Milan (14). Comparing Italian and non-Italian Jesuit production reveals that the former was the largest among European countries (at least 300 editions comprising close to 40 per cent of the total) but smaller than the combined Jesuit production of all other European countries (459). Many of these cities had more than one printing house publishing Jesuit books. Lyons—just to make an example—which printed the highest number of them, had at least 13 publishers. The most active among them were Cardon (often with Cavellat), Pillehotte and Rigaud. They were well aware of the popularity of Jesuit penitential literature and the subtitles often indicated how with 12-volume in folio Resolutiones morales (1636–57) by the Theatine Antonino Diana. 113 See Funes’s Speculum morale et practicum, in quo medulla omnium casuum Conscientae continetur pro confessariis et penitentibus extructum; Bardi’s Disceptationes morales de conscientia in communi, recta, erronea, probabili, dubia et scrupulosa: opus omnibus non modo confessariis, poenitentibus, verumetiam utriusque iurisconsultis perutile; Fornari’s Institutio confessariorum… liber secundus. De modo promouendi poenitentes ad Christianam perfectionem; Toledo’s Instructio sacerdotum ac poenitentium ...; Régnault’s Praxis fori poenitentialis ad directionem confessarii in usu sacri sui muneris … Opus tam Poenitentibus, quam Confessariis utile; Tamburini’s Methodus expeditae confessionis tum pro confessariis tum poenitentibus in quibus omnes fere conscientiae casus ad poenitentiae sacramentum … enodantur. 114 The other one is Pinelli’s Confessionario geral.

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they attempted to convince the buyer of the superiority of their edition. Therefore we find that an edition is new (nova), much more correct (multo correctior), larger (auctior), more beautiful (ornatior), revised by the (same) author (ab ipso auctore recognita) and doctrinally safe (repurgata, emendata).115 Jesuit book production on confession during the first 96 years was uneven. Until the end of the sixteenth century the editions per year never exceeded nine and in many years no publication occurred. The situation abruptly changed at the turn of the seventeenth century when the number of editions per year increased from seven in 1599 to 21 in 1600, while in the decade 1601–10 the number of editions never fell below eleven per year. The year 1611 marked the most productive year for publications, when they reached 25 editions. A high production was maintained until 1629, when the editions published never fell below nine per year. After 1630, the production decreased dramatically, fluctuating between nine and three editions per year. The year 1600 witnessed a dramatic shift in the printing business, announcing a new century marked by proliferation of penitential literature: nine different titles appeared, some of which had multiple editions, such as Sá’s Aphorismi (six editions) and Toledo’s Instructio (eight). The latter was issued twice by different printing houses in Rome and in Brescia that year. The total number of editions for 1600 was 21 and was exceeded only in 1611 (25 editions). That year three new editions of Toledo (bound with Fornari) were printed in the same city of Brescia by three different publishers. Also in Brescia four editions of Régnault’s De prudentia were issued in 1611. The printing houses of Brescia were very active in subsequent years. In 1612 they published twice the third part of Azor; in 1614—twice the work of Toledo; in 1617, five editions of Azor. Still more productive were the printers in Lyons, where, for example, in 1628 three editions of Toledo were issued: one in Latin and two in French, and in Venice, where in 1629 the same work of Toledo was printed three times: two Latin and one Italian editions. At the beginning of the seventeenth century new very large treatises by Azor (50 editions), Figliucci (24) and Régnault (45) were issued. These books made the first three decades of the seventeenth century the most fertile period in the history of the Jesuit penitential literature. Nearly all the most published authors were present on the book market for long periods. Polanco, who—as we have seen above—was the fourth most published author and translated into the largest number of languages, lasted on the book market for the longest period: 81 years (1554–1635). Loarte (the seventh most published and translated in many languages) was edited for 66 years (1574–1640). Sá (the third most published) was present on the book market for 58 years (1592–1649), and Toledo (the most published work) was issued through a period of 53 years. A kind of exception was De Bonis, who

115 I do not analyze in this study how some works were censored, but the census provides some useful information for it, as in case of Sá’s Aphorismi, for which the census indicates when the censorship intervened.

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had less editions (20) than Fornari (83), Azor (50), Régnault (45), Figliucci (24) and Laymann (23), but lasted on the market for 55 long years (1590–1645). The above data allows the yearly average of editions for a single author to be calculated. The highest yearly average belonged to Toledo (three editions), followed by Azor (2), Figliucci (1.8), Fornari (1.8), Agostini (1.4), Régnault (1.4), and Sá (1.3). The comparison of the number of editions with the years of presence on the book market indicates that this presence was uneven. For example, Polanco had the highest number of editions, six in 1576 (the year of his death), but in 1586–98 he was never published more than once a year, and in some years there was no publication. Régnault, although edited for only 32 years, was characterized by intense printing. He had the largest number of editions (nine within one year (1619) and the high number of editions per year was maintained between 1611–22, but after 1635 he had only one publication (in 1642). Azor had a high number of publications between 1600–25, but after that no edition was produced, perhaps because of the new text book for the students of the Roman College by Figliucci that appeared in 1621 and in just 13 years had 24 editions, reaching a high number of eight in 1626. This brief glimpse at the Jesuit penitential book production should satisfactorily convince us about the importance the Society of Jesus gave to the ministry of confession and the study of moral theology. The majority of the authors were professors of the Roman College, where the Jesuit pedagogical code was being elaborated through the second half of the sixteenth century. It highlighted the pivotal role of rhetoric and classes on cases of conscience in its humanistic curriculum.

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CHAPTER 2

“What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?”: Jesuit Ethics before the Revolution of Probabilism The link Pascal established between the Jesuits and Probabilism is a major reason why Probabilism was and still is so much identified with Jesuits and explains, for example, why Pierre Bayle (1647–1706) in his Dictionnaire historique et critique (1696)—a harbinger of the mostly anti-Catholic Enlightenment—would write on Jesuit Probabilism in the article dedicated to the founder of the Jesuits, Ignatius of Loyola (d. 1556). However, the terminus post quem on the subject of Probabilism is the year 1577 (37 years after the foundation of the Society of Jesus and 21 years after Loyola’s death), when it was formulated by Bartolomé de Medina, who was not a Jesuit, but a Dominican from the School of Salamanca.1 True enough, the Jesuits enthusiastically adopted Probabilism, but only since the 1580s, and “lax” is a poor word to describe such a sophisticated intellectual system, the flexibility of which enabled statesmen and confessors to forge creative responses to complex, unforeseen challenges of the early modern period, as we shall see in Chapter 5. Prior to that time, however, the Jesuits favored a quite different ethical approach to conscience and our attention in this chapter is turned to an analysis of it. The principal—although not the only—source to detect the approach the Jesuits employed in a half a century or so before their revolutionary turn towards Probabilism is the first Jesuit manual for confessors. The First Jesuit Manual for Confessors As we have seen in the previous chapter, the first published Jesuit book on sacramental confession was Juan Alfonso de Polanco’s Short Directory for Confessors.2 This pocket-sized3 manual was printed in Rome and then in Leuven at the very beginning of 1554—i.e., 14 years after the foundation of the Society of Jesus (1540) and shortly after the Council of Trent’s session 1 Bartolomé de Medina, Expositio in Summae Theologiae Partem Iam IIae, q. 19, a. 6: “Mihi videtur quod si est opinio probabilis licitum est eam sequi, licet opposita probabilior sit.” 2 Juan Alfonso de Polanco, Breve directorium ad confessarii ac confitentis munus recte obeundum (Romae, 1554). 3 The first editions are in octavo, but the majority of them were printed in 12° (37 editions) and 16° (13).

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on penance (1551).4 The manual’s preface explains that the decision to print the manuscript was fueled by the encouragement of the papal vicar in Rome, who not only appreciated the text, but also intended to expand its circulation beyond the Society.5 As we have learned from the census, it was the only Jesuit book on sacramental confession for twenty years—until 1574, when the first Jesuit manual for penitents, Gaspar de Loarte’s “Comfort of the Tormented,” was published in Rome.6 Loarte’s book was the only companion to Polanco’s until 1583, when Jean Tellier’s “Table” was printed.7 The Directory had its editorial boom in the 1570s and its decline in the 1590s, when it was almost entirely replaced by the works of another two Jesuit conversos: Manuel de Sá’s Aphorisms (80 editions)8 and Francisco de Toledo’s Instruction for Priests and Penitents (166 editions) at the end of the sixteenth century. After Toledo’s, Fornari’s,9 and Sá’s, it was the fourth most published Jesuit book on confession with at least 76 editions. It had the highest number of editions in 1576 (the year of Polanco’s death), when six were published, but between 1586 and 1598 it was not published more than once a year, and in some years there was no publication at all. The Directory was the only book translated into Illyrian and Slovenian languages, and one of the only two Jesuit confessional manuals translated into Portuguese.10 Loyola wanted every Jesuit confessor to have a personal copy of Polanco’s Directory. True, the manual was subsequently used in Jesuit ministries and

4 Directorium, p. 66. One can argue, therefore, that all Jesuit writing on confession was post-Trent. As we shall see, however, the Jesuit approach to penance developed because of, but also in spite of the Council of Trent. I disagree with Vereecke, who sees Trent as pivotal for Catholic moral theology. See, for example, Louis Vereecke, Da Guglielmo d’Ockham a sant’ Alfonso Liguori. Saggi di storia della teologia morale moderna 1300–1787 (Cinisello Balsamo, 1990), p. 168, and especially pp. 643–56, 623–9. 5 “Ita quidem [non] fecissemus, nisi Reverendissimus Archintus Summi Pontificis in alma Urbe Vicarius (qua una cum Magistro Sacri palatii de libris qui Romae imprimuntur, censuram ferre solet) nos, cum hunc tractatum vidit, ad evulgandum illum, et cum aliis etiam extra Societatem communicandum fuisset hortatus” (Directorium, p. 5). 6 Gaspar de Loarte, Conforto de gli affitti (Roma, 1574). 7 Tavola utilissima a confessori et penitenti … tradotta dall’originale latino da Francesco Grandi (In Rimino, 1583). As the title indicates, this is an Italian translation from the Latin original. I was not able to find any first-edition copy, which must have been printed of course before 1583. While Loarte’s book was multi-printed, Tellier’s one does not seem to have had the same editorial success. 8 Sá’s Aphorismi were published as far as in Nagasaki, Japan (1605). See DHCJ, p. 3454. I use the term “edition” in its early modern meaning that encompasses what today is understood also as reprint and translation. 9 Martino Fornari, Institutio confessariorum (Romae, 1607). 10 The other manual translated into Portuguese was Pinelli’s Confessionario geral. Utilissimo, assi para todos os estados de penitentes se saberem bem confessar, & aparelhar, como tambem para todos os confessores exercitarem dignamente o Sacramento da Penitencia. Composto pelo P. Lucas Pinello ... traduzido da lingua Italiana em a nossa Portugueza por Antonio Vaz Duarte (Lisboa, 1618).

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11

even in lectures on cases of conscience (lectiones casuum). An influential Directory to the Spiritual Exercises (1555) by Juan Alonso de Vitoria (d. 1578) recommended Polanco’s Directory as useful for the preparation to general sacramental confession.12 However, it is to be noted that the exclusivity of the Directory on the Jesuit penitential book market ceased with the election of the new Jesuit Superior General Everard Mercurian (1514–80) in 1573, when Polanco—who was not elected superior general because of his converso background13—was replaced as secretary of the Society of Jesus by Antonio Possevino (1533–1611) and with other converso Jesuits removed from the Jesuit government.14 It is not unreasonable to infer, then, that the publishing success of the Directory may well have been related to Polanco’s position of authority rather than to the manual’s intrinsic usefulness to confessors or students of cases of conscience. Even though it was designed to be just a compendium to accommodate the needs of the first Jesuits who were too busy with their ministries to dedicate much time to academic activities, the Directory lacked basic awareness of important shifts operative during that century. Indeed, the official edition of the Directory to the Spiritual Exercises from 1599 suggested a non-Jesuit contemporary text, namely Enchiridion by the Augustinian Martín Azpilcueta (1493–1586).15 The popular and authoritative Navarrus, as it was briefly called 11 See Giancarlo Angelozzi, “L’insegnamento dei casi di coscienza nella pratica educativa della Compagnia di Gesù,” in Gian Paolo Brizzi (ed.), La “Ratio studiorum”. Modelli culturali e pratiche educative dei Gesuiti in Italia tra Cinque e Seicento (Roma, 1981), p. 147. The Directorium was read in the Jesuit College of Vienna by 1560 (see Mon Paed., vol. 3, p. 309) and was also recommended by the synodal council of Malines (see Vereecke, Da Guglielmo d’Ockham, p. 638). 12 See Martin E. Palmer (ed.), On Giving the Spiritual Exercises. The Early Jesuit Manuscript Directories and the Official Directory of 1599 (St. Louis, 1996), p. 23. 13 After having discovered an important manuscript by the influential Jesuit Benedetto Palmio on the alleged converso conspiracy in the early Society of Jesus, I am currently writing a study on the role the Judeo-converso Jesuits played in that period (see www.jewishjesuits.com). 14 See DHCJ, pp. 3201–3. Ironically, Possevino—who previously served the Renaissance court of the Gonzaga in Mantua—was most likely of Jewish origins too, but he hid his converso identity from his confreres. See John P. Donnelly, “Antonio Possevino and Jesuits of Jewish Ancestry,” AHSI 109 (1986): 3–29 and Alberto Castaldini, “L’incognita marrana. Ipotesi sulle origini familiari del gesuita Antonio Possevino (1533–1611),” Atti e memorie dell’Accademia Nazionale Virgiliana 69 (2001): 129–40. 15 Enchiridion sive manuale confessariorum et poenitentium (1549 [Portuguese], 1553 [Spanish], 1573 [Latin]). Its structure may have influenced the formulation of cursus maior and cursus minor in the Jesuit Ratio Studiorum. See Angelozzi, L’insegnamento, pp. 139, 143, 147, 150, 153, and 159; Mario Scaduto, L’epoca di Giacomo Laínez. Il governo (Roma, 1974), p. 397; Scaduto, L’epoca di Giacomo Laínez. L’azione, pp. 588 and 596; Turrini, La coscienza e le leggi, pp. 181–2. On how Navarrus’s text influenced the development of Probabilism in the Jesuit Leonardus Lessius and on its use in the college of Louvain, see M.W.F. Stone and T. Van Houdt, “Probabilism and its Methods. Leonard Lessius and his Contribution to the Development of Jesuit Casuistry,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovanienses, 75.4 (1999): 363–4. On the place of Navarrus in the history of moral theology, see Emilio Dunoyer, L’“Enchiridion

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after the author’s birthplace, was more comprehensive and reflected important socio-economic changes brewing in the sixteenth century. The Jesuits, who were consulted between 1586 and 1599 about the text of their pedagogical code known as Ratio Studiorum (1599), overwhelmingly called for a new manual that could be used in the Society for lectures on cases of conscience. This time, Francisco de Toledo’s Instruction, rather than Polanco’s Directory, would have been an answer to that need.16 Even though the Polish Jesuits would reprint the Directory more than 300 years later,17 by the end of the sixteenth century the Directory was already outdated. Whatever judgment is passed on the Directory’s helpfulness, we have to acknowledge that the information provided by the analysis of the census unmistakably indicates that the Directory must be considered the expression of the early Jesuit corporate conscience. This is precisely the reason why an analysis of the Directory will constitute the core of this chapter. The place to begin is with questioning the exclusivity of Polanco’s authorship of the manual. Authorship of the Directory A closer look at the extensive correspondence emanating from the Jesuit headquarters—Roman Curia of the Society of Jesus, where Polanco functioned as secretary, reveals some intriguing information about the Directory’s authorship. In January 1554, shortly after the first Roman publication of the manual, Polanco wrote three letters commissioned by his superior Loyola mentioning the publication of the Directory. The first (I), in Italian and dated 13 January, was addressed to all Jesuit schools. The second (II) was written in Spanish on 17 January to the Jesuit Diego Mirón. The third (III) was issued in Latin on 23 January to another Jesuit, Adriaan Adriaensens. The synoptic view of the three letters allows us to better compare them:

Confessariorum” del Navarro. Dissertatio ad lauream in Facultate S. Theologiae apud Pontificium Institutum “Angelicum” de Urbe (Pamplona, 1957), pp. 143–54, and Vereecke, Da Guglielmo d’Ockham, pp. 647–8. 16 For an analysis of this book, see James F. Keenan, “The Birth of Jesuit Casuistry: Summa casuum conscientiae sive de instructione sacerdotum, libri septem, by Francisco de Toledo (1532–1596),” in Thomas M. McCoog (ed.), The Mercurian Project. Forming Jesuit Culture 1573–1580 (Rome, 2004), pp. 461–82. 17 Directorium breve ad confessarii et confitentis munus rite obeundum R.P. Joannis Polanci s.j. juxta modo vigentes censuras correxit Augustinus Arndt ejusd. Societ. (Cracovia, 1886).

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I

II

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III

Hauendo N[ostro] P[adre] ordinato si facessi in casa vn Directorio per li confessori della Compagnia. Acció vniformemente quanto si potessi, procedessino, alcuni Padri pigliorono questa cura; et hauendosi a stampare,

Aqui se inbian dos Directorios de los confessores que se han ahora stampado, y por orden de N.P. se tomó aquí en casa esse trabajo

Hoc Directorium confessarii, Patris nostri iussu, domi nostrae concinnatum fuit:

hanno voluto si mettessi il nome de chi l’haueua fatto, perché pare sia prohibito et suspetto stampar’ libri sanza nome; et cossí haueuamo messo per titulo: “Concinatum in domo Societatis Jesu.”

(y a mi me han mortificado en poner en el mi nombre), porque acá no parece bien estampar libro de alguna doctrina sin nombre, antes es cosa suspechosa. Hauíase puesto en el título “Concinnatum in domo Societatis Jesu,”

et quia suspectum est sine nomine quosuis libros aliquid doctrinae continentes in lucem edere, in huius titulo scripseramus nominis propri[i] loco: “Concinnatum in domo Societatis Jesu.”

È parso a N[ostro] P[adre], che non conueneua che si imputassi a tutta la casa, se alcuni particulari di quella auessino mancato, et cossì si rimesse al dottor Olaue, et lui ha posto il nome mio, et cossi lo fece stampare, quantunque si c’è qualche cosa di buono, più presto credo sia de altri che mia. […]

pero no le pareció a N.P.,

Id tamen non probauit Pater,

y pusieron mi nombre las personas a quien se remitió:

et ii quibus commisit hoc dubium soluendum, nomen meum, me inscio, in titulo posuerunt; quod ego sic interpretor: ut si quid male dictum deprehenderetur, mihi acceptum feratur (ut par est); si quid recte, haud dubie domui acceptum ferendum est, uel potius Deo, bonorum omnium auctori. […]

Alcuni errori ch’erano della stampa si sonno adnotati al fine. Saria bono, secondo quello ch’è annotato, emendare lo estesso libro con la penna. Di qua per la fretta non si è potuto fare.

Algunos errores que auía se annotaron al fin del libro; de alli se puede corregir lo de dentro.

sí que si ubiere faltas, sabrán a quien dar la culpa; de lo que ubiere bueno, a la casa, y no a mi, lo habrán de agradecer, o por mejor dezir, a Dios N.S., auctor de lo bueno, donde quiera que se halle. […] Vea V.R. por allá que manera habrá para inbiar a cada sacerdote de la Compañía el suyo, como quiere N.P. que le tenga; […]

Aliqua errata, quae typographo exciderunt, in fine sunt adnotata, et expediret penna emendare, quod nobis per ocium non licuit.

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All three letters state that the Directory was compiled for Jesuit confessors on Loyola’s request, the only information confirmed in the Preface to the manual itself: Since it seemed good to explain that the priests of the Society [of Jesus] that had spread in different parts of the world should follow one and the same way in doing this ministry [of hearing confessions]—since they are moved by one and the same spirit to promote men’s salvation—I have received a task from our Reverend Father Superior [Ignatius of Loyola] to compose, as far as I am able in good order, a compendium of what I had learned to be useful for both confessors and penitents, in part from lecture and in part from observation, and more so from my own personal and other peoples’ experience.18

A further comparison of the Preface with these letters reveals, however, a striking discrepancy. From the Preface we learn unequivocally that the author of the Directory was Polanco; whereas in all three letters Polanco discloses that the manual was composed by a group from the Jesuit headquarters in Rome. He does not unveil who participated in the task, but the Italian letter would suggest at least one name: Dr Martín Olave,19 who put Polanco’s name as the author of the Directory (the letter in Latin says that the former did it without informing the latter). Olave did so, because Loyola, probably with censorship requirements in mind, did not approve the idea of printing the book without expressly naming one author in particular. The critical-historical approach to the texts suggests that we rely more on the information provided by the three letters. When we do so, Polanco’s authorship resulting from the Preface needs to be considered a rhetorical device aimed at assuring the reader of the book’s authoritativeness. Additionally, Miriam Turrini observes that mentioning friends’ or superiors’ pressure to publish a work is a topos of authors’ prefaces in order to avoid criticism and to ensure book’s circulation.20 In the case at hand, mentioning Loyola in the Preface is a historical fact and naming Polanco as the only author of 18 “Cum igitur visum esset expedire, ut presbyteri huius Societatis diversissimis orbis regionibus disiuncti, unam eandemque rationem in hoc ministerio gerendo sequerentur, quemadmodum uno atque eodem spiritu ad promovendam hominum salutem ducuntur. Datum fuit mihi negotium a R.P. nostro Praeposito, ut quam aptissimo ordine possem, in compendium ea redigi curarem, quae partim lectione, partim observatione, crebrisque tum meis, tum aliorum experimentis utilia esse et confessariis et confitentibus comperissem (Polanco, Directorium, p. ii). [Translation is mine.]” 19 Martín Olave (1507/8–56) arrived to the Roman community only in September 1552 (see Scaduto, Governo, pp. 6–7). It is hard to imagine, thus, that his contribution to the Directory was significant. He mainly taught theology at the Roman College. Renown was his close friendship with Polanco (see references to his name in the Index in Gonçalves da Câmara, Remembering Iñigo. Glimpses on the Life of Saint Ignatius of Loyola. The “Memoriale” of Luís Gonçalves da Câmara. Translated with introduction, notes and indices by Alexander Eaglestone and Joseph A. Munitiz, S.J. (St. Louis, 2004). See also my review of the book in The Sixteenth Century Journal 37/3 (2006): 844–5. 20 See Turrini, La coscienza e le leggi, p. 36.

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the Directory is all part of a plan to ensure the manual’s good reception and circulation. This kind of editorial promotion is further confirmed by the title of the manual. The title of the Directory clearly indicates that it is intended for both confessors and penitents. But another letter from Polanco reveals something different. On 24 July 1554, Polanco advised the Jesuit Adriaan Adriaensens21 that the manual was published just for confessors and not for the general public.22 Indeed, the content of the manual brings to light that it approaches sacramental confession exclusively from the confessor’s position. The choice of Polanco’s name as the only author may have been motivated by at least two reasons. Either Polanco’s contribution to the work was truly significant, or the choice was made because of Polanco’s authority. After all, he was the second most important Jesuit in the Society as its and Loyola’s secretary since 1547 and he was also renowned as a good confessor. Perhaps both reasons were at work. Unfortunately, we can only speculate about motives, for they are veiled behind Polanco’s modesty. He asserts in the quoted synoptic letters that if there was something good in the book, it came from others (or better still, from God) rather than from himself. He interprets his confreres’ choice as a way of accepting his responsibility for any defects in the manual.23 Still, some other letters exchanged between Polanco and his confreres may shed light on the history of the making of the Directory. In his letter of 6 July 1549, Polanco wrote to his future superior, Diego Laínez, that he was planning to send him a certain “Practice of confessing” (Práctica del confessar) that he had composed in a clearer and briefer fashion, but only after Father [Ignatius of Loyola] had read it.24 In another letter dated just two weeks later, Polanco informed the Jesuit Miguel Ochoa that he was sending him a booklet concerning the way to confess.25 Very likely both letters mentioned the same text that would have become a part of the future Directory. The uneven and episodic structure of the latter would further confirm the possible evolution of the text: it consists of two unequal parts—the first and briefer is a description of the sacrament’s nature and of the confessor’s requirements; the second is a series of appendices: on how the confessor has to perform an interrogation by reviewing the Ten Commandments and some (not all) capital vices; a short interrogation composed in verse on how to interrogate persons according to status, on remedies against the capital vices, on restitution,26 and the final, See DHCJ, vol.1, pp. 6–7. See Mon Ign., vol. 7, p. 299: “Revera tamen confessariis, et non vulgo, liber ille editus fuit, et sacerdotibus, non laicis, ex usu videtur futurus.” 23 In his Chronicon, Polanco made a very laconic note that the Directorium was published in 1554. Laínez himself wrote some pages of advice for Jesuit confessors. They remain, however, unpublished (see ARSI, Opp. NN 55, ff. 109–120). 24 See Epp. Ign., vol. 2, pp. 467–8. 25 The letter from Polanco to Miguel Ochoa on 20 July, 1549: “Que se disponga para saber confessar, leyendo este libreto que aquí le invío muy al propósito” (ibid., p. 486). 26 In moral theology restitution is an act of commutative justice by which reparation is made for an offence that has been done to another. 21 22

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longest appendix on excommunication. Probably the first part is what Polanco composed as “Practice of confessing” as far back as 1549 and the appendices were written later by him and/or other Jesuits at Loyola’s request (especially after the Council of Trent’s session on penance in 1551 and other papal documents on the subject). The information from the letters analyzed above corroborates, thus, the thesis of this chapter, that the Directory’s content reflected the conscience not of a single author but of a group of men religious from the Jesuit headquarters and that the manual was highly representative of the first generation of Jesuits. The fascinating issue before us is to uncover the features of this corporate conscience. The Medieval Tutiorism of the Directory One can argue that the ethical approach of the Directory represents medieval Tutiorism in sheer contrast with the modern Probabilism adopted by the Jesuits in the last quarter of the sixteenth century.27 Due to its form of compendium, the Directory did not theorize about Tutiorism, but at least two quotations from the text show clearly its application. The first one comes from the paragraph dedicated to the confessor’s skills (scientia).28 There is a caveat to the confessor not to declare easily what mortal sin is,29 and in case of doubt either to incline rather to the safer [securior] course, or to ask somebody else’s advice (in more difficult cases), and even to defer the absolution.30 The second quotation can be found in the paragraph on confessor’s cautiousness (prudentia):

27 Paraphrasing O’Malley’s definition of modern Catholicism, by “modern” I do not mean to assert anything one way or the other about Jesuits’ manifesting more “modern” or more “medieval” traits. Rather, I am simply acknowledging that the Jesuits were subject to all the forces at play in the period, and to some degree or other, agent for them. Early modern Jesuits, in other words, were part of early modern history. See O’Malley, Trent and All That, p. 9. 28 The structure of this part of the Directorium recalls the medieval tradition of manuals for confessors (especially Antoninus’s Defecerunt), which used to picture the confessor’s profile according to the following list: 1. On the confessor’s qualities (potestas, scientia, bonitas, prudentia, secretus). 2. Reception of the penitent. 3. Interview. 4. Penances and absolution (see Turrini, La coscienza e le leggi, pp. 193–5). 29 Mortal sin is a serious sin that leads to spiritual death. If not confessed and absolved sacramentally before the physical death, it was considered an obstacle to achieving eternal salvation. Hence a great responsibility (and power) of the confessor. This doctrine was advocated by the Catholic Church since Lateran IV (1215) and was unconditionally (and uncritically) accepted by the Jesuits. 30 See Polanco, Directorium, p. 10: “Caveat autem facile pronuntiare, aliquid esse mortale, quod certo nesciat; in dubiis, inclinet potius ad securiorem partem, in difficilioribus noverit dubitare, ut quod per se non potest, alios consulendo resolvat.” Tutiorism claimed that if a less safe opinion is speculatively uncertain it is unlawful to follow it in practice, until all reasonable effort has been made to remove the uncertainty, by considering the arguments on both sides and by consulting available authorities.

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If there is a case, in which prominent doctors feel differently, namely that some consider it mortal sin and others do not, and the penitent chooses somebody’s more dangerous opinion, the safer way [tutior via] must be advised and the penitent has to be terrified about the danger [of not following it]. The ordinary confessor cannot, however, refuse the absolution to the penitent. In case the not ordinary confessor considers [an act] mortal sin, he can follow his judgment and not absolve, but he has to see what is useful. However, if the penitent does not support himself by a valid reason or a distinguished author, and there is a doubt about sin, the confessor must not hesitate not to absolve.

From the above quotation we can sketch three different scenarios of sacramental confession. The first case presents a penitent who confesses (or plans to perform) a moral act that by some prominent (i.e., qualified) authorities is not considered serious (mortal) and who chooses in good conscience to follow their opinion. In this situation the ordinary confessor has to counsel penitents to follow a safer opinion (which would not expose them to the risk of sinning materially) and to frighten them about the danger of not choosing it. However, this kind of ordinary confessor cannot refuse to absolve, because the penitent is backed by a legitimate opinion. The second case presents the same penitent but confessing not to the ordinary confessor, namely to a bishop or to a priest, who obtained from the former a privilege to absolve the cases reserved to him.31 In this case the confessor has a right not to absolve, although he is required to consider the situation carefully.32 Finally, the third case presents a penitent who cannot support his opinion by either a valid reason or an authoritative source. In this case no absolution is allowed.33 The preoccupation with security in a broader context was expressed also elsewhere in the Directory: in the section dealing with the repeated confession (reiteranda confessio). There are six circumstances necessitating the repetition of confession in addition to the case of penitents who forgot to do penitence, which had been given to them during the last confession. In these circumstances, the Directory explains, the confession must be repeated more for the sake of 31 The Jesuits were granted many of these privileges, especially in cases of heresy. See Institutum Societatis Iesu, vol. 1: Bullarium et Compendium Privilegiorum (Florence, 1892), pp. 550–54. 32 It is uncertain whether the distinction between the confessors in their right to absolve in case the penitent presents a probable opinion is the same made by Godefroid de Fontaines and Konrad Summenhart (see Turrini, La coscienza e le leggi, pp. 171–2). At any rate, Francisco de Vitoria and the School of Salamanca refused such a distinction, which surely opened the way to Medina’s formulation of Probabilism. The Directory’s solution confirms, again, the medieval heritage of the first Jesuits vis-à-vis the boldness of the Dominicans from Salamanca. 33 For the same kind of approaching penitent’s conscience, see Polanco’s “Directory to the Spiritual Exercises” in Palmer, On Giving the Spiritual Exercises, p. 147: “If he [the scrupulous penitent] is informed by learned men that the action is in no way sinful, then he must altogether set aside his judgment of conscience and convince himself that there is no sin involved, relying on the authority of other trustworthy persons rather than on his own thinking.”

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security than of necessity.34 Finally, the purpose of identifying the qualities of a confessor is so that he can perform his duty correctly and securely.35 Although the Directory admitted cases, in which doctors’ opinions can differ and be respected, even against the confessor’s opinion, by the grant of absolution, there was very little room for diverse, although reasonable and authoritative, opinions. It is noteworthy that in the very first sentence of the manual, a concordance of doctors was claimed.36 Following the AristotelianThomistic tradition, the doctors taken into consideration must have been at least distinguished (insignes, clari; prónimoi).37 In fact, the Directory acknowledged only a very few of them: Ambrose (340–97), Augustine (354– 430), Aquinas (1225–1274),38 Antoninus [of Florence] (1389–1459),39 and [Jean] Gerson (1363–1429).40 Significantly, no modern author was cited.41 Other authoritative texts were Acts of the Council of Florence (1438–45) concerning the penitential acts that were consonant42—as the text emphasized—with the Council of Trent (1548–63), and with distinguished doctors.43 There were only a few instances where the Directory mentioned a diversity of opinions on moral issues, and it did so in a generic way: “as almost all agree,” or “many add,”44 or “according to the sentence of some doctors.”45 Who judged whether the opinion was acceptable was not the penitent, but the confessor-judge, who had to juxtapose any risky opinion with a safer one and even frighten the penitent about the risk of not following the safer way (tutior or securior). A closer look at the role of opinions in other authoritative Jesuit authors will be useful in charting the transformation of the Jesuit tutioristic mindset.

Ibid., p. 11. Ibid., p. 9. 36 Directorium, p. 6. 37 See Martin Stone, “Probabilism in late scholastic thought,” Recherches de Théologie et Philosophie Médiévales 67.1 (2000): 120–21. 38 Directorium, pp. 6, 90, and 139. 39 Ibid., p. 74. 40 Ibid., p. 37. 41 In this aspect the Directorium resembles the Cento casi di coscienza (Florence, 1582) by the Dominican Serafino Razzi, influenced by Cajetan (see Turrini, Coscienza, pp. 156–7). 42 Note the choice of the term consonant, which highlights the lack of diversity of opinions. 43 Directorium, p. 6. Another mention of Trent regards duties of the bishop (p. 66). 44 Ibid., pp. 9 and 11. Compare in contrast Navarrus’s way of presenting opinions in Dunoyer, Enchiridion, pp. 138–9. 45 Ibid., p. 90. 34 35

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The Role of Opinions in the Directory and Later Jesuit Manuals for Confessors One of the most critical differences between tutioristic and probabilistic/ probabilioristic reasoning is the role of opinions. As has been mentioned earlier, the Directory differed from other contemporary manuals, especially that of the Augustinian Navarrus. Ultimately, however, what is of acute interest in tracking the making of the Jesuit conscience is that the tutioristic Directory also contrasted with later Jesuit manuals. In this section, the Directory will be compared with Francisco de Toledo’s Instruction for Priests and Penitents and Hermann Busen[m]baum’s Marrow of Moral Theology. Although the texts under consideration are of different genres—the Directory is not an academic work and was written in a rush as a ministerial compendium—a comparison of these texts will help uncover dramatic differences in the mentality of subsequent generations of Jesuits. Toledo’s Instruction was published for the first time in the year of his death (1596)46 and had its largest editorial success among Jesuit books on sacramental confession, reflected by at least 166 editions published before 1650—an average of three per year. Toledo’s lengthy tenure as a theologian of the Roman Penitentiary (central church office dealing with complex penitential issues), as a preacher at the papal court, and also—one supposes— his authority as the first Jesuit cardinal undoubtedly had an influence on this formidable publishing record. Busen[m]baum’s volume was published for the first time in Münster in 1645, but it had numerous editions especially in the eighteenth century and it served as the main source of Alfonso Maria de Liguori’s (d. 1787) enduring treatise on moral theology. In its time, Busenbaum’s was the most influential Jesuit book of moral theology. For the purposes of this comparison our focus will be the treatment of sexual sins labeled—according to the medieval tradition—sins against nature (peccata contra naturam) and therefore considered to be deadly. In the traditional medieval Directory’s classifications of the most important vices,47 it is easy to locate commentary on these kinds of sins: it is found in the chapters on The Ten Commandments and The Seven Deadly Sins.48 From the Directory’s convoluted sentence in the section on the sixth and ninth Commandments (“Thou shalt not commit adultery” and “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife”)49 we should assume there are three kinds of 46 Instructio sacerdotum ac poenitentium … cum additionibus D. Andreae Victorelli (Venetiis, 1596). 47 Tentler, Sin and Confession, p. 162. See also Pierre J. Payer, The Bridling of Desire: Views of Sex in the Later Middle Ages (Toronto: 1993). 48 Tentler notes how authorities in pastoral care in the Middle Ages were eager to differentiate between mortal and venial sins. The Directory follows this eagerness (in line with Loyola’s Spiritual Exercises) stressing that for the confessor “primo quidem loco scientia necessaria est eatenus, ut a non peccatis, peccata, & mortalia in communi vel ex genere, a venialibus discernat” (p. 9). 49 “Demum inquire [you, confessor] de peccato carnis consummato, cum solutis, vel coniugatis, vel consanguineis, & affinibus, vel consacratis ordine, aut voto, aut

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sin of carnal consummation: extramarital heterosexual consummation with several subdivisions, masturbation (mollicies)50—which was targeted as an unnatural sin with a remarkable emphasis by Peter Damian (d. 1072)51— and homosexual consummation (nefanda peccata).52 The latter two are designated as sins against the order of nature, without labeling them by the “utterly confused” term of sodomy,53 as was the case among many medieval moralists.54 It is interesting to observe that for homosexual consummation there is no specification of persons involved (simply “with others” [cum aliis], being in opposition to “him/her-self” [seipso]). We do not know, therefore, whether the Directory distinguished between male and female homoeroticism. Neither is there mention of bestiality55 or of illicit positions (indebito modo) in conjugal sexual intercourse,56 which were considered sins against nature in postquam ipse ordine aut voto castitatis se devinxit, vel contra naturae ordinem per molliciem in seipso, vel per nefanda peccata cum aliis.” 50 See John Boswell, Christianity, social tolerance, and homosexuality: gay people in Western Europe from the beginning of the Christian era to the fourteenth century (Chicago, 1980), p. 107 (n. 55). 51 See his Liber Gomorrhianus: “Four types of this form of criminal wickedness can be distinguished in an effort to show you the totality of the whole matter in and orderly way: some sine with themselves alone [masturbation]; some by the hands of others [mutual masturbation]; others between the thighs [interfemoral intercourse]; and finally, others commit the complete act against nature [anal intercourse]. The ascending gradation among these is such that the last mentioned are judged to be more serious that the preceding. Indeed a greater penance is imposed on those who fall with others than those who defile only themselves; and those who complete the act are to be judged more severely than those who are defiled through femoral fornication. The devil’s artful fraud devises these degrees of failing into ruin such that the higher the level the unfortunate soul reaches in them, the deeper it sinks in the depths of hell’s pit” (in Pierre J. Payer, Book of Gomorrah (Waterloo, Ont., 1982), p. 29. 52 In his “Interrogatorium breve in carmen redactum” (p. 64) in the same Directory, which was written to help the confessor to memorize the lists of sins by heart, Polanco uses the term scelera nefanda: Extra coniugium Veneri qui cedit inique, Alterius violare thorum qui mente paratus, Qui loquitur lasciva, animo qui turpia versat, Per visus, nutus, tactus male tendit adulter. At scelus, incestum admittit cum sanguine iuncta. Cumque intacta viro stuprum, Christoque dicatam Sacrilegium violat, scelera his adiunge nefanda. 53 Michel Foucault characterized the use of the term “sodomy” in pre-modern civil and canonical codes as “utterly confused”: Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality. An Introduction (New York, 1990), vol. 1, pp. 43 and 101, but, as Goldberg pointed out, this characterization is also valid for modern and contemporary texts: Jonathan Goldberg, Sodometries. Renaissance Texts, Modern Sexualities (Stanford, 1992), p. 3. 54 See Mark D. Jordan, The Invention of Sodomy in Christian Theology (Chicago: 1997). 55 It is unlikely that “with others” (cum aliis) includes animals, since it is in juxtaposition to “him/herself” (seipso). 56 In the section dedicated to the status of the married penitent (“De matrimonio iunctis,” pp. 70–71) the author considers sinful matrimonial intercourse if not made

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many medieval texts. In another section of the manual dedicated to the status of the married penitent,58 the Directory deals only with the sin of intercourse not open to procreation (modo non conveniente ad generationem), especially if made outside vagina (extra vas).59 The Directory’s counsel on sex is, thus, rather general, imprecise, and unclear. Perhaps it was in line with the tradition of medieval confessional manuals that avoided details so as “not to teach the innocent how to sin.” Its list of “unnatural sins” is even narrower than those composed by the authorities recognized by the first Jesuits—e.g., Aquinas, Gerson and Antoninus.60 Polanco’s laconic writing on sex seems not to be due to major attention he pays to other kinds of sins, such as social sins, but rather because of his (and Loyola’s) reluctance to write about sex at all.61 More comprehensive and systemic than the Directory is Toledo’s Instruction for Priests and Penitents. In Book 5, Chapter 13, dedicated to sins against nature—De peccato contra naturam62—Toledo specifies four kinds: 1) masturbation (mollities), 2) illicit position in sexual conjugal intercourse (inordinatus concubitus), 3) male homoeroticism (sodomia), and 4) intercourse with animals (bestialitas). Toledo shares with Polanco a concern about masturbation labeled with the same scholastic term of mollities (awkwardly, the root of the word means “soft”), but while Polanco simply names it, Toledo provides a more complete definition of it. According to Toledo, masturbation is voluntary emission of semen without intercourse (absque copula) that he calls “voluntary pollution” to be distinguished from the non-sinful nocturnal and involuntary pollution. Voluntary pollution is always very serious (gravissimum) sin because it contradicts nature and because of Scripture’s condemnation of it, regardless of whatever intended end, health

“sine tantum voluptatis” and if made “modo non conveniente ad generationem” (especially if extra vas), or when the wife is “in dispositione menstruorum,” pregnant, or if made with danger of abortion or serious damage. It is a sin if the spouse denies the debitum, as it was already noted above in the section on the Commandments. The only excuse for denial is in case of danger of life and serious sickness (“in periculo vitae vel aegritudinis notabilis”) or when the one who asks “per fornicationem ius amisit.” Finally, conjugal intercourse is sinful if performed in a sacred or public place. 57 See, for example, the texts by Albert the Great in Tentler, Sin and Confession, pp. 189–90. 58 Directorium (“De matrimonio iunctis”), pp. 70–71. 59 Medieval moral authorities condemned as unnatural intercourse sexual relations non in debito vase. The Directorium does not say anything about the act performed indebito modo (like “unusual” positions in sexual intercourse discussed by Albert the Great), which were also considered against nature. (Tentler, Sin and Confession, pp. 189–90). 60 See Tentler, Sin and Confession, p. 207. 61 It can be seen, for example, in the paragraph of the Jesuit Constitutions concerning the religious vows—the section on the vow of chastity is extremely brief in contrast with those on obedience and poverty (Const. # [547]). 62 I have used the 1609 edition: Toledo Francisco, De instructione sacerdotum, et de peccatis mortalibus libri VIII (Duaci, 1609), pp. 678–82.

