The Fathers, in three companies, made their way back to Venice in the same plight in which they came hardly bestead, and hungry. On rejoining their master, he, and those of them who still were laics, received priests' orders from the nuncio there. They moreover renewed their solemn engagements toward each other, and afresh dedicated themselves to the service of God, of the Church, and of mankind everywhere.

War still raged between the Venetians and the Turks, nor was it possible to obtain, by any means, a passage to the shores of Palestine. Nevertheless, that there might be no ground hereafter for reproaches of conscience, the party resolved to await in the neighbourhood of Venice the expiration of the year which their vow embraced; so that if, contrary to all probability, the war should be brought to a speedy conclusion, they might instantly re-assemble, and snatch at any favourable opportunity for accomplishing their original

purpose.

Meanwhile, in this crowded and voluptuous city, and in the surrounding territory, men so minded as were these fathers could not want a field of labour. They went forth, therefore, to their work, three and three; Loyola taking as his companions, as before, Lainez and Faber; and it is these who should be regarded as, in a strict sense, the authors of the Jesuit institute. It was at this time, no doubt, beneath the bare shelter of a hovel's crazy roof, and often in want of food, and worn with toil, as street preachers, that these extraordinary men, throwing into a common stock their individual gifts, digested, in loving concert, the rules of the Society, so far as it is constituted by written precepts; and more than this brought vividly before their own minds those unwritten principles which, from the first, have been to it a secret soul and mind a code not written

upon paper, but deep cut upon the fleshy tablet of every Jesuit's heart.

Loyola, Lainez, and Faber, quitting Venice, betook themselves to the neighbouring town, Vicenza. In a neglected and miserable suburb of this place they found a deserted building open to the blasts of heaven open to any rude intruder; for it had neither door nor window! This was the place of their conclave, and their only home: in the most sheltered corner of it they slept upon a bundle of straw or stubble, collected by themselves. But here the hubbub of the town was not heard; and here or at least during the hours of darkness-the solace of prayer and meditation might be enjoyed without disturbance; and here, at midnight, none making them afraid, the soul-kindling psalm might be recited, and the hymn, lifting the thoughts toward the world of triumphant harmony, might loudly be sung! Happy inmates of this hovel- happy, we say again, and say it with emphasis, after looking into the glittering palaces of Venice: happy its inmates; and wise too if man be immortal!

The plan adopted, after a preliminary season of prayer, was for two to go forth daily into the town, there to ask alms, and to exercise their evangelic functions among the people, while one remained at home if home it might be called, to guard their little stock of books and utensils, and to prepare food for supper, if food were in store. It was Ignatius, we are told, who most often took upon himself this domestic charge; and it is said that the reason for his doing soout of his turn-was his labouring under a complaint in the eyes, brought on by excessive weeping! an ambiguous explanation, we must think it, of an ambiguous course of conduct.

Forty days having been spent in penitential exer

cises, and a colleague having joined them, the fathers entered upon a course of labours the most arduous. Not one of them possessed a fluent and colloquial command of the Italian language a language which is so difficult an instrument in the hands of those who are imperfectly acquainted with its refinements. Forth they went, however, as street preachers. A stone, at the corner of a house, or a stool, borrowed from a shop, was pulpit enough. The preacher, occupying some such position, waved his bonnet over his head, and in a loud voice summoned the people to attend. Wan and wasted was his countenance - his eyes deep sunken, his attire worn, and in ill trim. At first mistaken for a quack, the gathering crowd was soon subdued to quietness and solemnity by the awe-inspiring tones of the speaker's voice, and its attention fixed by the weight of the subject-matter of his discourse, by the intensity of his manner, by the fearful energy of his gesticulations, and by the majesty of that appeal to the conscience, which those are best able to make whose thorough conviction of the truth and importance of what they affirm is recommended to the hearer by that dignity and selfpossession which belongs to men who are well educated and well bred. A similar advantage A similar advantage-let it be called adventitious and non-essential, and yet real-attached to the open-air preachings of the founders of Methodism. In this instance, however, it is not a John or a Samuel Wesley to whom we are listening, and yet the story is substantially the same (as were the topics). On the skirts of the crowd in the streets and squares of Vicenza, and of the neighbouring towns and cities, there were usually seen some who came up to mock the speaker and to disturb the congregation; but who, after venting for a few minutes their ribaldry and profane jests, were suddenly smitten by a word catching their unwilling ears. The countenance falls the straggler stands per

plexed-pushes forward toward the speaker — listens breathless melts and perhaps, with a loud voice, interrupted by sobs, confesses himself conscience-smitten and vanquished! Such conquests not unfrequently gladdened, we are told, the labours of these evangelists; and it is quite credible that it was so; for similar successes have ever rewarded the labours of apostolic preachers of every church, and of whatever school in theology.

The Fathers, when not abroad, preaching and teaching, were resorted to by many of these converts, to whom they gave sedulous attention. Some brief hours of rest excepted, they employed themselves in these labours early and late. Their devotedness, their cheerful endurance of privations, their humility, fervour, and especially their well sustained personal behaviour, produced an impression, of the most powerful kind, upon persons of all classes; and they quickly became the objects of general affection and reverence. In consequence of this change in their favour, their personal comfort was henceforward religiously attended to by devout persons, so that instead of the fragments of mouldy bread, which, for weeks, had constituted almost their only fare, they were now regularly and copiously supplied with the best provisions. At the same time, it is said, and we take it on the authority of Loyola's own narrations, that he was favoured, not merely with spiritual consolations of the most peculiar kind, but with visions or visitations, supernatural, such as he had not been wont to experience since the time of his retreat in the cavern at Manresa. A critical epoch in his personal history is now before us; and any one must feel it to be such who, sincerely wishing to render justice to the founder of Jesuitism, must yet reserve his faith in what is professedly supernatural, for narratives that stand quite exempt from colourable suspicion.

CHAPTER VI.

LOYOLA'S ELECTION TO THE GENERALSHIP OF THE
SOCIETY.

THE eleven companions had, at this time, drawn together at Vicenza, where they had made a greater impression upon the popular mind than elsewhere, and whence they had made excursions to the neighbouring towns-to preach, and although it does not appear why this should have been necessary to beg.

The time had now nearly expired to which their vow extended, in relation to Palestine; no prospect, however, of their finding it practicable to undertake the voyage had presented itself, in the interval, or was now apparent. The Fathers therefore would quickly find themselves released in conscience from that particular obligation, and might hold themselves free no doubt much to their inward satisfaction to prosecute those more vast schemes of spiritual agency which, lately, had been opened to their view. Loyola himself, it is probable, had willingly, and perhaps not very slowly, relinquished a vague ambition to convert a world of Mahometan misbelievers, in favour of that far better defined, as well as more practicable, plan which the Jesuit institute embodied, and which, while it did indeed embrace the conversion of Turks and pagans, held mainly to the purpose of erecting a ghostly empire over the entire area of Christendom.