First, let us glance an eye over the contents of this institute. It contains, not only what the founder wrote, but likewise all the papal {212} bulls and briefs granted to the society; all the decrees and canons of the several congregations, which form laws in the society; several instructions, precepts, and ordinations, issued by different generals, and adopted by general congregations, for universal practice; the general _Ratio Studiorum_; the privileges granted to the society by the holy see; the particular rules prescribed for every office in the society, and for every class of men in it, as priests, missionaries, preachers, students, &c. The groundwork of all this is what the founder himself wrote; _viz._ an _Examen Generale_ to be proposed to candidates for admittance; _Constitutiones Societatis Jesu_; an epistle _De Virtute Obedientiæ_; a book of _Spiritual Exercises_; and, finally, many of the particular rules of offices. The Prague edition of the Institute, anno 1757, two small folio volumes, lies before me, and I have taken a good deal of fruitless trouble to find out some propositions denounced by the enemies of the Jesuits, without reference to the page or chapter. I have found nothing but what reflects {213} honour on the code. The objects of it are the glory of God, the general good of man, and the preservation of the society. In pursuance of the first of these, the members make vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience; they mortify their senses, renounce worldly honours, and preach the Gospel. The means they use for the second consist of example, prayer, works of charity, pious publications, preaching, educating youth, and sending forth missions. For the third object, their preservation, they have appropriate rules of union, discipline, reputation, freedom from party, and moderation[73]. Such is the code which has been so misrepresented. It is impossible, within the bounds of a pamphlet, and, indeed, I have already stretched into the latitude of a book, to give an adequate notion of it, and to combat the opinions which have gone abroad against it. These opinions {214} are so many adopted prejudices, the refutation of which is completely given in the _Apologie de l'Institut_, to which I must refer the reader, who will find in it many extracts from the institute itself; and I shall here briefly notice the vow of obedience, and the imputed despotism of the general, about which so much has been said.