ivided as to the political safety of
strictly confining the friars to their religious duties. It was doubted
by some whether any State authority could ever gain the confidence or
repress the inherent inclinations of the native like the friar, who led
by superstitious teaching, and held the conscience by an invisible cord
through the abstract medium of the confessional. Others opined that
a change in the then existing system of semi-sacerdotal Government
was desirable, if only to give scope to the budding intelligence of
the minority, which could not be suppressed.

Emerging from the lowest ranks of society, with no training
whatever but that of the seminary, it was natural to suppose that
these Spanish priests would have been more capable than ambitious
political men of the world of blending their ideas with those of the
native, and of forming closer associations with a rural population
engaged in agricultural pursuits familiar to themselves in their
own youth. Before the abolition of monasteries in Spain the priests
were allowed to return there after 10 years residence in the Colony;
since then they have usually entered upon their new lives for the
remainder of their days, so that they naturally strove to make the
best of their social surroundings.

The Civil servant, as a rule, could feel no personal interest in
his temporary native neighbours, his hopes being centred only in
rising in the Civil Service there or elsewhere--Cuba or Porto Rico,
or where the ministerial wheel of fortune placed him.

The younger priests--narrow-minded and biased--those who had just
entered into provincial curacies--were frequently the greater
bigots. Enthusiastic in their calling, they pursued with ardour
their mission of proselytism without experience of the world. They
entered the Islands with the zeal of youth, bringing with them the
impression imparted to them in Spain, that they were sent to make
a moral conquest of savages. In the course of years, after repeated
rebuffs, and the obligation to participate in the affairs of everyday
life in all its details, their rigidity of principle relaxed, and they
became more tolerant towards those with whom they necessarily came
in contact. They were usually taken from the peasantry and families
of lowly station. As a rule they had little or no secular education,
and, regarding them apart from their religious training, they might be
considered a very ignorant class. Amongst them the Francisca