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included. Moreover, physicians who advise it for health reasons are also guilty of mortal sin. However, Toledo admits (as Gerson did) that this sin is universal and very difficult to correct, because men almost always have the opportunity to commit it. He writes confidently that “the greater part of those who go to hell are damned because of it.”63 As a remedy against the sin of masturbation, Toledo proposes making one’s confession three times a week to the same confessor, the sacrament being its biggest deterrent. Those who do not take advantage of this remedy cannot conquer this sin, unless there is a miracle from God or a very rare privilege is granted. Finally, Toledo discusses the case of reciprocal masturbation in heterosexual and homosexual (both female and male) intercourse, which has different modalities that the author omits, because “it is not appropriate to know” (scire non oportet). In contrast with the Directory, Toledo does not omit illicit position in sexual conjugal intercourse (inordinatus concubitus), which according to his list is the second species of unnatural sin. However, Toledo’s list is much less attenuated than the lists of Albert the Great (1206–80) and other medieval authors. What strikes us here is that, in contrast to them, Toledo does not consider the position from the rear (a tergo) mortally sinful, unless it is nonvaginal. In concert with the Directory, Toledo lists homoeroticism as a sin “against nature,” but, as in the case of masturbation, he dedicates much more space to it.64 From his description we can conclude that, for Toledo, sodomy does not mean any sin against nature but a specific one. From a consideration of the list, we must assume through a process of elimination that it refers to male homosexuality—which, according to the author, is defused (notum). Toledo interprets the biblical account of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah through this lens. What the Directory called an ineffable sin (nefandum peccatum) Toledo calls an abominable sin that has to be detested (peccatum detestandum et abominabile), giving to it the same severe deprecatory moral connotation. The male homosexual interpretation of sodomy by Toledo is confirmed by the subsequent paragraph regarding the fourth and last species of unnatural sin, bestiality: The worst of all is bestiality … and for this and the previous [i.e., sodomy] the death penalty in the civil law is rightly established, because man must not live, if—being man—he does not live as man. We have also a divine commandment regarding this ineffable crime in Leviticus, 18: “Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is an abomination.”65 63 See Thomas Walter Laqueur, Solitary sex: a cultural history of masturbation (New York, 2003), p. 167, who ascribes this text to a later writer. 64 He wrote on sodomy as follows: “sodomia, quod est quidem notum peccatum, sed valde detestandum & abominabile, & iram Dei plurimum contra humanum genus accedens, ut sacrae testantur litterae, Gen. 19.” 65 “Omnia tamen pessimum est bestialitas … pro hoc, & pro antecedenti peccato [Italics mine], mortis poenae in iure civili merito statutae: nec enim debet vivere homo, qui cum sit homo, non vivit ut homo. Habemus etiam de nefando scelere divinum

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This quotation provides us with some other interesting hints. First, Toledo, who follows, among others, Peter Cantor (d. 1197), understands sodomy as homosexual male intercourse from the account in Leviticus, 18. Second, there is a gradation of unnatural sins (“the worst of all of them” [omnia pessimum]) and only bestiality is worse than sodomy. Sodomy is called ineffable crime (nefandum scelus), according to the medieval tradition also expressed by the Directory, as noted above. Sins (and crimes) of sodomy and bestiality demand rightly (merito) the death penalty, as stated in the civil law that Toledo quotes. Still more systemic than the Directory or Instruction is Busenbaum’s Marrow of Moral Theology. In the chapter dedicated to the sixth and ninth Commandments66 (as in the Directory), there is a specific section concerning unnatural sins (as we also have seen in Toledo). Busenbaum lists five of these: 1) illicit intercourse position (congressus inordinatus or indebitus concumbendi modus—Toledo’s inordinatus concubitus), 2) masturbation (mollities), 3) incomplete sodomy (sodomia imperfecta), 4) complete sodomy (sodomia perfecta), 5) bestiality (bestialitas). In comparison with Toledo, for whom masturbation is evil per se, for Busenbaum illicit positions in sexual conjugal intercourse are less serious than masturbation, but his description of them is more articulated. He includes all of the five illicit positions already listed by Albert the Great. If a position does not impede pregnancy, i.e., if there is effusion of semen in the vagina (foeminae matrix)—and not only the position from the rear, or a retro (Toledo’s a tergo)— the couple commits only a serious venial sin (they act not against nature, but beyond nature, or praeter naturam) or possibly no sin, if there is a justifiable motive to do that, such as a wife’s pregnancy. Busenbaum dedicates a separate chapter to masturbation. Therein he provides solutions to seven doubts regarding the licitness of procuring pollution. This chapter is twice as long as the rest on the unnatural sins together. It confirms that there was no “wave of silence” regarding masturbation between the time of Jean Gerson67 and the Enlightenment, and that Laqueur’s statement in his recent book on solitary sex that “its [of masturbation] subsistence in the query of some confessionals was little more than a whisper” seems not to be exact.68 Busenbaum’s manual provides us with the definitions of two kinds of sodomy: complete and incomplete. Incomplete sodomy refers to heterosexual non-vaginal intercourse. Complete sodomy refers to male or female homosexual hac [sic] praeceptum, Levit. 18: ‘Cum masculo non commiscearis coitu femineo, quia abominatio est.’” 66 I have used the edition printed in Venice in 1654, pp. 133–41. 67 See D. Catherine Brown, Pastor and Laity in the Theology of Jean Gerson (Cambridge, 1987), especially pp. 157–8. Gerson composed a treatise specifically dedicated to the confession of masturbation (De confessione mollitiei). See, in Palemon Glorieux (ed.), Jean Gerson. Oeuvres completes (10 vols, Paris: 1962–73), vol. 8, pp. 10–17. 68 Laqueur, Solitary sex, pp. 166–7.

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intercourse.69 What is especially interesting in Busenbaum’s description is his differentiation of the roles in homosexual acts between top (agens) and bottom (patiens), in which he follows the Jesuit [Juan de] Lugo70 and not the Theatine [Antonio] Diana,71 as he points out. In the previously mentioned chapter on pollution, Busenbaum, in answering the question about reciprocal pollution between males or females and whether it must be labeled as masturbation only or as sodomy, states that if there is affection towards the person of the same sex, sodomy is the more accurate referent, especially if there is any conjunction or mingling of bodies (coniunctio et commixtio corporum).72 Finally, bestiality is considered the most heinous unnatural sin, regardless of the sex of either the beast or person participating in coition. For Busenbaum, bestiality is also coition with the devil. In conclusion, Busenbaum’s main concern—if not obsession—is pollution. For him, the term “sodomy” is not equal with every unnatural sin, and it does not mean only homosexual (either male or female—the latter not mentioned by Toledo) intercourse, but also heterosexual intercourse, if it is non-vaginal. Busenbaum seems, thus, to be more technical and less emotional. He does not use terms such as ineffable crime, or abominable and detested sin, as the Directory and Instruction do. A synoptic glimpse at the three works studied in this section allows us to see a large gap between the Directory and Toledo and Busenbaum’s manuals regarding what they wrote on sex in general and on “unnatural sins” in particular. Common with the Directory is their univocal doctrinal condemnation of nonprocreative sex as unnatural and thus mortally sinful, and their deprecatory tone in describing it. However, they put different weight on different sexual sins: clearly, a diversity of opinions appears. This diversity—that the Jansenists were so much scandalized by—was not new, but rather was inherited from the long medieval tradition, a tradition that was not taken into account by the Directory. Nevertheless, ethical Tutiorism—that had been part of the same scholastic medieval tradition—was strongly echoed in the Directory.

69 Busenbaum, Medulla, pp. 138–9: “Sodomia imperfecta, & est congressus cum debito quidem sexu, maris nempe cum foemina, sed extra vas naturale … Sodomia perfecta, & est congressus duorum eiusdem sexus, ut maris cum mare, vel foeminae cum foemina … Explicandum tamen esse, fuerisse agens an patiens, dicit Lugo contra Dianam.” 70 He likely mentions Juan de Lugo’s Disputationes scholasticae et morales (Lugduni [Lyon], 1644). 71 Antonino Diana (1585–1663) was known as the “Prince of Casuists” and the “Atlas of the Casuistical World.” His Resolutiones Morales (Palermo, 1629) contained 20,000 cases. Diana was quoted by Blaise Pascal more than any other Jesuit probabilist in his Provincial Letters, where he is portrayed as a close follower of the Jesuits (see especially Letter V and VI). On Diana and the Jesuit Sicilian probabilists, and on Diana and Pascal, see Santo Burgio, Teologia Barocca. Il probabilismo in Sicilia nell’epoca di Filippo IV (Catania, 1998). 72 Busenbaum, Medulla, p. 141: “si [pollutio] vera fiat ex affectu ad personam illam indebiti sexus (praesertim si adsit aliqua coniunctio, & commixtio corporum).”

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The Medieval Tutioristic Background of the Directory The Directory’s tutioristic way of approaching the doubtful conscience is characteristic of the major medieval theologians of the thirteenth century, such as Alexander of Hales (d. 1245), Bonaventure (1221–74), Albert the Great, and Aquinas.73 According to them, before making a moral choice the penitents are obliged to make their conscience clear of any speculative uncertainty in choosing among contrasting yet morally approvable opinions.74 As Albert the Great put it, the rule should be that doubts must be resolved by choosing the safer [tutior] part.75 Thomas agreed by saying, “When there are two opinions on a fact and somebody chooses the less safe opinion—it is a sin.”76 This tutioristic solution would lead to avoid not only the moral sin, but also the material one—an act that is objectively evil yet morally good because committed in penitent’s good conscience. Furthermore, someone who commits an act in speculative doubt, whether it is deadly sinful or not, is guilty of a mortal sin because of contempt (propter contemptum).77 What the medieval moralists sought was the security necessary for eternal salvation. Eternal salvation in Christ was a serious issue for both medieval and Jesuit moralists, and after the IV Lateran Council (1215) it could not be achieved without individual sacramental confession and absolution of all mortal sins. The Directory’s Preface clearly enunciated the Jesuits’ dedication to the ministry of confession, which was “above all necessary to help the people’s salvation.”78 The security leading to salvation in most of the cases

73 The main purpose of this paragraph is not to draw a history of penance, but to show how the first generation of Jesuits was deeply embedded by the scholastic tutioristic mindset. For a good review of medieval and early modern ideas on sacramental confession see Tentler, Sin and Confession, especially pp. 16–27 and 39–133 with abundant bibliography, and more recent W. David Myers, “From Confession to Reconciliation and Back: Sacramental Penance,” in Raymond F. Bulman and Frederick J. Parrella (eds), From Trent to Vatican II. Historical and Theological Investigation (Oxford, 2006), pp. 243–56. 74 Bonaventure quoted by Deman, “Probabilisme,” in DTC, vol. 13, p. 423 and Jean Delumeau, L’aveu et le pardon: les difficultés de la confession: XIIIe–XVIIIe siècle (Paris, 1992), pp. 114–5. 75 Deman, “Probabilisme,” col. 423. 76 See Quodl, n. 8, q. 6, a. 3: “Quando sunt diversae opiniones de aliquo facto, ille qui sequitur minus tutam, peccet,” quoted in Ilkka Kantola, Probability and Moral Uncertainty in Late Medieval and Early Modern Times (Helsinki, 1994), p. 84. For Ilkka Kantola it is clear that Aquinas’s formal rule “In doubt, the safer course must be chosen” (In dubiis tutior pars eligenda est) makes him a representative of Tutiorism (see Kantola, Probability and Moral Uncertainty, p. 84). See also, Stone and Houdt, “Probabilism,” p. 374. Deman is of the same opinion articulated in his renowned article on Probabilism (See Deman, “Probabilisme,” col. 425–6. See also Kantola, Probability and Moral Uncertainty, p. 84). 77 See Deman, “Probabilisme,” col. 424. 78 See also Directorium, p. 26: “Det operam Sacerdos, ut peccator eorum [peccatorum] gravitatem sentiat, in genere ostendendo, quam grave sit peccatum mortale, ex Dei iudiciis in Luciferum & primos parentes ob unum peccatum & ex

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meant conformity of the moral decision to the law. Conscience, thus, was subjugated to the superior authority of the law. Jansen and Toulmin have observed that the Jesuits “approached moral questions in the spirit of Aristotle and Aquinas rather than of Plato and Augustine: the problem that occupied them was how to choose a course of action prudently and virtuously, rather than how to ascend to a vision of eternal truth.”79 Moreover, the Jesuit approach to moral issues was much more complex: it encompassed various ethical systems—from Tutiorism to Probabiliorism to Probabilism. The Directory showed how the first generation of Jesuits sought moral certitude rather than probability also at the speculative level. They chose Aquinas’s Tutiorism, disregarding the late medieval and early modern approaches—a part of which was called by Jean Delumeau “préhistoire du probabilisme”80—that modified Thomistic theory of moral uncertainty: the radical Franciscan voluntarism of Henry of Ghent (d. 1293) and John Duns Scotus (d. 1308), the compromising views between Thomism and voluntarism of John Buridan (b. late 1200),81 the fifteenth-century thinkers Gerson82 and Antoninus (1389–1459),83 and finally Azpilcueta84 and the School of Salamanca.85 It seems that the original distinction between speculative and practical uncertainty by Thomas Cardinal Cajetan (1469–1534)86—highly revered by Loyola and Polanco—did not affect the moral reasoning of the first Jesuits, as did his Tutiorism, as we shall see soon. In the same way, the School of Salamanca, which “had formulated novel epistemic breaks in canon law and

punitione debita cuilibet peccato mortali, quo perditur gratia Dei, & regnum aeternae beatitudinis.” 79 See Jonsen and Toulmin, Abuse of Casuistry, p. 148. 80 See Chapter 11 of his L’aveu et le pardon, pp. 112–9. 81 About the influence of Buridan on the development of ethic empiricism against the intellectualism of Aquinas at the medieval University of Cracow, see Ryszard Wiśniewski, Możliwość probabilizmu etycznego. Studium metaetyczne ewolucji empiryzmu w etyce polskiej [The Possibility of Ethical Probabilism. A Metaethical Study of Empiricism in Polish Ethics] (Toruń: Uniwersytet Mikołaja Kopernika, 1992), pp. 44–9. 82 See Delumeau, L’aveu et le pardon, p. 116. 83 Ibid., p. 117. 84 See Dunoyer, Enchiridion, p. 139: “Ancora non esiste nel Navarro il sistema del Probabilismo, ma i suoi fondamenti vi sono già chiaramente enunciati.” See also ibid., p. 140. 85 For the notion of the term “School of Salamanca,” see Marjorie GriceHutchinson, “The Concept of the School of Salamanca: Its Origins and Development,” Revista de Historia Económica 7 (1989): 24–35. On various contributions of its representatives, see Vereecke, “Da Guglielmo d’Ockam,” pp. 489–500 and 522–45. 86 See Deman, “Probabilisme,” col. 455–6; Stone and Houdt, “Probabilism,” p. 371. This distinction, which allowed the conscience to be practically (ready to act) certain, even though it is not at the speculative level, was made also by Francisco de Vitoria from the School of Salamanca and later picked up by Medina, as we shall see in Chapter 4.

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in theology,” would not have exercised its influence on the Jesuit Collegio Romano—“the apple of Ignatius’s eye”88—until the arrival there of Francisco Suárez in 1580.89 He would have made a significant contribution to Cajetan’s (and the Salmantican) notion of uncertainty.90 Conversely, the Collegio Romano—where Toledo, Suárez, Vázquez,91 Sá, Azor, Fornari, Figliucci and J. de Lugo taught—would have become the main pan-European (and overseas) forge of probabilistic reasoning.92 Similarly, although the Directory quoted Antoninus and Gerson among its few authorities, it did not take into consideration that these authors gave a “new and more liberal solution” to the problem of moral uncertainty than Aquinas did.93 In fact, Gerson and Antoninus admitted the Aristotelian necessity of “probable certainty,” allowing in moral decision-making a certain degree of speculative uncertainty. In choir with John Nider (d. 1438), who affirmed as sufficient the choice of an opinion, which is safe and not necessarily safer,94 they interpreted probable certainty as psychological certainty. Although reluctantly, they did accept the idea that agents could risk performing a less ideal moral act.95 Against strict Thomistic Tutiorism, these three late medieval moralists allowed the penitent to choose between the contrasting opinions on the basis of the subjective probability, a solution that Kantola calls “a combination of subjective probabilism and extrinsic probabilism.”96 For Gerson and Antoninus, in the case of opposing opinions it did not matter which one was followed, as long as it was done in good conscience. Reflecting the Aristotelian notion of 87 See Louis Baeck, “The Legal and Scholastic Roots of Leonardus Lessius’s Economic Thought,” Storia del pensiero economico 37 (1999) and Louis Baeck, The Mediterranean Tradition in Economic Thought (London and New York, 1994), especially pp. 176–210. 88 See O’Malley, First Jesuits, 233–4. 89 Suárez’s development of the probabilistic doctrine seems to be much more important than his “championing the cause of the Counter-Reformation at the Roman College,” as Francesco Cesareo suggested in his “Jesuit Colleges in Rome under Everard Mercurian,” in McCoog (ed.), Mercurian Project, p. 621. Suarezian crucial contribution to the development of Probabilism will be analyzed in Chapter 4. 90 See Stone and Houdt, “Probabilism,” p. 362 and Turrini, Coscienza e le leggi, pp. 162–3. 91 Gabriel Váz[s]quez (1549–1604) studied philosophy at Alcalá under Domingo Báñez, where he subsequently (1579–84) taught the Summa and in 1585 replaced Suárez at the Collegio Romano. In 1591 he went back to Alcalá. He wrote a commentary to the Aquinas’s Summa in ten volumes (see DHCJ, pp. 3912–3). His contribution to the development of Probabilism will be analyzed in Chapter 4. 92 See Riccardo G. Villoslada, Storia del Collegio Romano dal suo inizio (1551) alla soppressione della Compagnia di Gesù (Romae, 1954), especially pp. 74–5 and 220–21. 93 Kantola, Probability and Moral Uncertainty, p. 112. 94 Delumeau, L’aveu et le pardon, pp. 116–17. 95 M.D.F. Stone, “The Origins of Probabilism in Late Scholastic Moral Thought: A Prologomenon to Further Study,” in Recherches de Théologie et Philosophie Médiévales, 67,1 (2000), pp. 145–6. 96 Kantola, Probability and Moral Uncertainty, p. 115.

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“probability” as “approvability” by qualified authorities,97 they considered it licit to follow that qualified opinion, which to the conscience of the penitent seemed more probable (probabilior) even if not the safest one in view of their ultimate salvation. Of course, the penitent’s decision still had to be made with attentive, prayerful deliberation in order to arrive at absolute certainty of conscience, which these and all other authors, regardless of the ethical school they belonged to, always required. It seems that this distinction between speculative and moral certainty that lay at the bases of the Jesuit Probabilism would have been misunderstood by the Jansenists who attacked the Jesuits for allowing the penitent to follow any probable opinion, as we shall see in the last chapter. According to Delumeau, the reason that led Antoninus to “denounce the abuses of the tutioristic axiom” was the benevolence towards his flock. Probably we cannot accuse the first Jesuits of lack of this benevolence, but— as O’Malley has portrayed—the Jesuits became involved “in a juggling act between the focus of the tradition on sin and law and their desire to emphasize the consoling aspects of the sacrament.”98 They were not bold enough to change the axiom so they cautiously chose to conserve the traditional tutioristic approach. Only the radical adoption of Probabilism rather than the benevolent employment of the thirteenth-century scholastic Tutiorism would mitigate the tension O’Malley spoke about. The liberty of conscience to choose even the less probable opinion was the real consolation that Medina—and after him only the second generation of Jesuits—presumably gave to overwhelmed penitents since the late sixteenth century.99 The above mentioned medieval authors, however, had already opened a way to Probabilism. As Delumeau put it, after his analysis of Nider’s probable certitude, “Voilà belle et bien ouverte la voie au probabilisme.”100 In what pertains to ethics, the first generation of Jesuits appeared, therefore, to be rigid and conservative in their fidelity to Thomism. An additional proof of their predilection for Aquinas is the Directory’s use of the medieval doctrine of circumstances, which the prudent confessor must be aware of: the confessor “must also know the circumstances of sins.”101 It is important to note that by “circumstances” were meant mainly those changing the species of a sin, namely from the venial into mortal and vice versa.102 Therefore, the confessor had to ask: “who, what, where, by what means, why, how, when” (quis, quid, ubi, quibus auxiliis, cur, quomodo, quando). The latter sentence is the standard medieval enumeration of circumstances composed in hexameter as 97 See Aristotle, Topics I, 1 (100b21–23): “Generally accepted opinions are those which commend themselves to all or to the majority or to the wise, that is, to all of the wise or to the majority or to the most famous and distinguished of them.” 98 O’Malley, First Jesuits, p. 147. See also p. 145: “the art of casuistry was developed in the framework of scholasticism that sought to resolve every possible doubt.” 99 See Delumeau, L’aveu et le pardon, pp. 114 and 117. 100 Ibid., p. 117. 101 Directorium, p. 10. 102 See Delumeau, L’aveu et le pardon, p. 92.

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a mnemonic by an early medieval rhetorician. It reveals the tradition of the Aristotelian thought expressed in the Nicomachean Ethics, where “ignorance of the particulars, that is, of the circumstances of an action and the objects with which it is concerned, can render an action involuntary.”104 Aquinas built on that tradition: Speaking in a formal sense alone, the just and the good are always and everywhere the same, since principles of natural reason are immutable. But, in the material sense, justice and goodness are not the same everywhere and always. … This is so, because of the mutability of human nature, the diverse conditions of persons and their affairs and the differences of time and place.

Despite his awareness of the quoted mutability, Aquinas (and after him the first Jesuits) would have still remained within the tutioristic axiom. Moreover, although the Directory evidently drew on the Aristotelian/ Thomistic doctrine of circumstances, it did not apply it in every respect. Certainly, the Directory was very concerned about the variety of persons and, therefore, proposed their examination by status, or walks of life, age, and sex. The confessor had to ask whether the penitent was married or a priest, whether he had ecclesiastical privilege, whether she or he was literate, and so on.105 The confessor was invited to encourage the penitent to answer all questions truthfully, completely and freely, especially in the case of women and children.106 The confessor had to differentiate penitents: those who were wiser and of higher position had to be admonished with tact.107 The Directory advised the wise confessor to help the penitents proportionally to their capacity and disposition.108 Finally, at the end the manual added specific interrogations according to status: lay rulers, bishops, judges, attorneys and prosecutors, notaries public, married couples, priests and seminarians, men religious, professors, students, merchants and craftsmen, physicians, and children. A special space was reserved for circumstances concerning restitution. The confessor had to ask them according to another mnemonic: “Who, to whom, what, how much, or where, in what time and in what way” (Quis, cui, quid, quantum, vel ubi, quo tempore, quove).109 Nevertheless, the Directory offered no concrete analysis of the moral act under various circumstances. The manual examined those that can make a sin mortal or graver: if the penitents were obliged to make restitution, if they persisted in sin, if they fell under reserved (to by solved only by selected confessors) cases, and if they were excommunicated. The confessor could not Jonsen and Toulmin, Abuse of Casuistry, p. 132. Ibid. 105 Directorium, p. 19. 106 Ibid., p. 22. 107 Ibid., p. 27. 108 Ibid., pp. 40–1. 109 Ibid., p. 84. See also p. 95: “consideratis circumstantiis singularibus, rei, temporis, loci et personae, et huiusmodi.” 103 104

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ask about circumstances, which were not necessary, namely those that did not change the species of a sin, especially if they were in regard of sexual ones.110 Otherwise, the Directory employed a simple enumeration of sins considered mortal. Strikingly, the first Jesuits, despite receiving so much information from the encounters with non-European cultures through their amazingly efficient system of letter-writing (that was co-built by Polanco as Society’s secretary), and despite observing the emergence of a new mercantile class,111 did not find the medieval Tutiorism obsolete in the new social and cultural context of the sixteenth century, as some renowned late medieval thinkers—especially the Dominicans from Salamanca—did.112 Even though trained at the University of Salamanca, Francisco de Toledo, who was appointed in 1559 to comment on Aquinas’s Summa at the Collegio Romano, was not as challenging as his nephew Francisco Suárez was. Nor was he as progressive as Suárez’s student Leonardus Lessius (1554–1623)113—“a bridge head to Modernity”—just a few decades later.114 Tutiorism seems to have pervaded the conscience and mind of the first generation of Jesuits and remained still alive, although barely, in the next generations, having some influential supporters, such as the Jesuit Cardinal Robert Bellarmine (1542–1621), whose dialogue with Galileo Galilei (1554– 1642) can be perhaps interpreted within the context of Bellarmine’s tutioristic approach. It is interesting to observe that the Jansenists who advocated Tutiorism in the next century, saw Probabilism “as a Trojan horse for almost any turpitude.”115 The mathematician Pascal’s words, “Je ne me contente pas du probable, je cherche le seur” could have been very well Loyola’s, Polanco’s or Laínez’s, as much as they could have been spoken by Philipp Melanchthon

Ibid, pp. 10 and 25. An example could be the importance of converso merchants of wool, whose major number came from Burgos, the native city of the founder of the School of Salamanca Francisco de Vitoria and of our Polanco (see Luois Vereecke, “Il commercio della lana secondo i teologi spagnoli del secolo XVI,” in Vereecke, Da Guglielmo d’Ockham, pp. 489–500). 112 On Navarro’s contributions to the economic theories of the sixteenth century, see Dunoyer, “Enchiridion,” p. 135 and Baeck, “Legal and Scholastic Roots,” pp. 17–18. 113 Leonardus Lessius was Suárez’s pupil at the Collegio Romano. He taught theology at Louvain (1585–1600) and wrote De iustitia et iure (Louvain, 1605) that “shows the outstanding originality and creativeness” (Baeck, “Legal and Scholastic Roots,” p. 3). See also DHCJ, pp. 2336–7. 114 See Baeck, “Legal and Scholastic Roots,” p. 22: “His progressive stance on a fiscal system in proportion with the level of income and profits, as well as his advocacy for non-intervention by the state authorities in monetary and exchange markets and last but not in the least his novel portfolio-analysis (with his theory on liquidity preference) made him a marker of change.” See also Stone and Houdt, “Probabilism,” pp. 375–94. 115 See Robin Briggs, Communities of Belief. Cultural and Social Tension in Early Modern France (Oxford, 1989), p. 292. See also Ilkka Kantola, “Pascal’s Wager and Moral Tutiorism,” in Ghita Holmström-Hintikka (ed.), Medieval Philosophy and Modern Times (Boston and London, 2000), pp. 137–44. 110 111

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(1497–1560) or Théodore Bèze (1519–1605). The tutioristic set of mind was cross-confessional. The fiery opposition of the Catholic Jansenists to the Jesuit Probabilism in the mid-seventeenth century—that we shall see in Chapter 5—would have confirmed it. Eventually, the second Jesuit generation would have disregarded the Directory—almost no subsequent Jesuit work on confession would have ever quoted it—for it was incompatible with the new Jesuit approach to ethics.117 The judgment Jansen and Toulmin gave on the medieval manuals, the Summa Silvestrina and Angelica, can also be applied to the Directory: “They looked to a medieval world that no longer existed: the simple lines of moral rule and precept they provided were no longer adequate.”118 Early Jesuit Tutiorism Beyond the Directory Although the Directory can be considered the expression of the early Jesuit moral reasoning, it was not the only text produced by the first generation of Jesuits to which Tutiorism can be traced. Another example of how far the early Jesuits belonged to medieval ethics is their Constitutions.119 This most representative Jesuit document was written by Loyola, but with large contributions from and consultations with his secretary Polanco. The interdependence between the Constitutions and the Directory are, thus, to be expected.120 Giancarlo Angelozzi pointed out how “the casus conscientiae played a much larger role in the Society of Jesus, almost from the beginning, than the Constitutions and other official documents indicate,”121 and O’Malley, writing about the Jesuit ministry of teaching, pictured the Constitutions as “out of date before the ink was dry.”122 The same can be said about Jesuit Constitutions as regards ethics: they do not fully reflect what in a few years

116 See Philip Melanchthon’s (1487–1560) Praefatio to Loci communes theologici (1521) and Theodore de Bèze’s (1519–1605) De haereticis a civili magistrate puniendis libellus adversus Martini Bellii farraginem et novorum Academicorum sectam (1554). 117 The process of transformation of the Jesuit mind we are observing here stirs questions about Jesuit identity. In respect to moral reasoning, whose approach was truly Jesuit: Polanco’s Tutiorism or Suárez’s Probabilism? In today’s trend to return to sources, what would be a fair approach of contemporary Jesuits: to imitate Ignatius tout court just because he was the founder or to be faithful to the Jesuit tradition, which in some aspects departed from Loyola’s original modus procedendi? 118 Jonsen and Toulmin, Abuse of Casuistry, p. 146. 119 See Georg E. Ganss (ed.), The Constitutions of the Society of Jesus [by] Saint Ignatius of Loyola. Translated, with an introduction and a commentary, by George E. Ganss (St. Louis, 1970). 120 See the dissertation on this subject defended at the Weston Jesuit School of Theology in Cambridge (MA): Juan Carlos Coupeau, Begenning, middle, and end: a rhetorical study of the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus as a classic of spirituality (Cambridge, MA, 2001). 121 Angelozzi, L’insegnamento dei casi, p. 139. 122 John W. O’Malley, “Concluding Remarks,” in M. Hinz, R. Righi, D. Zardin (eds), I Gesuiti e la Ratio Studiorum (Roma, 2004), p. 514.

