They made habit and bad example almost a sufficient exculpation from crime.  Perjury was allowable, if the perjured were inwardly determined not to swear.  They invented the notion of probabilities, according to which a person might follow any opinion he pleased, although he knew it to be wrong, provided authors of reputation had defended that opinion.  A man might fight a duel, if by refusing to fight he would be stigmatized as a coward.  They did not openly justify murder, treachery, and falsehood, but they excused the same, if plausible reasons could be urged.  In their missions they aimed at eclat; and hence merely nominal conversions were accepted, because these swelled their numbers.  They gave the crucifix, which covered up all sins; they permitted their converts to retain their ancient habits and customs.  In order to be popular, Robert de Nobili, it is said, traced his lineage to Brahma; and one of their missionaries among the Indians told the savages that Christ was a warrior who scalped women and children.  Anything for an outward success.  Under their teachings it was seen what a light affair it was to bear the yoke of Christ.  So monarchs retained in their service confessors who imposed such easy obligations.  So ordinary people resorted to the guidance of such leaders, who made themselves agreeable.  The Jesuit colleges were filled with casuists.  Their whole moral philosophy, if we may believe Arnauld and Pascal, was a tissue of casuistry; truth was obscured in order to secure popularity; even the most diabolical persecution was justified if heretics stood in the way.  Father Le Tellier rejoiced in the slaughter of Saint Bartholomew, and Te Deums were offered in the churches for the extinction of Protestantism by any means.  If it could be shown to be expedient, the Jesuits excused the most outrageous crimes ever perpetrated on this earth.

Again, the Jesuits are accused of riveting fetters on the human mind in order to uphold their power, and to sustain the absolutism of the popes and the absolutism of kings, to which they were equally devoted.  They taught in their schools the doctrine of passive obedience; they aimed to subdue the will by rigid discipline; they were hostile to bold and free inquiries; they were afraid of science; they hated such men as Galileo, Pascal, and Bacon; they detested the philosophers who prepared the way for the French Revolution; they abominated the Protestant idea of private judgment; they opposed the progress of human thought, and were enemies alike of the Jansenist movement in the seventeenth century and of the French Revolution in the eighteenth.  They upheld the absolutism of Louis XIV., and combated the English Revolution; they sent their spies and agents to England to undermine the throne of Elizabeth and build up the throne of Charles I. Every emancipating idea, in politics and in religion, they detested.  There were many things in their system of education to be commended; they were good classical scholars, and taught Greek and Latin admirably; they cultivated the memory; they made study pleasing, but they did not develop genius.  The order never produced a great philosopher; the energies of its members were concentrated in imposing a despotic yoke.