ch was elevated by Jesus Christ to the dignity of a sacrament)
merits among Christians, they received these doctrines without any
repugnance, since they were already free from the great obstacles which
perversity and corruption, elevated to their highest power--namely,
to have polytheism and idolatry as their foundation and support--can
present against those doctrines. In the year one thousand five
hundred and ninety-five, the Jesuit fathers, Torres and Sanchez,
[144] came to this island, and very soon established the Catholic
religion in Baclayon. Later, they founded a church and convent in
Loboc; and then went to a site called Talibon, and overran the rest
of the island, where they were able to conquer the difficulties which
presented themselves in the way of submitting to their rule--born
rather of repugnance to the Spaniards than of systematic opposition
to the Christian faith. When Legaspi passed by Bohol and anchored at
Jagna [145] in the year one thousand five hundred and sixty-four, he
already had occasion to observe that same thing; and the explanation
given him by a Moro from Borneo whom he had found there trading, was,
that two years before eight vessels from the Molucas had committed
great outrages, and those pirates had said that they were Castilians;
and since they were of the same color and bore the same arms [as the
Spaniards], the people of Bohol imagined that the Spaniards would
do the same thing to them as the men of the eight Portuguese boats
had done. [146] When Christianity had acquired a great increase in
that island, hell, angered by those spiritual improvements, availed
itself of the instrumentality of certain Moros of Mindanao, in order,
if possible, to choke the seed of the gospel. Knowing that the best
means of attaining that object was to make them rebel against the
Spaniards, who had brought to them the happiness of their souls, hell
stirred up a rebellion which had the same causes, and was invested
with the same forms as the insurrection of Caraga, and was of more
lasting effect. The missionaries having absented themselves in order
to celebrate in Cebu the beatification of St. Francis Javier, which
was celebrated in the year one thousand six hundred and twenty-one,
two or three criminals who were wandering through the mountains seduced
the tribes, as the messengers of the _diguata_ [_i.e._, divinity], to
refuse obedience to the Spaniards, to abandon their settlements, and to
unite together