1. We must do all that is possible, because we do not know if bound with the last vow of him, who is the claimant of an inheritance, meanwhile we do not know if it is confirmed, to not be had in the Society a younger brother, or of some other reason of much entity. Before all, that which we must procure, are the augmentations of the Society with rules to the ends agreed upon by the superiors, which must be conformable: for that the Church returns to its primitive splendor for the greater glory of God; of fate that all the clergy shall be found animated by a united spirit. To this end, we must publish by all methods, that the Society is composed in part of professors so poor, that are wanting of the most indispensable, to not be for the beneficence of the faithful; and that another part is of fathers also poor, although living upon the product of some household property; but not to be grievous to the public, in the midst of their studies, their ministry, as are other ordinary mendicants. The spiritual directors of princes, great men, accommodating widows, and of whom we have abundant hope, that they will be disposed at last to make gifts to the Society in exchange for spiritual and eternal things, that will be proportioned, the lands and temporalities which they possess; for the same, carrying always the idea, that we are not to lose the occasion of receiving always as much as may be offered. If promises and the fulfillment of them is retarded, they are to be remembered with precaution, dissimulating as much as we can the coveting of riches. When some confessor of personages or other people, will not be apt, or wants subtility, that in these subjects is indispensable, he will be retired with opportunity, although others may be placed anticipatedly; and if it be entirely necessary to the penitents, it will be made necessary to take out the destitute to distant colleges, representing that the Society has need for them there; because it being known that some young widows, having unexpectedly failed, the Society not having the legacy of very precious movables, having been careless by not accepting In due time. But to receive these things, we could not attend at the time, and only at the good will of the penitent.
2. To attract the prelates, canonicals and other rich ecclesiastics, it is necessary to employ certain arts, and in place procuring them to practice in our houses spiritual exercises, and gradually and energetically of the affection that we profess to divine things; so that they will be affectioned towards the Society and that they will soon offer pledges of their adhesion.
3. The confessors must not forget to ask with the greatest caution and on adequate occasions of those who confess, what are their names, families, relatives, friends, and properties, informing their successors who follow them, the state, intention in which they will be found, and the resolution which they have taken; that which they have not yet determined obtaining, having to form a plan for the future to the Society. When it is founded, whence directly there are hopes of utility; for it will not be convenient to ask all at once; they will be counseled to make their confession each week, to disembarrass the conscience much before, or to the title of penitence. They will be caused to inform the confessor with repetition, of that which at one time they have not given sufficient light; and if they have been successful by this means, she will come, being a woman, to make confession with frequency, and visit our church; and being a man, he will be invited to our houses and we are to make him familiar with ourselves.
4. That which is said in regard to widows, must have equal application to the merchants and neighbors of all classes, as being rich and married, but without children, of that plan by which the Society can arrive to be their heirs, if we put in play the measures that we may indicate; but over all, it will be well to have present, as said, near the rich devotees that treat with us, and of whom the vulgar can murmur, when more, if they are of a class not very elevated.
5. Procuring for the rectors of the colleges entrance for all the ways of the houses, parks, groves, forests, lawns, arable lands, vineyards, olive orchards, hunting grounds, and whatever species of inheritances which they meet with in the end of their rectory; if their owners pertain to the nobility, to the clergy, or are negotiators, particulars, or religious communities, inquiring the revenues of each one, their loads and what they pay for them. All these dates or notices they are to seek for with great skill and to a fixed pout, energetically yet from the confessional, then of the relations of friendship, or of the accidental conversations; and the confessor meets with a penitent of possibles, he will be placed in knowledge of the rector, obtaining by all methods the one conserved.
6. The essential point to build upon, is the following: that we must so manage, that in the ends we gain the will and affections of our penitents, and other persons with whom we treat, accommodating ourselves to their inclinations if they are conducive. The Provincials will take care to direct some of us to points, in which reside the nobility and the powerful; and if the Provincials do not act with opportunity, the rectors must notice with anticipation, the crops (the field of operations) that are there, which we go to examine.
