labor,
anxiety, danger, and cost, or for any other reason--to advise his
Majesty of this and to persuade him to undertake so grand a work, we
would fulfil neither our duty to heaven, which we owe to God and to
the souls of our kinsmen; nor the faith and loyalty, which in such a
juncture we owe to our king, our religion, and our fatherland. Surely,
we should all be known as vile-spirited cowards, and men of little
valor, since, standing on the threshold that bounds so much good,
we are content with the little we now possess; and by dint of idling
and amusing ourselves with the little that we have here, we fail to
look or reach for an object so important for the world, for God, for
our king, for ourselves, and above all for the people of this country.

Third: Let his Majesty come to a decision in this matter, for we who
dwell here know that either this matter must be left, and entirely
given over, and lost forever, or it must be taken up now, because
the chance is slipping by, never to return. Thus, a few years ago,
it might have been accomplished with no labor, cost, or loss of life;
today it cannot be done without some loss, and in a short time it
will be impossible to do it at any cost. For the Chinese are each day
becoming more wary, and more on their guard. They are even laying
in munitions of war, fortifying themselves, and training men--all
which they have learned, and are still learning, from the Portuguese
and our people. Seeing the Portuguese in that country, and us here,
they are fearful, and especially so from the accounts the Portuguese
give them of us, telling how we go about subjecting foreign lands,
overthrowing native kings and setting up our own, and that this has so
far been our sole object in coming, and other things that the father
has heard from the mouths of the mandarins themselves, and which he
will recount. Besides, there is the passage of the fragatas, which they
have seen on their way from here to Macan, having met nearly all of
them in their ports or with their fleets; and, most of all, the course
of affairs in these islands, which, if it were presently made known,
would be understood in such wise as to destroy all hope of success.

Fourth: Further, if, for their sins and ours, the doctrine of Mahoma
comes into their country--and it has already spread over nearly the
whole of Yndia as far as Malaca, Samatra, Javas, Burney, Maluco, Lucon,
and almost all other lands--if it should get a foothol