Étienne Pasquier, The Jesuits’ Catechism or Their Doctrine Examined (1602)

Known for her translations of Annales School historians, and her analytical bibliography of Marc-Antoine Charpentier, Patricia M. Ranum has edited several seventeenth-century sources, the most recent one being the Mystical Writings of Jean-Joseph Surin (Brill, 2018). Jotham Parsons, PhD (1997, Johns Hopkins University) is Associate Professor of History at Duquesne University. He has published extensively on early modern European history, including The Church in the Republic: Gallicanism and Political Ideology in Renaissance France (CUA Press, 2005). Robert A. Maryks, PhD (2006, Fordham University) has published widely on the history of the Jesuits, including The Jesuit Order as a Synagogue of Jews (Brill, 2010). He is the editor of the Journal of Jesuit Studies.

Acknowledgements

Historical Introduction

 Jotham Parsons



Translator’s Preface

 Patricia M. Ranum



Glossary of Terms lxvi



Étienne Pasquier The Jesuits’ Catechism or Their Doctrine Examined



Book I



1 Wherein a Gentleman Opens His Country House to a Group of Weary Travelers



2 The Plan of the Society of Jesus, Whom Ordinary Folks Call Jesuits



3 Censure of the Jesuit Sect by the Faculty of Theology of Paris in 1554



4 How, When, and by What Artifices, the Jesuits Wormed Their Way into France



5 Decree of the Gallican Church against the Jesuits at the Colloquy Held at Poissy in 1561



6 On the Request Presented to the Parlement by the Jesuits in 1564, to Matriculate at the University of Paris, and How Many Parties Butted Heads with Them



7 How the Jesuits Were Refused at the Very Beginning in Rome, and the Artifice Thanks to Which They Were Received



8 The Insolent Name of the Society of Jesus, Usurped by the Jesuits, and the Diverse Fashions They Expressed It, in Order to Get It Authorized



9 The Jesuits Are Called Apostles in Portugal and in the Indies, and the Deceit They Used



10 The Impieties of Guillaume Postel, Jesuit



11 The Studies of the Great Ignatius



12 When Ignatius and His Companions Presented Themselves before Pope Paul III, They Were True Charlatans, and the Titles They Used Were False



13 It Very Much Appears That the Approval Granted by Paul III to the Jesuit Sect Is Null and Void



14 First, the Management of Our Church by the Bishops; Second, the Ancient Religious Orders; Third, the Universities; and How the Jesuit Sect Is Built on the Ignorance of All This Antiquity



15 One Cannot Give a Place to the Jesuits in All the Three Ancient Orders of Our Church, and That Is Why They Do Not Dare Attend Processions



16 Without Wounding the Authority of the Holy See, One Can Truly Call the Jesuits Papelards, and Their Sect the Papelardie



17 On Ignatius of Loyola’s Fabulous Visions, and on the Miraculous Fables of Francisco Xavier



18 On Ignatius’s Machiavellisms, to Make His Sect Stylish



19 Closing Book I



Book II



1 Our Gallican Church and the Jesuit Sect Are Incompatible



2 The Popes Who Authorized the Jesuits When They First Arrived, Never Believed That They Could or Should Reside in France



3 The Jesuits’ Teaching of Humane Letters, Philosophy, and Theology to All Sorts of Scholars Is Contrary to Their First Institute; and Concerning the Progress and the Surprises They Used to Promote This New Tyranny, to the Detriment of the Ancient Discipline of the Universities



4 The Foundation of Jesuit Cheating Comes from the Instruction of Young People, and Why Our Ancients Did Not Want Young People to Be Taught Learning in Religious Orders



5 The Artifice by Which the Jesuits Enrich Themselves from the Castoff Possessions of Their Novices



6 The University of Paris Was Ruined by the Jesuit’s Crafty Liberality When Teaching the Young



7 The Jesuit Sect Has Encountered Peter Abelard’s Heresy on Several Occasions



8 Jesuits Claim the Right to Remove from Their College Children Who Are in the Guardianship of Their Fathers and Their Mothers, without Their Permission



9 Concerning the First Vow Made by the Jesuits, Which They Call the Simple Vow



10 One Cannot Excuse the Presence of Heresy and Machiavellism in the Jesuits’ Simple Vow



11 How the Jesuits Engage the Authority of the Holy See in Order to Excuse the Heresy of Their Simple Vow



12 In Addition to the Heresy in the Simple Vow of the Jesuits, There Is Also Manifest Cheating



13 The Jesuit Provincials Authorize Themselves to Dismiss Their Inferiors of the Simple Vow, Just as Their General Does



14 How the Jesuit Fathers of the Great and Third Vow Mock God When They Vow to Be Beggars



15 The Jesuits’ Vow of Chastity Contains Yet Another Heresy, and a Brief Discussion of the Title Fathers, Which the Jesuits of the Great Vow Call Themselves



