The bishop, or legate, or cardinal, or whoever possesses any authority, must be either friendly or adverse to the Company, and this especially in foreign and distant lands far from the control of Rome. In the former case, the Jesuits will load him with praises, whether deserved or not. They will pronounce him a saint, a luminary of the Church, a model of Christian virtue; and leaving to him all the external pomp and ostensible authority of his office, they will command and direct everything in his name. To such men they give the utmost outward respect, and make the most humble protestations of devotion, repeating at every word that they are the most obedient servants of the Holy See, and of its representative. And this same conduct of theirs, and the testimony which those same persons are ready to give to their dutiful behaviour, is held out by the fathers as an answer to those who reproach them with disobedience and irreligion. But if these ecclesiastical dignitaries refuse to submit to the guidance of the fathers, and pretend to exercise their own authority independently, they become profligate heretics, monsters of iniquity; and they may consider themselves fortunate if they escape with treatment short of that bestowed upon Palafox and De Tournon. Indeed, even the very Popes have been treated in nearly the same manner, and have been extolled or slandered, according as they were favourable or adverse to the Society. There are to be found in the _Bullarium_ a quantity of briefs against the Jesuits for their disobedience to the representatives of the Holy See, and for the persecutions these had suffered from them.[303] Their disobedience, and spirit of revolt against the Court of Rome, with respect to their conduct in the missions, in which they persisted, had become so offensive and provoking, that first Innocent X., and then Innocent XIII., had resolved to abolish the Society, not by a bold and decisive measure, as did afterwards Clement XIV., but by forbidding the reception of any more novices. Innocent XIII., after having ordered the Inquisition to collect full evidence of the almost traitorous actions of the Jesuits, in answer to an apologetic letter of the General, who declared the Society to be innocent, or, at least, excused their insubordination and rebellion, issued a bull by which it was expressly forbidden to the General, and the Society, to give the habit to any novice, or to admit any to take vows, whether simple or solemn.[304] But while Innocent was determining to act with extreme vigour against the Society, he died, and by a death which awakened no unnatural suspicion of foul play.[305]