pure nonsense. By abnegating his will through the practice of holy 
obedience his will has become enormously strong, so strong that none of 
his natural instincts, desires, or habits can intrude. He has freed his will of 
all these inhibitions. He is a perfect function of the machinery of the 
Order. In the General of the Society is concentrated the power of all those 
separate wills, just as in the human body every cell should be completely 
devoted in its particular quality to the concentrated will of the organism. 
     5. In other words, the Society of Jesus has created a perfect imitation 
of the skeleton of the original creation, living man. It has complied with 
the divinely instituted order of things, and that is why we see that the 
body, which was never numerically important, has yet been one of the 
greatest influences in the development of Europe. It has not always 
worked perfectly, but that has not been the fault of the system; and, 
even as it is, its record has been extraordinary. And one of the most 
remarkable things about it is that its greatest and most important 
achievements have been in the domain of science and philosophy. It has 
done nothing in religion; or, rather, where it has meddled with religion it 
has only done harm. What a mistake! And why? For the simple reason 
that it was in a position to take no notice of religion; all these matters 
were decided for it by the Pope, or by the Councils of the Church, and the 
Society was therefore able to free itself from the perplexities of religion, 
in exactly the same way as the novice obtains complete freedom from his 
moral responsibilities by sinking his personal phantasies in the will of the 
Superior. 
     6. I should like to mention here that the Spiritual Exercises of St. 
Ignatius are in their essence really admirable Yoga practices. They have, 
it is true, a tinge of magical technique, and they have been devised to 
serve a dogmatic end. That was, however, necessary, and it was good 
magic too, at that, because the original will of the Founder was to 
produce a war engine as a counterblast to the Reformation. He was very 
wise to devise a plan, irrespective of its abstract merits as philosophy, 
which would most efficiently serve that single purpose. The only trouble 
has been that this purpose was not sufficiently cosmic in scope to resist 
internal forces. Having attained the higher planes by practice of these 
exercises, they found that the original purpose of the Society was not 
really adequate to their powers; they were, so to speak, over-engined. 
They stupidly invaded the spiritual sphere of the other authorities whom 
they were founded to support, and thus we see them actually quarrelling 
with the Pope, while failing signally to obtain possession of the Papacy. 
Being thus thwarted in their endeavours, and confused in their purpose, 
they redoubled the ardour of their exercises; and it is one of the 
characteristics of all spiritual exercises, if honestly and efficiently 
performed, that they constantly lead you on to higher planes, where all 
dogmatic considerations, all intellectual concepts, are invalid. Hence, we 
found that it is not altogether surprising that the General of the Order and 
his immediate circle have been supposed to be atheists. If that were true, 
it would only show that they have been corrupted by their preoccupation