hip which you always had, and still have, for me; nothing
doubting, but that if God has delivered me from so many dangers, it has
principally proceeded from your fatherly intercessions for me." He calls
himself his son in all his letters, and thus subscribes himself in one:
"The least of your children, and most distant from you, Francis Xavier."
But the high ideas which Francis had of Ignatius, caused him frequently
to ask his advice in relation to his own conduct. "You will do a
charitable work," said he, "in writing to me a letter, full of spiritual
instructions, as a legacy bequeathed to one who is the least of all your
children, at the farthest distance from you, and who is as it were
banished from your presence, by which I may partake some part of those
abundant treasures which heaven has heaped upon you. I beseech you not to
be too niggardly in the accomplishment of my desires." "I conjure you,"
says he elsewhere, "by the tender love of Jesus Christ, to give me the
method which I ought to keep, in admitting those who are to be members of
our Society; and write to me at large, considering the smallness of my
talent, which is well known to you; for if you give me not your
assistance, the poor ability which I have in these matters, will be the
occasion of my losing many opportunities for the augmentation of God's
glory."

In prescribing any thing that was difficult to his inferiors, he
frequently intermixed the name of Ignatius: "I pray you by our Lord, and
by Ignatius, the Father of our Society. I conjure you by the obedience,
and by the love which you owe to our Father Ignatius." "Remember," said
he farther, "to what degree, both great and small, respect our Father
Ignatius."

With these sentiments, both of affection and esteem, he depended
absolutely on his superior. "If I believed," says he, writing from the
Indies to Father Simon Rodriguez, "that the strength of your body were
equal to the vigour of your mind, I should invite you to pass the seas,
and desire your company in this new world; I mean, if our Father Ignatius
should approve and counsel such a voyage: For he is our parent, it
behoves us to obey him; and it is not permitted us to make one step
without his order."

In this manner, Xavier had recourse to Ignatius on all occasions, as much
as the distance of places would permit; and the orders which he received,
were to him inviolable laws. "You shall not suffer any one," so he writ
to Gaspar Barzaeus,