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after their promulgation (1559) would have become a typically Jesuit approach to solving moral problems. The Aristotelian/Thomistic frame of the Directory that was analyzed above corresponds perfectly to the role given to Aristotle and Aquinas in the Jesuit Constitutions. In Chapter 14 (The Books to Be Lectured On) of Part IV dedicated to the formation of the Jesuits after the first two years of probation (novitiate), the two authors were identified as the most authoritative: “In theology there should be lectures on the Old and New Testament and on the scholastic doctrine of St. Thomas” (# 464) and: “In logic, natural and moral philosophy, and metaphysics, the doctrine of Aristotle should be followed, as also in the other liberal arts” (# 470). Additionally, the Constitutions reflect the Aristotelian/Thomistic doctrine of circumstances. The need to look at the circumstances in judging a concrete situation according to persons, places, and times is a sort of rhetorical refrain in the text. The choice of Aristotle and Thomas as the authorities articulated in the Jesuit Constitutions reveals the tutioristic desire for security of doctrine. The text highlights that the Jesuits have to follow in each subject that doctrine which is “safest and most approved, as also the authors who teach it.”123 The context of introducing the need to follow Aquinas in the Constitutions is exactly linked to the desire for security of doctrine: “Those books will be lectured on which in each subject have been deemed to contain more solid and safe doctrine.”124 Behind the medieval and early Jesuit Tutiorism lies a desire for uniformity that pervades the Jesuit Constitutions. The text underlines its importance for the union of minds and hearts, and its role in preserving the society in good state.125 It is to be sought as well in interior matters as in exterior ones, particularly in regard to doctrine: As far as possible, we should all think alike and speak alike, in conformity with the Apostle’s teaching [Phil. 2:2]; and differing doctrines ought not to be permitted, either orally in sermons or public lectures, or in books; … Even in judgment about practical matters, diversity, which is commonly the mother of discord and the enemy of union of wills, should be avoided as far as possible. This union and agreement among them all ought to be sought most earnestly, and the opposite ought not to be permitted, so that, united among themselves by the bond of fraternal charity, they may be able better and more efficaciously to apply themselves in the service of God and the aid of their fellowmen. Novel doctrines must not be admitted; in the case of opinions divergent from what is commonly held by the Church and its teachers, they should submit to what is laid down in the Society. … Furthermore, on matters where Catholic teachers hold different or

Const. # [358]. Const. # [464]. 125 The same motive of servare unionem is expressed in the Directorium’s Preface: “servantes eam unionem in illa exsequenda, quam omnibus in rebus tenere, propter Christi obsequium, ante omnia expetimus” (p. 4). 123 124

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opposed opinions, an effort should likewise be made to obtain uniformity in the Society. 126

Not surprisingly, for the same sake of uniformity Loyola asked Polanco and others to write a manual for Jesuit confessors. The preface “Ad Lectorem” of the Directory claims uniformity as one of the aims of writing such a book. The book is about the way of proceeding (modus procedendi) in the ministry of confession that should be common to Jesuit priests: “Since it seemed good to explain that the priests of the Society [of Jesus] that had spread in different parts of the world should follow one and the same way in doing this ministry [of hearing confessions]—for they are moved by one and the same spirit to promote men’s salvation.”127 It also seems that the way Loyola conceived the Jesuit vow of obedience in the Constitutions, indicating in the person of the superior the source of God’s will, has much to do with his search for security of salvation: For the individual members there is greater security in going under obedience to their superiors rather than on their own initiative, even supposing they could act in this way and not as sent by the one charged with directing them in the place of Christ our Lord, as the interpreter of his divine will [emphasis mine].128

Indeed, the converso Jesuit Ribadeneyra at the end of his diary commented, “[T]here is path no more certain nor more narrow and more secure than that of obedience and placing oneself totally in the hands of God, so that through his ministers and our superiors we might be governed [emphasis mine].”129 The safest interpreter of God’s will was for Loyola the Roman pontiff as “the supreme vicar of Christ”130 and this was the source of the Jesuit special fourth vow of obedience to the pope.131 According to O’Malley, Polanco was “surely instrumental in assigning Thomas his place in that document [the Constitutions], but only in seconding what seems to have been Ignatius’s predilection.”132 That predilection was confirmed by the latter’s recommendation of Thomistic Cajetan’s Summula Peccatorum (Rome, 1525) to Nadal for the lectures on cases of conscience in Const. # [273–274]. See also # [47], [671–2], and [821]. “Cum igitur visum esset expedire, ut presbyteri huius Societatis diversissimis orbis regionum disiuncti, unam, eandemque rationem in hoc ministerio gerendo sequerentur, quemadmodum uno atque eodem spiritu ad promovendam hominum salutem ducuntur, datum fuit mihi negotium a R.P. nostro Praeposito ut quam aptissimo ordine possem, in compendium ea redigi curarem, quae partim lectione, partim observatione, crebrique tum meis, tum aliorum experimentis utilia esse et confessariis et confitentibus comperissem.” (Directorium, p. 3). [Translation is mine.] 128 Const. # [619]. See also # [635]. 129 Quoted in Jodi Bilinkoff, “The Many ‘Lives’ of Pedro de Ribadeneyra,” Renaissance Quarterly 52 (1999): 193. 130 Const. # [603]. See also # [604]–[617]. 131 In this context, Loyola’s rules of sentire cum Ecclesia appended to his Spiritual Exercises are another clear example of his tutioristic mindset. 132 See O’Malley, First Jesuits, p. 248. 126 127

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the first Jesuit school founded in Messina (1548).133 In turn, Polanco consulted Cajetan’s commentary to Aquinas’s Summa during his theological studies in Padua.134 It seems clear that Loyola and the first Jesuits preferred to follow the Italian and not Iberian stream of the sixteenth-century Thomistic revival, a preference to which Cajetan contributed significantly (Who quotes Cajetan, recites Thomas).135 No wonder the first Jesuits liked Cajetan’s Summula where he appears “a vigorous champion of medieval tutiorism,”136 making his assertions synthetically and securely.137 Cajetan’s tutioristic Summula was not safe enough, however, for one of the first companions of Loyola and later his successor as Superior General of the Society (1558–65), Diego Laínez of a converso family in Castilian Almazán. His rigorously tutiorsitic “Disputation on usury” (Disputatio de usura, 1554)—“one of the most comprehensive treatments of the issue in the sixteenth century,”138 considered some parts of Cajetan’s text too lax. Additionally, Laínez may have not liked Cajetan’s views on the relationship of women’s dress to venereal excitation. In fact, Cajetan observed that beautiful clothes are suitable for wives in order to be more desirable to their husbands. He also considered blameless the use of cosmetics by (not only married) women, arguing—according to the Aristotelian axiom “art imitates nature”— that where the natural is deficient, it can be compensated for cosmetically.139 For Cajetan, women’s fashions are not mortally sinful per se. It is only the woman’s intention to arouse sexual desire in men that makes such intention sinful. Cajetan considered severe Aquinas’s statement that a foreseen occurrence resulting from some exterior act increases the moral goodness or evil of the act. The former objected that it would mean that someone who commits a venial sin foreseeing that others will thereby commit mortal sins is himself guilty of mortal sin. Ironically enough, he considered it false based on another Thomistic axiom, according to which what is accidental does not affect the morality of the act. Laínez countered Cajetan’s views in his yet unpublished until recently but very influential “On women’s cosmetics and clothes” (De fuco et ornatu mulierum), which was used as a vademecum by early Jesuit preachers.140 It is very interesting to note that Cajetan was the only modern author opponent

Epp. Ign., vol. 2, p. 153 and vol. 12, p. 186. See Angelo Martini, “Gli studi teologici di Giovanni de Polanco alle origini della legislazione scholastica della Compagnia di Gesù,” AHSI 31 (1952): 225–81. 135 See Dennis Doherty, The Sexual Doctrine of Cardinal Cajetan (Regensburg, 1966), p. 343. 136 Doherty, Sexual Doctrine, p. 37. See also Deman, “Probabilisme,” col. 455. 137 Turrini, La coscienza e le leggi, p. 151: “[Caetano] enuncia le proprie asserzioni senza appoggio di auctoritates, con una sinteticità e sicurezza senza aloni o pieghe.” See also p. 159, where Turrini speaks about Cajetan’s “sicurezza definitoria” in contrast with the fashion of the probabilistic López. 138 See O’Malley, First Jesuits, p. 150. 139 See Doherty, Sexual Doctrine, pp. 181–8. 140 See Scaduto, L’epoca di Giacomo Laínez. L’azione, pp. 486–7. 133 134

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quoted by this converso Jesuit. Cajetan’s consideration of women’s abuse of make-up and clothes as only venial sin is juxtaposed with the authority of the Scripture, of “many very saintly and learned ancient fathers” (plurimos sanctissimos et antiquos patres doctissimos), as well as of reason.142 Although he affirms that there is reason to contradict Cajetan’s views, Laínez does not bring up any reasonable arguments except those of doubtful scientific value, as when he tries to frighten women by saying that the make-up applied on the jaws harms teeth.143 Patristic opinions are safe only because they are ancient and saintly, meanwhile their modern opponents (and among them seems to be Cajetan) do not shine by their sanctity (non fulgentibus sanctitate).144 Following some of the Church Fathers, especially Clement of Alexandria (d. ca. 215), Laínez allows the use of modest cosmetics and clothes only by married women in order to please their husbands, but only if there is “no bad intention” involved.145 What for Cajetan was imitation of nature, for Laínez (after Clement) is sin against nature.146 The author of “On women’s cosmetics and clothes,” who considered women less reasonable in judgment and weaker (molliores) than men,147 recommended that husbands take off their wives’ ornaments, so they cannot go around [to lead other men into sin], ‘as they used to take off feathers from birds, so they cannot fly.’”148 Laínez appreciated Tertullian’s (b. ca.160) praise of Arab women who covered their faces not to be seen by men and proposed in his treatise that women use the veil as “wall for modesty.”149 In contrast with Calvinists and Jansenists, the Jesuits and their students would become less rigorous and tutioristic when, according to the curriculum of the newly founded schools, they began to read more Greco-Roman authors and fewer Church Fathers. But “what has Athens to do with Jerusalem?”150 Re-definition of the Jesuits The tutioristic mindset of Loyola and the first Jesuits was deeply shaped by the prophetic “culture of Jerusalem.” The year 1556 marked not only Holy Roman Emperor Charles V’s abdication and Loyola’s death, but also a farewell to the age of European religious uniformity that was already disappearing, despite their dream to preserve it. Diego Laínez, De fuco [24]. Ibid. 143 Ibid. [17]. 144 Ibid. [24]. 145 Ibid. [5]. 146 Ibid. [16]. 147 Ibid. [14]. 148 Ibid. [18]. 149 Ibid. [21] and [29]. 150 This is a Tertullian’s question. For the conflict between the prophetic (Jerusalem) and humanistic (Athens) cultures, see John W. O’Malley’s Four cultures of the West (Cambridge, MA, 2004), pp. 4–7. 141 142

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The first Jesuits may have been so conservative in contrast to the ethical Zeitgeist because of a lack of major interest in the culture of the age and in the strictly academic teaching of “culture of Athens.” Loyola himself had a little interest in these things. Indeed, the very purpose of the group Loyola gathered during his studies in Paris was the apostolate with the Muslims in the Holy Land. Only the impossibility of traveling there from Venice due to the war the Serenissima was waging against the Ottoman Turks in the late 1530s made that plan unachievable. The cult of Loyola the founder and the promotion of his imitation as the pattern of Jesuit life especially by Polanco, Nadal,151 Ribadeneyra,152 and Câmara153 may have negatively affected the engagement of the first Jesuits with culture and academic teaching. Among the first Jesuits were well-trained theologians, such as Salmerón, Laínez, and Favre, but their learning was characterized more by a good (or even excellent) scholastic knowledge of Scripture, the Church Fathers in their original languages, and theology than by their subtlety or originality of thought in philosophical/theological reflection, which would become more characteristic of Vázquez, Suárez, Lessius, Juan de Mariana (1536–1624) or Luis de Molina (1535–1600)154 of the next generation.155 Although Laínez and Favre were appointed by the pope to lecture at La Sapienza University in Urbe as early as in 1537, they never dedicated themselves to their academic positions on a full-time basis.156 At the core of the early Jesuit identity, as we have seen in the first chapter, were ministries listed in their foundational document Formula Instituti (1539) that did not include any intellectual or teaching activity if not that symbolic of catechizing children and the unlettered by the full members of the order (professi). The first Jesuits had been so seriously engaged in preaching, confessing and visiting the sick, and they spent so much time on traveling that they barely had time for anything else. As Salmerón put it, “Our vocation is not ordered to undertaking professorships or ‘ordinary’ lectureships in the universities.”157 Their lack of time for academic interests resulted in their need of compendia, as succinct and as comprehensive as possible for practical use 151 For the importance of Nadal in the early Society, see my “Abnegación en los escritos de Jerónimo Nadal (1507–1580),” Manresa 73 (2001): 387–96, and “Jerónimo Nadal (1507–1580),” in Diccionario de espiritualidad ignaciana (Madrid, 2007), pp. 1315–9. 152 See Evonne Levy, Propaganda and the Jesuit Baroque (Los Angeles, 2004), where Ribadeneyra is characterized as “Ignatius’s Veronica” (p. 126). 153 See Câmara, Remembering Iñigo: “It seemed to me most important that we should act in exactly the same way as our Fr. Ignatius” (p. 5). 154 Molina was the first Jesuit to write a commentary upon Aquinas’s Summa. His main contribution to theology (Molinism) was Concordia liberi arbitrii cum gratiæ donis, divina præscientia, providentia, prædestinatione et reprobatione (Lisbon, 1588). His doctrine vis-à-vis Jansenism will be analyzed in Chapter 5. 155 See Baeck, “Legal and Scholastic Roots,” p. 16. 156 See my Giacomo Laínez. Prima biografia ignaziana (Naples, 1996), p. 57. Favre lectured shortly also at the University of Mainz and Jay—at Ingolstadt (see O’Malley, First Jesuits, p. 201). 157 Quoted in O’Malley, First Jesuits, p. 203.

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and not for academic speculation. Laínez wrote a compendium of catechism for children during his mission in Parma in 1540.158 Loyola commissioned the same Laínez to produce the first Jesuit compendium on theology, but it was never completed.159 The second compendium commissioned was our Directory, completed but lacking the sophistication that marked the School of Salamanca and was to mark the next Jesuit generation. The conflict between the first Jesuits and the Dominican Melchor Cano (1509–60), an illustrious representative of the School of Salamanca, over the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises might also have affected their lack of interest in the thought of that School. It is less likely, however, that the memory of Loyola’s twenty-two day imprisonment in 1527 by the Dominicans of Salamanca had any influence on the first Jesuits’ distance from that School.160 This does not mean that the first Jesuits were totally resistant to other nonscholastic approaches, such as Renaissance Humanism. To the contrary, the latter became a means by which Polanco and Nadal, who were well-trained in theology and familiar with Renaissance Humanism, translated into an institutional framework for the new religious order the charisma of Ignatius (whose contact with the classical tradition was rather rudimentary), as the recent doctoral dissertation by J. Carlos Coupeau on the role of the humanistic rhetorical tradition in composing the Jesuit Constitutions has shown.161 Furthermore, O’Malley has pointed out how the popular among humanists Cicero’s On Duties may have influenced the notion of magnanimity used by Polanco in the Constitutions (Part IX) to describe the superior general’s qualities.162 At the same time, from the analysis of the Directory it is clear that the reading of Cicero’s On Duties did not affect Polanco’s moral reasoning to the extent it did, for example, that of Lessius’s of the next generation. Both Polanco and Lessius must have read Cicero’s famous account of the merchant of Alexandria going with grain to Rhodes in time of famine (On Duties, III, 12, 50–57), but only the latter would notice the complexity of 158 Del modo et ordine che si debbono osservare ad insegnare alli putti, et della dottrina che si ha da insegnare (see Pietro Tacchi Venturi, Storia della Compagnia di Gesù in Italia (Roma, 1950), vol. 1/1, p. 360). Other compendia of catechism were written by Doménech in 1547 and Araldo in 1552 (see Scaduto, Azione, p. 619). 159 See Scaduto, Il Governo, p. 156s. 160 See, Ignatius of Loyola, Autobiography [63–70]. The first Jesuits commenting on this “persecution” seem to defend the good name of the Dominicans and of the University. Polanco reported after Laínez that “gli [a Ignazio] fu mossa un altra persecuzione dallo zelo di alcuni buoni religiosi” (Summ. Hisp. [41]). Nadal, in his version of that accident, calling the Dominicans “come in altre, così in questa città, uomini eccellenti in religione e dottrina,” took an occasion to underline that “alla città di Salamanca si trova l’accademia più celebre e antiqua di tutta la Spagna” (Dialogi, vol. 2, p. 14). For the synoptic view of the texts related to this episode, see my Giacomo Laínez, pp. 34–5. See also Arturo Codina, “La estancia de S. Ignacio en el convento de S. Esteban de Salamanca,” in AHSI 4 (1935): 111–23. 161 For a quintessence of the dissertation see J. Carlos Coupeau, “The Constitutions of the Society of Jesus. The Rhetorical Component,” Studies in Spirituality 14 (2004): 199–208. 162 O’Malley, “Concluding Remarks,” p. 519.

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the case presented by “the first casuist” in the discussion between two Stoics, Diogenes of Babylon and Antipater of Tarsus.163 The second generation of Jesuits may well have been attracted to the figure of Cicero, who combined his civic duties intended as service to humanitas and his strong inclination to academic speculation, which was aimed—following the peripatetic tradition—to solve practical problems of life by discussing probable reasons supporting or contrasting moral choices. The Jesuits would not have necessarily followed Cicero’s solutions of moral doubts, but the Roman rhetorician would have become for them a gateway to the ancient tradition of rhetoric and casuistry. They would have become Ciceronians to a man, as we shall see in the next chapter. The important question that now arises is: How was it possible for the Jesuits to espouse and propagate probabilistic reasoning with such enthusiasm as soon as it was defined by the Dominican Medina in 1577? After all, the Jesuits were conservative and rigid in their opposition to late medieval and modern efforts to mitigate scholastic Tutiorism. This shift could take place because within one generation the Jesuits re-defined themselves. This re-definition could occur because their mindset had been penetrated by the reading of classical authors, required by their newly enlarged ministry of teaching youth liberal arts in a quickly built web of schools since 1548, the year of the foundation of the college in Messina. Through the schools the Jesuits committed themselves seriously to culture, a culture that in the sixteenth century underwent dramatic transformations. If the Society of Jesus in 1565 was different in important respects from what it was in 1540,164 by 1580 it changed even more from what it was in 1565. The issue is far too complex to be addressed here, but it seems that the generation represented by Lessius read the classical authors in different ways from Polanco’s generation. The latter did it as part of the medieval academic curriculum focused on training in logic and dialectics, but not in literature; the former—additionally—regarded serious, open-minded study as a necessary means of performing the ministry of teaching, in which the second generation of Jesuits became much more engaged. As Aldo Scaglione put it, “The second generation [of Jesuits], that of Perpinyá, the Belgian Del Río, Juan Bonifacio, Edmond Campion, and André Schott, became deeply imbued with Italian Humanism and was prone to look on the humanities with much greater understanding and even a sort of worldly passion.”165 It is emblematic that among the first books printed by the first press of the Roman College was the edition of Martial’s Epigrams (1558) by the Jesuit André des Freux (Frusius, 163 For the discussion of the case, see Jonsen and Toulmin, Abuse of Casuistry, pp. 81–2. On his probabilistic conclusions in what regards morality of dissimulation and lying in order to profit from sold goods, see Stone and Houdt, “Probabilism,” pp. 386–91. On the role of the De officiis in the Italian Renaissance, see Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, pp. 216–7. 164 This is one of the theses of O’Malley’s The First Jesuits (p. 14). 165 Aldo Scaglione, The Liberal Arts and the Jesuit College System (Amsterdam and Philadelphia, 1986), p. 81.

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ca. 1510–56), who—along with Nadal and Canisius—was part of the group to found the first Jesuit school in Messina. Thus, we can talk here about a kind of Jesuit literary Renaissance—a Jesuit journey from Jerusalem to Athens. Although the decision to engage in educating youth may have been the result of Loyola’s dependence on the wealthy and powerful rather than a premeditated plan, the process of incorporating teaching into the Jesuit original ministries after 1548 and its consequent preeminence received his blessing and was later earnestly promoted by Polanco himself.167 They must have not imagined that this ministry would have dramatically changed the mindset of the Jesuits after them. The ardent promotion of frequent sacramental confession and the “powerful tradition” of lectures on cases of conscience to train good confessors exercised by the first generation of Jesuits, combined with the literary Renaissance of the second generation, created an alliance that made the Jesuits well equipped to adopt and adapt Probabilism.168 Not less an important factor of the shift was the sensibility—speculative and practical—to socio-economic changes of the age in relation to moral problems so characteristic of the School of Salamanca, which was brought to the exemplary Collegio Romano, and through it to the rest of the Society of Jesus, by Suárez and Vázquez. There was, however, still another factor that would have molded the Jesuit mind to prefer the probabilistic route. It was Jesuit spirituality—with its anthropological and soteriological assumptions, and the rhetoric of accommodation to the circumstances of concrete situations that was central to the Jesuits’ ministerial style169 that sowed seeds for the future adoption of the probabilistic mentality. Ironically enough, these seeds can be traced in the texts that have been analyzed above from the tutioristic perspective: in the Directory and in the Jesuit Constitutions,170 but also in the Spiritual Exercises and in other Jesuit fundamental texts. This stage of the making of the Jesuit conscience can be termed early Jesuit embryonic Probabilism. Early Jesuit Embryonic Probabilism Until now we have seen how the first Jesuits became involved “in a juggling act between the focus of the tradition on sin and law and their desire to See DHCJ, vol. 2, p. 1537. In 1560 he wrote to Laínez: “Generally speaking, there are [in the Society] two ways of helping our neighbors: one in the colleges through the education of youth in letters, learning and Christian life, and the second in every place to help every kind of person through sermons, confessions, and the other means that accord with our customary way of proceeding” (Mon Paed., vol. 5, p. 485). 168 O’Malley has shown how the need the Jesuits felt to study cases of conscience grew out from the complex nature of the confessor’s task (O’Malley, The first Jesuits, pp. 144–6), and Jonsen and Toulmin argued that “it is not surprising to find the Jesuits, who were dedicated to teaching classical rhetoric in their colleges, become the leading exponents of casuistry” (Jonsen and Toulmin, Abuse of Casuistry, p. 88). 169 See O’Malley, First Jesuits, p. 256. 170 See Coupeau, “Constitutions,” p. 200. 166 167

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emphasize the consoling aspects of the sacrament.”171 This tension is much evident in the Directory that was previously analyzed from the tutioristic perspective. From the quotations, which directly indicated Directory’s Tutiorism, one has a perception of the Jesuit confessor as rigid, apodictic and severe: “The penitent has to be frightened about the danger [of not following the safer way to achieve salvation].” It is hard to reconcile this image of the relentless confessor with the benign and humane one that appears in the rest of the same Jesuit manual. This portrayal suggests the presence of Probabilism in its embryonic phase and suggests why the second generation of Jesuits was so prone to espouse the Dominican Medina’s new ethical approach as soon as it was officially proposed in 1577. In the part dedicated to how the penitents must be helped to regret (contritus) their sins, the manual asks the confessor “not to frighten with reprehensions,” but rather to encourage the penitent with “compassion and benevolence”172 in order to increase in them confidence to confess sins sincerely. Describing the relationship with the penitent, the Directory stresses that the confessor must “in his heart consider his penitents better than himself” and be an “instrument of God’s goodness”173 in front of the penitent, who is the “image of God, redeemed by the Blood of Christ.”174 The confessor has to be aware “not to show the penitent a less benign face” when hearing him confess a grave sin.175 Before the interrogation—instructs the Directory—the confessor has to be benign in supporting the penitent to make an integral confession.176 In the process of discerning the penitence to be given to the penitent, the confessor must be driven by love and persuade with more humane instruction.177 In the section on confessors’ cautiousness (prudentia), the more benign way of approaching the penitent is suggested, when the confessor is in doubt in situations when sin is not in consideration (such as giving penance or requiring restitution).178 If there is no articulated law, the confessor has always to take a more humane course, under the condition of respecting equity, according to the circumstances of person, place, and time.179 In assigning satisfaction, the confessor must consider rather the person than the gravity or quantity of sin.180 O’Malley, First Jesuits, p. 147. Directorium, p. 25: “nec reprehensionibus deterrendus est penitens, sed potius compasione & benignitate ostensa, animandus, ut cum fiducia omnia & sincere dicat.” 173 Ibid., p. 13: “In corde suo confitentes sibi praeferat, ac se meliores existimet.” 174 Ibid., p. 18. 175 Ibid., p. 9. 176 Ibid., p. 25. 177 Ibid., p. 30. 178 Ibid., p. 15: “Si non de peccato agitur, sed an hoc faciendum nec ne, puta poena subeunda, vel restitutio facienda, etc. benignior in dubiis pars eligenda.” 179 Ibid.: “In his super quibus ius non invenitur expressum, procedas aequitate servata, semper in humaniorem partem declinando, secundum quod personas, loca, & tempora videris postulare.” 180 Ibid., p. 29: “ea [satisfactio] non tam quantitati, aut qualitati criminis … quam personae debet congruere.” 171 172

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Finally, the confessor should accommodate his final instructions and advice, explains the Directory, to the capacity and disposition of the penitent.181 In this way one of the goals of the sacramental confession can be achieved: reconciliation with God through the remission of sins, peace, and spiritual consolation.182 The roots of this accommodating approach to the penitent are undoubtedly in the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises—the very foundation of Jesuit spirituality and ministries. The so-called first “week” of the Exercises ends with the general sacramental confession as a sign of abandoning one’s old life. Although confession to someone other than the Exercises’ director was preferred,183 it must have happened very often that the director and the confessor were the same person. At any rate, the way that the Exercises describe the relationship between who gives and who receives spiritual exercises must have influenced the way the Jesuits conceived the same relationship between the confessor and the penitent. In the seventh annotation of the Spiritual Exercises, Loyola advises the director: If he who is giving the Exercises sees that he who is receiving them is in desolation and tempted, let him not be hard or dissatisfied with him, but gentle and indulgent, giving him courage and strength for the future, and laying bare to him the wiles of the enemy of human nature [Satan], and getting him to prepare and dispose himself for the consolation coming [7].

Other Jesuits wrote their directories to the Spiritual Exercises in the same accommodating and benign spirit. Even our Polanco instructed the director that unless he already knows the exercitant, the director should try to get information about his intelligence, character, and temperament, either from others or through tactful questioning of the exercitant. In this way he will better be able to adapt himself to the exercitant. To grave and learned persons he should speak succinctly and learnedly; to persons of little spiritual experience, with greater fullness … [If the exercitant] is trying too hard the director can restrain him. If he is in desolation the director can console him. If he is flooded with consolations the director can sift them. If he is agitated by temptations of diverse spirits, the director should make the inquiries needed for the discernment of spirits.184 181 Ibid., p. 34: “disponitur & iuvatur plurimum per confessarii consilia, instructionem, & adhortationem, quae tamen accomodari debent ad captum confitentis.” See also ibid., pp. 40–41: “Non omnes omnium capaces sunt, prudens confessarius videat, ut proportionate cuique dispositioni vel captui proponat, ad gratiae augmentum.” 182 Ibid., “Triplex huius Sacramenti fructus est. Primus riconciliari Deo per gratiam, qua remittuntur peccata, huic coniugitur pax & consolatio spiritualis.” 183 See the second Directory to the Spiritual Exercises by Diego Miró in Palmer, On Giving the Spiritual Exercises, p. 171: “It is generally considered preferable for the exercitant to make his confession to someone else besides his director, unless his devotion or some other reason dictates otherwise.” 184 See Palmer, On Giving the Spiritual Exercises, pp. 124–6.

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Polanco’s directions were not confined to his own experience. Their echo can be found in the official Jesuit Directory to Spiritual Exercises from 1599, the same text that would reject Polanco’s Directory as a guide to the general confession and choose the manual of Azpilcueta, as we have seen above: [The director] should also study the exercitant carefully: not only his state and condition—whether noble or commoner, learned or unlearned, etc.—but also his special capacities—whether simple or astute, spiritually advanced or still unskilled and novice, intelligent and capable or duller and slower. Persons of different character will have to be explained more fully, to other persons more succinctly, etc.185

No wonder the Jesuits naturally became so prompt to espouse and subsequently propagate with such an enthusiasm the probabilistic method of reasoning. But this is already the next chapter of the story.

185

Ibid., p. 300.

CHAPTER 3

“Christian Virtue and Excellence in Ciceronian Eloquence”: The Jesuit Literary Renaissance and Adoption of Probabilism In the previous chapter, we have seen how the ardent promotion of unusually frequent sacramental confession, along with lectures on cases of conscience, in which the first generation of Jesuits intensely engaged, when combined with what could be called the “literary Renaissance” of the second generation, created an alliance that made the Jesuits well equipped to adopt swiftly, adapt skillfully, and advocate successfully Probabilism. This was the point at which Renaissance humanism and ethics permeated Western education and morals. Paul Grendler evocatively pointed out that “nothing so marked the difference between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance as the revival of classical rhetoric. Medieval scholars had placed grammar and logic at the center of learning and expression. They had little interest in the whole of classical Latin rhetoric and ignored its cultural associations.”1 A revolutionary shift in Jesuit ethics could occur, for the Jesuits understood well these cultural associations of rhetoric, as we shall see in this chapter. The most telling document where the marriage of casuistry with classical rhetorical tradition can be traced is the codification of Jesuit pedagogy, the Ratio Studiorum (1599). The document is a collection of task-descriptions for those in the Society of Jesus responsible for the ministry of education, beginning with the superior provincial and going down through the system’s ladder to explain the duties of the student. It describes every class of the program, from the lower classes of liberal arts up to higher classes in Scripture, theology and cases of conscience. The ministry of education, through which the Jesuits came to a closer and more systematic contact with the classical tradition, is considered principal in the Ratio. The very first paragraph of the text states: “It is the principal ministry of the Society of Jesus to educate youth in every branch of knowledge that is in keeping with its Institute [emphasis mine].” Therefore, the superior provincial should provide as many permanent teachers of grammar and rhetoric as possible. … He should encourage them to devote themselves entirely to this apostolate, which is so beneficial in the service of God. It will be advantageous to receive into the Society men who seem specially fitted for such work. … The condition of their acceptance will be their willingness

1

Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, p. 205.

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to dedicate their whole life to the service of God by teaching grammar or the humanities.2

Grendler reminds us that very few Jesuit schools went beyond the last or fifth class of rhetoric. To study logic, philosophy, theology, and Hebrew the students would have enrolled at the Roman College or at other universities.3 It follows that the majority of boys trained by the Jesuits received a more humanistic than philosophical or theological training. The divergence of the Ratio from the tutioristic Directory—that was scrutinized in the previous chapter—will show how the Jesuit mindset changed over the first 40 years, or so. A mere formulation of general principles, rules, commandments, and laws no longer sufficed. The Ratio indicates a deeper understanding of the complexity of moral situations as a result of altered circumstances of the case and not only of the person, as the Directory seemed to suggest. To detect the transitional process under investigation, it is enlightening to compare synoptically all three superseded editions of the Jesuit Ratio Studiorum (1586, 1591, 1599) in what concerns lectures on cases of conscience. They gather a half-century of Jesuit experience in coping with both lectures on cases of conscience and liberal arts. Lectures on Cases of Conscience in the Ratio Studiorum Noteworthy is the paragraph of the Ratio that explains how discussions on cases of conscience should be conducted: Every Saturday the lecture will be dropped and a disputation on proposed solutions of cases will be held before the teacher for a period of two hours, or a little less. … The disputation should be conducted by means of questions, that is, by asking the solution of some difficulty, by proposing a new case with some changed circumstances, by citing a canon or the opinion of a noted authority against some conclusion ([6]).4

In the section “Rules of the Professor of Cases of Conscience,” after having underlined the pastoral impact of these classes, the 1599 Ratio urges the professor to “substantiate his own opinions in such a way that, if another opinion is in some way probable and is supported by good authority, he will recognize it as also probable.”5 Although the document deals with the relationship of teacher to student and not confessor to penitent, it is safe to infer that the mentioned “recognition” See Ratio, “Rules of the Provincial,” # [24]–[25]. Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, p. 381. 4 The translation is of Allan P. Farrell, Ratio Studiorum (Washington DC, 1970). For the most recent Latin–English edition of the text, see The Ratio Studiorum: The Official Plan for Jesuit Education. Translation and Commentary by Claude Pavur (St. Louis, 2005). 5 Ratio # [5]: “Ita suas confirmet opiniones, ut, si qua alia fuerit probabilis et bonis auctoribus munita, eam etiam probabilem esse significet.” 2 3

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(significare) of somebody else’s probable opinion in the academic milieu, which in the eyes of the professor must have appeared less plausible, would induct him and students to do the same with the penitent in the sacramental confession (and even every extern student would be required to go to confession at least once a month, as the Ratio itself recommended).6 It is interesting to observe that there is a significant dissimilarity between the version from 15867 and the versions from 15918 and 1599. The latter two stress that an opinion must be recognized as plausible not only because supported by good authors (bonis auctoribus munita), as was sufficient for the 1586 version, but also because of its intrinsic probability. The Ratio reveals, then, that the Jesuits understood the term “probable” in two ways: as reasonably acceptable (as it was stressed by Cicero) and as approvable because of its extrinsic authority (as it was stressed by medieval moralists). There is no explicit trace of Vázquez’s or Cipriano Soáres’s distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic probability yet, as we shall see below, but the last two versions of the Ratio suggest that by the end of the sixteenth century the Jesuits—at least at the official level—were abandoning Tutiorism and espousing (at least) extrinsic Probabilism. A synoptic view of another paragraph in the three Ratio’s versions within the same chapter on the professor of cases of conscience unveils the first stage of the Jesuit transition from Tutiorism to Probabilism—a blend of Tutiorism and Probabiliorism. We must note how the formulation of the solution of the case by the coordinator of the discussion changed in the second and third versions of the Ratio. The earliest version categorically states that all ought to follow the safer solution. The version published just five years later uses a less compulsory tone: a safer solution is to be proposed, which would be followed universally. Finally, the eight-year younger and official version proposes not only a safer but at the same time a more probable solution. Remarkably, after the proposed solution of the moral case, yet another discussion on further questions would follow.

Ratio, “Rules for Extern Students,” # [3]. “Porro ita professor suas opiniones constabiliat, ut aliquam etiam aliam, quae bonos habeat autores, significet esse probabilem.” 8 “Praeceptor … ita suas constabiliat opiniones, ut si qua alia fuerit probabilis, et bonis auctoribus munita, eam etiam probabilem significet.” 6 7

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86 1586 Version

1591 Version

1599 Version

convenerint

Postquam convenerint omnes,

Postquam convenerint, primum utile esset a singulis,

interroget unum aliquem de primo casu; deinde duos fere alios de eodem.

ipse interroget de primo casu fere tres, quos satius est praemoneri et vicissim commutari.

quid suus doctor habeat, quam brevissime referri; tum qui praeest interroget fere tres quid sentient de primo casu:

Postea de iis quae dicta sunt, colligat doctrinam, quam ut tutiorem omnes sequi debeant.

Postea ex his, quae dicta sunt ab illis, colligat ipse doctrinam, quam ut tutiorem sequantur universi.

postea ex his, quae dicta sunt ab illis, collligat ipse doctrinam tutiorem, et probabiliorem;

Idem postea faciat in examine secundi casus et reliquorum. Illi vero tres, qui interrogandi sunt, vel ex tempore nominentur a praeside, cum omes parati accesserint, vel quod satius videtur, ante praemoneantur, et vicissim commutentur. Explicata vero illorum casuum doctrina, proponent, qui volent, suas iisdem de rebus dubitationes, respondente uno ex illis tribus praemonitis, et praeside tandem definiente, quid sentiendum sit.

Eodem deinde ordine casum secundum et reliquos deinceps excutiat. Illis casibus sic explicatis a praeside, proponent, qui velint, suas iisdem de rebus dubitationes, respondente uno ex illis tribus praemonitis, et praeside tandem, quid sentiendum sit, definiente.

eodem deinde ordine casum secundum, et reliquos deinceps eadem ratione excutiat. Illis casibus sic explicatis a Praeside quam brevissime, et eo modo, qui servandus est in disputationibus casuum, proponantur iisdem de rebus dubitationes; respondente uno ex praemonitis, et ipso tandem, quid sentiendum sit, ad extremum edocente.

Postquam omnes,

The conscious change in wording reflects the process of consultations on the text of the Ratio between the Roman editorial committee and Jesuits from different provinces before its final official edition was issued in 1599. Examining the 1586 version, the Aragonese Jesuits claimed that during the discussion the students must use not whatsoever authors but the principal works, selected by the coordinator, so from their sentences a safer doctrine can be advised.9 The same tutioristic approach can be noted in the response of the Milanese Jesuits, who recommended that the coordinator should be able to judge whether an opinion is to be accepted, when refused, which 9 Mon Paed., vol. 6, p. 246: “Non expedit, ut his casibus student caeteri indistincte apud quoscumque voluerint doctores; sed, ut quilibet apud unum aliquem a praeside praestitutum; quo principalium doctorum sententiae ibi referantur, et tutior doctrina ex his colligatur, quam omnes sequi debent.”

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10

is just probable, and which one can be sustained without danger. The response of the Castilian Jesuits seems to be the boldest one, nevertheless it would be reflected only partially in the Ratio’s official version from 1599: the coordinator is expected to choose what appears just more probable.11 The 1599 version reflected what the Jesuits from the Upper German Province proposed: the coordinator first has to list the safe classical authors and then indicate among them those who are more probable.12 Interestingly, the Jesuits from the same province formulated a postulate during their provincial congregation in 1600 that the Society should indicate just one author to follow in cases of conscience, as it followed Aquinas in theology. The answer of the Superior General Claudio Acquaviva (1543–1615) was that “the Jesuits should make every effort, as far as they can, to be uniform in their judgments, and follow the authors who are grave and approved, but it is difficult to impose generally one direction only, since there are different authors’ opinions and everybody is allowed to follow a probable opinion [emphasis mine].”13 It is to be noted that the Superior General’s advice does not contain any obligation of following a safe(r) opinion or doctrine. Acquaviva’s concern— as it was Loyola’s—was uniformity among the Jesuits, yet the former acknowledged the existence of a diversity of probable opinions and the liberty of following them. With the turn of the sixteenth century, the Jesuit ethical orientation was turning as well. What we have seen here at the official level (the superior general vs. the inclined towards Tutiorism Upper German Jesuits) can be traced in the Jesuit penitential manuals, as we shall see in the next chapter, that were produced about the same time. Fascinatingly enough, the answer from Rome does not quote the tutioristic/probabilioristic solution of the 1599 Ratio and just a year later offers the probabilistic one. At least some German Jesuits would eventually follow the Roman direction, for a well-articulated theory of Probabilism would come some years later from the

10 Ibid., p. 244: “Lector … suum cuique opinioni momentum prudenter tribuat, sive teneatur, sive refutetur, quae tantum probabilis, quae omnino tenenda, quae reiicienda omnino, quae sine periculo sustineri potest.” The congregation of the Roman Jesuits in 1597 expressed their concern in stating which opinion is safer and which just probable, especially in dealing with economic issues (see ibid., vol. 7, p. 355). 11 Ibid., vol. 6, p. 247: “Qui praeest, deligit, quid probabilius videatur.” Is it a coincidence that this suggestion comes from the Jesuit province, to which Salamanca– where the Dominican idea of Probabilism matured–belonged? 12 Ibid., p. 250: “Professor … referat primum classicas opiniones, quarum unamquamlibet possit quis tuto sequi, citatis autoribus. Deinde eligat ex illis unam, quam ipse putet probabiliorem [emphasis mine].” 13 Ibid., vol. 7, p. 366: “Difficile est, ut aliquid in universum praescribatur; cum diversae sint auctorum opiniones et probabilem cuique sequi liceat. Curandum tamen ut nostri, quoad fieri potest, uniformes sint in sententiis, et auctores graves ac probatos sequantur.” Answering the same kind of postulate by the Jesuit Province of France in 1606, Acquaviva repeated what he had said to the Germans, indicating, however, for its method and order, the manual by Francisco Toledo (see ibid., p. 397).

