o state the authorities, so highly honourable to the society, which I
have been induced to examine and collect; there are, however, two other
circumstances mentioned by sir John Hippisley, which I cannot pass over
without notice. He objects to students for the priesthood among the Jesuits
being sent abroad, to Sicily, to obtain ordination, instead of receiving it
at the hands of their own national prelates. It appears, by this, that sir
John is not aware that, in an order, it is requisite to obtain ordination
through a superior of the order. {114}

In all religious orders, candidates for priesthood must be presented by
their proper religious superior to some bishop. The prelate may examine the
candidate; and, if he has no canonical objection, he promotes him to orders
on the title of religious poverty; the superior, or the order, remaining
answerable for his maintenance. But no priest of the regulars can assume
any exercise of ministerial functions, in preaching, or administering
sacraments, without licence of the diocesan prelate, who may examine,
suspend, and correct him, incurring thus a certain responsibility. Of this
subjection of regulars to the established prelates, surely, sir John must
have been aware; why, then, endeavour to alarm us with the prospect of
Jesuits colonizing in the south of Italy, for the purpose of overspreading
these islands? I have reason, upon recent inquiry, to suspect, that sir
John has been misled by his Sicilian informer, as to the voyagers for the
priesthood; and the supposed system of seeking {115} furtive ordinations
beyond the seas will vanish before a plain relation of a few trifling
facts. In 1806 an ecclesiastical student, _on account of his health_,
embarked for Naples in a neutral ship, which touched at Palermo, where he
remained, having learned that Buonaparte had seized on Naples: he was
joined, the next year, by another student, who went abroad from the same
motive, that of health. To be of use to their catholic countrymen, whose
number was daily increasing, by the arrival of new regiments, they entered
into holy orders, though, it appears, they were not allowed to officiate as
priests among them. These recovered their health, and returned home. In the
course of the three ensuing years, one priest, and ten students, who were
impressed with a strong desire to study in a catholic university, went
also, at different times, to Palermo, where they experienced a similar
disappointmen