The Society of Jesus in England, 1623-1688 : an institutional study
From the Society of Jesus' first appearance in England in 1580, various political treatises, literary works, and theological discourses have attributed legendary plots, exploits, and malice to its members. For nearly two hundred years, the Jesuits were consistently portrayed as seditious regicides who would sacrifice all to regain England for Rome. Although modern scholarship has revealed the true nature of the myth of the evil Jesuits, few historians have attempted to explicate the reality. There have been biographies of individual sixteenth century Jesuits and studies of the Society's conflicts with the English secular clergy and of their pretended plots against the government but there has been no investigation of the English Jesuits as members of an international religious order. The Society of Jesus had a ~pathway to God~ in its Institute (that is, its Constitutions, decrees, and rules) which became more complicated throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Could it be adapted to the special conditions of England? Were the practices of the Jesuits there harmonious with those prescribed in the Institute? Or was England so singular that dispensations and concessions left the Society there scarcely
McCoog, Thomas M.
BX Christian Denominations
The Society of Jesus in England, 1623-1688 : an institutional study. From the Society of Jesus' first appearance in England in 1580, various political treatises, literary works, and theological discourses have attributed legendary plots, exploits, and malice to its members. For nearly two hundred years, the Jesuits were consistently portrayed as seditious regicides who would sacrifice all to regain England for Rome. Although modern scholarship has revealed the true nature of the myth of the evil Jesuits, few historians have attempted to explicate the reality. There have been biographies of individual sixteenth century Jesuits and studies of the Society's conflicts with the English secular clergy and of their pretended plots against the government but there has been no investigation of the English Jesuits as members of an international religious order. The Society of Jesus had a ~pathway to God~ in its Institute (that is, its Constitutions, decrees, and rules) which became more complicated throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Could it be adapted to the special conditions of England? Were the practices of the Jesuits there harmonious with those prescribed in the Institute? Or was England so singular that dispensations and concessions left the Society there scarcely
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