John Adams Quote on Jesuits and Religious Toleration

"They are Jesuits. This society of men, after exerting their tyranny for upwards of two hundred years, at length became so formidable to the world, threatening the entire subversion of all social order, that even the Pope, whose devoted subjects they are, and must be, by the vow of their society, was compelled to dissolve them. They had not been suppressed, however, for fifty years, before the waning influence of Popery and Despotism required their useful labors, to resist the light of Democratic liberty, and the Pope (Pius VII), simultaneously with the formation of the Holy Alliance, revived the order of the Jesuits in all their ‘power. From their vow of ‘unqualified submission to the Sovereign Pontiff,” they have been appropriately called the Pope’s Body Guard. “And do Americans need to be told what Jesuits are? . . . they are a secret society, a sort of Masonic order, with superadded features of revolting odiousness, and a thousand times more dangerous. They are not merely priests, or of one religious creed; they are merchants, and lawyers, and editors, and men of any profession, having no outward badge, (in this country) by which to be recognized; they are about in all your society. “They can assume any character, that of angels of light, or ministers of darkness to accomplish their one great end, the service upon which they are sent, whatever that service may be. They are all educated men, prepared and sworn to start at any moment, and in any direction, and for any service, commanded by the general of their order, bound to no family, community, or country, by the ordinary ties which bind men; and sold for life to the cause of the Roman Pontiff.”" Samuel Morse

"Do you wish to excite troubles, to provoke revolution, to produce the total ruin of your country? Call in the Jesuits . . . and build magnificent colleges for these hot-headed religionists; suffer those audacious priests, in their dictatorial and dogmatic tone, to decide on affairs of State." Antoine Arnauld