In India their success was not less remarkable and they succeeded in solving the caste problem, which had been up to this time a hopeless obstacle in the path of Christianity. Robert de Nobili, the nephew of Bellarmine, the great theological writer and historian of the Church, adopted the dress and the extremely difficult habits of life of the high-caste Brahmin. In a few years he succeeded in converting over one hundred thousand of this hitherto impossibly exclusive class. He had many worthy companions as his colleagues and successors. Among others Andrada, the first Apostle of Thibet, succeeded in penetrating into the forbidden sacred land of the Lamas and in making many conversions. All the castes of India were taken care of and there were great missionary centres at Goa, Mangalore, Madura, Calcutta and Bombay. The Chinese missions of the Jesuits were in their own good time not less successful and in certain ways gave the order even greater prestige. Distinguished scholars like Father Ricci impressed themselves upon even the contemptuous Chinese mandarins, established astronomical observatories and succeeded in gaining the favor of the Court. As a consequence, their brethren received permission to evangelize the people, {212} and proceeded to make many thousands of converts. Unfortunately, here as in Japan, political disturbances in China itself and Western commercial jealousies, with the fear that the Jesuits might favor certain nations rather than others in trade, led eventually to their banishment and the destruction of their missions. It is on the American continent, however, that the story of the Jesuit missions is particularly interesting for Americans. Ignatius himself founded the missions in South America, opening up the missions of Brazil through Father De Nobreza in 1549. Later in Chili, in Peru and in Mexico the Jesuits labored with unexampled success among the Indians. At the beginning of the seventeenth century they established the famous Reductions of Paraguay. These were communities of Christian Indians living in peaceful ways in the most happy community life. The story of the life led by the Indians in these Reductions reads more like some ideal commonwealth than an actual chapter of the history of a savage people gradually being brought to a happy civilization. Students of social order have often gone back to study the ways and means by which this great work was accomplished and have been enthusiastic in their praise of the marvels accomplished. In 1717 these Reductions in Paraguay counted over one hundred thousand Christian Indians. With the suppression of the Society in the Portuguese dominions after the middle of the eighteenth century they fell into decay, and an accomplished ideal of human life that made men happier than has perhaps ever before been the case disappeared from existence.