Sent out from Mexico, two Jesuits, Fathers Antonio Sedeno and Alfonso Sanchez, arrived in the Philippines in 1581. Their first college was opened in Manila in 1590 and became a uni versity in 1623. In 1605 the mission of the Philippines became an independent province and by 1768 it counted 158 members, distributed in three colleges, 4 seminaries, 15 residences and 6 missions. Among the natives, 93 Christian villages had been established with some 200,000 converts. Within this period, 19 missionaries were put to death by the natives.
In South America, Brazil was the first country to be evangelized by the Jesuits. Five of their Order accompanied the Viceroy Thome de Souze to Bahia in 1549. In 157o forty Jesuits were martyred by Calvinist pirates as they were on their way to Brazil; and twelve others were soon to shed their blood in the Mission. The Province of Peru was founded by five Jesuits in 1571. Churches and colleges were soon opened and by 1603 the Jesuits numbered 376. The provinces and vice-provinces of Paraguay, Colombia, Venezuela, Chile and Argentine were, like Ecuador, out growths from Peru. In Colombia besides the two colleges at Bogota and Cartagena (where St. Peter Claver alone baptized and instructed more than 300,00o Negroes) the Jesuits had one seminary and three other colleges. Missions were also established among the Indians of the Orinoco and Magdalena. Founded in 1593 by seven Fathers from Peru, Chile became an independent province in 1648. The Argentine was in its origin, a part of the Province of Paraguay. The famous Missions of Paraguay were established by missionaries from the then called Province of Paraguay and extended over a territory which today is divided between Brazil, Bolivia, Argentine, Uruguay and Paraguay. The missions were organized into some 57 villages (reductions) and harboured about 114,000 converted Indians.
In 1566, the Spanish Jesuits made a brave effort to evangelize the Indians of Florida. Father Martinez, the "first Jesuit martyr of North America," was slain in that year at a point on the coast opposite Havana. His fate did not discourage Father Segura. and Quiros, who after some years in Florida turned their atten tion to the North and attempted to found a mission on the banks of the Rappahannock in Virginia. Here in February, 1571, they were killed by the natives together with three lay brothers and three catechists, who had all been received into the Society. Needs of the apostolate in other parts of New Spain ended the short-lived mission in Florida.
At a time when the Catholic Church in England herself was in the throes of persecution, it despatched the first English-speaking priests to North America. Five Jesuits, headed by Father An drew White, arrived with the Maryland colonial expedition of Cecil Calvert in 1634. For ten years the Fathers laboured on be half of Catholics, Protestants, and the Indians. Full approval was given by the English Jesuits to the broad policy of religious freedom adopted by the Calverts. Governor Thomas Dongan of
New York, who likewise had a Jesuit chaplain, maintained the same ideal of liberty. The plans of the pioneer Jesuits for higher education were realized by the foundation of a school at New Town, an enterprise which culminated in the erection of George town College (1789) under the direction of Bishop John Carroll, who never lost his love of the Society which he had served until the Suppression.
In New France, after some abortive attempts beginning in 1611, the French Jesuits established themselves in 1632 at Que bec. For more than a century and a half they laboured for the conversion of the natives, enduring hardships that are almost unbelievable. The Church has recognized Sts. Isaac Jogues, Jean de Brebeuf and six others as martyrs, but many more died heroically in the name of Christ. Lavish praise has been given these French Jesuits for their discoveries of large portions of what are now Canada and the United States, and for their accu rate observations on the aborigines, topography and natural sci ences. They sent back to France each year lengthy reports which were annually published and are now celebrated as the Jesuit Relations (1610-1791). In 1635, they established a college for the French as well as for the Indians in Quebec. They strove too to colonize the natives as well as to Christianize them.
More than two centuries had now passed since Ignatius and his first companions prayed and conferred over the form that the Society of Jesus should eventually take. With the Society moulded during his lifetime, no essential changes were ever in troduced by his successors, though Francis Borgia and Claude Acquaviva, the third and fifth Generals, respectively, brought about many modifications. The growth in numbers and in the variety and importance of the apostolic work undertaken was truly amazing. In 1579, twenty-three years after Ignatius' death, there were 5,165 members and 21 provinces. When Vitelleschi was elected the sixth General, in 1615, there were 13,112 members and 32 provinces. At the death of Gonzalez, the thirteenth Gen eral, in 1705, there were 19,998 members and 37 provinces. In when the hostile forces in Spain, Naples, Portugal and France were combining to crush the Society, it numbered 22,589 members, of whom 11,293 were priests, distributed through 39 provinces. There were 24 Professed Houses, 669 colleges, 61 novitiates, 176 seminaries, and 273 missions among the savages. The Catholic Church has recognized the sanctity of 23 members who lived during this period by canonizing them as Saints. It has given the title of Blessed to more than a hundred other martyrs and confessors, and has permitted the introduction of the names of nearly two hundred more for canonization. Despite its glori ous defence of the Church, or rather, because it had defended it so well, the Society of Jesus was now doomed to extinction.