CHAPTER XXI
THE RUSSIAN CONTINGENT
Frederick the Great and the "Philosophers" – Protection of the Jesuits – Death of Voltaire – Catherine of Russia – The Four Colleges – The Empress at Polotsk – Joseph II at Mohilew – Archetti – Baron Grimm – Czerniewicz and the Novitiate – Assent of Pius VI – Potemkin – Siestrzencewicz – General Congregation – Benislawski – "Approbo; Approbo" – Accession of former Jesuits. Gruber and the Emperor Paul – Alexander I – Missions in Russia.
Even before the general suppression of the Society, Frederick II of Prussia had given a shock to the politicians of Europe and to his friends the philosophes of France, by welcoming the exiled Jesuits into his dominions and employing them as teachers. Hence d'Alembert wrote to remonstrate; though at first glance he appears to approve of the king's action, his insulting tone when speaking of the Pope reveals the animus of this enemy of God. It ran as follows:
"They say that the Cordelier, Ganganelli, does not promise ripe pears to the Society of Jesus and that St. Francis will very likely kill St. Ignatius. It appears to me that the Holy Father, Cordelier though he be, would be very foolish to disband his regiment of guards to please the Catholic princes. Such a treaty would be very like that of the sheep and the wolves; the first article of which was that the sheep should deliver their dogs to the wolves. But in any case, Sire, it will be a curious condition of affairs, if while the Most Christian, the Most Catholic, the Most Apostolic, and the Most Faithful kings are destroying the grenadiers of the Holy See, your Most Heretical Majesty should be the only one to protect them." A little later he writes: "I am assured that the Cordelier Pope needs a good deal of plucking at his sleeves to get him to abolish the Jesuits. I am not surprised. To propose to the Pope to destroy this brave troop is like asking Your Majesty to disband your body guards."
D'Alembert was playing double. He was as anxious as any one to bring about the Suppression, and on April 3, 1770, Frederick wrote him that, "The Philosophy which has had such vogue in this century is bragged about more brazenly than ever. But what progress has it made? 'It has expelled the Jesuits,' you tell me. Granted, but I will prove, if you want me to do so, that the whole business started in vanity, spite, underhand dealing and selfishness."
On July 7, 1770, Frederick wrote to Voltaire and said: "The good Cordelier of the Vatican lets me keep my dear Jesuits whom they persecute everywhere. I will guard the precious seed so that some day I may supply it to those who may want to cultivate this rare plant in their respective countries." Frederick had annexed Silesia which was entirely Catholic, while the part of Poland which was allotted to him at the time of the division had remained only half faithful. To gratify them and keep them at peace, he thought he could do no better than to ask the Jesuits to take care of the education of the youth of those countries, "let the philosophes cry out against it as they may." Hence, on December 4, 1772, he wrote to d'Alembert: "I received an ambassador from the General of the Ignatians, asking me to declare myself openly as the protector of the Order; but I answered that when Louis XV thought proper to suppress the regiment of Fitzjames (the Jansenists), I did not think I could intercede for that corps; and moreover, the Pope is well able to bring about such a reformation without having heretics take a hand in it."
A Jesuit named Pinto had, indeed, presented himself to Frederick to ask for his protection, but he had no warrant to do so. Someone in Rome had suggested it, and he was encouraged in his enterprise by Maria Theresa. When apprised of it, the General sent a very severe reprimand to the volunteer ambassador, and that disposed of Father Pinto. No more was heard of him.
Frederick showed himself a very vigorous protector of the Society. When the Brief was published he issued the following decree: "We, Frederick by the Grace of God, King of Prussia, to all and every of our subjects, greeting:
"As you have already been advised that you are not permitted to circulate any Bulls or Briefs of the Pope, without our approbation of the same, we have no doubt that you will conform to this general order, in case the Brief of the Pope suppressing the Society of Jesus arrives at any department within your jurisdiction. Nevertheless, we have deemed it necessary to recall this to your memory, and as, under the date of Berlin, the sixth of this month, we have resolved, for reasons prompting us thereto, that this annihilation of the Society which has recently taken place shall not be published in our states, we graciously enjoin upon you to take all necessary measures in your district to suppress the aforesaid Bull of the Pope; for which end you will, in our name, as soon as you receive this communication, issue an explicit order, under penalty of rigorous chastisement, to all ecclesiastics of the Roman Catholic religion domiciled in your territory not to publish the aforesaid Bull annulling the Society of Jesus. You are commanded to see carefully to the execution of this order, and to inform us immediately in case any high foreign ecclesiastics endeavor to introduce any Bulls of this kind into our kingdom surreptitiously."
