eration, solemnly relinquished to the viceroy all the missions, more especially those in California, offering to establish others among the heathen whenever desired. This must have been put forth as a test, with a full conviction that the surrender could not and would not be accepted. And so it proved. The viceroy called a council, consisting of oidores, the auditor de guerra, and the fiscal, who asked the opinions of the bishops and governors of the regions where the missions were situated. The bishops and most of the governors objected to the renunciation, stating their reasons. The viceroy then referred the matter to the crown.[1]
This great association, notwithstanding its wealth and almost unlimited sway over the Roman Catholic mind and conscience, was now to undergo a great calamity. Persecution,* dire and relentless, was at hand. On the 27th of February, 1767, King Cárlos III., after a consultation with his intimate counsellors, and for reasons that he reserved in his royal breast, issued a mandate to his minister of state, the conde de Aranda, for the expulsion from his dominions in Europe, America, and Asia of all the members of the society of Jesus[2] that is to say, ordained
- ↑ Meanwhile the California missionaries asked to be at least relieved of the two southern missions, which were troublesome, overtasked, and less fruitful, particularly since the opening of mines. The request was not granted. Clavigero, Storia Cal., ii. 160-70.
- ↑ The order had been expelled from the dominions of King José I. of Portugal, by a royal decree of September 3, 1759, in which the Jesuits were declared traitors and rebels, and the society’s estates confiscated. On the same date of the previous year the king was shot at and wounded in the public streets, and the Jesuits were accused of being at the bottom of a plot; three of their number were imprisoned, and the chief among them suffered death, against the express disapproval of the pope. The expulsion was said to be the work of the minister of state, marqués de Pombal, the first to raise the standard of persecution, who had resolved to reform the church, bringing its members under the control of the royal government; to accomplish which he committed numerous acts of despotism and cruelty, notably those against the Jesuits. So was asserted by their friends. The expulsion from Portugal was followed by the suppression of the order in France. A decree of the parliament of August 6, 1762, declared it inadmissible in any civilized state, because of its hostility to natural rights, as well as to spiritual and tempral authority. The society should l>e dissolved and its property confiscated. Other decrees were passed, and finally, King Louis XV., in November 1764,
