Rome and the Pope
When they reached Rome they did not at once ask to be received by the pope, because they found Paul III absorbed in weighty politics. So they went to work in a Spanish hospital, nursed the sick and taught young people. In early 1538 Paul received them, and when he heard that they meant to go to Palestine and lead a monastic, ascetic life there, he showed them kindness and, with the help of several of his cardinals, paid them 210 crowns for the journey (the source adds a dollar conversion, omitted here). When the devoted men found the voyage impossible and had to give it up, they returned all of the money to its donors. A few other members of the group who had stayed in the north were called to Rome, and their number now reached eleven.
Paul III appointed Favre and Laínez to professorships at the University of Rome, while Ignatius took up a special charge: helping destitute women to a new life. For this purpose, with donations he gathered from his supporters, he founded the "House of Martha" to shelter helpless women, and he preached zealously against sexual offenses of every kind, which made him enemies.
The Vow of Obedience and the Papal Bull
As new volunteers came to the group, its principles and rule needed to be stated clearly. To the vows of chastity and poverty was added a pledge of absolute obedience: a "General", elected by the members, was to stand directly below the pope himself. Later a fourth vow was added to the order's principles: service to the see of Rome as God's vicar on earth, and "immediate and unquestioning execution" anywhere in the world of whatever the reigning pope or his successors judged necessary for the salvation of souls or the spread of the faith.
In 1539 Ignatius asked Cardinal Contarini to put the articles of the rule before Paul III and to request that the group be approved as a new order. The pope was favorable, but some cardinals objected, since they took the group for rebellious extremists. In the end the pope overcame their objections, and by the bull Regimini militantis ecclesiae he recognized what the text called the "Society of Jesus" (27 September 1540). Its members were formally called "Obligated Servants of the Society of Jesus." The word "Jesuit" came into use only from 1544, and originally it was a mocking term used by Calvin and other opponents; Ignatius himself never used it. After his death the order's success and prestige stripped the word of its mockery, and in the second half of the sixteenth century it became an honorable title.
On 17 April 1541 Ignatius of Loyola was elected General of the new order. For several days afterward he did nothing but wash dishes and perform other lowly, laborious chores.
The Constitution
He spent the rest of his life, now fifty years old, in Rome, and made it the permanent seat of the Society's command. Under the full constitution he drew up between 1547 and 1552, which has remained in force with minor changes down to the present, final authority lay with the members who had taken the vows. Two delegates were chosen from each province, and together with the provincial superiors, the General and his assistants they formed the "General Congregation", which had the power to elect a new General when needed. The General had an adviser and four assistants who watched each of his acts, pointed out his major mistakes, and, if they judged him unfit, could call the Congregation to remove him from office.
Novitiate and Grades
Candidates who wished to join the Society had to serve two years as novices. In that time they learned its doctrine and purpose, performed the spiritual exercises, did humble service, and placed themselves entirely under the pledge of "holy obedience" to their superiors. They were to set personal wishes aside, carry out the orders of their superiors like soldiers, and go wherever sent like "bodies without a will," accepting that obeying their superiors was obeying God. They were to be watchful in reporting their companions' faults to the responsible authorities, and if another reported their own faults, they were not to hold the least grudge against him. Although the disciplinary rules were strict and exact, the Society allowed for special cases and had flexibility; it seldom broke an individual will or killed initiative. Apparently the readiness to obey was itself the first step toward fitness to command, since these very exercises produced many capable and enterprising men.
Those who survived the hard novitiate took a "simple" vow, which could be withdrawn, to spend their whole lives in chastity, poverty and obedience, and so entered the "second grade." Some remained at that level and continued charitable work as lay brothers; others, as "approved scholastics" hoping for the priesthood, studied mathematics, philosophy, theology and the classics and taught in schools and colleges. Those who passed further trials entered the "third grade" as "formed coadjutors." Finally a small number could rise to the "fourth grade", the "professed", priests who had specially sworn absolute obedience to every command of the pope. The professed usually formed a small minority, never more than a tenth of the members.
All four grades lived together in houses like monks, were moderate in eating and drinking, and kept their bodies ready for any hard service; but they did not fast and, except when necessary, did not practice penances. A member accepted into the Society could keep title to his personal property, but the income from it was wholly dedicated to the Society, which was the final heir of most such holdings. Every Jesuit was to regard his property and his work as devoted to the boundless glory of the Lord. Seldom in history has an organization been so thoroughly the work of a single man.
Ignatius in Old Age and Death
Ignatius lived long enough to revise the constitution and turn it into thoroughly practical instructions. From his small bare room he directed and coordinated, with complete power and skill, the work of his soldiers, who were scattered across Europe and many other parts of the world. The heavy duties of command, and of founding and maintaining two schools and several charitable institutions in Rome, gradually weighed on his aging body and wore him down. Always tender to the weak, he now treated even his closest subordinates with harshness. But he was strictest of all toward himself. He made several meals out of a handful of walnuts, a piece of bread and a bowl of water. Sometimes he slept only four hours in a day and night, and even cut his time absorbed in visions to half an hour a day.
When he left the mortal world (1556), many Romans felt that a strong wind had ceased to blow; some of his followers perhaps eased their sorrow with a sense of relief. At that time people could not yet imagine that this untamable Spaniard would become one of the most influential men in the history of the coming age.
After Ignatius
At Ignatius's death the Society had nearly a thousand members, of whom thirty-five were professed. After much wrangling, which showed a zeal for command among the apparently obedient Jesuits, Diego Laínez was elected General (1557). Because his ancestors four generations back were Jewish, some Spanish notables with influence in the Society judged him unworthy of the post. Pope Paul IV, who feared that a lifelong generalship would rival the papacy, ordered the constitution revised and the term limited to three years; but Pius IV later annulled that decision. From then on, in later generations, the Jesuit General was nicknamed the "Black Pope" because of the black cassock he wore.
After Francis Borgia, duke of Gandía, joined the Jesuits and gave his boundless wealth to the order, the Society grew rapidly in size and power. When he was elected third General (1565), the membership had reached 3,500, living in 130 houses in 18 provinces or countries, according to the source.