ey left Cochin on the 25th of April, and arrived at Malacca on the last
of May. All the town came to meet Father Xavier, and every particular
person was overjoyed at his return. Alphonso Martinez, grand vicar to the
bishop, at that time lay dangerously sick, and in such an agony of soul,
as moved compassion. For, having been advertised to put himself in
condition of giving up his accounts to God of that ministry which he had
exercised for thirty years, and of all the actions of his life, he was so
struck with the horror of immediate death, and the disorders of his life,
which was not very regular for a man of his profession, that he fell into
a deep melancholy, and totally despaired of his salvation. He cast out
lamentable cries, which affrighted the hearers; they heard him name his
sins aloud, and detest them with a furious regret, not that he might ask
pardon for them, but only to declare their enormity. When they would have
spoken to him of God's infinite mercy, he broke out into a rage, and
cried out as loud as he was able, "that there was no forgiveness for the
damned, and no mercy in the bottomless pit." The sick man was told, that
Father Francis was just arrived; and was asked if he should not be glad
to see him? Martinez, who formerly had been very nearly acquainted with
him, seemed to breathe anew at the hearing of that name, and suddenly
began to raise himself, to go see, said he, the man of God. But the
attempt he made, served only to put him into a fainting fit. The Father,
entering at the same moment, found him in it. It had always been his
custom, to make his first visit to the ecclesiastical superiors; but
besides this, the sickness of the vicar hastened the visit. When the sick
man was come, by little and little, to himself, Xavier began to speak to
him of eternity, and of the conditions requisite to a Christian death.
This discourse threw Martinez back again into his former terrors; and the
servant of God, in this occasion, found that to be true, which he had
often said, that nothing is more difficult than to persuade a dying man
to hope well of his salvation, who in the course of his life had
flattered himself with the hopes of it, that he might sin with the
greater boldness.

Seeing the evil to be almost past remedy, he undertook to do violence to
heaven, that he might obtain for the sick man the thoughts of true
repentance, and the grace of a religious death. For he made a vow upon
the place, to say a