This mandate had the effect of protecting the Jesuits who were in his dominions; for as canon law made the promulgation of the Brief an indispensable condition of the suppression, it followed that the Jesuits in Prussia could conscientiously continue to live there as Jesuits. Indeed, the king had previously notified the Pope that such would be his course of action, and an autograph dispatch to the Prussian representative at Rome, dated Potsdam, September 13, 1773, reads as follows: "Abbé Columbini: You will say to whomsoever it may concern, but without any ostentation or affectation, and indeed you will endeavor to find an opportunity to say naturally, both to the Pope and his prime minister, that with regard to the affair of the Jesuits, my resolution is taken to keep them in my States as they hitherto have been. I guaranteed in the treaty of Breslau the statu quo of the Catholic religion, and I have found no better priests than they under every aspect. You will add that as I am a heretic, the Pope cannot dispense me from the obligation of keeping my word nor from nullifying my obligation as an honest man."
The last phrase, of course, is very insulting, but there was no help for it. It was the king's. When d'Alembert heard of the letter, he revealed his true colors, and warned Frederick that he would regret it, reminding him that in the Silesian War, the Jesuits had been opposed to him; that is to say, the Silesian Jesuits were faithful to Silesia. Frederick replied, on Jan. 7, 1774: "You need not be alarmed for my safety. I have nothing to fear from the Jesuits; they can teach the youth of the country, and they are better able to do that than any one else. It is true that they were on the other side, during the war, but, as a philosopher, you ought not to reproach me for being kind and humane to every one of the human species, no matter what religion or society he belongs to. Try to be more of a philosopher and less of a metaphysician. Good acts are more profitable to the public than the most subtle systems and the most extravagant discoveries, in which, generally speaking, the mind wanders wildly without ever finding the truth. In any case, I am not the only one who has protected the Jesuits. The English and the Empress of Russia have done as much." This correspondence with d'Alembert continued for a year or so; and in 1777, when Voltaire was dying, the king wrote to advise him to think of his old school days at Louis-le-Grand. "Remember Father Tournemine, who was your nurse and made you suck the sweet milk of the Muses. Reconcile yourself with the Order which in the last century gave to France its greatest men." To all appearances Voltaire did not take the advice of his royal friend.
The politicians of Spain were particularly irritated at this action of Frederick, but he paid no attention to their anger. It is even said that the Pope ordered his nuncio at Warsaw to suspend all the Jesuits in Prussia from their ecclesiastical and pedagogical function and that a request was made to the King to have it done pro forma, with a promise to lift the ban immediately afterwards, a proposition which seems too silly to have ever been seriously made. But when Clement XIV died, Pius VI, after a few perfunctory protests, so as not to exasperate the other powers, let it be known that he was not dissatisfied with the status of the Jesuits in Prussia, and he not only wrote in that sense to Frederick, but encouraged him to continue his protection of the outcasts. Whereupon Frederick dispatched the following letter to the superior of Breslau. It is dated September 27, 1775:
"Venerable, dear and faithful Father: The new Pontiff having declared that he left to me the choice of the most suitable means to be employed for the conservation of the Jesuits in my kingdom, and that he would put no obstacle in my way by any declaration of irregularity, I have in consequence enjoined on my bishops to leave your Institute in statu quo, and not to trouble any of your members or to refuse ordination to any of your candidates to the priesthood. You will therefore conform to this arrangement and advise your confrères to do likewise."
Until the death of Bishop Bayer of Culm, who was the staunch friend of the Fathers, there was no cloud on the horizon; but he was succeeded by Bishop Hohenzotten, who belonged to the House of Brandenburg. He had been extremely friendly before his installation as bishop, but immediately afterwards he advised the king to secularize the Jesuits and to forbid the establishment of a novitiate. The king, however, would not yield any further than to permit of their dressing as secular priests, and until his death in 1786 they continued to live in community under the name of the "Priests of the Royal Institute." His successor was not so benignant, for he seized all the revenues of the houses and thus put an end to their existence in Prussia, and they, like their brethren elsewhere, took the road of exile. Some joined the secular clergy and others made their way to Russia.
