Jesuit Writings of the Early Modern Period, 1540–1640 (review)

This well-balanced compendium of texts reflects the diversity and dynamism of the Jesuits' first century. In each of the eight sections, a potted introduction is followed by illustrative material, mainly drawn from familiar sources (the Jesuit Constitutions, letters of Jesuit luminaries, the Chronicon of Juan Polanco, etc.) but with other, less well-known documents also included. Throughout the book, Donnelly's selections are astute and informative. Useful bibliographical suggestions are made for further study, and footnotes are provided to explain major events and introduce any significant figures who are mentioned.

After an introductory chapter detailing the formative influence of Loyola's writings, most of the main spheres of Jesuit activity are tackled. Jesuit educational initiatives are approached through extracts from the Constitutions, documents concerning the establishment of the first Jesuit schools, and an example of the many dramatic productions written and performed in Jesuit colleges. The letters of celebrated missionaries (Matteo Ricci, Roberto de Nobili, Francis Xavier, and others) form the centerpiece of the chapter on evangelism in Asia and the Americas, while extracts from Edmund Campion and Robert Bellarmine represent the Society's efforts to oppose the rise and spread of Protestantism. While combating Luther and Calvin was an insignificant factor in the motivation behind the Jesuits' creation, it quickly became one of their chief duties and obsessions. The inclusion of an especially bullish letter from Loyola to Peter Canisius, advising how Protestantism should be confronted in Austria, makes this point very nicely.

Subsequent sections cover Jesuit spirituality (a difficult subject to capture in a handful of extracts), the more specialized ministries the Society pursued (including the reform of prostitutes, internal rural missions, and engagement with witchcraft), and the fraught debate over how far Jesuits ought to become involved in European political life. Accounts of internal wrangling about the duties and responsibilities of highly placed Jesuit confessors are supplemented by extracts from the works of Robert Bellarmine and the controversial, tyrannicide-discussing passages from Juan de Mariana's On a King and the Education of a King. A final section surveys the opposition the Society faced from both Protestants and rivals within the Catholic fold. The antics of Spanish Dominicans, the opposition of the Paris Parlement (represented by extracts from Etienne Pasquier's influential Le Cathéchisme des Jésuites), and the resentments provoked among English secular priests are all discussed.

In his pithy introduction (a brief summary of Loyola's spiritual odyssey and the arrival of the Jesuits on the European stage), Donnelly apologizes for having neglected various issues. As he admits, it would have been advantageous to hear more about the lay sodalities established by the Society or the first stirrings of Jesuit art and science. Given the constraints of space, however, some omissions are inevitable, and Donnelly has done his wide subject justice. Admittedly, there might have been more stress on the internal divisions that afflicted the early Jesuits: the fierce rivalries between the various national branches of the Society; quarrels about the nature of Ignatian spirituality or about missionary methods, for instance. That aside, this is a thoughtfully edited and well-arranged book that would be eminently suitable for a course dealing with Jesuit history or a broader survey of early modern Catholicism.