AND INFLUENCE OF THE FRIARS

[The following is taken from volume ii of Sinibaldo de Mas's _Informe
sobre el estado de las islas Filipinas en 1842_ (Madrid, January,
1843).]

The ecclesiastical estate

Shortly after Legaspi had discovered the islands, came successively
religious of St. Augustine, St. Dominic, and St. Francis, who spread
through the interior and founded convents in Manila. They were the
ones who accomplished most in the spiritual and temporal conquest,
as is attested uniformly by writers, native and foreign, even the
least devout. Some years later, bishoprics were erected; and from
that moment began a struggle between the bishops and the monastic
orders as to whether or no the friar curas should be subject to the
diocesan visit. Innumerable are the treatises, opinions, superior
decrees, and scandalous disputes, which took place on this account,
as we have already seen in the chapter called "History." The arguments
of the religious were founded on the fear of falling into relaxation
of their regular observance, as they believed that they could not
be good ministers without being good religious. The religious of
the Order of St. Dominic, discussing this point in the year 1710,
resolved that, if the lords ordinary [98] attempted to subject them
to the diocesan visit, they would first abandon all their missions;
_for the province regards it as certain and evident that the ruin
of the ministering religious must follow the said visit; and of this
opinion have been, for many years past, grave religious and zealous
and superior prelates whom the province has had_. In the year 1757,
Governor Don Pedro Manuel Arandia claimed, with the greatest firmness,
that the regulars should submit to the laws of the royal patronage in
respect to the appointment of religious for the curacies, and that they
should receive the canonical installation. He first directed himself
to the provincial of the calced Augustinians, even going so far as
to warn him that, if he did not obey his behests and commands in this
matter, the governor would proceed to his exile and the occupation of
his temporalities. To that the provincial replied that he could not
under any circumstances accede to his demands, adding that "he knew
by proof in his establishment the ruin of their regular institute,
with notable harm to souls;" and that "he was at the same time assured
that the piety of the king (whom may God preserve) would not take it
ill