More surprising still was the protection accorded to them by the terrible Empress Catherine II of Russia. Indeed, it was she who made it possible to preserve unbroken the link between the old and the new Society. On the other hand, not a few Pharisees have reproached the Society for having accepted the protection of this imperial tigress. For the same reason, they might have found fault with Daniel in the lion's den. He could not get out of it; and, the animals were kinder than the humans above ground.
Catherine of Russia was not a Russian but a Prussian. Her name was Sophia Augusta of Anhalt-Zerbst. She and her unfortunate husband had been adopted by the czarina, Elizabeth, as her successors on the imperial throne of Russia, on condition that they would change their name and religion. There was no difficulty about either, especially the latter. According to Oliphant, Kohl, Döllinger and others who have described the state of the empire as it was about forty years later, sixteen millions or about one fourth of the entire population of Russia did not profess the Greek faith. The educated classes neither cared nor affected to care for the state religion. From the mercantile classes and most of their employees and the landed aristocracy all faith had departed. The peasants were divided into about fifty sects, and hatred and contempt for one another and the enmity of all of them for the Orthodox Church were extreme. No two Russian bishops had any spiritual dependence or connection with any other. They were simply paid officials of a common master who appointed, degraded or discarded them at pleasure. De Maistre who lived in Russia about that time says. "The words: "Oriental Church" or "Greek Church" have no meaning whatever." "I recognize," said Peter the Great, "no other legitimate Patriarch than the Pope of Rome. Since you will not obey him you shall obey me only. Behold your Pope." On that basis the Russian Church was built.
Strictly speaking the Jesuits were not entering Russia but merely staying in their old establishments which were still Polish, though geographically labelled Russia. Nevertheless, with Russia proper they had already a considerable acquaintance. Thus, as early as 1612, Father Szgoda had allowed himself to be taken by the Tatars to the Crimea, so as to evangelize the Cossacks. Later, Father Schmidt had appeared at the court of Peter the Great as chaplain of the Austrian embassy. In 1685, Father Debois brought a letter to the czar from the Pope Innocent XI, and in 1687 Father Vota, encouraged by several Russian theologians of note, was bold enough to propose to Peter the Great a union with Rome. Peter's sister Sophia was favorable to the project and the moment seemed propitious, but a brace of fanatical monks backed by the patriarch, fiercely denounced the scheme and it was dropped. A school, however, was established at Moscow, but when Sophia died, Peter drove out the Fathers. In 1691, however, he returned to a better state of mind and permitted the Catholics of Moscow to build a church and to invite the Jesuits to take charge of it. But in 1719 he again expelled them, for he had conceived the idea of a Church of his own; not only independent of Rome but of Constantinople, and absolutely under his own control – a view it is said that was suggested to him by the French Jansenists whom he met in Paris on a visit there in 1717.
That ended all hopes of Catholicity in Russia, but in 1772 when Poland was dismembered, a large number of Catholics were added to the population of Russia and Catherine II, who had murdered her husband in order to be supreme in the State, addressed herself to the task of constituting these Russianized Poles into an independent Catholic Church. She found an ambitious Polish bishop, named Siestrzencewicz who entered into her views, and on May 23, 1774, by an imperial ukase she established the Diocese of White Russia. Zalenski, S. J., the author of "Les Jésuites et la Russie Blanche" is strong in his denunciation of Siestrzencewicz, as are Pierling and Markowitch, but Godlewski is more benignant and tries to excuse the bishop as a man who did indeed resort to questionable methods, but was striving to stave off an open persecution of the Catholics. Zalenski has the more likely view.
This name of "White" Russia is a puzzle to most people, as are the opposite descriptions of "Black" and "Red" Russia. Indeed Okolski, who wrote in 1646, has a book entitled "Russia Florida," a name not in accordance with the popular notions about that country. There is also a "Greater" and a "Little" and a "West" Russia. The geographical limits of White Russia may be found in any encyclopedia. It is the region in which are Polotsk, Vitebsk, Orsha, Mohilew, Motislave and Gomel, and is bounded by the rivers Duna, Dnieper, Peripet and Bug. It was Russia's share in the first spoliation of Poland, and had a population of 1,600,000. Moscow is not far to the east but St. Petersburg (Petrograd) is at a great distance to the north.
