PHILOSOPHY AMONG THE JESUITS. 255 how he was to attain his purpose in the outside world. If anyone takes the trouble to read his Exercitia Spiritualia through, he will not be repaid by five lines of pure specula- tion, except perhaps in the Contemplatio ad Amorem, in the last ' Week ' ; and even that contemplation, as may easily be seen, works towards an end towards the one end of the whole book. This allusion to the Exercitia is by no means irrelevant ; we are at the very springhead of Jesuit philo- sophy. The book in question contains the whole idea of St. Ignatius, already worked out and matured in the solitary grotto of Manreza, at the very beginning of his conversion ; and the whole subsequent life of this man, together with the whole history of his Order, is but the systematic evolution of the principles contained in this book. It is studied in silence and solitude, during one week every year, by each member of the Order. It is studied in the same absolute seclusion during the three probations : a week during the first, a month during the second, and a month again during the third. From its contents the subject of the daily hour of meditation of every Jesuit is selected. It is the theme of every retreat preached by a member of the Order ; and it would be hard to find a single book, a single sermon, com- posed by a Jesuit, in which some idea taken from the Exer- citia does not occur. Now in this book, after the first fundamental idea of salvation, from corollaries to corollaries, the author comes at last to the problem : By what means can the interests of the Church be best promoted intellectually ? And the answer is given in the Regulce ad rede sentiendum cum Ecclesia. Not that, in raising this question, St. Ignatius means altogether to throw aside the free exercise of his reason. True, reason is for him a " means unto salvation," and nothing more ; but, if not exercised freely, it is no longer reason. The Church, being true, needs no reasonings for itself, but only for its children ; and the fewer they need, the more meritorious their faith is. " Blessed is he that hath not seen, and yet hath believed." Still, one must be practical, and it is a fact that the better and stronger the arguments given in favour of the Church, the more easy a task it is to believe. Therefore it only remains to look out the best arguments and the best system of philosophy whereby to defend the Church. In the Regulce, Loyola begins thus : "I must be ready to believe that what I see to be black is white, should the Church declare it to be so ". This seems a rather astounding position for a man in his right senses to take up ; and how any philosophy can be possible in such a state of mind is at