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authoritative German Jesuit Paul Laymann.14 The process of transition from Tutiorism to Probabilism that we have just observed was centrifugal: Rome was more progressive than the provinces—a situation not very usual in the history of the Roman Catholic Church. Crucial in this process was classical rhetoric that Ratio established pivotal in the Jesuit educational system. The purpose of the class in rhetoric was “the development of the power of self-expression. Its content spans two major fields, oratory and poetry, with oratory taking the place of honor. The purpose of the formation is both practical and cultural. It may be said in general that this class is concerned mainly with the art of rhetoric, the refinement of style, and erudition.”15 Grendler suggested that the Jesuits won over public opinion, persuading parents that they were better educators than their rivals. They did that through public academic exercises, such as inaugural orations.16 Usually the Jesuit students could not proceed with their studies in philosophy unless they had devoted at least two years to the study of rhetoric. Students showing aptitude to become eminent in these studies would be encouraged to spend another year “in laying a more solid foundation.”17 This strategy shows how important rhetoric was in the Jesuit way of proceeding. However, the Ratio reveals that the Jesuits seemed to be still unaware of the potent impact rhetoric may have had on their way of ethical reasoning. This impact would have come mainly from works of Cicero, to whom they assigned a “sacred” place in their classes. Classical Rhetoric in the Ratio and Jesuit Ciceronianism In the “Rules of the Teacher of Rhetoric” of the Jesuit Ratio, the main authors recommended are Cicero and Aristotle: “Cicero is to be the one model of style, though the best historians and poets are to be sampled. All Cicero’s works are appropriate models of style. … Only Cicero is to be taken for orations, and both Cicero and Aristotle for the precepts of rhetoric.”18 The special role of Cicero is also patent in the class of humanities: “Knowledge of the language involves correctness of expression and ample vocabulary, and these are to be developed in daily readings in the works of Cicero, especially those that contain reflections on the standards of right living [emphasis 14 Paul Laymann, Theologia moralis in quinque libros partita, quibus materiae omnes practicae, cum ad externum ecclesiasticum, tum internum conscientiae forum spectantes ... explicantur (Monachii [München], 1625). 15 See Ratio, “Rules of the Teacher of Rhetoric,” # [1]. See also Jacobus Pontanus, “Prefatio,” in Progymnasmatum Latinitatis, sive dialogorum De rebus litterariis (Ingolstadii, 1599): “Abutitur autem, Cicerone iudice, qui cogitationes suas mandate litteris, cum eas nec disponere, nec illustrare possit, nec delectatione aliqua afficere lectorem.” 16 See Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, p. 368. 17 See Ratio, “Rules of the Provincial,” # [18]. 18 See Ratio, “Rules of the Teacher of Rhetoric,” # [1–2] and [6].

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mine].” The Ratio advises the master of humanities that “the pupils have to spend their time in such exercises choosing phrases from previously read passages and expressing them in different ways, reconstructing a passage from Cicero that had been disarranged for this purpose.”20 The familiarity with Cicero continued in the highest grammar class, where “the reading matter in prose in the first semester will be taken from the more important of Cicero’s letters: Ad Familiares,21 Ad Atticum, Ad Quintum Fratrem, and in the second semester, his Laelius on Friendship (De Amicitia), On Old Age (De Senectute), Paradoxa, and the like.”22 In this class, the written exercises in the rules of syntax must be based also on Cicero’s texts.23 Cicero’s letters Ad Familiares are prescribed for the middle grammar class as well.24 The students of the lowest grammar class must start their school day by reciting parts of Cicero’s easiest letters by heart.25 The Ratio reflects what the Jesuit practice had been from the very beginning of the engagement of the Society in the ministry of teaching (1548–99). Indeed, the first Jesuit school in Messina (Sicily) opened with classes of rhetoric, oratory, and casuistry among a few others. The texts used there were Cicero’s Laelius on Friendship (De Amicitia), Quintilian’s Institutes and some readings of Livy or Suetonius for the class of rhetoric; and Cicero’s Tusculan Questions, Horace’s Art of Poetry, and Erasmus’s De verborum et rerum copia for the class of humanities.26 Grendler’s analysis of the class syllabi (catalogi lectionum) of other Italian Jesuit schools shows that the Ratio’s recommendation of Cicero unsurprisingly reflected Jesuit practice. In the second grammar class the students would have analyzed several of Cicero’s Epistulae ad familiares. In the two-year humanities class they would have read one of his moral treatises, such as Laelius on Friendship, or selections from the Epistulae ad Atticum, combined with further reading of Ad familiares. The rhetoric class would have concentrated on Cicero’s Partitiones oratoriae and one of his orations, such as Pro Milone or Pro lege Manilia.27 The students would have also read Pseudo-Cicero’s See Ratio, “Rules of the Teacher of Humanities,” # [1]. See Ibid., # [4]. 21 On the Epistulae ad familiares as prose model in the Italian Renaissance, see Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, pp. 217–22. 22 See Ratio, “Rules of the Teacher of the Highest Grammar Class,” # [1]. 23 See ibid., # [4] and [6]. 24 See ibid., # [1]–[2], [6]–[7], [10]. 25 See Ratio, “Rules of the Teacher of the Lowest Grammar Class,” # [1]–[2]. 26 See Allan Farrell, The Jesuit Code of Liberal Education. Development and Scope of the Ratio Studiorum (Milwaukee, 1938), p. 38. 27 From other sources, such as Jesuit speeches, we learn that other of Cicero’s orations were the subject of analysis in the classroom. F. Benci’s speech to his students in the Roman College explains why it is worth to study Cicero: “Pro P. Sextio: Cum in ea, Auditores, quae ornate ac sapienter a M. Tullio dicuntur hoc libro, oculos animumque converto, sive dictionem ipsam considero, sive res quae dictione explicantur, sic statuo, nihil reperiri omnino, quod homini Rhetoricae antiquitatis, humanitatis studioso, venire posset in mentem, cuius hic non et plurima et praeclara maxime vestigia cernantur. In eodem prato (ut vetus sententia est) bos herbam 19 20

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Rhetorica ad Herennium,28 a text that with the humanist Gasparino Barzizza (1359–1431) marked the revival of the classical rhetoric in the Renaissance.29 Hence one must observe the remarkable number of hours the Jesuit students (and professors) spent in contact with classical authors, and especially Cicero, through all classes of the school curriculum. If one considers that the class met daily for five hours approximately 270 days in the calendar year, with a two-week vacation, a student who went through all five years of the preuniversity curriculum would have spent about 6,750 hours in the company of the classics. This amount would increase if we took into consideration the readings during students’ leisure time (Ciceronian otium literatum), the theater activities, and other celebratory occasions of school life, in which classical texts were often used. In sheer contrast with Calvinist schools appears the place not assigned by the Jesuit Ratio to the study of the Bible and Church Fathers, who—albeit not explicitly excluded—were not part of the curriculum. Indeed, the Ratio quotes the Bible and Church Fathers only once (in the chapter on the prefect of studies and professor of Sacred Scripture) vis-à-vis Cicero, who is mentioned in the text at least 33 times. Indeed, it is hard to find biblical quotations in Jesuit humanistic speeches by Pedro Juan Perpiñan (1530–66), Francisco Benci (1542–94),30 or Giulio Negrone (1553–1625). The preeminence of Cicero was also emphasized by many leading Jesuit humanists of the second half of the Cinquecento and beyond. The converso Diego de Ledesma (1519–75) in his De Ratione et Ordine Studiorum Collegii Romani (1568)31—written in collaboration with his confrere Perpiñan— underscored that “whatever is dictated by the teacher ought to be directed as much as possible to the imitation of Cicero.”32 The Elizabethan martyr Edmund Campion (1540–81)33 stated in his treatise on imitation that “I do not hold that profit will be derived only from Cicero’s volumes, but I believe that in reading other authors one should be a critic, in reading Cicero, a disciple.”34 In his speech De imitatione et laudibus Ciceronis (1582), the quaerit, canis leporem, ciconia lacertum. In hoc uno eodemque volumine, inveniet, summa sua cum voluptate, pari cum utilitate coniuncta, et orationis illustrandae cupidus lumina, et indagator veteris historiae, reique publicae Romanae, praecipua capita, quae ad eam pertinent; et earum amator literarum, quae dicuntur ab homine, politissimam quamque liberalemque doctrinam (Francesco Benci, ‘Orationes & carmina: quae partim nvnqvam antehac, partim in Germania nunc primum in lucem prodierunt: orationvm singvlarvm argumentum, pagina quae primam orationem antecedit proxime, indicabit: his demum subiuncta est eiusdem de stylo & scriptione disputatio,’” Ingolstadii, 1592), p. 164). See also his speech Post ferias Paschales, cum esset aggressurus orationem in L. Pisonem (ibid., pp. 174–82). 28 Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, pp. 378–9. 29 Ibid., p. 208. 30 See DHCJ, vol. 1, pp. 405–6. 31 See ibid., vol. 3, pp. 2318–9. 32 Mon Paed., pp. 338–453. 33 See DHCJ, vol. 1, pp. 617–18. 34 See Farrell, Jesuit Code, p. 179.

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Genovese Giulio Negrone proposed, in the name of the students of rhetoric at Padua, to erect a commemorative tablet dedicated to Cicero—prince of the human eloquence (humanae facundiae princeps).36 In his official Jesuit textbook De Arte Rethorica (1562), a standard text that was used in Jesuit schools for more than 200 years, Cipriano Soáres quoted the Roman rhetorician 410 times against 119 references for Quintilian and 22 for Aristotle.37 In his Preface, Soáres praised Cicero’s books for such “solicitude, smoothness, grace, and learning that not even among Greeks is the art of speaking fitted out with more or finer precepts.”38 Even Peter Canisius (1520–97)—a member of the team to open the first Jesuit school in Messina—who was deeply affected by scholastic training, praised his fellow Adriaan Adriaensens for the latter’s acquisition of Ciceronian style: “I am happy about the change of your style, my brother Adriaan, that I want to consider excellent among Ciceronians,”39 which echoes Erasmus’s Ciceronianus—“It is not great to speak like a Grammarian, but it is divine to speak like Cicero.”40 Finally, it is emblematic that the first book written in Chinese by the former Italian student of the Roman College, Matteo Ricci (1552–1610)41—the symbol of the scorned by Pascal Jesuit rhetorical principle of accommodation42—was a treatise on friendship Jiaoyou lun (1595), echoing obviously Cicero’s Laelius on Friendship (De Amicitia). It brought him, “according to his own report, more prestige and admiration among the Chinese elite than anything else he wrote, a view that is reinforced by comments made about the book by leading Ming scholars.”43 His later The Memory Palace introduced to the Chinese culture the Western rhetorical tradition of Aristotle, Quintilian, and Cicero. When Cicero’s preeminence was undermined, the Jesuits were prompt to defend it vigorously, as Bartolomé Bravo’s (1554–1607)44 De arte oratoria, ac de eiusdem exercendae ratione Tullianaque quaestiones de instauranda See DHCJ, vol. 3, pp. 2806–7, where this work is not mentioned. See Farrell, Jesuit Code, p. 179. 37 See Jean Dietz Moss, “The Rhetoric Course at the Collegio Romano in the Latter Half of the Sixteenth Century,” Rhetorica, 4, 2 (Spring 1986): 140. 38 Cyprian Soárez, Three Books on the Art of Rhetoric Taken Especially from Aristotle, Cicero, and Quintilian, trans. Lawrence J. Flynn (Gainesville, FL, 1955), p. 105. 39 Otto Braunsberger (ed.), Beati Petri Canisii, Societatis Iesu, Epistulae et acta (Friburgi Brisgoviae, 1896), vol. 1, p. 282. 40 See Desiderius Erasmus, Ciceronianus or A Dialogue on the Best Style of Speaking, in Izora Scott, Controversies Over The Imitation of Cicero in the Renaissance. With translation of letters between Pietro Bembo and Gianfrancesco Pico On Imitation and A Translation of Desiderius Erasmus, The Ciceronian (Ciceronianus) (Davis, CA, 1991), p. 25. 41 See DHCJ, vol. 4, pp. 3351–3. 42 See Letter 5 of Pascal’s Provincial Letters. 43 See Jonathan D. Spence, The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci (New York, 1984), pp. 149–51. On the folio before the preface of Feng Yingjing there is a red label that reads: “P. Mathaei Ricci de Amicitia Ciceron[is].” 44 He was also the author of Compendium M. Nizolii sive Thesauri M.T. Ciceronis (Valladolid, 1519). See DHCJ, vol. 1, p. 538. 35 36

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Ciceronis imitatione (Medina del Campo, 1596)45 and André Schott’s (1552– 1629)46 Tullianae quaestiones de instauranda Ciceronis imitatione (Antwerp, 1610)47 unquestionably prove. The same approach—oscillating between enthusiasm and moderation—can be found in the writings of other Jesuit humanists, Francesco Benci (De Stylo et Scriptione), Jacob Pontanus [Spanmüller] (1542–1626):48 Progymnasmata Latinitatis (Ingolstadt, 1588–94),49 Antonio Possevino: Bibliotheca selecta (Rome, 1593), and Melchor de la Cerda (1550–1615): Apparatus latini sermonis (Seville, 1598).50 As Grendler pointed out, “the Jesuits explicated the same texts and led the students through the same kinds of exercises that humanistic masters had, but they organized the syllabus more rigidly than their predecessors had.”51 Indeed, the organization of Jesuit syllabi and clear predilection for Cicero transparently recall the tradition of the second Ciceronian Renaissance.52 The fifteenth and sixteenth centuries witnessed a heated debate among Renaissance humanists over the role of the Roman rhetorician. Poggio Bracciolini (1380– 45 See Juan María Nuñez González, El ciceronianismo en España (Valladolid, 1993), pp. 123–4. 46 See DHCJ, vol. 4, p. 3531. 47 In it, Schott expressed a desire that Cicero laudetur, vigeat, placeat, relegatur, ametur (p. *7). The Jesuit Ciceronians quoted by Schott are Perpiñan, Benci and Pontanus. See also Paul Nelles, “Cicero and Jesuit history teaching,” Renaissance Studies 13, 2 (1999): 140–69. 48 See DHCJ, vol. 4, p. 3191. 49 “Metuendum est, ne dum in gymnasio pueris solas Ciceronis Epistolas explicamus, idem prorsus cum ingeniis, quod illi cum corporibus agre iudicemur. Est profecto merissimum aurum, est purpura, sunt gemmae, quae in tabernis Ciceronianis venalia proponuntur: et hoc uno auctore in universa lingua Latina cum verborum ubertate, tum omne genus ornamentis nullus, concordibus omnium suffragiis, censendus opulentior, quem absolutum in eloquentia artificem, et omnis elegantiae consummatum exemplar nuncupare possumus: at non omnibus illa convenient: non ad omne corpus illae tanquam vestes: non ad omnem pedem illa velut calceamenta quadrant: quia non ad quemvis captum, non ad quodvis ingenium perinde sunt accomodata: quare nec tantum inde fructum capi necesse est a pueris. … Ingentes sunt orationis in Tullio divitiae, magnifica verborum et infinita supellex: non tamen ex eodem unico quivis, et quocunque tempore, et ad omnem omnino materiam dives ac fortunatus evaserit. … Pascentur denique non Ciceronianis tantum, sed elegantissimorum praeterea auctorum, inprimisque Terentii et Plauti veluti conquisitissimis epulis: quorum amborum quanta sit post Ciceronem laus, quam idonea ad congressiones rerumque quotidianarum explicationem eloquentia, novit, qui strictum saltem utrumque attigit. … Conformanda est ad Ciceronis exemplar quantum fieri potest nostra oratio, tamen cum iudicio et delectu, non ex Caesare tantum et antiquis illis, quin etiam ex recentioribus, Plinio, Tacito, Suetonio, Quintiliano, Seneca, bellissimum quodque, et quo quisque maxime videbitur excelluisse, depromendum est (Praefatio).” These ideas concerning Cicero’s role are expressed in the dialogues 89–93 of Pontanus’s work. On Pontanus see also Marc Fumaroli, Eroi e oratori. Retorica e drammaturgia secentesche (Bologna, 1990), pp. 233–47. 50 See Sommervogel, Bibliothèque, vol. 2, col. 990–92. 51 Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, p. 377. 52 See Marc Fumaroli, L’Âge de l’Éloquence. Rhétorique et “res literaria” de la Renaissance au seuil de l’époque classique (Genève, 1980), pp. 162–202.

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1459), Paolo Cortesi (1465–1510), and Pietro Bembo (1470–1547) belonged to Nosoponus’s party of Ciceronians, who advocated the strict imitation of Cicero’s prose and were ridiculed in Erasmus’s Ciceronianus (1528). Lorenzo Valla (1406–57), Angelo Poliziano (1454–94), and Gianfrancesco Pico (1470–1533) called for an eclectic imitation. The majority of humanists led by Barzizza and Guarino Veronese (1374–1406) followed the Ciceronian party, attracted mainly by Cicero’s stress on honor, family and patria, values dear to the Italian Renaissance.53 In his De ordine docendi et discendi (1459), Battista Guarino (1434–1513) required the students to learn Cicero’s letters by heart so they “would acquire elegance of style, purity of language, and profundity of thought.” In the list of Latin classics taught by Venetian teachers in 1587–88, Cicero’s texts would have been taught by 162 teachers in contrast to 94 teaching Virgil, 46 Terence, 36 Horace, 13 Ovid, 11 Aristotle and ten Caesar.54 Following further the Italian Humanistic tradition, the Jesuits would have found in Cicero not only a good style to imitate, but also the social utility of rhetoric, as we shall see below. The humanist Guarino of Verona affirmed that “all the other arts and disciplines needed rhetoric’s aid: the military art needed rhetoric in order to inflame the soldiers, politics needed the help of rhetoric in order to inspire respect for institutions, and philosophy needed rhetoric to make abstruse material attractive.”55 The Jesuit priest-orators could have added that their ministries of preaching and confessing needed rhetoric in order to announce the kingdom of Heaven.56 The Jesuit schoolmasters, who were committed to educate boys as future good citizens, may have been inspired moreover by George of Trebizond’s (1396–1486) definition of rhetoric as “the civil science by which we speak in civil questions with the assent, as much as possible, of the listeners.”57 No classical writer’s thinking was as closely connected with the exigencies of civic life as Cicero’s, who stated in his De officiis that “more fruitful to mankind and more suitable to greatness and renown are the lives of those who apply themselves to statecraft and to great enterprises,” and in Somnum Scipionis he highlighted that “nothing on this earth is more agreeable to God than life as lived in the civitates.”58

53 See Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, p. 215 and James J. Murphy, “Introduction,” in Peter Ramus, pp. xv–xxxi. See also, Benci, Orationes & carmina, pp. 168–70. 54 Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, p. 204. 55 Ibid., p. 208. 56 See Marc Fumaroli, “Rhetoric, Politics, and Society: From Italian Ciceronianism to French Classicism,” in James J. Murphy (ed.), Renaissance Eloquence. Studies in the Theory and Practice of Renaissance Rhetoric (Berkeley, 1983), p. 254. 57 John Monfasani, George of Trebizond: A Biography and a Study of His Rhetoric and Logic (Leiden, 1976), p. 208: “Rhetorica est civilis scientia qua cum assensione auditorum quoad eius fieri potest in civilibus quaestionibus dicimus.” 58 See Hans Baron, “Cicero and the Roman Civic Spirit in the Middle Ages and the Early Renaissance,” John Rylands Library 22 (1938): 72–97.

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This is precisely why the Italian and later the Jesuit humanists gave primacy to Cicero’s letters, which not only taught rhetorical skills, but also were filled with civic values.59 Loyola’s secretary Polanco argued for founding Jesuit schools by highlighting these values: “those who are now only students will grow up to be pastors, civic officials, administrators of justice, and will fill other important posts to everybody’s profit and advantage.”60 Thus, when the Jesuits opened their school in Tivoli (1550), they gave reason for it by saying they did so “for the advantage of the city” (ad civitatis utilitatem). The same motivation was brought up in the founding of the school in Murcia (Spain) five years later.61 In his dedication to Tullianarum Quaestionum, the Jesuit Schott wrote to his compatriot senators that there are two valuable things in a republic—a good education of youth and eloquence, because “without that early education no one can become an orator in order to appease the civil discords, reunite the separated, and narrate the glory of the fathers.”62 When the Ciceronian union of citizen and orator was undermined by the French humanist Pierre de la Ramée (Ramus) in his Quaestiones Brutinae (1547),63 the Jesuits followed the intense opposition of other fellow Ciceronians.64 Influential in this discussion may have been the friendship between the Jesuit professor of rhetoric Pedro Perpiñan and the famous French humanist at the Roman university La Sapienza, Marc-Antoine Muret (1526–85).65 Pedro Perpiñan66 (about whom much will be said soon), who was described by the Jesuit historian and rhetoric teacher, Francesco Sacchini (1570–1625),67 as an exemplar of the union of Christian virtue and Ciceronian rhetoric— Christiana Perpiniani mens, ore potens Tulliano—explained well the aim of the Jesuit humanistic education of the Christian gentleman in an inaugural address at the Jesuit Royal University of Coímbra (Portugal) in 1555: Nothing would be more disastrous to our own ideals and to the expectations of our own patrons, if, forgetful of our very name and the dedication of ourselves to God, we should attempt to draw youth to us by means of teaching grammar, rhetoric, dialectic and philosophy, unless these were directed to that one end of all our endeavors, the inculcation of Christian virtue. Many of you indeed perceive that learning is not by See Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, p. 221. Epp. Ign., vol. IV, p. 9. See also O’Malley, First Jesuits, p. 213. 61 See ibid., pp. 210–11. 62 Schott, Tullianarum Quaestionum, p. *2. 63 See Murphy, Peter Ramus. On Ramus and Ramism see also Walter J. Ong, Ramus. Method, and the Decay of Dialogue. From the Art of Discours to the Art of Reason (Cambridge, MA, 1958); Marc Fumaroli, “The Fertility and the Shortcomings of Renaissance Rhetoric: The Jesuit Case,” in John W. O’Malley (ed.), The Jesuits. Cultures, Sciences, and the Arts 1540–1773 (Toronto, 1999), p. 92. 64 See J.H.M. Salmon, “Cicero and Tacitus in Sixteenth-Century France,” American Historical Review 1980 85(2): 314–7. 65 Benci, Orationes & carmina, p. 169. See also Muret’s funeral orations by Benci, ibid., pp. 219–36, and especially p. 230. 66 On Perpiñan, who was most likely a converso, see, Scaduto, L’epoca di Giacomo Laínez. L’azione, pp. 296–304 and DHCJ, vol. 4, pp. 3099–100. 67 See DHCJ, vol. 4, p. 3458. 59 60

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nature estranged from even the perfection of virtue; nay more, that in the instruction of youth it is of paramount importance that the two should go hand in hand. But in Christian republics there have ever been two sorts of individuals striving with noble effort to compass the perfection of learning. The one sort, captivated by the very appeal of learning and its seeming selfsufficiency, strains every nerve to acquire subtlety in argument, power and fecundity in speech, and the inner secrets of science. The other, dedicated to promoting the interests of the common weal, seeks only to cultivate the useful arts, believing that in so doing he will at once win the plaudits of glory and fulfill the highest call of integrity, but withal forgetting or obscuring the evident claims of Christian virtue. Both of these classes of individuals are in error. Thus you see, I take it, the great necessity we have to unite and harmonize knowledge and virtue; and you see as well the direful consequences of their dissension and disunion. Indeed, if learning is allied to virtue, it is potent to form the youthful mind, to recall it from sin and shame, to safeguard religion itself; but alone it is powerless to instruct or improve, and oftentimes it thus becomes the worst enemy of religion. This the Society of Jesus understands clearly, and understanding it seeks with all its strength and tenacity of purpose to direct its work of the classroom to the formation of learned men surely, but withal of men who have imbibed and made their own the virtues worthy of Christian gentleman. This is what the Society aspires to accomplish on your behalf, this is its whole aim and endeavor, that remembering your Christian faith and profession, you will never be content with the vain glory of science alone, but will bring into perfect alliance and harmony every highest virtue and the best of learning.68

In the same spirit another gifted Jesuit orator and editor of Marc-Antoine Muret’s and Perpiñan’s speeches, Francesco Benci, argued that “at the price of labor, labor, I say, most noble young men, God has sold mortals, just like all goods, wisdom, the most desirable of all goods, and the knowledge of those things which are contained in literature.”69 Furthermore, the Jesuits may have felt a kindred spirit with Cicero’s comprehension of withdrawal (otium) as well. For the Roman rhetorician otium was not only a source of peace and contemplation, but also of motivation and energy that spurred one into the active life. Perhaps an echo of this approach can be found in the Jesuit ideal of “contemplative likewise in action” (contemplativus simul in actione) formulated by Jerónimo Nadal,70 68 Quoted in Farrell, Jesuit Code, pp. 113–14. See also Juan Bonifacio, Pueri Institutio Adolescentiaeque Perfugium, authore Ioanne Bonifacio Societatis Iesu Sacerdote (Tokyo, 1978, 1588). 69 “Labore labore, inquam, Adolescentes nobilissimi, vendidit Deus mortalibus, ut bona omnia, bonorum omnium praestantissimam sapientiam, et rerum cognitionem, earum quae litteris continentur” (Benci, Orationes et carmina (Romae, 1590), p. 82. See also Benci’s oration “De vitae integritate coniungenda cum eloquentia” delivered at the Roman College, ibid., p. 128: “Nos ab nostro Gymnasio exclusos esse volumus, si qui sunt (nullos esse speramus, cupimus quidem certe) quos ignava ac turpis vita delectat.” See also Yasmin Annabel Haskell, Loyola’s Bees. Ideology and Industry in Jesuit Latin Didactic Poetry (Oxford, 2003), p. 15. 70 See my review of A. Demoustier, La trasmission de l’experiénce. Le rapport de Jéróme Nadal á Ignace de Loyola (Paris, 1999), Manresa 73 (2001): 435–7.

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who used to remind his Jesuit fellows across Europe that they were not monks (in the medieval sense of men dedicated to otium monacale). Even after the early Jesuit ideal of the itinerant preacher had been modified by the immobility of place (immobilitas loci) of the Jesuit schoolmaster, Cicero’s interpretation of otium—picked up by Coluccio Salutati (1331–1406), Pier Paolo Vergerio (1370–1444), Leonardo Bruni (1370—1444), Paolo Giustiniani (1476–1528), and other Renaissance humanists71—may have been of a special consolation to the Jesuit “worker-bees,”72 who were spending hours in the solitude of their rooms, preparing classes and dedicating themselves to didactic, literary or scientific activities.73 This understanding of Cicero’s otium was in stark contrast with the interpretation given to it earlier by Ambrose (340ca.–97) and Jerome (340ca.– 420), who saw in Cicero “not the active Roman politician but the Stoic sage who advocated otium, or withdrawal from the world in order to contemplate the world philosophically.”74 That became a medieval ideal, as we can perceive it from the opening of Aquinas’s Summa, where the Angelic Doctor defines theology as a “contemplative” discipline. Despite the Jesuits’ admiration for Thomas, they would have not bought his intellectualistic approach to learning.75 The aim of Jesuit—and Erasmus’s—theology was to move hearts to love and serve God.76 The Jesuit plan of studies was directed to their ministries, as was

See Baron, Cicero and the Roman Civic Spirit, p. 17–23. I borrowed this expression from Haskell’s Loyola’s Bees. See also my review of it in AHSI 74 (2005): 507–8. 73 It is also possible that in his definition of “contemplativus simul in actione,” Nadal was inspired by the following Senecan text (Ad Serenum de otio, part V): “Duas res publicas animo complectamur: alteram magnam et vere publicam, qua dii atque homines continentur, in qua non ad hunc angulum respicimus aut illum, sed terminos civitatis nostrae cum sole metimur; alteram, cui nos ascripsit condicio nascendi. Haec aut Atheniensium erit aut Carthaginiensium aut alterius alicuius urbis, quae non ad omnes pertineat homines, sed ad certos. Quidam eodem tempore utrique reipublicae dant operam, maiori minorique; quidam tantum minori, quidam tantum maiori. Huic maiori reipublicae et in otio deservire possumus, immo vero, nescio an in otio melius, ut quaeramus quid sit virtus, una pluresne sint, natura an ars bonos viros faciat; unum sit hoc quod maria terrasque et mari ac terris inserta complectitur, an multa eiusmodi corpora deus sparserit, continua sit omnis et plena materia ex qua cuncta gignuntur, an diducta et solidis inane permixtum; quae sit dei sedes, opus suum spectet an tractet, utrumne extrinsecus illi circumfusus sit an toti inditus; immortalis sit mundus an inter caduca et ad tempus nata numerandus. Haec qui contemplatur quid deo praestat? Ne tanta eius opera sine teste sit! Solemus dicere summum bonum esse secundum naturam vivere: natura nos ad utrumque genuit: et contemplationi rerum et actioni!” [emphasis mine]. 74 See Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy, p. 216 referring to Baron. 75 See John W. O’Malley, “Renaissance Humanism and the Religious Culture of the First Jesuits,” Heythrop Journal 31 (1990): 477. 76 See W. David Myers, “Humanism and Confession in Northern Europe in the Age of Clement VII,” in Kenneth Gouwens and Sheryl E. Reiss (eds), The Pontificate of Clement VII. History, Politics, Culture (Aldershot, 2005), especially pp. 371–8. 71 72

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the Ciceronian (or even Senecan) philosophical contemplation (otium) aimed at the action of the orator.77 The second generation of Jesuits, then, may have felt uncomfortable hearing about the account of St. Jerome’s dream, in which he saw himself in front of the judgment seat of Christ saying: “You are not a Christian, but a disciple of Cicero.” No Jesuit would have repeated Jerome’s prayer: “Lord, if I ever had worldly books and read them, I’d deny you.”78 The French philosopher, Michel de Montaigne (1533–92), was right, therefore, in stating that the Jesuit educational system was a part of a long-running Renaissance.79 It is impossible not to imagine that years of close contact with Cicero’s writings, which the Jesuit students read, analyzed, dictated, discussed, translated and memorized “with great avarice,”80 may have changed the Jesuit mindset and subsequently produced the re-definition of their approach to ethics, which had revolutionary consequences, especially in the internal fore of sacramental confession. The marriage between rhetoric and casuistry comes to light from the epistemological foundations of the Ciceronian rhetoric—the theory of probability. The next paragraph will indicate that the leading Jesuit teachers of rhetoric were fully conscious of this framework. Ciceronian Probability The converso Jesuit Soáres’s exposition of the rhetorical invention in his De arte rhetorica pointed to the interdependence between not only rhetoric and logical reasoning, but also rhetoric and casuistical reasoning. The aim of an orator, who for Cicero was at the same time philosopher and statesman, was to devise a plausible cause, using true or very probable arguments, which could serve to establish confidence in a doubtful case.81 The arguments can be intrinsic or extrinsic: Some arguments are inherent in the very nature of the subject under discussion; wherefore, they are termed intrinsic. Others, brought in from outside the subject, are called extrinsic because they are removed and widely separated from the subject being discussed. For example, if you say that eloquence is the art of speaking well, the reason is intrinsic to the subject, for eloquence is the art of speaking well. But if you say that eloquence should be sought because Aristotle, Cicero, or Plato thought so, the reason will be extrinsic, for the authority of these men is not contained

77 See Cicero, De Oratore, XIX, 69. See also Marc Fumaroli, L’età dell’eloquenza. Retorica e “res letteraria” dal Rinascimento alle soglie dell’epoca classica (Milano, 2002), p. 47. 78 See Schott, Tullianae quaestiones, pp. 97–108. 79 See Fumaroli, “Fertility and the Shortcomings,” p. 93. 80 Mon Paed., p. 270. 81 See Soáres, De arte rhetorica, vol. 1, p. 7: “Inventio est excogitatio rerum verarum, aut verisimilium, quae quaestionem probabilem reddant” and ibid., p. 13: “Argumentum est probabile inventum ad faciendam fidem, vel aliter, est ratio rei dubiae faciens fidem.”

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in the very nature of eloquence which should be desired for its own sake without their recommendation.82

Cicero collected the extrinsic proofs in his Topica under the term of “testimony,” where “testimony means everything that is drawn from an extrinsic source to persuade.”83 This collection of arguments cannot be used, however, without discrimination, for decisive proof do not always or in all cases come from the same sources. The prudent man will use discretion, then, and he will not only discover what to say but will weight it. There is nothing more fertile than minds, particularly those which have been cultivated by training. But as fruitful and fertile fields bring forth not only useful crops but also weeds most harmful to these crops, so now and then frivolous or irrelevant, or useless arguments rise from those topics. … We must bear in mind that material is sought from these topics for convincing audience and for arousing their emotions.84

As Prentice A. Meador Jr. has aptly shown, the clue to understand Cicero is his concern with living the good life, the root of which is the question: “are men always able to act on the basis of complete knowledge and truth or should they sometimes act on the basis of probability and expediency?”85 In his Academica, Cicero states—following Philo (159–84 BCE) and with him the Carneadean86 tradition influenced by Pyrrhonistic87 skepticism—that probability is an alternative basis for practical conduct. Meador concludes, then, that Cicero’s theory of probability is “one of the greatest watersheds of classical thought.”88 The Jesuit probabilists would subscribe to Cicero’s description of the Academy: “We are the men who wish to discover the truth and our discussion has no other purpose than to force to the surface the truth or what most nearly approaches it [emphasis mine].”89 Whence it can be inferred that Cicero understood probability as a resemblance to the truth—veri-similitudo, as did Socrates in Plato’s Phaedrus.90 Cicero contrasted his view with that of the dogmatists (who had the same features of later medieval, Jansenist, and early Soárez, Three Books on the Art of Rhetoric, pp. 141–2. Ibid., p. 164. 84 It is possible that the differentiation of extrinsic and intrinsic probability made by Vázquez in the field of casuistry (that we shall see in the next chapter) had its roots in classical rhetoric. 85 Prentice A. Meador, Jr., “Skeptic Theory of Perception: a Philosophical Antecedent of Ciceronian Probability,” Quarterly Journal of Speech 54 (1968): 340–41. 86 Carneades of Cyrene (214/213–129/128 BCE) was head of the Academy in midto-late second century and founder of the “New Academy.” 87 Its founder was Pyrrho, a Greek philosopher, who died in 270 BCE. 88 Meador, “Skeptic Theory,” p. 341. 89 Cicero, De partitione oratoria, quoted by Meador, “Skeptic Theory,” p. 348. On the deep concern with the issues of skepticism, doubt and certitude in the religious disputes of the sixteenth century, see Charles B. Schmitt, Cicero Scepticus. A Study of the Influence of the Academica in the Renaissance (The Hague, 1972), pp. 58–66. 90 “Probability (to eikos) happens to spring up within the people (tois pollois) on account of its resemblance (homoioteta) to the truth” [273a]. 82 83

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Jesuit tutiorists), who maintained that to deny certainty in knowledge destroys all activity of life, when he stated that “the lack of a probable would rather be an eversio omnis vitae, but the wise man accepts what seems probable, providing nothing appears contradictory to the probability, and so keeps in a straight course his whole life.”91 This epistemological acceptance of probability by Cicero had implications for his theory of rhetoric. It became socially necessary as an instrument by which man admits propositions as true upon arguments or proofs that are found to persuade him to receive them as true, without certain knowledge that it is so.92 For him, rhetorical argument is “a plausible (probabile) device to obtain belief.”93 Rhetorical principles lack universality because the rhetorical act is situationally conditioned: “Probabilities are obtained from the parts or members of the statement; these deal with persons, places, times, actions, occurrences—the natures of the actual facts and transactions.”94 Douglas F. Threet went even further in stating that probability, although a philosophical notion, was placed by Cicero as “the foundation for an interlinking relationship of the orator-message-audience” in his rhetorical system.95 Ciceronian probability, as Threet has shown, is not constrained to his few philosophical works—namely to De natura deorum and Academica, which Meador had already analyzed from this angle—but it permeates Cicero’s writings “as a virile and germane philosophical concept,” for he decisively unifies rhetoric, civil duties, and philosophy. Cicero’s orator is a “composite of the philosopher-statesman-orator,”96 who cannot act based on knowledge of infallible truth. He has to make wise decisions guided by probabilities, which “in some cases carry their own weight intrinsically, and in others even if they seem to be slight in themselves nevertheless go a long way when combined together.”97 Cicero’s civic experience led him to conclude that for all of the issues disputed among men, whether the matter is criminal, as a charge of outrage, or a civil proceeding, as one relating to an inheritance, or a discussion of policy, as one touching a war, or of a personal kind as a panegyric, or a philosophical debate, as on the way to live, there is not one

91 Meador, “Skeptic Theory,” p. 348 and Salmon, “Cicero and Tacitus,” p. 311. It is interesting to note that the Ciceronian concept of the wise man quoted above seems to differ from the tutioristic one. Ciceronian wisdom means mental flexibility in contextualizing any situation; the tutioristic wisdom means rather cautiousness, as the content of the Jesuit Directory’s chapter on prudentia would suggest. 92 Meador, “Skeptic Theory,” p. 349. 93 Ibid., p. 351. 94 Ibid. 95 Douglas F. Threet, “Rhetorical Function of Ciceronian Prrobability,” The Southern Speech Communication Journal 39 (Summer 1974): 309–21. 96 Threet, “Rhetorical Function,” pp. 309, 312, and 314. 97 Cicero, De Partitione Oratoria, xi, 40, quoted by Threet, “Rhetorical Function,” p. 314. Vázqez’s distinction between extrinsic and intrinsic Probabilism strikingly echoes this Ciceronian passage.

