The Secret History of the Jesuits

GERMANY 35 of the higher classes only. It did not gain the hearts of ordinary people...

Nevertheless, under the iron discipline of the State and the restored Church, they again became devout Catholics, docile, fanatic, and intolerant towards any heresy..."

"It may seem excessive to attribute such prodigious virtues and actions to a mere handful of strangers. Yet, in these circumstances, their force was in inverse ratio to their numbers and they were immediately effective as no obstacles were met.

Loyola's emissaries won the country's heart and mind from the start... From the next generation on, Ingolstadt became the perfect type of the german Jesuit city".(14) One can judge the state of mind the Fathers introduced to this stronghold of faith by reading the following: "The Jesuit Mayrhofer of Ingolstadt taught in his "Preacher's mirror": "We will not be judged if we demand the killing of Protestants, any more than we would by asking for the death penalty on thieves, murderers, counterfeiters and revolutionaries."(15) The successors of Albert V, and especially Maximilian I (1597-1651), completed his work. But Albert V already was conscientious in his "duty" of assuring his subjects' "salvation".

"As soon as the Fathers arrived in Bavaria, his attitude towards Protestants and those favourable to them became more severe. From 1563 on, he pitilessly expelled all recalcitrants, and had no mercy for the anabaptists who had to suffer drownings, fire, prison and chains, all of which were praised by the Jesuit Agricola... In spite of all this, a whole generation of men had to disappear before the persecution was crowned a complete success. As late as 1586, the moravian anabaptists managed to hide 600 victims from the duke Guillaume. This one example proves that there were thousands and not hundreds who were driven out, an awful breach into a thinly populated country.

"But", said Albert V to the Munich City council, "God's honour and the salvation of souls must be placed above any temporal interests". 16) Little by little, all teaching in Bavaria was placed in the Jesuits' hands, and that land became the base for their penetration in eastern, western and northern Germany.

"From 1585 on, the Fathers converted the part of Westphalia depending on Cologne; in 1586, they appear in Neuss and Bonn, one of Cologne's archbishop's residences; they open colleges at Hildesheim in 1587 and Munster in 1588. This particular one already had 1300 pupils in 1618... A large part of western Germany was reconquered in that way by Catholicism, (14) H. Boehmer, op.cit., pp.89, 104, 112, 114. (15) Rene Fulop-Miller, op.cit., II, pp.98, 102. (16) H. Boehmer, op.cit., pp.89, 104, 112, 114.