In 1772 Catherine made known her intention regarding the Jesuits whom she found teaching in the section of Poland which had passed under her sceptre. They were even to retain their four colleges of Polotsk, Vitebsk, Orsha and Dunaberg besides their two residences and fourteen missions. She needed them as teachers and as they were the first to declare their acceptance of the new conditions, and had thus set an example to their countrymen, she revoked the ancient proscription of Peter the Great against the Society in Russia proper, and also apprised the other provinces of Europe that she would be their guardian in the future.
When the Brief of Suppression was announced, the Fathers felt perfectly sure that, like Frederick II, she would not permit it to be promulgated, both because the Russian Church refused allegiance to Rome, and also because she had already bound herself by a promise to protect them. Nevertheless, through their superior, they addressed to her "Sacred Imperial Majesty" the following letter:
"It is to Your Majesty that we owe the privilege of professing publicly the Roman Catholic Religion in your glorious states, and of depending in spiritual matters on the Sovereign Pontiff who is the visible head of our Church. That is the reason why we Jesuits, all of whom belong to the Roman Rite, but who are most faithful subjects of Your Majesty, now prostrate before your august imperial throne, implore Your Majesty by all that is most sacred to permit us to render prompt and public obedience to the authority which resides in the person of the Sovereign Roman Pontiff and to execute the edict he has sent us abolishing our Society. By condescending to have a public proclamation made of this Brief of Suppression, Your Majesty will thus exercise your royal authority, and we by promptly obeying will show ourselves obedient both to Your Majesty and to the Sovereign Pontiff who has ordered this proclamation. Such are the sentiments and the prayers of all and each of the Jesuits, which are now expressed by me to Your Majesty, of whom I have the honor to be, with the most profound veneration and the most respectful submission, the most humble, the most devoted and the most faithful subject,
"Stanislas Czerniewicz."
"Her Sacred Majesty" absolutely refused to accede to the request. On the contrary she insisted that the Brief should not be proclaimed in her dominions. She showed them the greatest consideration and insisted that her nobles should imitate her example, so that it became the fashion for the dignitaries of the empire to visit the various Jesuit establishments; on their part, the Jesuits never failed to show their appreciation of such an honor in as splendid a fashion as possible. The most memorable of all such visits was one in which the "Semiramis of the North" was the central figure. Catherine left St. Petersburg, on May 20, 1780, and reached Polotsk ten days later. In her suite were Potemkin, Tchernichef, de Cobentzel, the Prince Marshal Borjantynski, and Prince Dolkowiouki. On her arrival, while surrounded by all the notables who had hastened to meet her, the Jesuits were pointed out to her and she graciously saluted them. In the evening, the college was splendidly illuminated in her honor, and on the following morning she came to the church, for she was burning with a desire to witness a Catholic ceremonial. After Mass she went through the house, and both at her arrival and departure the rector celebrated her glory in an epic poem.
From thence she set out for Mohilew where Joseph II of Austria awaited her. He had already visited the college at this place, and was received with proper honor by the rector and provincial. He made all sorts of inquiries about the reason why the suppressed Jesuits were permitted to exist in Russia, and the bishop told him laconically: "The people need them; the empress ordered it and Rome has said nothing." "You did well," replied the emperor, "you should not, and could not have done otherwise." With the emperor on this occasion appears the unexpected figure of one of the suppressed Jesuits: Father Francis Xavier Kalatai. He was his majesty's travelling companion, and has left a letter telling us what happened on this occasion.
"At Mohilew," he writes, "at the farthest extremity of the recently dismembered provinces of Poland, the Jesuits still remain on their former footing. They are protected by the empress, because of their ability in training the youth of the country in science and piety. I asked to be presented to the superior when we visited the college and found him to be a very venerable old man. I questioned him and other members of the community on what they based their non-submission to the Brief of Suppression, and they replied in the same formula as the bishop: "Clementissima imperatrice nostra protegente, populo derelicto exigente, Roma sciente et non contradicente;" (i. e. on the protection of our most clement empress, the needs of the abandoned people, and the knowledge and tacit consent of Rome). They then showed me a letter from the Pope expressing his affection for them, and exhorting them to remain as they were until new arrangements could be made. He insisted upon their receiving novices and admitting Jesuits from other provinces, who desired to resume with them the sweet yoke of Christ from which they had been so violently torn. The provincial added that all the Jesuits of Russia were willing to relinquish everything they had, at the first authentic sign of the will of the Pope, and that they waited only a canonical announcement to that effect. Thus, I found that the true spirit of the Society had kept its first fervor among these scattered remnants of it in Russia."
