________________
AUGUST, 1916]
THE HISTORY OF THE NAIK KINGDOM OF MADURA
139
this movement. He wrote to the Provincial of Malabar enumerating these charges and concluding that De Nobilis was spoiled by paganism. Father Laerzio, the Provincial, was a personal friend and admirer of De Nobilis. He therefore took no steps against him, and even perguaded the Archbishop of Cranganore to support his view. The indefatigable Fernandez, however, did not koop idle. When a new Provincial came in the person of Father Perez, he resumed his charges in "a voluminous memoir." The result was De Nobilis was summoned to Cochin to appear before a synod of the Fathers and answer the charges. De Nobilis made a masterful defence, but was unable to satisfy a tenacious Father, Pimento by name. The case was therefore carried to the archbishop of Goa. He too was convinced of De Nobilis' reasonings, and expressed his admiration of the great missionary. But the perseverance of Father Fernandez and Pimento kept the question a burning one and brought it to the notice of the Pope himself. The result of this formidable crusade was, De Nobilis was ordered to suspend 72 his work till a regular inquiry into the charges was made and a settlement arrived at. No greater blow, says Nelson, ever befell Christi - anity in India. The encouragement of De Nobilis might have resulted, he says, in the conversion of the great majority of the people of Mylura to Christianity. There is too much of optimism in this view of Mr. Nelson ; but the truth of it cannot be denied. The suspension of D3 Nobilis was indeed a blow from which Christianity never recovered. True, he was in the long run asquitted and his principles were vindicated; but the momentous interval of ten years cluring which the controversy was prolonged, was enough to shake the prestige of the new creed, to undo much of the past achievements and to retard much of the new. Brahmins ceased to come to the new creel, an:1 Da Nobilis himself, in spite of his eventual victory, had to leave Madura and seek fresh scenes of labour.
It does not lie within the province of the general historian to go into the details of the various decisions and counter decisions, the arguments and answers, of the controversialists during this period of ten years. It is enough for our purpose to note that, after a good deal of anxiety and suspense on the part of Da Nobilis, a decision in his favour, was given by Pope Gregory XV in Jan. 1623. The papal bull recorded that, as the Brahmans were " kept from confession of Christ by difticulties about the oord and the kudumi," he accorded to them "and other gentiles tho cord and the kudumi, sandalpaste and purification of the body," providing only that they should not be received in Hindu temples, but from priests after blessing. It was a result entirely due to the brilliant defence De Nobilis made of himself in a memorial he addressed to the Pope. The defence was that of a deep and wellread scholar of Tamil, Telugu and Sanskrit. He maintained in it, first, that the titles of Guru, Sanyasi, Aiyar and Raja were applicable to himself, as they simply meant respectively a teacher, an ascetic, a householder and a nobleman. Secondly, he defended his disavowal of his being a Parangi on the ground that it was generally used only in connection with & vile drunkard and shameless race of half-castes, that the Portuguese were wrong in calling Christianity Parangi märgam, and that he was a Parangi neither by birth nor by character. De Nobilis, however, did not see or would not see that as the Indians used the term indiscriminately towards all Europeans, he was simply saying a half-truth when he denied that he was a Parangi. But the clever sophistry of the nephew of Cardinal Bellarmine was convincing enough to Gregory's mind. With regard to Hindu
72 Nelson gives 1628-1638 as the period of De Nobilis' suspension ; but Chandler says 1613-1623.