16 About the Mission Vow, and How They Use It to Make Fun of Us All, Especially Our Holy Father the Pope



17 On the Blind Obedience That the Jesuits Have for the Pope, and Which They Are Disavowing Today in Their New Books



18 The Jesuits’ Solution for Concealing the Impiety of Their Blind Obedience



19 About Ignatius’s Wisdom and the New Jesuits’ Silliness. A Conversation between the Jesuit and the Author of the Present Discourses



Book III



1 On the Anabaptism in the Jesuits’ Blind Obedience toward Their Superiors. And How, Owing to That, No King or Prince Can Protect Himself from Being Ambushed



2 On the Extraordinary Trial Conducted in the Low Countries against Robert Bruce, a Scotch Gentleman Who Had Been Denounced by Father William Crichton, Jesuit, for Being Unwilling to Carry Out the Assassination of the Chancellor of Scotland



3 On the Assassination That William Parry, Englishman, Urged On by the Jesuits, Wanted to Commit against Elizabeth, Queen of England, in 1584



4 About Another Assassination Pursued in 1597 against the Queen of England by the Jesuits



5 The Jesuits Today Pretend to Disapprove of Their Heinous Doctrine Concerning the Murders of Princes and Rebellions against the State



6 The Prodigious History of the Detestable Parricide Attempted against King Henri IV, Most Christian King of France and Navarre, Incited by Jesuits



7 How Very Prejudicial to Our Church the Barbaric Impiety of the Jesuits Would Have Been, If Their Execrable Advice Had Had Its Effect



8 On the Assassination That Jean Châtel, Nurtured at the School of the Parisian Jesuits, Wanted to Attempt against the King in 1594



9 It Is a Heresy to Approve of the Assassins of Princes, Even Though the Princes Were Tyrants



10 A Memorable Act by Ignatius, Where the Jesuits Learned to Kill, or to Have Killed, Those Who Do Not Adhere to Their Opinions



11 On the Holy League That the Jesuits Introduced into France in 1585, and How They Are the Cause of the Huguenots’ Resurgence



12 The Auricular Confession of the Jesuits Has Been the Strongest Sword of the Rebellion, and How They Fence with It



13 On the General Congregation of the Jesuits, Held in Rome in 1593, Where They Were Forbidden to Become Involved in Affairs of State



14 Do Jesuits Have Spanish Souls, as Their Enemies Say They Do, or Do They Belong to the Highest Bidder?



15 The Jesuits Caused the Death of Mary, Queen of Scots: a Brief Discourse on the Ruin They Created for England



16 The Jesuits Get Involved in the Affairs of State, and after They Have Troubled Kingdoms, Everything Turns Out the Opposite of What They Hope



17 The Pope Does Not Have the Power to Transfer the Kingdom of France from One Person to Another, to Counter the Dangerous Proposition of Jesuism, and Other Discussions on the Same Subject



18 Decree of the Parlement of Paris against the Jesuits in 1594, and a Chapter Excerpted from Book 3 of the Recherches de la France by Étienne Pasquier



19 By Covert Words, the Jesuits Claim That the Decree against Jean Châtel Was Unjust: and How God Permitted Him to Be Punished in Order to Make the Jesuits’ Punishment More Exemplary for Posterity



20 Concerning the Pyramid Built in Front of the Palais of Paris, and the Decree Issued in Rome by the Magnificent Pasquin about the Reestablishment Being Sought by the Jesuits



21 On the Division That Seems to Exist between the Parlements of France Concerning the Jesuits, and How That Division Can Be Handled



22 How the Order of the Umiliati Was Suppressed by a Decree from Rome, and Why There Are More Arguments for Suppressing the Jesuits than the Umiliati



23 The Jesuits’ Impudence in Order to Protect Themselves from the Decree of the Consistory of Rome, Issued against the Order of the Umiliati



24 The Jesuit Sect Is No Less Prejudicial to Our Church than the Lutheran Sect Is



25 Concerning the Noteworthy Undertaking of the Superior General of the Jesuits against the Holy See of Rome, and That There Is No New Sect That Eventually Can Be as Prejudicial to It



26 One Must Not Make It a Practice to Believe Our Jesuits’ Promises, Because There Is No Faith and Law in Them, beyond the Faith and the Law That Depend on the Convenience of Their Affairs



27 Conclusion to the Third Book, about the Reestablishment of the Jesuits Who Had Been Chased Out



28 On the Schism Recently Introduced by the Jesuits into the Catholic Church of England, Scorning the Authority of the Holy See, a Tragic Story That Is Full of Compassion and Pity

Index