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of which the point is not either what has been done, or what is being done, or going to be done, or as to the nature or description of something.98

The source of probabilities by which the Ciceronian orator should convince the audience is to be sought in the opinions, customs, and ordinary beliefs of mankind: “That is probable which for the most part usually comes to pass or which contains in itself some resemblance to these qualities whether such resemblance be true or false.”99 However, this way of approaching reality is not, in Cicero’s view, restricted to orator’s duties. It should be characteristic of any wise and reasonable man. That idea clearly emanates from On Duties (De officiis), Cicero’s most important work through the centuries,100 which was indicated in the previous chapter as inspirational (although in different ways) for Polanco and Lessius: Can you imagine the sort of mind a man would have, or rather the sort of life he would lead, if he were completely debarred rational discussion and a rational way of life? There are those who say that some things are certain and others uncertain. I disagree with them: I would say that some things are probable and others improbable. Is there anything, then, to prevent me from pursuing what seems probable and rejecting the reverse? Surely by avoiding over-bold assertion one reduces the risk of being irrational, which is the very negation of philosophy. The very reason why we Academics question the certainty of everything is that the probability, which I have mentioned, could not come to light except from a comparative analysis of the arguments on both sides.101

As we shall see in the next chapter, the Jesuits—the early modern neoAcademics—made one step beyond Cicero, not only denying the over-bold certainty of medieval Tutiorism of the first Jesuit generation by choosing Ciceronian probability, but also following Medina’s Probabilism by allowing the penitent to follow even a less plausible opinion. In the late seventeenth century, some Jesuits, after the turmoil of the tutioristic Jansenists, would make a step back to Probabiliorism, but they would never go back to the tutioristic position of the first generation. For instance, the great opponent of Jansenism, René Rapin (1620–87),102 in his Reflexions sur la philosophie ancienne et moderne (1676) would employ Cicero’s academic skepticism towards the limits of human knowledge—the epistemological framework for his theory of probability—to argue with the former Jesuit student René Descartes (1596–1650). Rapin would highlight Cicero’s point that we cannot have certain knowledge, but we do have fallible probable opinions. A proof of it would be that Cicero translated Carneades’s 98

Cicero, De Oratore, II, xxiv, 104 quoted by Threet, “Rhetorical Function,”

p. 315. Cicero, De Inventione, I, 46, quoted by Threet, “Rhetorical Function,” p. 318. O’Malley, Four Cultures of the West, p. 132; see also Douglas Kries, “On the Intention of Cicero’s De Officiis,” Review of Politics 65.4 (Fall 2003): 375–93. 101 Cicero, De officiis, II, 7–8, quoted by Threet, “Rhetorical Function,” p. 320. 102 See DHCJ, vol. 4, p. 3291, where this work is not mentioned. 99

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pithanon as probabile and verisimile. As Maia Neto observed, “This moderate epistemic position fits well Christian anthropology of the pure nature of human beings developed by the Jesuits in opposition to the kind of Augustinianism held by some Jansenists.”103 The Ciceronian probability inherited by the Jesuits and adopted in their ethics would generate a caustic discussion with the Jansenists and would have enduring political implications, as we shall see in the last chapter. What is important to indicate here is the striking resemblance of Cicero’s instruction on how the orator should proceed (presentation of the case and the use of probable opinions in order to persuade the audience) with the way of proceeding in the Jesuit Ratio during the conference on cases of conscience, which we have seen in the first part of this chapter. The issue cannot be addressed here extensively, but the analysis of other Jesuit texts, such as commentaries on rhetorical school texts through the lens of Ciceronian probability would shed light on the extension of the process in consideration. Since the text of the Ratio was consulted over years and gathered the Jesuit educational experience from 1548 to 1599, it reflected what was actually happening in the field and, therefore, it would be sufficient here to consider it representative. However, a further confirmation of the influence of the Ciceronian employment of probability in class of rhetoric can be found in Pedro Juan Perpiñan—a leading professor of rhetoric at the Roman College. Pedro Perpiñan and the Jesuit Rhetoric at the Roman College Although “early death did him an injury,” Perpiñan’s voice can be considered authoritative for many reasons that tie together the paragraphs of this chapter. He was considered one of the most illustrious humanists of the early Society of Jesus. Born probably in a converso family of Valencia in 1530, he was trained at its Academy, renowned for the presence of the humanist Pedro Juan Nuñez (1522–1602).104 Entering the Society in 1551, Perpiñan became professor of rhetoric at the Jesuit college in Lisbon only two years later, where his colleague was Cipriano Soáres, the author of the De arte rhetorica, mentioned above, which Perpiñan would later polish for its second publication.105 In 1555, he passed to the newly opened College of Coímbra in Portugal, at the opening of which Perpiñan delivered an oration on the aim of Jesuit education (quoted above). After his apparently successful oration at the funeral of Prince Luis (1506–55)—perhaps the first Jesuit humanistic oration that marked the progress of the Jesuit literary Renaissance—he was appointed in 1557–59 103 José R. Maia Neto, “Academic Skepticism in Early Modern Philosophy,” Journal of the History of Ideas 58.2 (1997): 203–5. See also Fumaroli, L’età dell’eloquenza, p. 35. 104 Pedro Juan Nuñez taught Greek, logic, philosophy, and rhetoric at the University of Valencia 1548–63. See Enciclopedia Universal Ilustrada Europeo-Americana (Madrid, 1990–), vol. 39, p. 130. 105 See Chron., vol. 5, p. 595.

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court preacher to Queen Elisabeth, whom he lauded in his orations delivered on the occasion of Queen’s birthdays. Meanwhile he was teaching humanities at Coímbra. In 1561 Perpiñan was transferred to the Roman College, where he taught rhetoric for four years. During his Roman sojourn, he participated in the discussions over the Jesuit education system with his converso confreres: Manuel Sá (future author of the probabilistic Aphorismi), Francisco de Toledo (future author of the most printed Jesuit manual for confessors—Instructio sacerdotum), and Diego de Ledesma, who would compose a preliminary Ratio studiorum—De ratione et ordine Studiorum Collegii Romani. Perpiñan’s most relevant contribution to the Ratio was the rules for the distribution of scholastic awards. In 1565 he moved to Lyons and then to Paris, where he participated in the heated discussion with the French Parliament and the University of Paris over the presence of the Jesuits at Clermont. On this occasion, he confronted the famous French humanist Ramus, whose anti-Ciceronian rhetoric the Jesuits opposed vigorously, as we have seen above. While the ashes of the anti-Jesuit dispute were still burning, he died at the age of 36. Perpiñan was famous not only for his qualities as teacher of rhetoric, but also as one of the most accomplished European orators. Besides his humanistic orations in Portugal, he drew attention to his talent in the orations delivered at the Roman College: De arte rhetorica discenda (1561), De officio Christiani Doctoris (1562), and others. In his Variae Lectiones, the arbiter elegantiarum of neo-Latin Roman prose, Marc-Antoine Muret106—a friend of Perpiñan and master of another Jesuit humanist Francesco Benci107 at the Roman university La Sapienza—compared the Jesuit orator to Homeric Nestor: “For I have never heard anybody, and I think you will not even hear one to whom the famous epithet of Nestor better applies: ‘From whose mouth used to flow words sweeter than honey.’” No wonder, a collection of his 22 orations was soon published.108 In its Preface, Benci declared Perpiñan precursor of the Christian literary Renaissance. The fame of the first Jesuit humanistic orator remained vivid in the next Jesuit generations of literati, as the Palatium Rhetoricae by Johannes Kosmas Michael Denis (1729–1800)109 shows. In it, an adolescent at the beginning of his training in rhetoric is guided in his dream by Cicero and encounters, among other famous classic and contemporary orators, our Perpiñan.110

106 On Muret as the promoter of the second Ciceronian Renaissance, see Marc Fumaroli, L’Âge de l’Éloquence, pp. 162–75. 107 On the friendship Muret-Benci and its aftermath see ibid., pp. 176–9. 108 Petri Joanni Perpiniani Orationes duodeviginti juxta exemplar Romae editum (Paris, 1588). The collection was reprinted, for example, in Lyon (1594, 1603, 1606, 1622), Douvai (1598, 1608), and Rouen (1611). 109 See DHCJ, vol. 2, p. 1081. 110 See Michael Denis, Carmina quaedam (Wien, 1794): “Hic ubi constitimus, niveis in vestibus adsunt/ Indigenae, Crassus, divini Hortensius oris,/ Plinius, Isocrates, et, quem stupuistis, Athenae/ Perpinianus, item Muretus, tuque, Sigoni!”

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During his stay in Rome, Perpiñan probably composed a treatise on rhetoric, De oratore, a manuscript of which was consulted by his biographer Gaudeau,111 but today is unavailable. Its content described by Gaudeau can be compared with another manuscript attributed to Perpiñan, which was the subject of an article by Jean Dietz Moss in 1986.112 According to Moss, Perpiñan’s De arte rhetorica (FC 1563) is likely a collection of student lecture notes on Soáres’s text. A comparison of this manuscript with another one (APUG 1179), coming from the same archives of the Roman College (today’s Gregorian University) and until now unpublished, sheds, however, more light on the former. The content would suggest that it is notes on lectures given by a professor of rhetoric in 1563, most likely Perpiñan, as the second-hand inscription reads on the front page of both manuscripts. The manuscript FC 1563 contains three marked books: 1. De arte rhetorica; 2. De Oratore; and 3. Quibus rebus comparetur eloquentia. Each book corresponds to a different part of the course of rhetoric. From the introduction to the first part, we learn that this general portion is divided into seven chapters: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

De nomine artis rhetoricae; De origine et progressu rhetoricae ac eloquentiae; Quid sit rhetorica; De materia, fine et officio rhetoricae; An rhetorica sit ars, an scientia, an virtus; Similitudines et dissimilitudines logicae atque rhetoricae; De utilitate artis rhetoricae.

The order of the notes is slightly changed from the order in the introduction, however. The last two chapters are included in Chapter 5 and the last comes before the penultimate. In the introduction, the professor informs the students that he previously lectured them on the dignity and necessity of rhetoric, and that this part of the course is indispensable to learn the precepts of rhetoric contained in Cicero’s Partitiones [oratoriae] that the students would analyze immediately after this introductory part. The content of this section corresponds partially to Soáres’s De arte rhetorica published just a year earlier and polished by Perpiñan for the second edition in 1565, but the organization of the material is different. The professor does not quote Soáres’s text in his lecture, as he does the primary sources, such as Cicero’s De finibus, Partitiones oratoriae, Brutus, De Inventione, Ad Herennium, and of course De Oratore,113 and many others, such as Quintilian’s Institutiones, Virgil’s Georgics, Livy’s Ab urbe condita, Aristotle’s Rhetoric, Ethics and Metaphysics, and Alexander of Afrodisias’s Topicos. Bernard Gaudeau, De Petri Io. Perpiniani Vita et operibus (Paris, 1891). See Jean Dietz Moss, “The Rhetoric Course at the Collegio Romano in the Latter Half of the Sixteenth Century,” Rhetorica, 4, 2 (Spring 1986): 137–51. 113 To which he draws students’ attention very often by indicating a particular page, which would suggest that the students may have had available for consultation editions of Cicero’s works. 111 112

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The second book is entitled De oratore and treats the following issues: De materia oratoris, de quaestione eiusque generibus (Chapter 2 [sic for 1]); An infinitae quaestiones pertineant ad oratorem an non (3); Sintne tria genera causae, an pauciora, an plura (4); Dicendane sint genera rhetoricae an potius genera causarum (5); De fine et officio oratoris (6), De eloquentia (7), and Pluresne sint an pauciores eloquentiae partes. The third and last book of the manuscript asks Quibus rebus comparetur eloquentia and is dedicated to rhetorical inventio. A synoptic look at both manuscripts (FC 1563 and APUG 1179) betrays other circumstances in which Similitudines et dissimilitudines from the introductory part De arte rhetorica and the other two books may have been explained. The latter manuscript has an additional title that the former lacks: Perpiniani in Tertium M.T. Ciceronis librum De Oratore Annotationes. This information fits perfectly the program of the Jesuit studies of rhetoric studied in various colleges by Grendler, as we have seen above: after the Partitiones oratoriae the Jesuit students would have analyzed one of Cicero’s orations. Of special interest for the purposes of this study is the chapter Similitudines et dissimilitudines logicae atque rhetoricae, which is not developed in Soáres’s De arte rhetorica, as it was noted above. In the text, Perpiñan begins by saying that “the aim of both rhetoric and dialectic (logic) is persuasion, which produces not a true science, but which creates faith and generates opinion. Both employ probable arguments and judgments, not the qualities of things and principles of sciences, but certain assumptions found in daily life and in human opinion.”114 The professor of rhetoric stresses more, however, the differences between the two. While logicians employ more general and common rules, orators accommodate their orations to concrete places, times and persons.115 Rhetoric should not use probable opinions, unless they are suitable to persuade many.116 Indeed, Cicero stressed in his Partitiones that “the statement will be probable, if the facts narrated are in accordance with the persons, the times and the places; if the causes of every action and occurrence are set out; if they appear to be based on evidence and to be in agreement with the judgment of mankind, and with law and custom and religion.”117 114 See FC 1563 f. 31v–32r and APUG 37v–38r: “Nam dialecticae et rhetoricae finis est persuasio, non illa quae veram scientiam gignit, sed illa quae fidem facit et excitat opinionem; utraque utitur probabilibus argumentis et sententiis non propriis rerum et scientiarum principiis, sed communibus quibusdam in consuetudine vitae et hominum opinione positis.” See also Moss, “The Rhetoric Course,” pp. 143–4. 115 See ibid.: “Itaque logici communioribus et latius patentibus pronuntiatis utuntur, oratores autem, quia ad loca, ad tempora, ad personas accomodant orationes, quae orationes rerum singularium sunt augustioribus.” 116 See ibid.: “Cum rhetorica non utatur probabilibus, nisi quia eadem apta sunt ad persuasionem popularem conficiendam.” 117 See Cicero, Partitiones oratoriae IX, 32: “Probabilis autem erit si personis, si temporibus, si locis ea quae narrabuntur consentient: si cuiusque facti et eventi causa ponentur: si testata dici videbuntur, si cum hominum auctoritate, si cum lege, cum more, cum religione coniuncta.”

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As we have observed, the text may have been treated either as an introduction to Cicero’s Partitiones oratoriae (FC 1563), or as an explanation of Cicero’s third book of De oratore (APUG 1179). At any rate, both manuscripts point toward Cicero’s rhetorical system and confirm the influence of Ciceronian probability on the Jesuit way of reasoning. The Aristotelian distinction between art and science is here clearly present, but filtered through Cicero. True, the Jesuit professors preferred to teach rhetoric on the basis of Tullius’s texts. Francesco Benci explained it explicitly in his speech on Cicero’s Pro P. Sextio. Asked, why that year he preferred Cicero over Aristotle, he compared the former to the sun of the rhetorical universe. A few lines below, as an example of Ciceronian preeminence Benci quoted our Perpiñan, whose eloquence would have been very close to that of Cicero.”118 In conclusion, the analysis we have conducted until now shows that the Jesuit leading teachers of rhetoric and their students at the Roman College—the alma mater of the Jesuit international web of education—since at least the 1560s were conscious that at the very base of Ciceronian rhetorical construction was the epistemic theory of probability. The Jesuits employed Ciceronian probability in the weekly lectures on cases of conscience, necessary for their (and other’s) training in the preeminent ministry of sacramental confession. The impact of rhetoric catalyzed the revolutionary transition from Tutiorism to Probabilism, from a medieval to a modern set of mind, in the Jesuit approach to ethics. When the Dominican Medina expressly formulated the doctrine of Probabilism in 1577, the leading Jesuit minds found it akin to their way of reasoning. Furthermore, they found themselves well prepared not only enthusiastically to adopt it but also progressively to adapt it. To begin this process were two Jesuit academics from Spain, Gabriel Vázquez and Francisco Suárez, and after them almost all the authors of manuals for Jesuit confessors that had their editorial boom between 1600 and 1630.

Benci, Orationes & carmina, pp. 166–9: “Quarum rerum umbram modo & simulacrum ostendisset se sequentibus Aristoteles, quasi in tenebris praeferens lumen; id quod quibusdam de avibus, quae in Hercynio Germaniae saltu, per densam etiam noctem raro intermicantium splendore plumarum, monstrant iter facientibus viam, vero ne an ficto sermone? Traditur: earum rerum pulcherrimam omnino speciem & formam Tullianus ille Sol, clarissima luce diffusa. Ita omnibus aperiet, ut in Rhetorico hoc, ut ita dicam, orbe, eius ope multo melius, quam Homericae Palladis, ab ipsis animis, tamquam ab oculis dispulsa caligine, omnia sint insignem quemdam visum & illustrem habitura; quae scilicet omnia, ne quid videamur gloriosius elocuti, in progressione docendi manifestius apparebunt. [Perpinianus] totum se ad Ciceronis similitudinem & fuit illi quidem eloquentia proximus.” 118

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CHAPTER 4

The Genealogy of Jesuit Probabilism The turning point in the making of the Jesuit mind arrived with the adoption and adaptation of Medina’s formula of Probabilism by the leading Iberian Jesuit thinkers—Gabriel Vázquez (1551–1604)1 and Francisco Suárez (1548–1617) in their classes on the Prima Secundae of Aquinas’s Summa, taught respectively at the College of Alcalá (1579–84) and at the Roman College (1581–85).2 Vázquez contributed to elaborating Medina’s rule by pointing out the combinations of safer/less safe and more probable/less probable opinions. Suárez (who before entering the Society studied and taught at Salamanca, as Medina did) noted the practical reflex principles of possession and promulgation. They both transformed Medina’s still cautiously formulated and vague theory into a more elaborated doctrine of Probabilism. Simultaneously and subsequently the probabilistic approach was employed in the leading Jesuit manuals for confessors and/or penitents and in the textbooks of moral theology. Thanks to the comprehensiveness of the newly published census of the Jesuit penitential literature it is now possible to investigate with more precision the process of Jesuits’ adopting, adapting and extending Probabilism. The census suggests that the most successful Jesuit probabilistic texts at the turn of the sixteenth century were: Sá’s manual for confessors, Aphorisms,3 and Juan de Azor’s first comprehensive textbook of moral theology, Moral Institutions. Whereas in the former one can trace mostly a practical employment of Probabilism, the latter provides its detailed theoretical discussion. Published first in 1600, Azor’s Institutions was printed separately in three volumes in 1 Gabriel Vázquez (1549–1604) studied philosophy at the University of Alcalá under Bañez (1565–69), where he later also taught (1579–84). In 1585 he was called to Rome to replace Suárez. In his article on Vázquez (DHCJ, vol. 4, p. 3913), J.P. Donnelly surprisingly stated that “Su [Vázquez’s] teología moral a veces se apartaba del probabilismo para refugiarse en el tutiorismo.” There is no mention of Vázquez’s elaboration of Medina’s theory. 2 Their works were published respectively in 1599 and 1621. It is interesting to note that during the years Vázquez and Suárez developed Probabilism, seven editions of Polanco’s tutioristic Directorium were published (in 1579: two in Venice, one in Rome and one in Liège; in 1581: one in Antwerp; in 1582: one in Rome (an Illyrian translation) and one in Paris. 3 Sá’s Aphorismi confessariorum, although the smallest in size, was the third most published among the Jesuit manuals, reaching at least 80 editions. It had panEuropean circulation: it was printed in Lyon and Cologne (11 editions in each), Rome (10), Brescia (9), Douai (8), Venice (7), Antwerp (5), Paris (5), Madrid, Rouen, Tarvisio and Turin (2), Alcalá, Bacelona, Pamplona and Valladolid (1). After having composed the census, I learned about the Japanese translation of Sá’s work: it was published in Nagasaki in 1605.

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folio of ca. 3,000 pages and had at least 51 editions.4 Moral Institutions was a standard text for at least three decades until Juan de Lugo published his Scholastic Disputations (1636).5 Azor, who was professor of moral theology at the Roman College, was also responsible for the final redaction of the Ratio Studiorum (1599) analyzed in the previous chapter. The probabilistic approach expressed in the Institutions must have been compromised, then, with some tutioristic/probabilioristic formulas of the Ratio, issued just one year earlier. The structure of the discussion that will occupy us through this chapter emerges from an analysis of a very intriguing list of approved authorities contained in Azor’s textbook. Although those authorities are listed chronologically and not according to their importance (that can be found in the other parts of his Institutions, where Azor deals with their opinions, discussing specific moral issues), this vast list gives us a good picture of Azor’s and his students’ class readings. The goal of providing the students with such an extensive discussion on how to make a right moral decision goes back to the very Jesuit tradition of Spiritual Exercises, aimed to prepare a person to make good life choices. 1st Class of Theologians

1130 1140 1150 1216 1200 1240 1240 1270 1270 1280 1280 1290 1290

Hugo of St. Victor Peter Lombard Richard of St. Victor Wilhelm bishop of Paris Wilhelm bishop of Auxerre Alexander of Hales Albert the Great St. Thomas St. Bonaventure Giles of Rome Innocent V Henri de Gand Richard of Middletow

1st Class of Canon Jurisprudents

1245 1255

Innocent IV Henricus de Segusio

1st Class of Civil Jurisprudents

1200 1200 1227 1526 1260 1271

Azo of Bologna Rofredus Beneventanus Accursius Florentinus Ioannes de Blanasco Odofredus Benevent. Iacobus de Belloviso

1st Class of Authors of Summae

1200 1255 1260 1290 1261 1290 1280 1271

Azonis of Bologna Henricus de Segusio Raimundus Peñaforte Ioannes de Friburgo Hugo of Barcelona Ulricus Argentinans Goffredo da Trani Guglielmus Durandus

4 The very first Jesuit manual of moral theology was Enrique Henríquez’s Theologia Moralis (1591), but it had a very constrained influence. 5 Juan de Lugo, Disputationes scholasticae, et morales, de sacramentis in genere, de venerabili Eucharistiae sacramento et de sacrosancto missae sacrificio (Lugduni, 1636).

THE GENEALOGY OF JESUIT PROBABILISM 2nd Class of Theologians

1300 1317 1320 1324 1320 1300 1350 1350 1350 1350 1390

John Duns Scotus Petrus de Aureolis Wilhelm Occkam AugustinusTriumphus Alvarus Pelagius Durandus de Sancto Portiano Petrus De Palude Gregorius Ariminensis Thomas Argentinas John Bacon Marsilius of Inguen

2ndClass of Canon Jurisprudents

1300 1340 1340 1340 1340 1354 1340 1355 1374 1383 1390 1350

Guido de Baysio Giovanni of Bologna Federico of Siena Paulus de Leazaris Oldradus de Laude Lapus de Castellione Lapus, Abbot of St. Miniati Giovanni Calderino Giovanni de Lignano Aegidius Bellamera Henricus Boich Bonifacius de Vitalinis

2nd Class of Civil Jurisprudents

1300 1300 1300 1300 1300 1300 1320 1305 1300 1320 1320 1330 1335 1350 1350 1350 1350 1350

Dynus de Muxella Pierre de Belleperche Iacobus de Arena Martinus de Sulmanis Gaufredus de Trano Richardus de Malumbris Oldradus da Ponte Jacobus de Ravani Nicolaus de Malumbra Rainerius Arsendus Iacobus Buttigarius Signoroius de Homodeis Cynus Pistoriensis Bartolo da Sassoferrato Ioannes Fabri Albericus Bergamensis Andreas de Iffernia Nicolaus Spinellus

2nd Class of Authors of Summae

1317 1317 1320

Monaldus Astensis Bartholomaeus Pisanus

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110 3rd Class of Theologians

1415 1415 1420 1420 1460 1490 1490

Johannes Capreolus Alphonsus Tostatus Jean Gerson Thomas Valdensis Dionysius Rikel Konrad Summehatt Gabriel Biel

3rd Class of Canon Jurisprudents

1442 1494 1408 1408 1410 1430 1416 1434 1434 1434 1466

Domenico di S. Gimignano Joannes A. de S. Georgio Pietro d’Ancarano Antonio da Budrio Gaspar Calderinus Giovanni d’Imola Francesco de Zabarelli Lodovico Pontano Nicolaus de Tudeschis Ioannes de Turrecremata Andreas Barbatius

3rd Class of Civil Jurisprudents

1400 1423 1400 1400 1404 1408 1420 1410 1430 1434 1434 1442 1442 1440 1466 1461 1470 1470 1470 1482 1470 1498 1499 1489 1498 1498

Baldus de Ubaldis Nellus Sancti Geminiani Angelo degli Ubaldi Petro degli Ubaldi Franciscus de Ramponib. Bartholomeus de Saliceto Benedictus de Plombino Raffaele Fulgosio Raphael Cumanus Florianus de S. Petro Paulus de Castro Guido Papae Matthaeus Matthae silan. Martinus Laudensis Martino Cipolla Martinus de Accoltis Angelus de Aretio Marianus Socinus Ioannes Bertachinus Franciscus Curtius Alessandro da Imola Giasone del Maino Ludovicus Bolgninus Antonius Corsetus Bartholomeus Bologn. Bartholomeus Socinus

3rd Class of Authors of Summae

1444 1444 1435 1443 1454 1484 1484 1454 1460

Rainerius Pisanus Petrus Casuel Ioannis Nider St. Bernardino of Siena Nicolaus de Ausmo Pacificus Navariensis Joannes B. de Salis St. Antoninus Henricus de Herp

THE GENEALOGY OF JESUIT PROBABILISM 4th Class of Theologians

1510 1515 1515 1516 1540 1550 1550 1555 1550 1550 1550 1550 1560

John Major Iacobus Almainus Thomas de Vio Cajetan Adrianus Flander Francisco de Vitoria Domingo Soto Melchor Cano Martín Ledesma Pedro Soto Juan Vigerio Juan Medina Alfonso Castro Antonio Cordoba

4th Class of Canon Jurisprudents

1502 1504 1518 1550 1515 1550 1560 1506 1518 1530 1560

Felinus Sandeus Ioannes Selva Petrus Paulus Parisius Augustinus Berous Rochus Curtius Petrus Rebuffus Didacus Covarruvias Antonius Burgos Ludovicus Gometius Fortunius Gartia Martinus Navarrus

4th Class of Civil Jurisprudents

1500 1502 1502 1502 1510 1513 1559 1519 1520 1520 1524 1523 1520 1530 1530 1546 1533 1540 1512 1520 1530 1540 1540 1546 1550 1540 1550 1550 1540 1550 1540

Lancellottus Decius Philippus Decius Paulus de Citadinis Vincentius Herculanus Thomas Parpalea Ioannes Crotus Joannes Franciscus Ripa Rupertus Maranta Paulus Orianus Carolus Ruinus Hippolitus Marsilius Joannes F. Purpuratus Udalricus Zafius Ludovicus Cozadrinus Franciscus Curtius Junior Hieronymus Cagnolus Joannes A. Rubeus Andreas Alciatus Andreas Gammarus Andreas Tyraquellus Nicolaus Boerius Bartholomeus Castaneus Aymon Cravetta Ioannes Corasius Franciscus Connanus Arias Pinellus Emanuel Costa Antonio Gomez Fortunius Garcia Hugo Donellus Ioachim Minsinger

4th Class of Authors of Summae

1525 1526 15? 1515 1560

Silvester Ioannes Tabiensis Bartholomaeus Fumus Thomas de Vio (Cajetan) Navarrus

111

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This list shows that the most consulted authors are civil jurists (81) against theologians (44), canon jurists (37), and “summists” (24). It follows that Azor adopts Probabilism with a support of juridical traditions, a tendency that would be observed especially in Francisco Suárez. In fact, Azor introduced in his work a distinction between the external and internal forum of the conscience and analyzed their relation in the process of decision-making.6 Interestingly enough, the list of early modern theologians contains all the famous Dominicans from the School of Salamanca, from Vitoria and Soto to Cano and Medina, but no Jesuit theologian is mentioned. Similarly, the list of the “summists” includes Cajetan and Azpilcueta (Navarrus), but names no Jesuit author of manuals for confessors. The information provided would imply that Probabilism as adopted and propagated by Azor at the Roman College derived from the School of Salamanca (Medina) and not from the Jesuits Sá, Vázquez, or Suárez, who had already espoused Probabilism two decades before the publication of Azor’s first volume. To show that before Probabilism entered in moral theology at the Roman College it had been already taught by the Jesuit lecturers on Aquinas’s Summa, we shall first observe in this chapter the elaborations of Medina’s proposal by Vázquez and Suárez in their commentaries on the Prima Secundae of Aquinas’s Summa. Vázquez’s and Suárez’s commentaries on Aquinas are not listed in the census of the Jesuit penitential literature, for they do not strictly pertain to that genre. Nevertheless, our discussion of Probabilism may not overlook such important contributions. Vázquez, Suárez, Sá, and Azor may have discussed their ideas about Probabilism while staying at the Roman College between 1581 and 1585. Suárez, Sá and Azor taught there simultaneously. When Vázquez arrived to replace Suárez in 1585, Sá was leaving while Azor would keep teaching at the Roman College throughout Vázquez’s stay in Rome (until 1591). Suárez and Vázquez would meet again in Alcalá in 1591, but the former would have left soon for Salamanca due to his strong differences with the latter. Vázquez arrived in Rome after teaching the course on Prima Secundae of Aquinas’s Summa in Alcalá, in which he expressed his sympathy with Medina’s Probabilism, even though his commentary would be published only after 1598 (the year of his superior’s imprimatur). Suárez would have independently taught the same course in Rome before Vázquez’s arrival. Azor does not cite Vázquez, Sá, or Suárez, but this may be due to the fact that Azor’s manual was printed earlier than Suárez’s and just one year after Vázquez’s. Given Vázquez’s and Suárez’s familiarity with the School of Salamanca, where Probabilism matured, it is reasonable to assume that both brought the new ethical sensibility to the Roman College, or at least fueled its reception in Jesuit circles after Medina’s new method had perhaps arrived there independently. Despite the title of this chapter, tracing the exact genealogy of Jesuit Probabilism, however, is not the major purpose of the present work. The main aim here is to show that by the end of the sixteenth century the leading Jesuit 6

See Azor, Institutiones, II.9.

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thinkers in philosophy, casuistry, and moral theology alike enthusiastically and swiftly adopted Probabilism, which became the dominant (if not exclusive) Jesuit ethical system through the seventeenth century, for all the leading moralists, such as Azor, Bauny, Busenbaum, Escobar y Mendoza, Figliucci, Laymann, Lessius, Juan de Lugo, Régnault, Sá, Thomas Sánchez, Suárez, and Tamburini adopted Probabilism. Rather than drawing a genealogical tree, we shall underscore in this chapter that Vázquez, Suárez, and Azor were driven by the same pastoral motivation in adopting Probabilism, although they approached Medina’s formula from slightly different angles. Another common motive for employing Probabilism was the peripatetic and Ciceronian epistemological conviction that moral decisions are most often based on probable arguments and not on speculative certitude. This pastoral intention echoes the very Jesuit (and Erasmian) spiritual tradition of combining academic speculation with practical goals of sacerdotal ministry, as we have already seen in Chapter 1 and 2. Probabilism, although elaborated in academia, had its roots in spiritual concern for the overly scrupulous and overwhelmed consciences devout penitents experienced in sacramental confession. Because confession “was a religious act in which the entire Latin Christian population of Europe engaged,”7 the potential for spiritual anguish was great indeed, as the title of Loarte’s popular Comfort of the Tormented evidently shows.8 Unlike scholastic theologians, the first Jesuits did not distinguish between speculative theology and ministry. As that most poked at target of Pascal, Escobar y Mendoza, put it, “diversity of opinions in moral matters renders the yoke of the Lord more sweet and His burden more light.”9 It is hard to agree, therefore, with Turrini, who argued that Probabilism favored the believer’s judgment only in appearance.10 To the contrary, it was predominantly intended to lighten the conscience of the penitent. The aim of this book is tracing the making of the Jesuit mind and thus it will omit how Probabilism actually entered the confessional practice. It can be argued, however, that what we shall find in the Jesuit academic speculation on Probabilism may have seriously affected the Jesuit ministry. This argument can be corroborated by an analysis of the very structure of the Roman College— the main forge of Jesuit probabilistic reasoning. In Chapter 3, we have seen how rhetorically founded probability would have influenced the adoption of probabilistic reasoning in the conferences on cases of conscience, which were precisely aimed at training the students (and even outsiders who were allowed 7

Myers, “Poor, Sinning Folk,” p. 10. Pascal interpreted the origins of Jesuit Probabilism with the words put in the mouth of a Jesuit character in his Provincial Letters (Letter 7): “[the persons] would be almost all of them excluded from our confessionals, had not our fathers relaxed a little from the strictness of religion, to accommodate themselves to the weakness of humanity.” 9 Quoted by Jonsen & Toulmin, Abuse of Casuistry, p. 168. See the opposite view by Hugo Adam Bedau, Making Mortal Choices. Three Exercises in Moral Casuistry (Oxford and New York, 1997), pp. 104–5. 10 Turrini, Coscienza e le leggi, p. 302. 8

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to participate, especially if the conference was held in a church) in the ministry of confession. By training the best subjects, the Roman College would have propagated the new ethical approach wherever in the world its students later operated. The popularity of Probabilism in the Jesuit circles beyond Rome was confirmed by the editorial success of the probabilistic Jesuit manuals of the French Valère Régnault, and the Germans Paul Laymann and Hermann Busembaum, as the census clearly shows. It became the Jesuit ethical system, as one can assume just from the fact that decades later (1673) the Jesuit Superior General Oliva prohibited the publishing of González de Santalla’s (1624–1705) probabilioristic Moral Theology, which will shall see analyzed in detail in the next chapter. Medina’s Revolutionary Ethical Solution This study relies on the consensus of historiography11 that commonly ascribes the paternity of Probabilism to the Spanish Dominican Bartolomé de Medina (1528–80), who advanced the new moral system that matured in the School of Salamanca founded by the converso Francisco de Vitoria (1480–1546).12 In his comment on Aquinas’s Summa (Prima Secundae), published first in Salamanca in 1577, Medina stated: “It seems to me that, if an opinion is probable, it is licit to follow it, even though the opposite opinion is more probable.”13 Medina’s novel ethical solution of moral doubt evolved from the Dominican reflection on the problem of uncertainty of conscience. The Spaniard Domingo de Soto (1494–1560) and the Italian Cajetan (1469–1534) had made a distinction between speculative and practical uncertainty.14 In turn, they followed the late medieval tradition of Gerson, Nider and Antoninus, as we have seen in Chapter 2. They did not consider doubting speculatively about moral principles to be sinful, whereas acting on a practical doubt, i.e. doubt of conscience in regard of the licitness of an action to be performed hic et nunc, was considered sinful. The meticulous deliberation of conscience should,

11 See Massimo Petrocchi, Il problema del lassismo nel secolo XVII (Roma, 1953), pp. 15 and 56; Albert Schmitt, Zur Geschichte des Probabilismus. Historich-kritische Untersuchung über die ersten 50 Jahre desselben (Innsbruck, 1904), pp. 5–68. 12 Vázquez commenting on Medina’s theory of Probabilism, observed that “today it is common in schools and it was also much earlier.” See Ulpiano López, “La teologia morale,” in La Compagnia di Gesú e le scienze sacre (Rome, 1942), p. 97. See also Eduardo Moore, La moral en el siglo XVI y primera mitad del XVII (Granada, 1956), pp. 45–8. 13 Bartolomé Medina, Expositio in Summae Theologiae Partem Iam IIae, q. 19, a. 6: “Mihi videtur quod si est opinio probabilis licitum est eam sequi, licet opposita probabilior sit.” 14 Medina, Expositio, q. 19, a. 6: “Advertendum est quod dubium est duplex: speculativum et practicum. Speculativum, ut cum dubito haec est mea, hic est meus fundus. Practicum, faciendum est hoc, teneor facere et unico verbo definio; practicum est quando dubio hic et nunc, operationem quam facio esse peccatum, vel non esse.”

