Volume 43, Number 7 · April 18, 1996
The Enlightened Despot
By Derek Beales
Pombal: Paradox of the Enlightenment
by Kenneth Maxwell
Cambridge University Press, 200 pp., $44.95
Twice in its history Portugal has had a leading part in Europe. In the fifteenth century it pioneered explorations and discovery in other continents, ending up with a vast empire including outposts in Asia, substantial parts of Africa, and half of South America, mostly now the territory of Brazil. Other powers soon followed Portugal's example—though not Austria. The Portuguese empire was still largely intact, and in Brazil was still expanding, when in 1759 Portugal took another great initiative, the expulsion and expropriation of the Jesuits from both the mother country and its colonies. One by one the other Catholic Powers, again with the major exception of Austria, followed Portugal's example. In 1773 their pressure on Pope Clement XIV became too strong for him to resist, and he decreed the total suppression of the Jesuit order. Austria complied.
Review, 3628 words
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