The rapid rise of the Society of Jesus in the various countries of Europe, naturally attracted the attention of all those whose aim was the acquisition of as much personal power as was possible, to the detriment of individual, family, and social rights, and who had reason to fear an influence that stood for human progress and equal rights to all. The Jesuits soon assumed great prominence among the religious orders. Their excellence was admitted both in school and seminary; their learning gained for them the spiritual direction of influential persons; they became the confessors to princes and kings; they displayed extraordinary zeal in the practices of devotion, especially that in honor of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and they had already embraced the whole world in the field of their missions. They became a power that excited the envy of the less active, and the fear of potentates whose greed and inhumanity found a check in the gentle teachings of the followers of St. Ignatius. More than all, they had ever shown themselves energetic in their support of ecclesiastical authority, especially in times when the latter was threatened by the vagaries of Gallicanism, Jansenism, and like movements; in the state itself they showed themselves veritable defenders against the machinations of those secret societies which even in the eighteenth century were very much in evidence. [Illustration: FATHER RICCI, S. J. The last General of the Society of Jesus before the suppression in 1773.] It was impossible that an organization such as theirs, blessed by the spirit of religion, going about doing good, defending the principles of true Christianity against any and every assault, should escape the odium and persecution of spirits whose chief claim to existence lay in the desire to pull down the structure of civilization and to erect in its place the temple of anti-Christ. The vials of irreligious wrath were poured out upon them to the last dregs. In the various countries of Europe they met with proscription and expulsion. In 1759 they were driven from Portugal through the efforts of the infamous Pombal; in 1764 they were forbidden to live as a society in France; they were exiled from Spain in 1767, from Naples in 1767, and from Parma in 1768. Finally every effort of anti-Christianism and Masonry was exerted to bring about their complete extinction in the whole world. In 1773 pressure was brought to bear upon Pope Clement XIV., who, while refusing to listen to the invidious complaints brought against them, nevertheless, for the sake of a temporary peace, was compelled to sign the decree of their suppression.