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according to Soto and Cajetan, lead one to choose the safest among probable opinions.15 This is where Medina departed from his confreres. He posed an important question: “Are we obliged to follow a more probable opinion abandoning the probable one, or is it sufficient that we follow a probable opinion?”16 For example, what obligations confront a married woman, who at some point learns that her husband is related to her by blood in a degree prohibited by canon law for the validity of marriage, or who discovers that the previous husband, whom she considered dead, is alive? Can she have sex with her present husband without exposing herself to the sin of adultery? Conversely, if she refuses her present husband, does she sin by not fulfilling her conjugal duties? Or, what are the obligations of subjects, who, though ordered by their superior to reveal a misdeed of their colleague, nevertheless doubt the lawfulness of the superior’s order? If the subjects reveal the misdeed, they will expose the colleague to infamy, but if they do not, they might sin through disobedience.17 Medina arrived at his probabilistic conclusion based on the conviction that if we can follow a probable opinion speculatively (as Soto and Cajetan allowed) without danger of error and deception, we can also follow a probable opinion practically without danger of sinning [morally].18 Therefore, there is certainly a good reason to assert that sometimes it is licit to expose oneself to a risk of sinning mortally.19 It is licit not only to act [in good conscience] against the speculative doubt, but also against an opinion or an evident proof, as in case of a judge, who has to condemn an innocent man proved to be guilty, even if the judge acts against his own opinion and evidence.20 To understand Medina’s issue correctly, it is indispensable to know what he meant by “probable opinion.” Following the peripatetic tradition,21 by “probable” Medina meant mainly “approvable,” i.e. supported by wise men, and confirmed by very good arguments.22 It would be a contradiction if one 15 “Dico quod, quantocumque habeant plurimas rationes pro parte non tuta dummodo non habeant assensum, tenetur sequi partem tutam, licet nulla sit ratio pro illa” (quoted in Stone, Origins, p. 151). 16 Medina, Expositio, q. 19, a. 6: “Sed ex hoc nascitur magna quaestio: utrum teneamur sequi opinionem probabiliorem, relicta probabili, an satis sit sequi opinionem probabilem.” 17 See Medina, Expositio, q. 19, a. 6. 18 Ibid.: “Nam opinio probabilis in speculativis ea est, quam possumus sequi sine periculo erroris et deceptionis, ergo opinio probabilis in practicis ea est quam possumus sequi sine periculo peccandi.” 19 Ibid.: “Sed certe videtur et magno argumento, quod aliquando liceat homini exponere se periculo peccandi mortaliter.” Medina thinks here about the sin from the material point of view—one assumes the risk of performing a materially evil action but not a morally evil action (see below). 20 Ibid.: “Non solum licitum est agere contra dubium speculativum, sed etiam contra opinionem et contra evidentem scientiam, nam iudex contra propriam scientiam et evidentiam tenetur condemnare innocentem probatum nocentem, secundum allegata et probata ..., quemadmodum licitum est agere contra opinionem propriam.” 21 Medina quotes here Aristotle’s Topics and Ethics. 22 Medina, Expositio, q. 19, a. 6: “Ea opinio probabilis est quam asserunt viri sapientes et confirmant optima argumenta.”

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could not licitly follow an opinion that is approvable. Probable opinion is also an opinion supported by correct reason.23 An opinion against reason is called error and not probable opinion.24 It is, therefore, clear that Probabilism is not about following just any opinion, as Jasnsenists would later suggest.25 Certainly, questions remain what relative weight to give to intrinsic reasonable arguments and the extrinsic arguments of wise men. What makes an opinion reasonable and “apparently reasonable?” This qualification is still vague in Medina’s discussion. It would be left to the Jesuit Vázquez to clarify the two groups of probable opinions, while Suárez would add that probable opinions “do not contradict the truths of the Catholic Church or evident reason, or the common teachings of the doctors of the Church. The more evidence of reason and Church authoritativeness an opinion has, the more probable it is.”26 Also Juan Azor in his Institutions defined as “unacceptable” (improbandae) those opinions that do not concord with official Church doctrine, even if expressed by notable authorities. From Medina’s argumentation it seems that an opinion becomes improbable when it lacks both its reasonability and authoritativeness. Following an improbable opinion, except for the case of an erroneous conscience, is sinful. The revolutionary solution that Medina gives to the problem of moral uncertainty is that it is licit to follow any approvable opinion, even though it might seem less probable. If an opinion is reasonable and authoritative according to a penitent’s subjective judgment in good conscience, then it can be followed. It may be a risky decision, but only from the material point of view—one assumes the risk of performing a materially evil action but not a morally (formally) evil action.27 Following an approvable opinion is morally safe because that opinion is supported by the authority of wise men, who are expected to have a deeper comprehension of a moral issue at hand. It is to be noticed that Medina uses here the term “safe” in a non-traditional context. The medieval authors and Vázquez (see below) refer to this term as “not exposed to a risk of sinning [morally].” In Medina’s context somebody is safe, because excused by external authority or intrinsic reasonability from following a probable opinion. Medina’s logic would be followed by Juan Azor in his oft-published manual of moral theology for students of the 23 Ibid.: “Opinio probabilis est conformis recta rationi et existimationi virorum prudentum et sapientum.” 24 Ibid.: “Nam si est contra rationem, opinio probabilis non est.” 25 Ibid.: “Opinio non dicitur probabilis ex eo quod habeat assertores et defensores, nam isto pacto omnes errores essent opiniones probabiles.” 26 Suárez, XII.6.1: “Nobis nunc satis est, illam existimari opinionem probabilem, quae etiam nititur auctoritate aliqua digna fide (quae in re morali multum habet ponderis) et non repugnat, aut veritatibus ab Ecclesia receptis, aut evidenti ratione: neque etiam temere contradicit communi, et receptae doctrinae doctorum: unde quo plus opinio participaverit utramque harum rationum, eo erit probabilior.” 27 Medina, Expositio, q. 19, a. 6: “Ille qui sequitur erroreneam conscientiam et falsam credulitatem, licet materialiter faciat aliquid quod sit contra Dei legem, sed formaliter agit secundum Dei legem, existimat namque esse divinam legem et praeceptum.”

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28

Roman College. This understanding of “safe” does not undermine Medina’s and Azor’s Probabilism juxtaposed to Tutiorism, for which “safer” means renouncing the possibility of following a reasonable or approvable opinion against a wider approvability of experts or the authoritativeness of the law or confessor, because to surrender the conscience (deponere conscientiam) in front of such authorities is safer for achieving eternal salvation. Medina’s final argument is especially worth highlighting, for it uncovers the pastoral motivation behind Probabilism, so dear to his Jesuit followers. He argues that the opposite solution [i.e. Probabiliorism] torments the minds of devout men, because one must always inquire which opinion is more probable, something that devout men never do.29 But Medina goes even further: “It has to be noticed—he states earlier in the same chapter—that the rule [of Tutiorism] not always is true.”30 For example, if somebody claims rights to the land that I posses lawfully, I begin to doubt whether it is mine. However, I am not obliged to give it up, because in doubtful cases the lot of the owner should be preferred, even though by giving it up I would be certain not to sin [not only morally but even materially]. Therefore, when the magisterial rule states that “in doubtful cases the lot of the owner should be preferred,” it has to guarantee that following the safer part does not cause me any losses. Otherwise, the rule does not work.31 By quoting this case Medina contrasts the tutioristic solution (it is safer to give up the land to avoid even a far possibility of sinning materially: who knows, maybe it is not mine?) with the probabilistic one based on a juridical rule that Suárez would subsequently define as “reflex principle of possession” aimed at passing from speculative uncertainty to moral certainty necessary to take a right decision, as we shall see below. But Suárez would allow using this principle only in the case of doubt of law and not of fact, for which he would employ the tutioristic rule. The latter approach would force the agent to double check as much as possible who is the lawful owner of the land and choose eventually the safest solution, even if it would imply losing the property. Establishing the liberty to follow one’s own judgment of conscience instead of deponere conscientiam in order to follow the law or the confessor’s opinion was an important shift that characterized the transition from medieval ethics into a modern mentality characterized by a higher degree of subjectivity, 28 Azor, Institutiones II.16: “Qui probabili opinione ductus quidpiam agit, nullum peccati periculum subire: quia quamvis pars opposita esset vera, peccatum in agendo devitat, eo quod ex probabili opinione operatur. Quemadmodum is qui consilio boni et periti viri aliquid efficit, prudenter et bene agit, quamvis re ipsa malum sit id quod eligit.” 29 Medina, Expositio, q. 19, a. 6: “Opposita sententia cruciat animos timorosos; nam semper oporteret inquirere, quae nam sit opinio probabilior, quod timorati viri numquam faciunt.” 30 Ibid.: “Sed est advertendum maxime quod haec regula non semper est vera.” 31 Ibid.: “Nam si quis petat a me fundum, quem iure possideo, incipio dubitare an meus fit, non teneor reddere, nam in dubiis melior est conditio possidentis, licet in reddendo certus sum quod non pecco; quapropter quando dicit regula Magisterialis, quod in dubiis tutior pars est eligenda, intelligenda est, quando ex eo quod sequor partem tutam, non sequitur mihi grande detrimentum, alioqui verum non dicit.”

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responsibility and interiority. This liberalizing approach mitigated medieval tutiorisitic rigorism: now nobody was obliged to choose a better and more perfect solution. For Medina it is more perfect to be celibate than married or to be a man religious than to be a rich one, but it does not follow that everybody must choose to be celibate or man religious.32 It is necessary, continues Medina, to choose a good means to an end, but not obligatory to choose the best one. Even though it may appear that following an opinion that has a wider approvability would be more perfect, it is not compulsory to choose it.33 Azor in his Institutions admits that if the opinion of an expert has a better and more solid ground, it is licit to follow it against the common opinion of many (which would be safer), although it should not happen too often.34 As John Mahoney has shown, the theory of Probabilism reflects an important moral debate on the nature of moral responsibility and the tension between freedom of the individual and authority, between conscience of the individual and law.35 Miriam Turrini, who analyzed the rise of Probabilism in the context of the making of the modern state and of confessionalization, argued that this tension would have become acute at the end of the sixteenth century.36 The fast circulation—a “flood,” to quote Lea37—of Probabilism can be traced already in the multi-published Instructorium conscientiae (1585) by another Dominican from Salamanca, Luis López,38 who, after having proposed various opinions, allowed the penitents to choose: “they will decide on their own.”39 However, López was one of the few Dominicans who followed Medina’s theory of Probabilism. Above all others, it was the Jesuits who adopted swiftly, adapted fervently and advocated successfully Probabilism since the last quarter of the sixteenth century through the first half of the seventeenth.

32 Ibid.: “Nemo obligatur ad id quod melius et perfectius est: perfectius est esse virginem quam esse uxoratum; esse religiosum quam esse divitem: sed nemo ad illa perfectiora obligatur.” 33 Hypothetically, one might object to Medina, however, that there are cases in which the opinion of a few (or even of one) became universally accepted later and we admire those few who followed it when it was not popular. For example, we love quoting Medina’s fellow Dominican, Bartholomé de las Casas (1484–1566), but indubitably his opinion on the incompatibility of slavery with Christian values was not an opinion held by many. We praise today as moral those who followed the opinion of de las Casas. 34 Azor, Institutiones, II.16: “Id passim aut crebro non licere, aliquando tamen vitio et culpae dandum non est, si eam singularem opinionem sequamur: nam contingit interdum, ut contra communem unius Classici doctoris opinio firmiori meliorique fundamento nitatur.” 35 Mahoney, Making of Moral Theology, p. 137. 36 Turrini, Coscienza e le leggi, p. 304. 37 Lea, History of Auricular Confession, vol. 2, p. 300. 38 Instructorium conscientiae: duabus contentum partibus/fratre Ludouico Lopez ... Ordinis Praedicatorum (Salmanticae, 1585). 39 “Ipse enim poenitens sibi viderit.” Quoted by Turrini, Coscienza e le leggi, p. 159.

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Gabriel Vázquez—the First Jesuit Probabilist The first Jesuit to deliberately adopt Medina’s solution was Gabriel Vázquez (1551–1604), to whom his Jansenist and Jesuit enemies, Blaise Pascal and Tirso González respectively, attributed the leadership among all probabilists. He did so in his commentary on the Prima Secundae of Aquinas’s Summa, which he taught in the Jesuit College of Alcalá since 1579. The text was first published in 1599,40 but the superior’s permission for printing is dated earlier—1598. It suggests that Vázquez’s adoption of Probabilism was officially accepted before the final edition of the Ratio Studiorum (1599), which still seemed to propose a mixture of Tutiorism and Probabiliorism for the solution of doubtful cases of conscience, as shown above in Chapter 3. Vázquez’s espousal of Probabilism and the probabilisticly inclined postulates for the revision of the Ratio Studiorum by the Castilian Jesuits that we have seen in the previous chapter indicate that Spanish ethical thought was particularly prone to adopt the new way of solving moral problems. No doubt, the School of Salamanca played a major role in this process. In his Commentary, Vázquez expressly states that he considers Medina’s proposal true. Interestingly enough, he remarks that Medina’s solution was commonly taught in schools much earlier.41 Vázquez interprets Medina’s definition as follows: “Certainly it is licit for a learned man to be against his own opinion that he considers more probable and to act against it according to somebody else’s opinion, even though this opinion is less safe and according to his judgment less probable, not lacking reason and probability.”42 This reasoning contrasts exactly with the solution that we have observed in Polanco’s Directory. In the latter’s case the confessor would not act against his own more probable and safer opinion and would even force penitents to follow it by giving up their less probable and less safe (from the confessor’s point of view) opinion, even though the penitent’s opinion would be reasonable and backed by an expert. We must observe that Vázquez approaches the issue from a slightly different angle than Medina does—he asks not just whether it is licit to follow a less probable opinion, but whether it is licit not to follow one’s own more probable and thus safer opinion, or, in other words, whether it is licit to follow somebody else’s less probable and less safe opinion. Vázquez seems to be more concerned about the risk of sinning [materially], i.e. about not choosing the safer part. Perhaps in this way he shows better the difference between Tutiorism and Probabilism. In the previous chapter of his Commentary, Vázquez underscores the distinction between safer and less safe opinions: an opinion is safer not 40 In this study, I have used the following edition: Gabriel Vázquez, Commentariorum, ac disputationum in Sancti Thomae (Antverpiae, 1621). 41 Vázquez, Commentariorum, XIX.6.4: “Veram igitur existimo sententiam, quam sequitur Bartholomaeus Medina in artic. 6 huius quaestionis, iamque in scholis et multo ante communis fuit.” 42 Ibid.: “Nemper viro docto licitum esse contra suam opinionem, quam probabiliorem arbitratur, operari secundum opinionem aliorum; et si opinio aliorum sit minus tuta et suo iudicio minus probabilis, dum tamen ratione et probabilitate destituta non sit.”

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because it is more probable, but because who follows it cannot sin [formally, or morally]. For example, there are different opinions on whether somebody has to return something or not. The opinion saying that the thing must be returned is safe, because there is no sin in returning. The opposite opinion holds that not to return is less safe, because not returning might be [materially] sinful.43 There are also opinions more and less probable. The more probable is that which has a better foundation. The less probable is the opinion, which, although not having a better foundation, does not lack sufficient probability. The probable opinion cannot have authority from just one doctor to justify acting prudently against one’s own opinion and that of many other wise men.44 The probable opinion cannot contain any error but must have probability in order to be adopted.45 Furthermore, continues Vázquez, we can more rely on others’ opinion against our own, if there was a confrontation of opinions between the doctors representing opposing views.46 That goes along with the conviction expressed earlier in Vázquez’s text that views in morals are not certain, but opinionative.47 Vázquez’s major contribution lies in pointing out the possible combinations of safer/less safe with more probable/less probable opinions. He argues that the less safe opinion can be more approvable, i.e. the opinion in which [material] sin may occur is more probable, than the opinion in which there is no suspicion of sin. Vázquez cites the same example of restitution employed above. He argues that the opinion holding that the return is not necessary can be more probable, i.e. have better foundations, than the opinion demanding restitution, even though 43

Vázquez, Commentariorum, XIX.6.1: “Notandum vero in primis est, inter opiniones quondam esse tutiorem, quondam vero minus tutam; dicitur autem tutior, non quia sit probabilior, sed quia qui illam sequitur, non potest peccare, ut si sint opiniones contrariae de restitutione facienda ea, quae dicit restituendum aliquid esse, dicitur tutior, quia in facienda restitutione non potest esse peccatum; contraria vero est minus tuta, quia in non facienda restitutione potest esse peccatum.” 44 Vázquez, Commentariorum, XIX.6.4: “Ut censeatur sufficienter probabilis ad hoc, ut eam contra propriam sequamur, debet esse non unius tantum Doctoris et singularis, nam si talis opinio unius ex propriis fundamentis considerata mihi non probatur, sed opposita et eam video tantum niti auctoritate unius Doctoris, non videtur mihi censenda probabilis ad hunc effectum, ut secundum illam prudenter possum operari contra propriam et communem omnium sententiam.” 45 Ibid.: “Talis debet esse opinio, quam contra propriam sequi volumus, ut communiter existimetur non continere errorem, sed adhuc probabilitatem habere, atque adeo non esse antiquatam.” 46 Ibid.: “Tunc demum multo magis possumus secundum opinionem aliorum contra proriam operari, quando videmus fundamenta omnia et rationes nostras Doctores oppositae sententiae vidisse et considerasse et ad eas aliquo modo respondisse, nec eis convictos fuisse. Tunc enim iure arbitrari debemus, operari nos posse recte et prudenter sequentes aliorum sententiam contra propriam opinionem, neque existimare debemus nostras rationes esse demonstrationes evidentes, quae oppositae opinioni probabilitatem auferant.” 47 Ibid.: “In rebus moralibus quae certe non sunt, sed sub opinione.”

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less safe. The safer option (demanding the return) might be less probable, because of weaker reason or even the lack of any probability.48 This demonstration helps Vázquez to highlight the contradiction of thinkers such as Cajetan, who assert that it is never licit to act against the proper more probable opinion, but who always suggests choosing the safer action. An analysis of various combinations of these opinions would be also present in Azor’s Institutions.49 Vázquez’s reasoning seems to imply that Medina’s solution cancels this contradiction. If it is always licit to follow the less probable opinion, whether or not it is safer, the subject can act rightly against the proper more probable opinion. A man can accept as probable the extrinsic arguments of good authorities against his own conviction about which intrinsic arguments he considers even more probable.50 Vázquez agrees basically with Medina’s justification of Probabilism. First of all he confirms Medina’s logic that if we accept and defend a probable opinion speculatively, so, in good conscience, can we also act according to it. The probability of an opinion that we are able to defend without reproach is sufficient reason to act correctly according to it.51 If the probability of an opinion means that it is grounded in the authority of experts in the field and in reason, the person who gives assent to others’ solution by following it practically cannot be reprehended.52 Vázquez’s additional argument for Probabilism comes from contrasting the contradictory views of authors, such as Corduba, who require the subjects to follow the probable opinion of their superior against their own belief, but who deny that it is licit to act against the proper opinion. Vázquez argues that the former would not be possible if it were not licit to act against one’s own

48

Vázquez, Commentariorum, XIX.6.1: “Contingere ergo potest, ut minus tuta opinio sit probabilior, hoc est, ut ea pars, in qua forsan potest esse peccatum, sit probabilior, contra vero ea pars, in qua nullum esse potest peccatum, sit minus probabilis, ut in exemplo posito de restitutione facienda: ea pars quae dicit non debet fieri restitutionem, potest esse probabilior, hoc est potest meliora habere fundamenta et tamen ea est minus tuta; contra vero ea qua dicit faciendam esse restitutionem, quae est magis tuta, potest multo debiliores habere rationes, imo etiam interdum potest esse omni probabilitatis momento destituta.” 49 See Azor, Institutiones, II.16. 50 Vázquez, Commentariorum, XIX.6.4: “Hic sententia ... intelligenda est, retenta adhuc propria opinione, ut probabiliori et assensus illius per intrinsica principia, ita tamen ut per extrinseca principia existimans vir doctus contrariam opinionem esse probabilem in universum consideratam, formet sibi iudicium conscientiae singulare, quo iudicet licitum sibi esse sic operari.” 51 Ibid.: “Quod opinio aliqua probabilis est, sicut absque ulla nota possumus eam speculative amplecti et defendere, sic etiam sana conscientia possumus secundum eam operari. ... cum alias sit probabilis opinio, ut sine nota eam defendere possimus, sufficiens erit, ut secundum illam recte operemur.” 52 Ibid.: “Quia exeo quod opinio illa est peritorum in arte et probabili ratione fundata, nulla videtur reprehensione aut nota dignus, qui eam sequitur in operando, aliorum in hoc sentientiae acquiescens.”

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opinion. If it is licit to follow the contrary probable opinion of the superior, what precludes following the contrary opinion of a wise man?53 Importantly for our discussion, Vázquez follows Medina in showing the practical application of Probabilism in the practice of confessing. A confessor not only can, but even must accept the less probable opinion of the penitent and therefore grant the latter absolution, regardless confessor’s legal status (ordinary or delegated).54 Vázquez’s position directly contradicts the opinion of Polanco’s Directory, which asserts that only the ordinary confessor, i.e. bishop or pastor, can be allowed to give absolution against his own more probable opinion. Given that the Jesuits were not pastors (they usually did not run parochial offices) and consequently had only the delegated authority to confess, Polanco’s tutioristic view would forbid them to act against their own more probable opinion and give their penitents absolution in such cases. Adopting Probabilism would mean dramatically changing Jesuit confessors’ way of approaching the penitent. Applying Probabilism in confession softened the juridical picture of the confessor designed by the Council of Trent (1545–63). The probabilistic confessor was still a judge, but not an absolute one. He could suggest a more probable opinion to his penitents but could not oblige them to follow it. The confessor could, conversely, abandon his own opinion and righteously absolve the penitent despite a divergent opinion. The probabilistic confessor may have had then less power and therefore less possibility of manipulating the penitent. Ironically, if Probabilism was actually practiced by the Jesuit confessors to kings and princes, they would not have been able to manipulate the consciences of their penitents as it is so often claimed. Instead, the probabilistic solution to the relationship between law and conscience articulated especially by Suárez may have given penitent subjects the means to become less submissive to their rulers. Ibid.: “Eadem sententia confirmatur, nam ... subditus etiam contra propriam opinionem parere debet praeposito praecipienti, si sciat ipsum praecipere secundum probabilem opinionem, ut ingenue fatentur etiam Adrianus et Corduba, quamvis putent neminem agere posse contra propriam opinionem. Hoc autem verum non esset, si non liceret contra propriam opinionem operari, aut si hoc ipso, quod quis contra propriam opinionem operaretur, contra conscientiam etiam propriam ageret. Quod si nihil obstat propria opinio, quo minus quisque possit et debeat sequi praeceptum superioris, quod imponitur iuxta opinionem contrariam, eadem ratione nihil obstabit, quo minus quisque possit sequi opinionem alterius, qui praepositus eius non sit, contra propriam opinionem. Nam quod opinio contraria nostrae sit opinio praepositi, aut alterius, nihil referre videtur, ut ideo probabilior quam propria nobis censeri debeat, aut ut existimemus tutum contra propriam opinionem operari sequendo opinionem praepositi, non autem sequendo opinionem alterius viri docti.” 54 Vázquez, Commentariorum, XIX.6.7: “Colligo quemlibet confessarium etiam ex commissione debere absolvere contra propriam opinionem poenitentem.” Of the same opinion was Medina: “Sentio namque quod confessarius, tam ordinarius, quam extraordinarius, debet illum absolvere contra propriam opinionem. Nam talis confessor scit, vel scire debet, quod poenitens in tali casu non peccat: ergo non potest illi absolutionem denegare” (Expositio, q. 19, a. 6). 53

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Francisco Suárez and the Reflex Principles A major Jesuit contribution to the development of Medina’s theory belongs to Francisco Suárez, who was trained in law and theology at the University of Salamanca for ten years. He built on the premise of Vitoria’s School that introduced the distinction between speculative and practical uncertainty, as noted above. However, for Suárez the conscience encompasses both speculative and practical judgments of the intellect. Speculatively the conscience judges whether an action is correct or not in reference to general principles.55 Practically the conscience judges whether an act to be performed is moral hic et nunc. While the speculative judgment of the conscience can be false, the practical judgment can be correct at the same time. One can perform an act that is subjectively (according to good conscience) correct, even though it can be objectively evil. One might add to Suárez’s argumentation that the moral responsibility comes only for the practical judgment, because none can judge the agent’s honest will (although informed by, for example, invincible ignorance). As Vázquez made a distinction between extrinsic and intrinsic opinions, Suárez distinguished between extrinsic and intrinsic doubtful conscience. The former refers to a speculatively doubtful conscience and the latter to a practically doubtful conscience.56 Someone can have doubts regarding the speculative judgment, but still be certain on the practical level.57 Uncertainty in the practical conscience, according to Suárez, does not permit the agent to perform an action—every doubt and danger must be excluded, even if the consequence of such a choice would produce the agent some losses.58 Suárez made another important distinction among speculative doubts (and opinions). He differentiated between doubts (and opinions) of law and of fact. 55 Francisco Suárez, “De bonitate et malitia humanorum actuum,” in Opera omnia, vol. IV (Paris, 1856), XII.1.6: “Interdum vero potest esse iudicium de aliqua conditione, vel principio, ex quo pendet honestas vel turpitudo actionis, ut est utrum haec res sit mea, vel aliena, ex quo pendet, an actio sit iusta, et hoc solet appellari iudicium conscientiae; et hoc iudicium formaliter magis est speculativum, quam practicum, et interdum sufficit, ut actio moraliter censeatur, ideo nomen conscientiae retinet.” 56 Suárez, De bonitate et malitia, XII.2.7: “Hinc secundo conscientia dubia dupliciter contingere potest: uno modo practice in illo iudicio ultimo de actione, et hanc volo formaliter et intrinsice dubiam; haec tamen conscientia, ut ab aliis distinguatur, revera non includit positivum iudicium practicum, sed potius carentiam, vel suspensionem circa honestatem, vel turpitudinem actionis.” 57 Ibid.: “Alio vero modo illud iudicium practicum denominatur dubium solum extrinsece, quae dubitatio non excludit certitudinem practicam in ipso ultimo iudicio, sed tantum speculativam circa rem aliquam.” 58 Ibid., XII.3.2: “Dicendum primo, ut voluntas sit recta, necessarium esse ut sequatur iudicium conscientiae practicae de honestate obiecti et actionis” and XII.2.5: “Haec regula potissimum verum habet, quando dubium est practicum, et ratio est clara, quia tunc non licet operari cum tali dubio, quia exponit se homo periculo peccandi. ... Aliqui tamen limitant hanc regulam, quando ex tali omissione sequitur grave aliquid damnum, quia videtur nimis grave obligare tunc hominem ad sustinendum certum damnum propter dubium incertum; sed formaliter ac proprie nulla est possibilis limitatio.”

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In the process of decision-making only the former are permitted in order to avoid performing an illicit action. “A doubtful law does not bind.” This was an important shift in the early modern concept of law and marked its hiatus with the Middle Ages. Suárez the jurist transformed the canon law principle “In doubtful cases the lot of the owner should be preferred” into a moral axiom by replacing “lot” with “freedom.” Therefore, freedom is primary before the law. It means that the agent has moral freedom to disregard a law, the existence of which is doubtful or which is insufficiently promulgated. This freedom is not granted, however, in case of doubt of fact, as in the case of contracts. The agent who is not sure about the lawfulness or validity of a contract must make every effort to inquire about it, so the decision will be taken based on the safest opinion. In approaching the doubt of fact Suárez applies a tutioristic solution, according to the maxim “In doubt, the safer course must be chosen” (In dubiis tutior pars eligenda est).59 He justifies this distinction by saying that while the existence of laws depends on people being made aware of them, the existence of facts does not—they exist with or without people’s knowledge of them.60 Suárez follows Medina and Vázquez (who, in turn, echo the Ciceronian rhetorical tradition) in justifying Probabilism from the epistemological point of view—the human condition dictates the conscience to act upon probable judgment and not speculative certainty. Furthermore, it is often very difficult for men to judge what is true when they have to make moral choices.61 The reflection on Probabilism initiated in the Jesuit academic milieu by Vázquez and Suárez must have continued at the Roman College, where the major Jesuit moralists—Sá, Azor, Fornari, Figliucci and Juan de Lugo—also taught. For the purposes of this work, again, it was not necessary to analyze all the probabilistic texts, as intriguing as that might be, pointing out the differences in applying Medina’s rule—from strict to lax. Even though we have drawn here just a sketch of the genealogical tree of Jesuit Probabilism, we have seen clearly enough that by the end of the sixteenth century the most robust branches of this tree, i.e. the leading Jesuit professors of the Roman College in philosophy/theology (Vázquez and Suárez), casuistry (lectiones casuum and manuals for confessors, starting probably with Sá’s 59

See Ibid., XII.5.8. Ibid., XII.2.10: “Confirmatur ex differentia inter iudicium de iure, vel de re, nam primum dicit ordinem ad operantem, et omnino tollit periculum malitiae: secundum vero dicit ordinem ad rem ipsam, et non tollit periculum detrimenti, quod est in ipsa re. Unde in priori est sufficiens excusatio, seu ratio sequendi probabile iudicium, quia nondum est lex sufficienter proposita, et non expedit hominem obligationibus operari: hic autem nulla est sufficiens excusatio, cum satis constet periculum in re ipsa manere, et consequenter inde obligationem oriri.” 61 Ibid., VI.8.6: “iudicium probabile in rebus moralibus sufficit ad prudenter operandum, praesertim ubi regula certa applicari non potest. .... Item quia alius modus operandi est ultra humanam conditionem, et prudentiam, cum omnis fere cognitio humana coniecturalis sit et praesertim in rebus agendas” and XII.2.5: “Ratio huius rei sumitur ex ipsa naturali hominis conditione, quia saepe est illi impossibile iudicare, quid in re verum sit nihilominus operari: ergo oportret ut saltem practice possit determinari.” 60

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Aphorisms [1592]), and moral theology (Azor) alike enthusiastically and swiftly adopted Probabilism that, although first formulated by the Dominican Medina, became the dominant Jesuit ethical system until the attacks of Pascal and his Jansenist fellows in the mid-seventeenth century. The professors of the Roman College and after them many others wrote a new and most important chapter of the making of the Jesuit mind between Loyola and Pascal. But what was the impact of Pascal on the history of Jesuit Probabilism?

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CHAPTER 5

Probabilism as the Spiritual Sodom: Jansenist Attack Against Jesuit Ethics No history of Probabilism may omit the controversy between the Jesuits and Jansenists that exploded in the middle of the seventeenth century. The main anti-Jesuit diatribe arrived through Blaise Pascal’s Provincial Letters (1556–57), whose portrayal of Jesuits and especially their ethical system of Probabilism (and by extension the entire method of casuistry) would furnish weapons to any anti-Jesuit movement to come. As noticed above, the notion of Jesuit Pharisaic duplicity1 penetrated literature (e.g. Dostoevsky), and philosophy (e.g. Bayle), and the adjective “Jesuitical” in its derogatory sense has been used until today as a part of the common vocabulary. The Jansenist antagonism produced different reactions within the Society of Jesus. As Pascal’s work testifies itself, some Jesuits engaged in vehement polemics with the Jansenists by means of spoken and printed word; others tempted to exercise political pressure in the French Parliament and at the royal court. There, the Jesuits found their allies, who disapproved the Jansenist approach: cardinals Richelieu and Mazarin, and Louis XIV, whose Jesuit confessor, Father Annat, would be directly attacked for his “malicious perversion” in the Provincial Letters (17–18). What is of special interest for our story, some Jesuit moralists began to denounce the rationale of Probabilism and proposed a via media between, as they put it, lax Probabilism and rigorous Tutiorism of Jansenists, a system that would be labeled Probabiliorism. Before we analyze the principles of Jesuit Probabiliorism in the form given to it by its most outspoken promoter, Tirso González de Santalla (1624–1705), we must start with an analysis of Pascal’s Provincial Letters and his ties to Jansenism. Blaise Pascal’s Road to Port-Royal des Champs Blaise Pascal was born in Clermont-Ferrand in France just one year before Tirso González, but died much earlier than the latter—at the age of 39 (1662). See especially the ending of Pascal’s Letter 13: “To this conclusion, then, reverend fathers, must we come at length, that, as your probabilism renders the good opinions of some of your authors useless to the Church, and useful only to your policy, they merely serve to betray, by their contrariety, the duplicity of your hearts. This you have completely unfolded, by telling us, on the one hand, that Vasquez and Suarez are against homicide, and on the other hand, that many celebrated authors are for homicide; thus presenting two roads to our choice and destroying the simplicity of the Spirit of God, who denounces his anathema on the deceitful and the double-hearted: “Vae duplici corde, et ingredienti duabus viis!—Woe be to the double hearts, and the sinner that goeth two ways!” 1

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During his short yet industrious life, Pascal learnt fast from his father, attorney Etienne, and was able to make significant contributions, especially in the field of mathematics (mechanical calculator, theory of probability, Pascal’s triangle), physics (hydraulic press and the syringe), and projective geometry (conics). The Provincial Letters proved, furthermore, his literary skills: even Voltaire (1694– 1778), a Jesuit-trained master of an anti-Jesuit satire so skillfully employed in his Candide, would praise Pascal’s Letters as “the best-written book that has yet appeared in France;”2 the Catholic Encyclopedia would describe them as “the first prose masterpiece of the French language, in their satirical humor and passionate eloquence;”3 and Richard Parish would portray them as “the single polemical work of the French seventeenth century to have survived into posterity.”4 The leaders of the French Jansenist movement understood well Pascal’s literary skills and commissioned him the Letters in order to defend the theological orthodoxy of their movement, even though Pascal was not a trained theologian.5 But how did Pascal enter the Jansenist circle? Pascal was first familiarized with Jansenist thought during his father’s illness in 1646 through his physicians, the Deschamps brothers, who happened to be disciples of the Jansenist Jean Duvergier de Hauranne (1581–1643)—known also as Saint-Cyran after the name of an abbey that he held. On November 23, 1654 (in the middle of the decade, in which the Jansenist-Jesuit controversy escalated), Pascal experienced a spiritual conversion that was caused by an accident involving his carriage, which almost fell from a bridge. During his recovery, he felt the presence of God that he described in what is now known as Memorial (which he used to carry in the lining of his coat as a sort of talisman). It would have repudiated the “God of the philosophers” and espoused the “God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob.” Consequently, in January 1655, Pascal retired for a two-week retreat to the convent at Port-Royal, where his sister Jacqueline had been a nun since 1651. The retreat, guided by the head of Port-Royal, Antoine Singlin, generated in him so characteristic for that milieu desire of radical ascetism (such as wearing a cincture of nails) and detestation of his previous learning. After the retreat, Pascal remained closely associated with the convent as member of its solitaires—lay singles who lived there to practice convent’s spirituality. And Port-Royal was the center of the French Jansenism. Here—only a year after his retreat (January 1556)—Pascal was commissioned to write a defense of Jansenism, which would take form of the Provincial Letters that he continued to write until March 1557. The collection was published anonymously (under the pseudonym of Louis de Montalte) in Voltaire, The Age of Louis XIV (London-Toronto, 1926), pp. 358–9 and 424. The Catholic Encyclopedia: www.newadvent.org/cathen/11511a.htm See also Leszek Kolakowski, God Owes Us Nothing. A Brief Remark On Pascal’s Religion and on the Spirit of Jansenism (Chicago, 1995), pp. 61–6. 4 Richard Parish, “Pascal’s Lettres provinciales: from flippancy to fundamentals,” in Nicholas Hammond (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Pascal (Cambridge, 2003), p. 182. 5 According to Jonsen and Toulmin (Abuse of Casuistry, p. 234), The Letters “represent skilled theological amateurism brilliantly expressed.” 2 3

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Cologne in 1557. A one-year young convert to the movement became its most renowned spokesman. But why did Pascal have to defend Jansenism? French Jansenism Jansenism derives its origins and name from Cornelius Jansen (1585–1638), bishop of Ypres in West Flanders. He dedicated twenty years of his life to studying the doctrine of Augustine of Hippo (354–430) and composing a lengthy treatise dedicated to it, Augustinus.7 It was published posthumously in 1640. The part of Augustinus that mostly interests our investigation is its third volume dealing with the thorny theological topic of Christ’s grace. In it, Jansenius equals the heresy of Semi-Pelagians with the contemporary theological school of Molinism,8 named after the Jesuit Luis de Molina (1535– 1600). The Jesuits adopted Molinism in its elemental points, but the Dominican Neo-Thomists contrasted it, beginning a protracted and heated dispute known as controversy de auxiliis. It involved also Pope Clement VIII, who eventually came to establish a commission to settle this quarrel. Without entering into the intricate nature of this theological dispute that is not the subject of this book, it would be sufficient for our purpose of explaining the relation of the Provincial Letters to Jesuit Probabilism, if we captured the main difference between the systems of Jansenism and Molinism. It lies in their polarized anthropologies.9 For Jansenius, who presented his doctrine under the patronage of Augustine,10 after Adam’s original sin human nature is thoroughly corrupt, depraved, and driven by concupiscence, to which it cannot resist. Its passiveness can be won by human will only if supported by God’s grace. Consequently, man voluntarily yet irresistibly does either good or evil, depending on the preponderance of grace or concupiscence. Molina, who aimed at the reconciliation between man’s free will and God’s grace in his Concordia,11 defended the unrestrained freedom of man’s will in consenting to God’s grace, without compromising, however, the latter’s efficacy and priority. Jesuits’ relentless defense of human freedom—that we have already observed in Suárez’s exposition of its relation to law—was the reason why 6 Most of the biographical information in this paragraph comes from Ben Rogers, “Pascal’s life and time,” in Hammond, Cambridge Companion to Pascal, pp. 4–19. 7 Its full title reads as follows, Augustinus, seu doctrina S. Augustini de humanae sanitatae, aegritudine, medicina, adversus Pelagianos et Massilienses. 8 See Letter 18: “We [Jansenists] overthrow the equally profane sentiment of the school of Molina.” 9 This polarization between Jansenists and Molinists was noticed by Pascal in Letter 1: “So far are they from being united in sentiment that some of them are diametrically opposed to each other [de tout contraires]” (Blaise Pascal, Oeuvres complètes (Paris, 1998), vol. 1, p. 593). Here, though, it has more a political connotation—to him Molinists were the opponents of Arnauld at Sorbonne, even though the party included both Molinists and Neo-Thomists, who differed in their theological view on grace. 10 See Letter 18: “This has been most admirably explained by St. Augustine.” 11 Concordia liberi arbitrii cum gratiae donis, divina praescientia, providentia, praedestinatione et reprobatione (Lisbon, 1588).