The empress arrived, after making fifty leagues a day on the trip from Polotsk; killing ten horses on the journey. The meeting of the two sovereigns was unusually splendid; ten thousand soldiers stood on guard in the city, and besides state receptions, there were theatrical performances, public sports, banquets and the rest. The Jesuits of other establishments paid their respects, and were presented to the empress by the governor. On the 12th of June, "Semiramis" left for St. Petersburg. Such a favor, of course, made the Jesuits still more popular and, at the same time, checked the papal nuncio, Archetti, who had not yet recovered from his failure to have the suppression made effective. Nevertheless, he still persisted in his efforts, in spite of the threats of the empress. But she never yielded.
Father Brucker writing in the "Etudes" (tom. 132, 1912, 558-59) gives a characteristic letter of the empress to Baron Grimm who was a friend and associate of Rousseau, Diderot, d'Alembert, Holbach and the rest. At that time, Grimm was the envoy of the Duke of Saxe-Gotha, at the court of France, and later on, Catherine's own plenipotentiary to Lower Saxony.
The letter is dated May 7, 1779 and runs as follows: "Neither I nor my coquins en titre (my honorable rogues) les Jésuites de la R. Bl. (the Jesuits of White Russia) are going to cause the Pope any worry. They are very submissive to him and want to do only what he wishes. I suppose it is you who wrote the article in the 'Gazette de Cologne' about the hot house (the Jesuit novitiate). You say that I am amusing myself by being kind to them. Assuredly, you credit me with a pretty motive, whereas I have no other than that of keeping my word and seeking the public good. As for your grocers (the Bourbon kings) I make a present of them to you; but I know one thing, namely, they are not going to visit me and sing the song: 'Bonhomme! you are not master of your house while we are in it.'"
As early as 1776, that is only three years after the Suppression, the Jesuits of White Russia already numbered 145 members, and had twelve establishments: colleges, residences, missions, etc. In 1777 the question was discussed about opening a novitiate and the Fathers had sufficient evidence that Pius VI would be glad of it and that even Clement XIV had not been averse. Moreover, the letter sent to Bishop Siestrzencewicz had been found on examination not to be the "formidable decree," as friends in Rome had described it, for it left to him the right of creating and renewing only "what he might find necessary." Finally, as it was not couched in the usual form of Apostolic documents, the superior, Father Czerniewicz, set aside his doubts and wrote both to the bishop and to the firm friend of the Society, Governor General Tchernichef, that he had determined to open that establishment.
Tchernichef's support must have been very strong, for when Father Czerniewicz arrived at Mohilew to arrange matters with the bishop, he received from the prelate a decree dated June 29, 1779, authorizing him to carry out his purpose. This decree began with the words: "Pope Clement XIV, of celebrated memory, condescending to the desire of the Most August Empress of the Russias, our Most Clement Sovereign, had permitted the non-promulgation in her dominions of the Bull 'Dominus ac Redemptor;' and Our Holy Father Pope Pius VI, now happily reigning, shows the same deference to the desires of Her Imperial Majesty, by refraining from all opposition to the retention of their habit, name and profession by the Regular Clerks of the Society of Jesus, in the estates of her Majesty, notwithstanding the Bull 'Dominus ac Redemptor.' Moreover as the Most August Empress to whom both we and the numerous Catholic churches in her vast domains are under such grave obligations has recommended to us both verbally and by writing to do all in our power to see that the aforesaid Regular Clerks of the Society of Jesus may provide for the conservation of their Institute, we hasten to fulfil that duty which is so agreeable to us and for which we should reproach ourselves did we stint our efforts in carrying it out. Hitherto, they have not had any novitiate in this country, and, as their numbers are gradually diminishing, it is evident that they cannot exercise their useful ministry unless a novitiate is accorded them."