7. When we receive the sons of strong houses in the Society, they must show whether they will be easy to acquire the contracts and titles of possession; and if so they were to enter of themselves, of which they may be caused to cede some of their property to the college, or the usufruct (profit) or for rent, or in other form, or if they can come for a time into the Society, the gain of which may be very much of an object, to give a special understanding to the great and powerful, the narrowness in which we live, and the debts that are pressing us.8. When the widows, or our married devoted women, do not have more than daughters, we must persuade them to the same life of devotion, or to that of the cloister; but that except the endowment that they may give, they can enter their property in the Society gently; but when they have husbands, those that would object to the Society, they will be catechized; and others who desire to enter as religiouses in other Orders, with the promise of some reduced amount. When there may be an only son, he must be attracted at all cost, inculcating the vocation as made by Jesus Christ; causing him to be entirely disembarrassed from the fear of its fathers, and persuading him to make a sacrifice very acceptable to the Almighty, that he must withdraw to His authority, abandon the paternal house and enter in the Society; the which, if he so succeeds, after having given part to the General, he will be sent to a distant novitiate; but if they have daughters, they will primarily dispose the daughters for a religious life; and they will be caused to enter into some monastery, and afterwards be received as daughters in the Society, with the succession of its properties.
9. The Superiors will place in the channel of the circumstances, the confessors of these widows and married people, that they on all future occasions may act for the benefit of the Society; and when by means of one, they cannot take our part he will be replaced with another; and if it is made necessary, he will be sent to great distances, of a manner that he cannot follow understandingly with these families.
10. If we succeed in convincing the widows and devoted persons, who aspire with fervor to a perfect life, and that the better means to obtain it is by ceding ad their properties to the Society, supporting by their revenues, that they will be religiously administered until their death, conforming to the degree of necessity in which they may be found, and the just reason that may be employed for their persuasion is, that by this mode, they can be exclusively dedicated to God; without attentions and molestations, which would perplex them, and that it is the only road to reach the highest degree of perfection.
11. The Superiors craving the confidence of the rich, who are attached to the Society, delivering receipts of its proper hand writing whose payment afterwards will differ; not forgetting to often visit those who loan, to exhort them above all in their infinities of consideration, as to whom will devolve the papers of the debt; because it is not so to be found mention of the Society in their testament; and by this course we must acquire properties, without giving cause for us to be hated by the heirs.
12. We must also in a grand manner ask for a loan, with payment of annual interest, and employ the same capital in other speculation to produce greater revenues to the Society; for at such a time, succeeding to move them with compassion to that which they will lend to us, we will not lose the interest in the testament of donation, when they see that they found colleges and churches.
13. The Society can report the utilities of commerce, and value the name of the merchant of credit, whose friendship we may possess.
14. Among the peoples where our fathers reside, we must have physicians faithful to the Society, whom we can especially recommend to the sick, and to paint under an aspect very superior to that of other religious orders, and secure direction that we shall be called to assist the powerful, particularly in the hour of death.
15. That the confessors shall visit with assiduity the sick, particularly those who are in danger, and to honestly eliminate the other fathers, which the superiors will procure, when the confessor sees that he is obliged to remove the other from the suffering, to replace and maintain the sick in his good intentions. Meanwhile we must inculcate as much as we can with prudence, the fear of hell, &c., &c., or when, the lesser ones of purgatory; demonstrating that as water will put out fire, so will the same alms blot out the sin; and that we cannot employ the alms better, than in the maintaining and subsiding of the persons, who, by their vocation, have made profession of caring for the salvation of their neighbor; that in this manner the sick can be made to participate in their merits, and find satisfaction for their own sins; placing before them that charity covereth a multitude of sins; and that also, we can describe that charity, is as a nuptial vestment, without which, no one can be admitted to the heavenly table. In fine it will be necessary to move them to the citations of the scriptures, and of the holy fathers, that according to the capacity of the sick, we can judge what is most efficacious to move them.
16. We must teach the women, that they must complain of the vices of their husbands, and the disturbances which they occasion, that they can rob them in secret of some amounts of money, to offer to God, in expiation of the sins of their husbands, and to obtain their pardon.