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the Jansenists accused the Jesuits of Semi-Pelagianism. Conversely, Jansenists’ stress on determinism of God’s will was the reason why the Jesuits accused the Jansenists of crypto-Calvinism.12 The structure of The Letters, which will be analyzed shortly, betrays how the Jansenist-Jesuit controversy over Probabilism was rooted in these two polarized anthropologies—the central letters (5–16) mocking the Jesuit ethical system are encircled by the letters dealing with grace (1–3, 17–18) that are placed in the beginning and end of the collection. Letter 11—in the very center of the series—highlights another crucial polarization between the Jansenists and Jesuits: the absolute authority of the Scripture and Church Fathers (Tutorism)13 on the one hand, and probability of the opinions of modern theologians (Probabilism) on the other. It is remarkable that Pascal evokes authoritative “admirable words” of the rigorous Tertullian in Letter 11, who—as we have seen at the beginning of this book—was given the same credit by the converso Jesuit Diego Laínez, the author of the treatises on women’s use of cosmetics and on usury. The severe tutioristic mentality was common both to the first Jesuits and the Jansenists, but very strange to the second and later generations of Jesuits (except for González de Santalla’s Probabiliorism), who—affected by Cicero’s epistemology—espoused and propagated Probabilism. But “What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?” Despite its great success, Augustinus was condemned by a decree of the Roman Holy Office in 1641. This decision encountered strong resistance in Belgium (Archbishop of Mechlin and the University in Louvain), and in France, where an old friend of Jansenius, Duvergier de Hauranne (whose disciples took care of Pascal’s father, as we have seen above) seriously engaged in defending Augustinus. In his pro-Jansenist campaign, Saint-Cyran hired the influential Dr Antoine Arnauld (1560–1619), a famous lawyer in the Assembly of Paris and a Counselor of State under Henry IV, later turned priest and known already for his anti-Jesuit speeches and pamphlets. Indeed, he had published against them Théologie morale des Jésuites (1643)—which would become a precursor and source of the Provincial Letters—and De la fréquente Communion, which Pope Alexander VII would condemn much later (1690). Six of his daughters were all nuns at Port-Royal and one of them, Mère Angélique Arnauld, was there an abbess and thus the superior of Pascal’s sister. After Saint-Cyran’s death (1643), Antoine Arnauld became the leader of the Jansenist movement. 12 “You must now be prepared to admire the machinery of Molinism, which can produce such prodigious overturnings in the Church—that what is Catholic in the fathers becomes heretical in M. Arnauld—that what is heretical in the Semi-Pelagians becomes orthodox in the writings of the Jesuits” (Letter 3). Pascal narrowed the Jesuit accusation of Calvinism to Meynier’s work quoted in Letter 16 that targeted the alleged disbelief in transubstansiation of Port-Royal (Port-Royal and Geneva in concert against the most holy Sacrament of the Altar). 13 “I always thought that we were bound to take the Scripture and the tradition of the Church as our only rule, and not your casuists. … Probable won’t do for me,” said I; “I must have certainty” (Letter 5). “Where can [the Jesuit] Molina have got all this wisdom to enable him to determine a matter of such importance, without any aid from Scripture, the councils, or the fathers?” (Letter 7).

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His battle had then to face a new blow from the papacy—a bull Cum occasione (1653) which condemned five propositions regarding grace that would have been contained in Augustinus. Cardinal Mazarin made every effort so that the French Church, even though often characterized by its autonomy from Rome (Gallicanism), accepted the bull. Arnauld reacted to it by publishing two open letters, in which he argued that the five condemned propositions could not be found in Augustinus and repeated his interpretation of Augustinian view on grace. In response, the Jansenist opposition had him arraigned before Sorbonne’s Faculty of Theology. The Jansenists claimed that behind both the papal bull and Sorbonne’s decision were the Jesuits.14 It was at this point that Arnauld turned for help to Pascal. The Provincial Letters as a Political Invective The theological and political controversies over Jansenism that we have just pictured are all mirrored in a series of letters that Arnauld and his friend Pierre Nicole (1625–95)15 produced secretly with the assistance of Pascal. The retrospective subtitle of the anonymous Provinciales betrays its main target: Letters written by Louis de Montalte to a provincial friend and to the Reverend Jesuit Fathers on the subject of the morals and politics of these Fathers. This title, however, does not perfectly reveal the content of Pascal’s work. Only the first ten letters are directed to the fictitious Louis de Montalte’s provincial friend “on the subject of the present debates in the Sorbonne.”16 The second part of the letters (11–16) is instead written “to the Reverend Jesuit Fathers” and the last two (17–18) are specifically directed to the Jesuit Annat, the king Luis XIV’s confessor and apparently the leader of the antiJansenist movement.17 Neither does the title explain fully the letters’ subject. “The subject of the morals and politics of these Fathers” is not present in the letters 1–3, dedicated instead to the defense of Arnauld, who had been censured by Sorbonne. Indeed, Arnauld’s request of help from Pascal was born out of his troubles with the Parisian Faculty of Theology,18 but after having “Cleverest among them are those who intrigue much” (Letter 3). After his bachelor degree in theology (1649) he moved to Port-Royal, where he had already taught in its schools. He translated Pascal’s Letters into Latin, annotated them and published as his work, but under the pseudonym of William Wendrock (this edition would be consulted by the Jesuit Tirso González, as we shall see below). 16 I am following here an analysis of the Provincial Letters proposed by Richard Parish in his “Pascal’s Lettres provinciales: from flippancy to fundamentals,” p. 182– 200. 17 See Letter 18: “Father—you, whom the whole of your party regard as the chief and prime mover of all their councils.” Annat submitted to the Holy Office the petition to inquire about five propositions of Jansens and denounced to the Queen Mother Anne of Austria Arnauld’s pamphlet against the adversaries of Jansenism. See DHCJ, vol. 1, p. 177. 18 “The question of fact consisted in ascertaining whether M. Arnauld was guilty of presumption, for having asserted in his second letter that he had carefully perused the book of Jansenius, and that he had not discovered the propositions condemned 14 15

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made a link to the Jesuits in the opening of Letter 4, “There is nothing quite like the Jesuits”,19 Pascal passed from Arnauld’s defense to the attack against the Jesuits that became the main target of the letters 5–16. As intriguing as it can be, our purpose here, however, is not to analyze the details of how the Provincial Letters reflected the Jansenist–Jesuit controversy, but how Pascal’s portrayal of the Jesuit Probabilism is in sharp contrast with the origins, motives, and the progress of the Jesuit Probabilism as showed in the previous chapters of the present book. The definition of Probabilism that Pascal gives is a much narrower version of what Medina, Vázquez, and Suárez developed: “It is warrantable to follow the less probable and less safe opinion, giving up the more probable and more safe one.”20 The Letters extrapolate from Manuel Sá’s Aphorismi to show that according to the Jesuit doctrine, “the opinion of a single grave doctor is all that is requisite.”21 The Jesuits would have claimed “that whatever has been approved by celebrated authors is probable and safe in conscience.” We must immediately notice that Pascal’s presentation of the Jesuit Probabilism does not exactly match the exposition of the system that we have analyzed in this book. The main and most important part of the probabilistic doctrine that Pascal and his Jansenist peers missed is the differentiation between moral (practical) and speculative (theoretical) certainty. Neither Tutiorism, nor Probabilism ever allowed the decision-making without moral certainty— the penitents had to be sure in their conscience about the act’s licitness. The difference between the two systems lay in the approach to speculative certainty. While Tutiorism argues that the subject must have total speculative certitude in order to decide whether an action is morally licit, Probabilism allowed certain degree of speculative uncertainty. The liberty of choosing among approved (probable) opinions is applied to this speculative uncertainty. Wherefore, the subject could be speculatively uncertain as to which opinion is more approved, but the decision to follow any probable opinion had to be made with moral certainty in the subject’s conscience that the chosen opinion was licit to follow. This misunderstanding of the very fundaments of Probabilism by Pascal (and Arnauld behind him) came from the fragmentary knowledge of the Jesuit ethical system that the Jansenists had while compiling the Provincial Letters. That bias was due to the selectiveness of their sources. Ironically enough, what Pascal accused the Jesuits of was his own flaw: he neither read them in their entirety nor consulted the original writings of his enemies. As Pascal openly admitted,22 his main source of information came from the compilation of 24 by the late pope; but that, nevertheless, as he condemned these propositions wherever they might occur, he condemned them in Jansenius, if they were really contained in that work (Letter 1).” 19 “Il n’est rien tel que les jésuites” (Pascal, Oeuvres completes, vol. 1, p. 614). 20 Letter 13. 21 Letter 5. 22 “As Escobar has collected the opinions of twenty-four of your writers, I beg to ask if I am bound to guarantee anything beyond the correctness of my citations from

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authors by the Jesuit Antonio Escobar y Mendoza in his multi-edited Moral Theology.23 As the anti-probabilistic Jesuit González de Santalla himself has observed, this selectiveness of Pascal led him to believe that Probabilism was devised by the Jesuits. Had he read at least a commentary on the Prima Secundae of Aquinas’s Summa by Vázquez (whom he credited with the leadership among the Jesuit probabilists), Pascal would have known that Probabilism was born in the milieu of the Dominican School of Salamanca. It is, then, obvious that the Provincial Letters were much more a political pamphlet against the Jesuits and their role in repressing Jansenism than a serious theological analysis of the genesis and progress of Probabilism. What sort of image of the Jesuit Probabilism, therefore, did Pascal fix in the minds of the future generations of their enemies? To Pascal, Probabilism was an ethical system that was firmly established by the Jesuits, who “have such a good opinion of themselves as to believe that it is useful, and in some sort essentially necessary to the good of religion, that their influence should extend everywhere, and that they should govern all consciences,”24 especially those of substance in the world.25 In Pascal’s view, the very motives that led the Society of Jesus to invent Probabilism were false. The Letters portray the Jesuits as benign, accommodating, indulgent, and lenient: The grand project of our Society, for the good of religion, is never to repulse any one, let him be what he may, and so avoid driving people to despair. … They would be almost all of them excluded from our confessionals, had not our fathers relaxed a little from the strictness of religion, to accommodate themselves to the weakness of humanity.26 his book?” (Letter 12). 23 Liber theologiae moralis viginti et quatuor Societatis Jesu Doctoribus reseratus … Post trigesimam-septimam Hispanicam Editionem, prodit prima additionibus illustrata (Lugduni [Lyon] Sumpt. Haered. P. Prost, Philippi Borde, & Laurentii Arnaud, 1644. 8°, p. [44], 854, [11]). This is the oldest edition I was able to locate. Pascal used this and other two editions, as he testified himself in Letter 8: “Should you think of purchasing [different editions of Escobar], I would advise you to choose the Lyons edition, having on the title page the device of a lamb lying on a book sealed with seven seals; or the Brussels edition of 1651. Both of these are better and larger than the previous editions published at Lyons in the years 1644 and 1646.” 24 Letter 5. See also ibid.: “Nor need you attempt to combat the doctrine. The Jansenists tried this; but they might have saved themselves the trouble—it is too firmly established.” 25 “Father John Gans, confessor to the Emperor; the reverend Father Daniel Bastele, confessor to the Archduke Leopold; Father Henri, who was preceptor to these two princes; all the public and ordinary professors of the university of Vienna” (wholly composed of Jesuits); “all the professors of the university of Gratz” (all Jesuits); “all the professors of the university of Prague” (where Jesuits are the masters);—“from all of whom I have in my possession approbations of my opinions, written and signed with their own hands; besides having on my side the reverend Father Panalossa, a Jesuit, preacher to the Emperor and the King of Spain; Father Pilliceroli, a Jesuit, and many others, who had all judged this opinion to be probable, before our dispute began” (Letter 15). 26 Letters 6 and 7.

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But Pascal straightforwardly criticizes the results of such a permissive approach to conscience. “Such a set of monstrous principles”27 is “a total subversion of the law of God”28 that “threatened to the whole system of morals.”29 Jesuit Probabilism—“very climax of impiety”30—exposes its followers “to the grave peril of eternal damnation.”31 The Jesuit “carnal and worldly policy” is hidden “under the garb of divine and Christian prudence.”32 Their pernicious lax opinions “are ruining Christian morality by divorcing it from the love of God”33 and their language belongs to the city of confusion, which Scripture terms “the spiritual Sodom.”34 Interestingly enough, similar arguments were brought against the Jesuit Probabilism by its major Jesuit enemy, Tirso González de Santalla. Tirso González de Santalla and Jesuit Probabiliorism Even though Probabilism became—as we have seen—the ethical system of the Jesuits in the first half of the seventeenth century, some Jesuits were unwilling to identify themselves with it. Ironically enough, the most significant Jesuit opposition to Probabilism originated in the same academic milieu where it was born: at the University of Salamanca. There, it was strongly promoted by a professor of moral theology, Tirso González de Santalla. To convince the world, as he put it, that the continued development of Probabilism was harmful to souls,35 the Spanish Jesuit wrote, in 1670–72, a treatise, The Fundament of Moral Theology (often quoted as On the Right Use of Probable Opinions)36 that he sought to publish. Yet, in 1674 the Superior General of the Jesuits, Giovanni Paolo Oliva (d. 1681), refused permission for its publication.37 The anti-probabilistic book was eventually published in Dillingen in 1691, only after Tirso González himself became the Superior Letter 4. Letter 10. 29 Letter 4. 30 Letter 10. 31 Ibid. 32 Letter 5. 33 Letter 17. 34 Letter 14. 35 “Ostenditur vergere in magnum detrimentum animarum quod Mundus sibi persuadeat, esse sententiam communem Theologorum huius saeculi, quod quilibet possit in operando sequi sententiam probabilem aliorum de honestate, vel licentia actus, quamvis ipse agnoscat sententiam oppositam esse magis communem, magis fundatam” (De ortu et origine, § 5). 36 De recto usu opinionum probabilium. 37 González tried to excuse Oliva, arguing that the responsibility for his decision against the publication of his book was of his counselors: “Reverendus Pater Ioannes Paulus Oliva erat circundatus theologis valde doctis et religiosis, quibus iure merito multum deferebat, ii autem verissimam iudicabant sententiam benignam tunc communissimam in omni familia religiosa et in omnibus orbis catholici universitatibus. … Et hanc doctrinam benignam toto conatu defendebant, quia existimabant esse aptiorem ad facilitandum proximis viam salutis, et 27 28

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General of the Jesuits (1687), strongly supported by an intervention of Pope Innocent XI (1611–89), who shared with González his ethical probabilioristic views. The manipulated election of González and his relentless fight against Probabilism forced the Society of Jesus to adopt Probabiliorism by the turn of the seventeenth century. González’s anti-Probabilistic struggle became the major mark of his generalate38—he struggled against his own assistants to have his book published in Rome (1694)39 and, in addition, prepared for publication his history of modern Probabilism, On the Origins of Modern Probabilism (1699)40 that was never published yet broadly circulated in the Society.41 The Jesuit probabilists kept publishing their books on moral theology, as Jakob Illsung’s Arbor scientiae boni et mali sive theologia practica universa de bono et malo morali (Dillingen, 1693) can prove, but they were harshly criticized by González: he termed Illsung’s doctrine, for example, as “mere sophism.”42

non exasperandum iugum Christi et persuaserunt Rev. Patri Generali, hanc doctrinam benignam esse praeferendam in Societate (fol. 122).” 38 On how González got involved personally in his anti-Probabilism war, see his letter to Oliva: “Ingemisco et lachrimis subortis, non semel autem subortae sunt dum haec scribo, amare defleo eo iam in Societate vel saltem in his Hispaniae provinciis devenisse, ut nullus theologiae professor possit quaestionem de usu opinionum probabilium tangere, nisi ad defendendam sententiam probabilistarum asserentium licitum esse sequi sententiam minus tutam et simul minus probabilem relicta probabiliori et tutiori; et nefas reputavi et alienum ab schola Societatis sententiam antiprobabilistarum, etiam sub quacumque moderatione et limitatione defendere; neque libertatem dari nostris theologiae professoribus impugnandi sententiam probabilistarum, atque cum supercilio a superioribus respici et tanquam homines mali iudicii haberi eos qui audent coram aliis pronuntiare sibi non arridere sententiam probabilistarum. Et postquam late ponderavi rem hanc subiunxi, ego vero tanta incommoda reperio in ea, quod illud principium probabilistarum … quam opposita fiat proprium Societatis ut paratus sim quascumque persecutiones pati, ne hoc dedecus tam sanctae et sapienti religioni obveniat. Et ne haec macula illi aspergatur, quod pro religione defendat, licitum esse sequi sententiam minus probabilem et minus tutam ei qui agnoscit sententiam tutiorem esse absolute probabiliorem, praesertim per principia intrinseca simul et extrinseca. Et testor coram Deo et Christo Iesu, qui me iudicaturus est, me praecipue ob gloriam Dei et bonum Societatis nomen hanc causam suscepisse et certus sum me causam Societatis agere, dum tan enixe contendo, ne in ipsa claudatur ostium sententiae antiprobabilistarum moderate acceptare (fol. 122).” 39 Sumptibus Jo: Jacobi Komarek Bohemi, Typographi, ac Characterum Fusoris apud S. Angelum Custodem. 40 De ortu et origine Moderni Probabilismi. The date can be easily established from the following internal information: “De quadruplici statu quam habuit Probabilismus in suo exordio usque ad annum 1699 in quo haec scribuntur, quorum consideratio nata est falsitatem illius ostendere, et sectatores, ac patronos dominuere” (Sectio 19). 41 De ortu et origine Moderni Probabilismi eiusque progressu ex fallaciis, aequivocationibus, falsisque suppositionibus, absque solido ullo principio, cui nitatur. Et de eius decremento, atque imminente interitu ex Decretis Romanorum Pontificum, et Episcoporum conspiratione, atque quamplurimum Theologorum recentium valida impugnatione Tractatus Historico Theologicus Authore P. Thyrso González Praeposito Generali Societatis Iesu. 42 “Infertur ex dictis esse merum sophysma argumentum, quo recens Probabilista [author of Theologia practica universa de bono et malo morali, 1693] existimat

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In his option for Probabiliorism, González would distance himself not only from Jesuit Probabilism and its Ciceronian epistemic foundations, but also from Jansenist Tutiorism and its Neo-Platonic/Augustinian anthropology. To González, his Probabiliorism was a balanced mediation between too benign Probabilism and too rigorist Jansenism. Yet, his refusal of Probabilism as a lax doctrine against evangelical simplicity, the authority of the ancient Church Fathers, the spirit of St. Ignatius, and deviation from the truth made his mentality very close to that of Jansenists. González’s anti-Probabilism is an important final part of the history of the making of the Jesuit mind that we have tracked in this book. It merits, therefore, to be analyzed now in more detail. The long title of González’s Fundamentum explains well the author’s definition of the Probabiliorism favored by him: The Fundament of Moral Theology, i.e. a Theological Treatise on the Right Way of Using Probable Opinions, in which one proves that in order somebody can licitly follow a probable opinion favoring liberty against the law, it is absolutely necessary yet suffice that—after a diligent inquiry of truth conducted because of sincere desire of not offending God—this opinion, with due rationality and authority, seem to him either universally likely, or clearly more likely than the opposite opinion which favors the law against liberty; and therefore it will be judged by him with a firm, absolute, and unhesitating judgment.43 Just from the baroque title of his work it is clear that González’s understanding of Probabilism (as it was Pascal’s) is stricter than what Medina, Vázquez, and Suárez discussed, as we have seen in the previous chapter.44 To the future Superior General, Probabilism focused on the dialectics between (personal) freedom and the (objective) law and always favored that opinion which follows freedom. Probabilism, in his view, did not require a diligent inquiry of truth (that supposedly can be achieved with a “firm, absolute, and unhesitating judgment”) in order to avoid offending God. Indeed, he accused the probabilists, finding that their option for the less probable opinion was

probari, licitum esse sequi opinionem probabilem de honestate, vel licentia actionis, reliqua probabiliori de eiusdem malitia” (De Ortu et origine, Sectio 18). 43 Fundamentum Theologiae Moralis, id est Tractatus Theologicus De Recto Usu Opinionum Probabilium, in quo ostenditur, ut quis licite possit sequi Opinionem Probabilem faventem libertati adversus legem, omnino necessarium esse, et sufficere, quod post diligentem veritatis inquisitionem, ex sincero desiderio non offendendi Deum susceptam, opinio illa ipsi appareat, attenta ratione, et authoritate, vel unive verisimilis, vel manisfeste verisimilior quam opposita, stans pro lege adversus libertatem; ac idcirco ab ispo iudicetur vera iudicio absoluto, firmo, et non fluctuante. 44 “Probabilismum appello sententiam eorum doctorum qui a fine praecedenti saeculi usque ad tempora Alexandri VII PM, id est ab anno 1577 ad 1664, docuerunt licitum esse in operando sequi opinionem minus probabilem et minus tutam relicta probabiliori et tutiore” (fol. 24). González was wrong in stating that the discussion of combinations of more and less probable and more and less safe opinions came only after Vázquez (see ibid.). It is noteworthy that Lea’s vitriolic critique of Probabilism in his History of Auricular Confession (p. 301) is based on González’s definition of this doctrine.

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45

made almost a priori. González’s preoccupation with fighting Probabilism and promoting Probabiliorism stemmed from his religious duty to warn the faithful about offending God by sinning. Following the Jansenist view, he argued that the main Jesuit propagator of Probabilism, Gabriel Vázquez,46 opened a large gate to laxism47 and created occasion to innumerable sins,48 although the main lax author that González targeted in his On the Origins of Modern Probabilism was not a Jesuit, but the Spanish Cistercian, [Juan] Caramuel [Lobkowitz] (1606–82).49 González’s The Fundament of Moral Theology was first aimed to contrast the abuse of probable opinions of authors who were too benign [nimis benigni], i.e. the probabilistic ones. Indeed, González did not consider it sufficient for a person to have just a weak conviction or a doubt about licitness of following the opinion favoring liberty against law, “for weak means nothing.”50 He enthusiastically welcomed in his On the Origins of Modern Probabilism the decree of Pope Innocent XI against the use of weak probability that González described as a thunder against probabilists.51 The probabilistic confessors and moralists who resolved cases by probability that prescinded their truth acted against the doctrine of Aquinas and all other ancient Thomists and theologians, who required a firm judgment about the truth of an opinion.52 The goal of the formation of the judgment without passion or precipitation was to assure 45 “Ostenditur precipuam, et communem rationem, qua Probabilistae, quasi a priori licitum esse operando sequi sententiam minus probabilem de honestate actus, relicta probabiliori de eiusdem actus in honestate niti mera aequivocatione et fallacia” (Sectio 16). 46 “P. Vazquez, in hac tamen controversia reflexa de usu liciti opinionum probabilium et de modo formandi conscientiam, quando dantur opiniones contrariae doctorum, nimis benigni fuerint eaque principia statuerunt et iactarunt semina ex quibus Caramuel et alii probabilitate magnas postea deduxerunt laxitates quas nec Vazquez neque Medina unquam probarent” (fol. 31). 47 “Quod nimirum omnibus licitum sit sequi opinionem certo probabilem de honestate vel licentia actiis, lata aperitur ianua laxitatibus.” (Sectio 15, § 8). 48 See Sectio 28, § 5. 49 See De Ortu et origine, Sectio 15, § 4. 50 “Propositio VI. Ut quis possit sequi sententiam faventem libertati adversus legem, non sufficit quod illa sit probabilior seu verisimilior operanti cum excessu exiguo et dubio, quia parum pro nihilo reputatur; sed requiritur quod sit manifeste verisimilior operanti cum excessu notorio et idcirco ab ispo iudicetur vera iudicio firmo.” 51 “Impugnantur recentes aliqui Probabilistae, existimantes sufficientem caveri fulmen Vaticani Innocentii XI contra usum licitum tenuis probabilitatis, si dicamus ad usum licitum opinionis minus tutae non sufficere quod sit tantum probabiliter probabilis, sed omino requiri, quod sit in se certo probabilis (Sectio 15, § 7). See Joseph Brucker, “Le prétendu décret d’Innocent XI contre le probabilisme,” Études 86 (1901): 778–800. 52 “Propositio VII. Modus dirigendi conscientias et resolvendi casus per probabilitatem opinionum faventium libertati, praescindendi ab earum veritate seu ita ut operans non transeat ad ferendum iudicium de earum veritate, est contra doctrinam quam constanter semper tenuit D. Thomas cum omnibus antiquis Thomistis et theologis: utpote qui ad usum licitum opinionis minus tutae indispensabiliter requirunt, ut operans sibi firmiter persuadeat, illam esse veram et legi divinae conformem; opposito vero, etsi sit tutior, esse falsam et imponere onus, quod Deus non imposuit.” See also fol. 30.

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the security of conscience.53 On the other hand, González’s text targeted the authors who were too rigid [nimis rigidi], i.e. the tutioristic ones. He argued that to determine which opinion must be followed, it is not necessary to be totally sure, which was required by tutiorists, yet the opinion had to seem clearly likely and no doubt about its absolute truth was allowed.54 From this presentation of González’s main theses against Probabilism it is quite clear that the difference between his approach to ethics and that of his probabilistic enemies was rooted in different epistemological foundations. Against the Ciceronian probability (that the Jesuits espoused a century earlier, as we have abundantly discussed in the previous chapters), arguing that men are not always able to act on the basis of complete knowledge and truth, and thus act sometimes on the basis of probability and expediency, González confidently believed that penitents could clearly attain the truth in pondering probable opinions on their moral act and consequently form a “firm, absolute, and unhesitating judgment.” González’s stand against Probabilism is still better understandable from his unpublished work on the history of modern Probabilism, On the Origins of Modern Probabilism (1699). Originally, it was conceived as an appendix to his The Fundament of Moral Theology, but eventually González decided not to publish it. The autographed manuscript of González’s text has been unknown until the publication of the present book. It will be, thus, illuminating to analyze its content now.55 The long title of the treatise reveals well the reasons for author’s total rejection of Probabilism: Historic-Theological Treatise on the Birth and Origins of Modern Probabilism, and on its Progress due to its Ambiguities, Equivocations, False Suppositions, and Lack of any Solid Principle that it Should Rely on, and on its Decline and Eminent Fading [Resulted from] the Decrees of Roman Pontiffs, Bishops’ Alliance, and Fair Defeat of Contemporary Theologians.56 53 “Propositio IX. Ut iudicium operativum conceptum ab operante de honestate obiecti, sit sufficiens ad securitatem conscientiae omnino necessarium est ut formetur ob momentum authoritatis et rationis manifeste praeponderans fundamento sententiae contrariae, ac ut formetur sine passione et praecipitatione.” 54 “Propositio Prima. Quando disputatur, an antiqua actio sit honesta vel turpis, sit licita vel illicita, ut quis possit tuta conscientia aplecti partem minus tutam faventi libertatem adversus legem, non est necesse, ut illa proponatur ipsi tamquam omnino certa, sed satis est, ut citra passionem et culpam post debitam veritatis inquisitionem, appareat ipsi manifeste verisimilior, quam contraria et ab ipso iudicetur absolute vera.” 55 “Nota, in hoc volumine contineri omnia opuscula de probabilismi, quae typis mandari volebam per modum appendici ad tomum meum de recto usu opinionum probabilium, inter quae opuscula septimum erat historico theologicum de origine probabilismi, sed postea mutato consilio—decrevi ut istud seorsim descriveretur et sic factum est, amputando ab illo volumine separato illam sectionem in qua P. Ferrier conatur probare modernos casuistae nihil asserere, quod non sit conforme veritati: et haec sectio in hoc volumine est 22, in volumine autem separato est 27 (fol. 1).” 56 De ortu et origine Moderni Probabilismi eiusque progressu ex fallaciis, aequivocationibus, falsisque suppositionibus, absque solido ullo principio, cui nitatur. Et de eius decremento, atque imminente interitu ex Decretis Romanorum Pontificum,

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This title unveils also the author’s interpretation of the last quarter of the seventeenth century that elapsed between the writing of his two works on the subject as a period of Probabilism’s defeat and fading. Naturally, the main merit in this anti-probabilistic campaign he ascribed to himself. At the very beginning of his work, González repeats his epistemological stand: probabilists must be aware that if the truth of their opinions cannot be certain, they jeopardize the faithful’s salvation.57 In other words, the penitents can achieve salvation only if acting based on certainty that the opinion they follow is absolutely true.58 It is interesting to observe that the term “Probabilism” is in this treatise often substituted by the expression “benign doctrine” (sententia benigna). Thus, it links this work to González’s earlier The Fundament, in which he placed himself between the rigid and the benign authors, and unveils his concern that the probabilistic confessors and moralists were too benign. Now, the term “benign” (so detestable to the Jansenists, as we have seen earlier) was a key term of Jesuit spirituality, even if imbedded by scholastic Tutiorism. Indeed, we observed how the probabilistic approach to the penitent was justified by the Jesuit pastoral concern that González himself explained—“not to exasperate the yoke of Christ.”59 González wrote against this long Jesuit tradition represented in his view by the Jesuits [Henrique] Henríquez, [Gregory de] Valentia [(1541– 1603)],60 [Juan de] Azor, [Francisco] Suárez, [Leonardus] Lessius, [Juan de] Salas [1553–1612],61 Tomás Sánchez,62 and especially [Gabriel] Vázquez,63 who acknowledged the paternity of “the deceitful reason” to Bartolomé de Medina, even though he claimed that Probabilism could be detected already

et Episcoporum conspiratione, atque quamplurimum Theologorum recentium valida impugnatione Tractatus Historico Theologicus Authore P. Thyrso González Praeposito Generali Societatis Iesu. 57 “Non possunt Probabilistae certi esse, quod ipsorum sententia saluti animarum non noceat, nisi certi sunt de cuius veritate, hanc autem certitudinem habere non possunt” (§ 3). 58 “Ostenditur eo praecipuo titulo Probabilistas deceptos fuisse, quia falso existimarunt in delectu opinionum circa mores non esse necessarium quaerere earum veritatem, sed satis esse quaerere probabilitatem; et pro secura regula morum non assignarunt veritatem, ut prudenter creditam et existimatam; sed dumtaxat probabilitatem quandam vagam, quae communis est sententiis oppositis, et non magis connectitur cum veritate, quam cum falsitate in existimatione operantis, imo aliquando connectitur magis cum falsitate quam cum veritate, nempe quando illi opinio tutior proponitur, ut magis verisimilis (De Ortu et origine, Sectio 15).” 59 “Et hanc doctrinam benignam toto conatu defendebant, quia existimabant esse aptiorem ad facilitandum proximis viam salutis, et non exasperandum iugum Christi” (fol. 122). 60 See DHCJ, vol. 4, pp. 3871–2. 61 See DHCJ, vol. 4, p. 3467. 62 There were various Jesuit authors who bore this name. Most likely González (and Pascal) had in his mind Tomás Sánchez (1550–1610), famous for his controversial De sancto matrimonii sacramento. 63 See fol. 30.

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before him.64 González argued that these eight Jesuit authors could not represent the entire Society, especially if more grave writers from outside the Society published against it. González deemed it as opportunism that led to damnation of souls and the propagation of Probabilism as a way of facilitating peoples’ road to salvation and supporting man’s fragility.65 He made his the words of Alexander VII that the vague and versatile doctrine of Probabilism was alien to evangelical simplicity.66 However, González’s account has to be contrasted with the study conducted earlier in the present book. The number of eight probabilistic Jesuit moralists quoted by the author of On the Origins is far lower than the Census of the Jesuit Penitential Literature (1554–1650) shows. Indeed, González omits the major probabilistic professors of moral theology at the central Roman College, such as Vincenzo Figliucci and Juan de Lugo, and other prolific writers, whose multi-edited volumes were widely known to both their supporters and enemies, such as Herman Busenbaum, Valère Régnault, Antonio Escobar y Mendoza, and Paul Laymann.67 To understand better the role González attributed to himself in the history of moral theology it is enlightening to see how he presented this history in his On the Origins of Modern Probabilism. He composed it in order to show the falsity of Probabilism and to constraint its authors.68 González divided the history of modern Probabilism from its beginning until 1699, in which he prepared this work for publication, in four stages: 1) From 1580 to the pontificate of Alexander VII [1655–67]; 2) From Alexander VII to 1679, during which Pope Innocent XI “seriously repressed the doctrine of Probabilism;” 3) From 1679 to 1694, in which González’s The Fundament of Moral Theology was published; 4) From 1694 to 1699, when González re-worked his On the Origins of Modern Probabilism. In describing the first period of the history of Probabilism (1580–1667), González emphasized that the attribution of Probabilism as the system of 64 González agreed with Vázquez: “Ostenditur, Bartholomaeum de Medina non fuisse primum inventorem sententiae Probabilistarum, licet sua magna authoritate, et argumentis eam celebrem reddiderit” (De Ortu et origine, Section 1). One example of the probabilists before Medina was Thomas Mercado who would have propagated Probabilism since 1569 (see fol. 26). 65 “Unde doctrina illa probabilistarum … est occasio innumerabilium peccatorum et damnationis animarum. Quare ego convictus sum de falsistate illius sententiae, hac falsitatem detegere amplius curavi in hoc opere, ut fideles deterrantur a praxi talis doctrinae. … contra intentionem suorum authorum, qui ideo illam in scholas invexerunt et magno zelo promuoverunt quia illam opportunistarum iudicarunt ad subveniendum fragilitati hominum, et facilitandam viam salutis (fol. 14).” 66 “Sententia Probabilistarum assumens pro regula morum probabilitatem quamdam vagam et versatilem, communem sententiis oppositis, in circumstantiis, in quibus indifferens apparet ad veritatem et falsitatem, et in quibus magis propinqua falsitati quam veritati, videtur esse illa doctrina quam Alexander VII apellat alienam a simplicitate evangelica (Section 15, § 11).” 67 Figliucci, Régnault, Lugo, Escobar, and Laymann were well-known even to Pascal. See Letter V and VI of his Provincial Letters. 68 “Quorum consideratio nata est falsitatem illius ostendere, et sectatores, ac patronos dominuere” (Sectio 19).