In virtue of this permission, a novitiate was established at Polotsk on February 2, 1780, and ten novices entered and began community life under the direction of Father Lubowicki. On that occasion, according to de Mürr, a formidable Latin poem of 169 hexameters was composed by Father Michael Korycki in honor of Bishop Siestrzencewicz. Thus was the house established; and in spite of the importunities of the Bourbon ambassadors at Rome, the Sovereign Pontiff, Pius VI, never gave utterance, either personally or through his nuncio in Poland, to any public protest against it. All the denunciations of the alleged "refractory Jesuits" were either letters of private individuals or secret official correspondence, written doubtless in the name of the Pope, but indirectly, that is through the channel of the secretaryship of State and the nunciature; and never going outside the narrow diplomatic circle. Nor is there the slightest positive proof that the Pope regarded the Jesuits of White Russia except as religious.
"On the contrary," says Zalenski (I, 330), "Pius VI knew very well, as did everyone else in Rome, that Clement XIV had published the Brief of Suppression in spite of himself, and only after four years of hesitation and conflict with the diplomats. Moreover, Cardinals Antonelli and Calini, eye-witnesses of what had happened, represented to Pius VI in personal memorials that the suppression was invalid. Pius himself had belonged to that section of cardinals which disapproved of the destruction, and, as has been already said, when he was Pope, he set free the prisoners of the Castle Sant' Angelo, rehabilitated their memory, and ordered Father Ricci to be buried with the honors due to the general of an Order. In brief, Pius VI, as both Frederick II and Tchernichef insisted, was really glad that the Society had been preserved, and his silence was an approbation of it. Indeed, he could not, as the Father of Christendom, exclude the Jesuits from the protection of the general law of the Church and regard them as suppressed and freed from their vows, before the Brief of Clement XIV had been properly made known to them by the ordinary of the diocese. Of course, their enemies systematically rejected this axiom although accepted both by common and canon law. They denounced it as "a vain subterfuge," and even the Apostolic nuncio, in one of his dispatches declared it to be such; but the Holy Father could not, in conscience, accept that view.
In February, 1782, Tchernichef, the great friend of the Society, fell from power, but his successor Potemkin showed himself even a more devoted defender. Fortunately, Father Benislawski, a former Jesuit, but now a canon, was very intimate with him and induced him to give his aid to the Society. As Bishop Siestrzencewicz had meantime become Archbishop of Mohilew, the fear was again revived that he would claim to be the religious superior of the Jesuits. Indeed, by sundry appointments to parishes, he began to reveal that such was his intention, and Archetti, the nuncio at Warsaw, urged him to persist in his attacks. To head off the danger, the Fathers had determined to proceed to the election of a Vicar General, and they obtained permission from the empress to that effect. She issued a ukase, on June 23, 1782, in which she said that the Jesuits were to be subject to the archbishop, in things that pertained to his rights and duties, but that he should be very careful not to interfere with any of the rules of the Order which were to remain intact "in as far as they agree with our civil constitutions." Siestrzencewicz was quite upset by this order, and not knowing that it had been obtained through the intervention of Potemkin, he asked the Prince Wiaziemski, who was then president of the Senate, to obtain a decree from that body subjecting the Jesuits to his jurisdiction. The Senate so ruled by a rescript dated September 12, 1781, but it was a very ill-advised proceeding on their part, for it set them in opposition both to the empress and the powerful Potemkin, besides making a rebel of the archbishop and a meddler of the nuncio.
While a spirited correspondence was going on between those two distinguished ecclesiastics about the matter, the Fathers met at Polotsk, on October 10, 1782, which happened to be the feast of St. Francis Borgia, to hold the twentieth congregation of the Society. Everything was done according to the rule which governs such assemblies, and Father Stanislaus Czerniewicz, the vice-provincial, was chosen Vicar General of the Society. In the following session, it was decreed that for those who re-entered the Society, the years spent involuntarily and by compulsion, in the world, would count as so many years in religion. With this the congregation ended, because orders had come to Polotsk, for the Vicar General to report immediately to the Empress at St. Petersburg. Accordingly, after naming Father Francis Kareu, vice-provincial, he set out for the capital and was welcomed by Catherine with the words: "I defended you thus far, and will do so till the end."