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the Jesuits par excellence by the Jansenist authors, and especially by Antoine Arnauld, was a mere calumny,69 even though the Jansenists credited the Jesuit Probabilists with false statements. William Wendrock (pseudonym of Pierre Nicole, 1622–95),70 for example, suggested that the Jesuits erroneously considered probable, i.e. excusing from sin, any opinion, even a false one that was contrary to God’s law. The biased presentation of the Jesuit moral theology, especially in the popular Provincial Letters, was in González’s view a result of Jansenists’ resentment that, in turn, was caused by the Jesuit support of the pope’s condemnation of Jansens’s Augustinus.71 On the other hand, González reluctantly admitted that Probabilism—understood as a doctrine considering it licit to follow the less probable and less safe opinion—was a common system in this first stage of the history of Probabilism.72 He argued that the Jesuit adoption of Probabilism was a response to the Jansenist rigidity contained in Augustinus, which would have stated that mere probability was not sufficient for the security of conscience to act honestly or licitly. González’s point was that the right response to the errors of Jansenism should not have been Probabilism but his Probabiliorism.73 The thesis of the present study 69 “Infertur ex dictis iniuste, et per meram calumniam Ludovicum Montaltium, Wilhelmum Wendro[c]kium, et Antonium Arnauldum affingere Societati ut proprium Probabilismum, seu sententiam benignam de uso licito opinionis minus probabilis et minus tutae” (Sectio 19, § 2). 70 He translated into Latin and annotated Pascal’s (Louis de Montalte) Provincial Letters. Ironically, he wrote later against Jansenism in his Lettres sur l’hérésie imaginaire (Liège, 1667). 71 “Cum ergo solis Iesuitis eam doctrinam tribuunt, sane non alia ex causa, nisi ut totam invidiam detorquerent in Iesuitas, quibus erant infensi ob procuratam damnationem quinque propositionum Jansenii. Ad vinidicandam hanc iniuriam quam putabant sibi factam in condemnatione Pseudo-Augustini Cornelii Jansenii, assumpserunt consilium accusandi doctrinam moralem Jesuitarum et in hunc finem concinnarunt Litteras Provinciales, ut enim inquit auctor Dialogorum Meandri et Eudoxii ‘Constat inter omnes hunc librum (Litterarum Provincialium) a suis auctoribus eo dumtaxta editum fuisse consilio, ut obiecta sibi crimina ulciscerentur ac vicissim accusatores suos per fas et nefas criminarentur. Iniusta fuerat Jansenistis Ecclesiae decreto haereseos nota. Quid restabat, nisi ut eorum adversarii moralis saltem doctrinae corruptores essent?’ (fol. 94).” 72 “Quamvis sententia reflexa de usu lecito opinionis minus probabilis et minus tutae fuerit communis in hoc saeculo usque ad Pontificatum Alexandri VII, non tamen fuit ita communis semper in sensu invidioso de opinione minus tuta, quae ipsi speranti appareat minus verisimilis opinione tutiore” (Sectio 20). 73 “Ita averantur nimium rigorem, quem communiter servantur in doctrina morali Jansenista, adserentes nullam opinionem mere probabilem de honestate vel licentia actionis sufficere ad securitatem conscientiae; et huius rigori magis se opponerent nostri auctores censuerunt, satis esse ad usum licitum opinionis minus tutae, quod illa sit certo probabilis, quamvis opposita sit probabilior; id est quod nitatur fundamento gravi et magno, quamvis opposita nitatur fundamento graviori et probabiliore et censerunt tamen in zelo impugnandi rigorem Jansenistarum, nam ad declinandam ab illo extremo rigoris satis erat constanter defendere ad usum licitum partis minus tutae non requiri certitudinem de honestate actionis, sed sufficere probabilitatem, saltem si sit valde conspicua et notabiliter maior quam sit probabilitas opinionis oppositae. … Unde est magna vel temeritas vel imperitia vel ignorantia appellare fautores Jansenistarum eos

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challenges, though, González’s interpretation of the origins of Probabilism. As we have seen, it developed out of the rigid Tutiorism of the first generation of Jesuits and was catalyzed by the epistemological shift that originated in the close contact with Cicero’s works that were permeated by the classical concept of probability as opposed to speculative certitude in moral decisions. That change occurred already in the last quarter of the sixteenth century and, thus, cannot be viewed as a response to Jansenism. This statement does not preclude, however, a possibility that the propagation of Probabilism by the Jesuits in the second half of the seventeenth century was stimulated by its stark opposition to the theology of Port-Royal. The third period of the history of Probabilism, continues González, was marked by the condemnation of sixty-five lax opinions by Pope Innocent XI in 1679. The description of this stage by González confirms his earlier statement that Probabilism opened a wide gate to laxism. To him, laxism condemned by the pope is inevitably consequential to the formation of Probabilism. In this part, the author claims that the doctrine of anti-probabilists (himself included)—that sustains as illicit using the less probable and less safe opinion against the more probable and safer opinion and follows the more probable one—conforms to the Constitutions of St. Ignatius [of Loyola], the Decrees of General Congregations,74 and to Letters of Superiors General.75 According auctores qui docent licitum non esse in agendo sequi opinionem minus tutam quin proponatur operari ut probabilior et verisimilior quam opposita (fol. 122).” 74 On fol. 113, González quotes the decree 28 of the General Congregation XI (1661): “Congregatio amplexa iudicium Deputatorum pro studiis statuit: Primo monendos serio professores theologiae moralis, cause omnino ut doceant, neque quod aliquid probabile reputent, illico sibi licere arbitrentur, illud in pubblicum scripto verbone protrudere: sed ad id attendant maxime quod monet Congr. V Dec. 91 an communi scholarum sensui congruat; ac praeterae scandalum vel opinionem aliquam cuipiam parere possit. Superiores autem, si quos novitatem amantes, aut parum cautos in docendo compererint, a munere docendi submoveant, speque omni illius privent, poenis etiam aliis, si forte opus iis esse senserint, coercant” and a decree of the General Congregation XII (1682): “Quamvis contra novitatem laxitatemque opinionum, praesertim in rebus moralibus abunde provisum sit et praepositorum generalium ordinationibus et superiorum congregationum decretis et constitutionibus ipsis, quibus iubemur sequi in quavis facultate securiorem magisque approbatam doctrinam. In re tamen tanti momenti, postulante pro suo zelo Patre nostro, omniumque conspirantibus votis, nihil praetermittendum [rata?] Congr. Praesens decretorum, quibus novae illae laxioresque opiniones doceri typisque mandari prohibentur, vim totam renovat, roborat et confirmat. Commendat praetera in primis Patri nostro, ut non tantum transgressores loco et cathedra moveat, aliisve gravibus pro modo culpae poenis subiciat, sed ipsos etiam superiores, si quando in cohibenda liberiori illa opinandi licentia negligentiores fuerint severe puniati.” 75 See fol. 122v: “Nam anno 1617 quando adhuc incipiebat probabilismus animos occupare et in scholis plausum habere, Rev. Mutius Vitelleschus Praep. Gen. Societatis Jesu praevidens damna, quae saluti animarum poterat afferre doctrina illa, quae pro regula secura conscientiae satis esse quod operans sciat dari opinionem probabilem de honestate vel licentia operis ut illud possit licite exercere, quamvis sciat dari opinionem magis probabilem magisque fundatam de eiusdem operis malitia; gravissimam epistolam

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to him, in the entire Institute of the Society of Jesus, there was no probable argument that would support modern Probabilism.76 Again, González reluctantly admits that Probabilism was a common doctrine of the Jesuits in this period, but here he eagerly shows that nonetheless there were grave Jesuit authors who fought against it, such as Fernão Rebelo (De Iustitia, 1608),77 Paolo Comitolo (Responsa moralia, 1609), Mutius Vitelleschi (Epistula ad Superiores, 1617),78 and Card. Bellarmino (Admonitio ad episcopum Theanensem nepotem suum, 1618).79 Additionally, González proudly brings a long list of examples of how his contemporary confreres supported his antiProbabilism. For example, the Superior Provincial of France removed from teaching a probabilist professor; the Belgian theologians expressed themselves contrary to Probabilism; an important theologian from Rome wrote in 1692 a treatise against the use of Probabilism in regards of the natural law; a major professor of scholastic theology from Milan, despite his earlier support for Probabilism, proved its falsity even before González published his The Fundament; on request of Pope Innocent XI, a theologian from Spain, José de Alfaro,80 was called to teach at the Roman College the anti-probabilistic doctrine.81 Finally, González was pleased to refer to the fact that many other ecclesiastical milieus were sustaining his effort to destroy Probabilism: the religious orders, such as Benedictines and Dominicans, repudiated Probabilism and adopted Probabiliorism.82 Indeed, he argued that Probabilism was born with Bartolomé de Medina accidentally and that during the pontificate of Alexander VII the Dominicans would have rejected it as a bastard.83 The archbishop of Naples, Cardinal [Giacomo] Cantelmo [1691–1702], sent dedit ad superiores Societatis 9 Ianuarii 1617, in qua sic illos monet: omni itaque studio perficiant ut qui docent scribuntve, minime haec regula ac norma in delectu ad eas sententias accedant, quae tutiores, quae graviorum maiorisve nominis doctorum suffragiis sunt frequentatae, quae bonis moribus conduerunt magis, quae denique pietatem alere et prodesse … non vastare, non perdere.” 76 “Sententia Antiprobabilistarum de usu illicito opinionis probabilis minus tutae, relicta probabiliori et tutiori, atque operanti ipsi verisimiliori, est conformis Constitutionibus Sancti Ignatii, Decretis Congregationum Generalium, et epistolis Praepositorum Generalium. Nihilque est in toto Instituto Societatis, ex quo possit deduci argumentum probabile in favorem Probabilismi moderni” (Sectio 22, § 1). 77 See DHCJ, vol. 4, p. 3303. 78 Mutius Vitelleschi (d. 1645) was the sixth Superior General of the Jesuits elected in 1615. His letter is quoted above. 79 See DHCJ, vol. 1, pp. 387–90. 80 Ibid., p. 75. 81 See Sectio 31, § 2. 82 Sectio 35. See also fol. 18: “Anno 1656 cum sacra Praedicatorum Familia coacta esset ad capitulum generale ei impense commendavit hoc negotium, et anno 1665 edidit decretum primum in quo 28 propositiones ut minimum tamquam scandalosas damnavit atque prohibuit; et anno 1666 alias 17.” 83 “Quia indecorum foret Societati, si doctrinam Probabilistarum in Sacra Praediacatorum familia fortuito natam cum Bartholomaeo de Medina, et a tempore Alexandrii VII magna cum laude ab ipsa iam repudiatam ut prolem spuriam et principiis divae Thomae difformendo Societas adoptaret, et sibi propriam faceret” (Section 28, § 8).

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González a letter in support of his anti-Probabilistic campaign.84 And the list continued. This part of the work is clearly apologetic and pictures González as the defender of the true spirit of the Society that could not be conciliated with the benign and permissive approach of the Jesuit probabilists. However, in the context of the study that we have conducted in the previous chapters, González’s interpretation of the Jesuit major documents must be challenged again. In another part of his work,85 González added to the list of the Jesuit authoritative documents still another one, the Ratio Studiorum.86 Ironically enough, this is exactly the document that shows how the ethical views of the Jesuits had been changing in the last quarter of the sixteenth century. Furthermore, we have also seen a letter of the Superior General Acquaviva from 1600, in which he clearly supported the probabilistic direction of the Society. González seems to claim that his interpretation of the genuine Jesuit spirit that opposed Probabilism, as potentially open to pernicious permissiveness87 and to the danger of offending God,88 successfully led to the formulation of a decree by the Jesuit General Congregation 13, stating that the Jesuits would be free to teach and publish their anti-probabilistic views and that the new superior general would be required to strongly support them.89 In his opinion, this decree would have proved again that the Jesuit endorsement of Probabilism as their own ethical system was just a false rumor.90 But was it?

84 See Sectio 31. González inserted a copy of this letter dated 27 February 1694 into his treatise. Another copy of it is preserved in ARSI (Epp. NN. 40, fol. 137). 85 See On the Origins of Modern Probabilism, fol. 112v. 86 “Institutum Societatis per Constitutionibus Societatis S. Ignatii, per Decreta Congregationum Generalium, per Rationem Studiorum, et per epistolas Praepositorum Generalium enixe semper suis professoribus commendavit, ut in unaquaque materia eas seligerent opiniones, quae solidioribus authoritatis et rationis nituntur fundamentis et quae proximorum saluti et edificationi magis congruant et procul sint ab omni laxitatis specie” (fol. 112v). 87 “Quia doctrina Probabilistarum indiscriminatim et sine limitatione asserentium licitum esse cuilibet sequi sententiam minus tutam in occursu tutioris et sibi probabilioris, exposita est pernicissis laxitatibus: quas indecorum et absurdum foret Societati cum fundamento tribui” (Sectio 28, § 2). 88 “Non expedit autem Societati pro religione tueri doctrinam, quae huic periculi exposita est” (Sectio 28, § 6). 89 “Congregatio XIII declararet liberum esse in Societate sententiam benignam Probabilistarum impugnare, et oppositam tueri, et ut novus Generalis in ea electus id solicite procuraret” (Sectio 28). 90 “Ad dissipandum falsum rumorem quod Societas sibi asseruisset, ut propriam sententiam Probabilistarum, Congregatio Generalis XIII declaravit illam non esse doctrinam Societatis, sed liberum esse ipsius professoribus contrariam doctrinam antiprobabilistarum in scholis et in libris impressis tradere” (Sectio 27, § 3).

Conclusion How did the Jesuit ethics of a doubtful conscience between Loyola and González de Santalla develop? It was not as straightforward as Pascal and his Jansenist colleagues and after them many more or less biased historians claimed. This process had different stages—the first generation of Jesuits employed Tutiorism, which ironically made the Jansenists’ approach to ethics similar to that of the first Jesuits. But Pascal did not know that and through his popular Provincial Letters fixed forever the image of Jesuit minds as hypocritical and Janus-faced. Not only was he unaware of the Jesuit transition from Tutiorism to Probabilism as a result of their re-definition catalyzed by the fascination with Greco-Roman literature, but he also pictured Jesuit Probabilism as a way of deliberately deceiving the conscience. The making of the Jesuit conscience was much more complex and variegated, as this book has aimed to show. Fundamental to tracing the crucial transformation of the early modern Jesuit (and European) approach to conscience was the census of the Jesuit penitential literature (1554–1650). Beyond providing a much fuller picture of that production than any other bibliographical source or historiography on the topic has ever done, it pointed out two very important issues. First, the census showed the overwhelming publishing predominance of the first Jesuit manual for confessors, the tutioristic Short Directory for Confessors and Penitents, attributed to Polanco. (This observation raised additional questions about the relationship between religious authority and the publishing success of a book.) Second, the census highlighted the success of the probabilistic texts on sacramental confession in the last two decades of the sixteenth century. It also underscored that manuals for confessors or students of moral theology, although inescapable sources for studying the making of the Jesuit conscience, do not suffice. The analysis of Vásquez’s and Suárez’s commentaries on Aquinas’s Summa, which belong to a different genre, in Chapter 4 convinced us about the great importance of these texts to understand the process under consideration. Even though the Directory was the most authoritative expression of the early Jesuit corporate conscience, this book has examined other important Jesuit texts of the period, such as the Jesuit Constitutions and Laínez’s treatise on women’s cosmetics and clothes. All of them revealed the same tutioristic mindset linking the first Jesuits to the mainstream of the thirteenth-century scholastic tradition (Alexander of Hales, Bonaventure, Albert the Great, and Thomas Aquinas). The same cast of mind distanced them from the late medieval and early modern streams of ethical thought that attempted to mitigate scholastic Tutiorism: the radical Franciscan voluntarism represented by Henry of Ghent and John Duns Scotus, the compromising views between Thomism and voluntarism by John Buridan, the fifteenth-century thinkers Gerson and Antoninus, and finally early modern Azpilcueta and the School of

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Salamanca. Even tutioristic Cajetan would have appeared to some Jesuits too lax, as seen in the discussion of Laínez’s De fuco et ornatu mulierum. The tutioristic Jesuit frame of mind underwent, however, a revolutionary transformation in the late sixteenth century. The leading Jesuits involved in any field concerned about decision-making, from lectures on cases of conscience to manuals for confessors and treatises on moral theology, abandoned medieval Tutiorism and adopted modern Probabilism. The most fascinating question at this point of my research asked how it was possible that the first Jesuits, who did not consider Tutiorism obsolete in the context of enormous cultural and social shifts of the era, espoused a new ethical probabilistic approach so enthusiastically and swiftly, as soon as Probabilism was exposed by the Dominican Medina in 1577. My thesis was that the Jesuits re-defined themselves when they decided to teach youth liberal arts and for that purpose began founding numerous schools, which in a few decades became the widest educational system of the early modern era. Through an analysis of the code of the Jesuit pedagogy known as Ratio Studiorum, I have showed that in the program for their schools the Jesuits followed the tradition of Renaissance Humanism, which was fascinated about Greco-Roman literature and especially about Ciceronian rhetoric. The Jesuits could easily be captivated by the latter, for they found in it common features with their spirituality—humanitas, civilità, and the rhetorical principle of accommodation to the particular circumstances of the case. I highlighted this Ciceronian and Renaissance heritage not only in the Jesuit Ratio or in their humanistic orations or academic lectures, but even in those texts analyzed previously from the tutioristic perspective—the Directory, the Jesuit Constitutions, and the directories to the Spiritual Exercises. These texts showed the presence of the probabilistic way of reasoning in its embryonic stage. A closer analysis of the lectures on rhetoric at the Roman College by Pedro Perpiñan revealed a further association between Ciceronian and Jesuit rhetoric—their epistemological foundation on probability and Aristotelian distinction between science and ethics. By demonstrating the interaction among lectures on cases of conscience, the study of Greco-Roman literature with a special devotion to Ciceronian orations, and classes of rhetoric in the Jesuit schools (especially at the exemplary Roman College), I indicated the variety of factors in the process of transforming the Jesuit conscience at the end of the sixteenth century. This transformation had its revolutionary consequences in the ministry of confession for which the Jesuits were already famous before the decision of founding schools (1548), but which they never renounced. They continued to form confessors not only through lectures on cases, but also through numerous books for confessors, as the census evidenced. Almost all of them employed Probabilism, which became the ethical system of the Jesuits through the next century. Even the biggest Jesuit enemy of Probabilism and propagator of Probabiliorism, González de Santalla, had to admit it. My purpose in this book has been to trace the transformation of the Jesuit way of ethical thinking and not how Probabilism actually entered the confessional

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practice. Our discussion in Chapter 4, however, suggested that the Jesuit academic speculation on Probabilism might have seriously influenced Jesuit ministry. Based on the interaction of humanities and ethics characteristic to Jesuit pedagogy, it would now be fascinating to track the extension of probabilistic reasoning to different spheres of early modern life and analyze its application to significant contemporary moral, political, and even scientific problems. It is no coincidence that the main Jesuit probabilist was Suárez, who was not only a theologian, but also a philosopher renowned as the father of international law. It is no coincidence that the Spanish playwright Calderón de la Barca (1600–81) was an alumnus of the Jesuit Imperial College in Madrid. It is probably also no coincidence that Galilei was influenced by the Jesuit Roman College—the main pan-European forge of probabilistic reasoning—even though his opponent Cardinal Bellarmine was himself a Jesuit. Although Probabilism originated as a practical way to alleviate the allegedly anxious conscience of medieval penitents in the context of sacramental confession, it profoundly affected the early modern prince, lawyer, physician, merchant, and scholar. Indeed, Probabilism addressed a wide range of problems in the normal performance of their civil duties: should Catholics obey a nonCatholic or non-Christian ruler? May a judge condemn an innocent man proved to be guilty, even if the sentence would be against his own opinion and evidence? May a physician obtain sperm through masturbation? Is it moral to gain profits through lending money at interest? Is it licit to follow an opinion that contradicts the authority of the Scripture? These are only some of the many subtle yet vital queries that emerged more challenging in the early modern era. In spite of its strictly religious origins, Probabilism offered a method of valid ethical reasoning that has not lost its appeal even to contemporary doubtful consciences.

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Index

accommodation, 3–4, 27, 79–81, 91, 104, 114, 133, 146 Acosta, José de, 32, 45 Acquaviva, Claudio, 41, 87, 144 Adriaensens, Adriaan, 52, 91 Agostini, Giuseppe, 33, 43, 44, 45, 48 Albert the Great, St, 2, 61, 62, 63, 65, 108 Alcalá Jesuit book printing in, 10 University of, 33, 42, 67, 107–8, 112, 119 Alexander VII, Pope, 130, 136, 140, 143 Alexander of Afrodisias, 103 Alexander of Hales, 2, 65, 108 Alfaro, José de, 143 Ambrose, St, 58, 96 Annat, François, 127, 130 Antoninus, St, 18, 43, 56, 58, 60, 66, 67, 68, 110, 114, 145 Antwerp, Jesuit book printing in, 10, 46, 108 Aráoz, Antonio de, 24 Aristotle (Aristotelianism), 4, 7, 58, 66, 67–9, 72, 74, 88, 91, 93, 97, 103–4, 146 Arnauld, Angélique, 5, 130 Arnauld, Antoine, 129–32, 141 Augustine (Augustianism), 66, 101, 129, 131, 136 Ávila, Juan de, St, 18 Azor, Juan, 4, 9, 10, 11, 32, 33, 43, 44, 46, 67, 107–8, 112–14, 116, 121, 124, 125, 139 Azpilcueta, Martin de (Navarrus), 51–2, 58, 59, 66, 70, 82, 111–12, 145 Bagot, Jean, 33 Bañez, Domingo, 67, 107 Bardi, Francesco, 34, 45 Barzizza, Gasparino, 90, 93 Bauny, Etienne, 8, 11, 34, 43, 113 Bayle, Pierre, 41, 49, 127

Bellarmino, Roberto, S., 70, 143, 147 Bembo, Pietro, 91, 93 Benci, Francesco, 4, 89–90, 92, 95, 102, 104 Bertonio, Ludovico, 34, 45 Bèze, Théodore, 71 Bible (Scripture), 61–3, 83, 90, 130; see also Word of God Bobadilla, Nicolás de, 19, 21 Bonaventure, St, 65, 108 Bonifacio, Juan, 78, 95 books compendia, 51, 54, 56, 59, 76–7 production of penitential, 1, 2, 7–8, 32–47 Borja, Francisco de, St, 29 Bracciolini, Poggio, 92–3 Bravo, Bartolomé, 91 Bresser, Martin, 34 breviary see liturgy, and Jesuits, Broët, Paschase, 28 Bruni, Leonardo, 96 Bruno, Vincenzo, 32, 34, 35, 43, 44, 45 Buridan, John, 66, 145 Busembaum, Hermann, 2, 9, 35, 43, 44, 59, 63–4, 113–14, 140 Cacciaguerra, Bonsignore, 20 Caesar, Julius, 92–3 Cajetan (Tommaso de Vio), 7, 58, 66, 67, 73–5, 111–12, 114–15, 121, 146 Calderón de la Barca, 147 Calvin, John (Calvinism), 75, 90, 130 Cantelmo, Giacomo Cardinal, 143 Cantor, Peter, 63 Carneades of Cyrene, 98 Casas, Bartolomé de las, 118 Campion, Edmund, St, 4, 78, 90 Canisius, Peter, St, 79, 91 Cano, Melchor, 77, 111–12 Caramuel de Lobkowitz, Juan, 137 Cardona, Juana de, 29 Carneades, 7

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cases of conscience (casuistry) and ancient rhetoric, 7, 47, 78–9, 97, 101 lectures on 2, 6, 33, 38, 51, 71, 73–4, 79, 83, 105, 113–14 and probability, 7, 97–101 and Probabilism, 3, 51 scholarship on, 2, 6, 51 census, of Jesuit penitential literature, 1, 32–47, 107 Cerda, Melchor de la, 92 certitude (certainty), moral, 7, 57, 65–8, 73, 98–9, 100, 113–14, 117, 120, 123–4, 130, 132, 137–9, 141–2 Charles V, Emperor, 14, 75 Cicero, 3, 4, 7, 11, 77–8, 85, 88–105, 130, 142 Ciceronianism, 3–4, 90–112 circumstances, 57, 68–70, 72, 79–80, 84, 146 civic virtues, 78, 93–4, 96, 99 Clement VIII, Pope, 129 Clement of Alexandria, 75 Coímbra, Jesuit College of, 94, 101–2 Collegio Romano, 4, 34, 36, 39, 41, 42, 48, 54, 67, 70, 78–9, 89, 91, 95, 101–5, 107–8, 112–14, 117, 124, 140, 143, 146 Cologne, Jesuit book printing in, 10, 32, 45, 107 Comitoli, Paolo, 6, 11, 35 Communion (Eucharist) frequent, 19–24 and confraternities, 22 confession (sacrament) and absolution, 56–8, 122 and colleges, 22–3, 25, 113–14 and Communion, 19–22 and confraternities 22 and Councils, 19, 66, 122 and the dying, 21 frequent, 19–24, 79 general, 22, 29, 30–31, 51, 81–2 Jesuit privileges, 32, 58 and kings, 8, 122, 127 ministry of, 1, 14, 16, 17, 54, 76, 146 and preaching, 19, 23–6 reiteranda, 57 and rhetoric, 93 and salvation, 65–6

and sexuality, 59–63 without pay, 15 and women, 26–30; see also books; conscience; consolation; Spiritual Exercises confessor, Jesuit, 8, 18, 26–7, 49, 54–8, 68–70, 73, 80–81, 84–5, 107, 119–20, 122, 132, 134, 138–9, 146 congregations, general, 14, 142, 144 conscience and confession, 113, 117–18 doubtful, 2, 65, 75, 119, 123, 146–7 extrinsic and intrinsic, 122 freedom of, 2, 9, 68, 124, 129 and law, 7, 65–6, 122–4 consolation and confession, 17–19, 26, 44, 79–81 and ministries, 16, 17 and probabilism, 8, 68 Constitutions, Jesuit, 2, 3, 14, 17, 41, 71–3, 79, 145–6 consueta ministeria, 13, 21, 79 contemplation and action, Jesuit combination of, 95–6 conversation, spiritual, 14 converso (of Jewish ancestry), Jesuits, 3, 15, 18, 30, 32, 41, 42, 50, 51, 70, 73, 74, 75, 90, 97, 101–2, 130 Cortesi, Paolo, 93 Crispoldi, Tullio, 20 Damian, Peter, 60 De Bonis, Emerio, 35, 46 De la Puente, Luís, 35, 43–4 Denis, Johannes Kosmas Michael, 102 De officiis (Cicero), 77–8, 93, 100 Descartes, René, 100 devil, 23, 60, 64 Devotio Moderna, 20 Diaceto, Giacomo, 35, 43–4 Diana, Antonino, 45, 64 Doménech, Jerónimo, 77 Dominican controversy with Jesuits, 5, 77, 129 Dominican influence see Salamanca, School of Dostoevsky, Fyodor, 3, 127 Duns, John Scotus, 66, 109, 145

INDEX

Duvergier de Hauranne, Jean (Saint– Cyran), 128, 130 education, Jesuit academic, 13 in colleges, 4, 6, 22, 79, 84, 94–5, 105, 114 common good as goal of, 3, 93–4 humanist influence on, 3, 83, 97 see also illiterates; Ratio Studiorum Eguía, Diego de, 24 Egypt, spoils of, 3 Elisabeth, Queen of Portugal, 102 Enlightenment, 49, 63 Erasmus, Desiderius, 89, 91, 93, 96, 113 Escobar y Mendoza, Antonio, 3, 6, 11, 36, 43, 44, 113, 133, 140 Eucharist see Communion Exposcit debitum, 15, 16 Favre, Pierre, l, 18, 21, 31, 76 Fernández de Córdoba, Antonio, 36, 43, 44 Figliucci (Filliucci), Vincenzo, 10–11, 36–7, 43, 44, 46, 47, 67, 113, 124, 140 “Five Chapters” see Formula of the Institute Formula of the Institute, 5, 14–17, 18, 22, 76 Fornari, Martino, 6, 37, 43, 45, 46, 47, 48, 50, 67, 124 Freux, André de, 26, 78–9 Funes, Martín de, 38, 44, 45 Galilei, Galileo, 70, 147 Gerson, Jean, 20, 43, 58, 60, 62, 63, 66, 67, 110, 114, 145 Giustinelli, Pietro, 38, 43, 44 Giustiniani, Paolo, 96 Godefroid de Fontaines, 57 Gonçalves da Câmara, Luís, 27, 30, 76 González de Santalla, Tirso, 5, 114, 119, 127, 130–31, 133–5, 137, 138–46 Guarino, Battista, 93 Hallier, François, 34 Henríquez, Henrique (Enríques, Enrique), 5, 7, 38, 43, 44, 108, 139

165

Henry of Ghent, 66, 145 heroism, ethical, 117–18 Horace, 93 humanism/humanistic tradition, 2, 77 hypocrisy, Jesuits, accusation of, 3, 127, 145 and Renaissance, 3, 83, 92–3, 101–2, 146; see also education, Jesuit; and Ratio Studiorum illiterates, teaching of, 13, 16, 76 Illsung, Jakob, 135 Innocent XI, Pope, 135, 137, 143 Jansen, Cornelius (Jansenius), 129–31, 141 Jansenism (Jansenists), 5, 6, 9, 11, 19–20, 30, 32, 33, 64, 68, 70, 75–6, 98, 100–101, 116, 119, 125, 128–37, 139, 142, 144 Jerome, St, 96–7 John III (king of Portugal), 23 Julius III, Pope, 15, 17 Laínez, Diego, 2, 3, 5, 15, 21, 22, 25, 28, 55, 70, 74–7, 79, 130, 145–6 Lateran Council IV (1215) and confession, 16–17, 18, 19, 56; see also confession, and Councils law canon, 24, 34, 38, 43, 60, 66, 84, 108–12, 115, 124 and conscience, 7, 122–4 and Probabilism, 112, 136–7 and Tutiorism, 2 Laymann, Paul, 6, 7, 9, 11, 38, 43, 47, 88, 113–14, 140 lecture notes, on rhetoric, 103–5, 146 Ledesma, Diego de, 4, 5, 90 Lessius, Leonardus, 9, 51, 67, 70, 76–8, 100, 113, 139 Liguori, Alfonso, 11, 40, 59 liturgy, and Jesuits, 24 Livy, 89, 103 Loarte, Gaspar de, 5, 6, 18, 27, 28, 38–9, 43, 44, 45, 46, 50, 113 logic, 97, 104 Lombard, Peter, 43 López, Luis, 118 Louis XIV (king of France), 5, 127

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Loyola, Ignatius of, St, 1, 3, 13–15, 18, 20, 30, 41, 49–50, 52, 54, 56, 59, 61, 66, 70–71, 73–7, 79, 81, 87, 94, 125, 136, 142, 145 Lugo, Juan de, 6, 9–11, 39, 43, 64, 67, 108, 113, 124, 140 Luis, Prince of Portugal, 101 Lyons, Jesuit book printing in, 10–11, 32, 45–6, 102, 108, 133 Madrid, Cristóbal de, 19 Maldonado, Juan de, 39, 44 male gender and female penitents, 26–30 Mariana, Juan de, 76 Martial, 78 mass, 24 Mazarin, Cardinal, 127, 131 Medina, Bartolomé de, 3–4, 7, 18, 24, 49, 57, 66, 69, 78, 80, 100, 105, 107, 112–19, 121–5, 132, 136–7, 139–40, 143, 146, Melanchthon, Philipp, 70 Mercado, Thomas, 140 Mercurian, Everard, 51 Messina, school at, 22–3, 74, 78–9, 89, 91 Mirón, Diego, 52, 81 misogyny, Jesuit, 26, 29 modesty, 27, 29, 55, 75 Molina, Luis de (Molinism), 6, 76, 129 monks, Jesuits as different from, 96 Montaigne, Michel de, 97 moral, theology, 6, 9, 34–8, 40–43, 45, 47, 50–51, 55, 59, 63, 107–8, 112–14, 116, 118, 125, 133, 134–7, 139–41, 145–6 Muret, Marc-Antoine, 94–5, 102 music, Jesuit relation to, 24 Nadal, Jerónimo, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 24, 25, 26, 30, 73, 76–7, 79, 95–6 nature, sins against, 59–64 Negrone, Giulio, 4, 90–91 Nicole, Pierre (William Wendrock), 130, 141 Nider, John, 67, 68, 110, 114 Nuñez, Pedro Juan, 101 obedience, Jesuit, 13, 16, 28, 61, 73 Ochoa, Miguel de, 55

Olave, Martín de, 54 Oliva, Giovanni Paolo, 114, 134–5 Omnis utriusque sexus, 19, 20 opinions difference of, 58, 64, 67, 72, 87, 113 extrinsic and intrinsic, 122–3 multitude of, 8 of law and fact, 122–3 probable, 2, 68, 84–7, 97–8, 101, 104, 107, 114–21, 134, 137 role of, 59–64 safe/less safe and safer, 8, 57, 65, 85–7, 107, 115, 119–21 and truth, 7, 139 orator, Jesuit, 88, 93–4, 102, 104 Ciceronian, 99–101, 146 Ovid, 93 Palmio, Benedetto, 51 Paris, University of, 5, 31, 102, 129, 131 Jesuit book printing in, 10, 32, 45 Parliament, French, 35, 102, 127, 130 Pascal, Blaise (Louis de Montalte), 1, 4–6, 8, 10, 11, 34, 36, 40, 41, 49, 64, 70, 91, 113, 119, 125, 127, 136, 139–40, 145 Pascal, Etienne (father of Blaise), 128 Pascal, Jacqueline (sister of Blaise), 128 Paul III, Pope, 5, 17 Pelagianism see Semi-Pelagianism Penance, sacrament of see confession Perpiñan, Pedro Juan, 4, 78, 90, 94–5, 101–5, 146 Philo, 97 Pico, Gianfrancesco, 91, 93 Pinelli, Luca, 39, 43, 45, 50 Plato (Platonism), 66, 97–8, 136 Plinius, 92 Poissy, Colloquy of, 3 Polanco, Juan Alfonso de, 1–3, 5, 9, 11, 15, 18–19, 21, 23, 25, 28, 39, 43–6, 48, 49–52, 55–6, 60–61, 66, 70–71, 73–4, 76–9, 81–2, 94, 100, 119, 145 Poliziano, Angelo, 93 Pontanus, Jacob, 4, 88, 92 Possevino, Antonio de, 51, 92 preaching and confession, 14, 16, 24–6 priesthood, Jesuit, 14, 25, 54, 58, 73, 93

INDEX

printing, of Jesuit penitential books, 1, 7, 10–11, 32, 44–5 Probabiliorism definition of, 2 and Dominicans, 9, 24, 117, 143 and Jesuits, 6, 66, 85–7, 127, 100, 130, 134–44 and papacy, 135 Probabilism adopted by the Jesuits, 1, 6, 9, 49, 51, 66, 79, 83, 105, 107–14, 118–25 and Cicero, 4, 97–105, 142 in contrast to Probabiliorism, 117 in contrast to Tutiorism, 56, 68, 70, 85, 100, 105, 117, 119–20, 132 and the Dominicans from the School of Salamanca, 1, 6, 49, 57, 70, 87, 114, 118–19, 133 embryonic, 4, 79–82 Jansenist opposition to, 11, 70–71, 127, 141 Jesuit opposition to, 6, 11, 134–44 and laxity, 5, 6, 34, 49, 127, 134, 136–7, 142 theorization, 7 and liberty of conscience, 9, 117–18 Probability, 4 Ciceronian, 97–105, 138 Provincial Letters (Pascal), 4, 10, 34, 36, 127–34, 141, 145 Pyrrho, 98 Quintilian, 4, 89, 91–2, 103 Ramée, Pierre de la (Ramus), 94, 102 Rapin, René, 100 Ratio Studiorum, 33, 52, 144 and casuistry, 2, 4, 47, 51, 83–6, 88, 101, 119, 146 contributors to, 102, 108 and rhetoric, 88–90 Razzi, Serafino, 58 Rebelo, Fernão, 143 Reformation, Protestant, 5–6, 13, 43 and Counter-Reformation, 15 Regimini militantis ecclesiae, 15, 16 Régnault, Valère (Reginaldus), 6, 10, 11, 32, 40, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 114, 140

167

rhetoric and accommodation, 3–4, 91 and Cicero, 3–4 and logic, 97; see also Ratio Studiorum, and rhetoric and Renaissance, 3–4, 83–4, 89–90, 93 Ribadeneyra, Pedro de, 30, 76 Ricci, Matteo, 4, 91 Richelieu, Cardinal, 127 risk, moral, 8, 57–8, 68, 115–16, 119 Rodríguez, Juan, 27, 40, 43 Rome, Jesuit book printing in, 45–6, 49–50, 92, 107, 135 Rubens, Peter Paul, 24 Sá, Manuel de, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11, 41, 43, 44, 46, 48, 50, 67, 107, 112–14, 132 Salamanca School of, 3, 5, 57, 65–6, 70, 77, 79, 112, 145–6 University of, 1, 107, 123, 134 Salas, Juan de, 139 Salmerón, Alfonso de, 15, 25, 76 Salutati, Coluccio, 96 San Esteban Church, 1, 77 Sánchez, Juan, 41 Sánchez, Thomas, 11 Sánchez, Tomás, 32, 41, 113, 139 Santarelli, Antonio, 41 Savonarola, 20 Schott, André, 78, 92, 94 Semi-Pelagianism, 129–30 Seneca, 92, 96–7 Short Directory for Confessors and Penitents (Polanco), 1–2, 11, 39, 43, 44, 45, 46, 48, 49–61, 64, 67, 69–71, 73, 77, 79–80, 84, 119, 122, 145 Singlin, Antoine, 128 Soáres, Cipriano, 4, 85, 91, 97–8, 101, 103–4 Socrates, 98 Soto, Domingo de, 111–12, 114–15 spiritual direction, 26 Spiritual Exercises, 10 and confession, 30–31, 59, 81 controversy of, 77 and embryonic Probabilism, 146 ministry of, 14, 16

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SAINT CICERO AND THE JESUITS

and Tutiorism, 73 spirituality, Jesuit, 4, 79–82, 113, 139 Suárez, Francisco, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 32, 41, 67, 70, 71, 76, 79, 105, 107, 112–13, 116–17, 123–5, 129, 132, 136, 139, 145, 147 Suetonius, 89, 92 Summenhart, Konrad, 57 Tacitus, 99 Tamburini, Tommaso, 7, 42, 45, 113 Tellier, Jean, 42, 50 Terence, 93 Teresa of Ávila, St, 29, 38 Tertullian, 2, 75, 130 theology moral, 6, 9, 34–8, 40–44, 47, 50–51, 55, 59, 107–8, 113–14, 116, 125, 133, 135–8, 140–41, 145–6 Thomas Aquinas, St (Thomism), 2, 11, 58, 61, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 72, 73, 74, 87, 96, 107–8, 112, 114, 119, 133, 137, 145 Toledo, Francisco de, 2, 5, 9, 10, 11, 37, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 50, 52, 59, 61–3, 64, 67, 70, 87 Trent, Council of, 3, 8, 9, 13, 14, 15, 18, 19, 25, 30, 49, 50, 56, 58, 122 Tutiorism and certainty, 100 and conscience, 117 definition of, 2, 56 and Jansenism, 5, 7, 9, 70, 100, 127, 136, 141, 145 and Jesuits, 2–3, 5–6, 7, 11, 70–72, 85–8, 145 and rigorism, 118, 127, 130, 136–8 and salvation, 21, 65–6, 68, 73, 117, 134

and Scholasticism, 2, 65–71, 145 in Jesuit Constitutions, 71–3 in Laínez, 74–5, 145 in Polanco’s Directory, 56–9, 80, 84, 119 in Spiritual Exercises, 73 Valdivia, Luís de, 42, 45 Valentia, Gregory, 139 Valla, Lorenzo, 93 Vázquez, Gabriel, 4, 9, 10, 67, 76, 79, 85, 98–9, 105, 107, 112, 116, 119–22, 124, 132–3, 136–7, 139, 145 Venice, Jesuit book printing in, 10–11, 18, 34, 45–6, 63, 107 Vergerio, Pier Paolo, 96 Veronese, Guarino, 93 Villanova, Francisco de, 22 Virgil, 93, 103 Vitoria, Francisco de, 57, 66, 70, 111–12, 114, 123 Vitoria, Juan Alfonso de, 51 Vitelleschi, Mutius, 143 Voltaire, 128 Ward, Mary, 29 women and Cajetan’s view of, 74–5 Jesuits too familiar with, 26; see also confession, and women; male gender; misogyny and Laínez’s view of, 2, 74–5 and Spiritual Exercises, 30 Word of God, 13, 16, 25 works of mercy, 13, 16 Xavier, Francis, 31 Zamberti, Carlo, 42