The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898. Volume 13 of 55. Unknown

that very time of the malady, admirable evidence appeared of the importance of the confraternity which, as we said above, that people had instituted for the purpose of exercising themselves in similar pious acts. Its members aided the sick with the utmost solicitude, striving to provide them with comforts and medicines; and when deaths occurred they kept watch over the corpses, and accompanied them to burial, to the great edification of all who saw them. As a natural result, the confraternity came to be much esteemed and valued, and many sought the intercession of influential persons in order to be admitted to its membership. It is proverbial among the Spaniards that its members can be recognized by their quiet and modest address, for which they are much respected. Not to mention other details, the devotion which they showed that year in the harvesting of their rice was certainly a source of great consolation; for they would not taste it until, after they had brought part of it as an offering to our Lord in His temple, that part had been blessed which they must immediately use. Their offering was a sort of grateful acknowledgment that God had delivered their grain-fields from the plague of locusts, and themselves from the sickness.

      Care was taken to check offenses against our Lord, and to break up vile illicit relations—some secretly, and others by other gentle means—by which many Indian women were kept in bondage. These women, in their eagerness for worldly gain and kind treatment, were gratified by certain men, who maintained them in that mode of life without fear of God. Indeed, there were two women who had killed their husbands that they might gain greater freedom in this respect. Some, too, had lived during many years in this wretched state—one ten years, another twelve, another thirteen; and still another, twenty long years. Yet God, in His infinite patience, had been waiting for them all this time, and at the end received them into His most gentle mercy.

      As in past years, our ordinary ministries were also exercised among the Spaniards; in particular, many general confessions were made, and friendly relations were established between certain prominent persons. Among these latter was one notable case concerning a prebendary of the cathedral of Manila—whom, for certain good reasons, I do not name; but his noble conduct on this occasion gives him sufficient fame. Knowing that another prebendary of the same church, an aged and venerable man, was offended at him, he secured an opportunity to meet him in the house of an auditor of Manila, and in the presence of several dignified persons; there, after having expressed himself in such gentle and conciliatory terms as to appease all angry feelings, he knelt at the feet of his elder, and, taking his hand, kissed it. Then they embraced each other; and thus began a very stable friendship between them, which I saw with my own eyes for many days—confirmed, months later, by their very intimate and fraternal intercourse.

      The progress in eradicating idolatry from Taitai, and the piety and constancy of its Christians. Chapter LIII.

      The pest, with its mortality, spread among all the Indians of that region, even to the villages of San Juan del Monte, Antipolo, and others. This kept our fathers busy night and day, caring not only for the welfare of souls, administering to them the holy sacraments with much fervor and concern, but for that of their bodies, aiding them with medicines and the necessary comforts—an important consideration with those people, in view of the value that they attach to kind treatment during illness and the pleasure that it gives them; indeed they often recover their health from very contentment at seeing that they are cherished and cared for. The confraternities of that village and of Manila gave no less useful aid, on this occasion, to the sick and the dead, their members taking turns in caring for the sick and attending funerals, which were usually accompanied by more than two hundred persons bearing lighted candles; these attentions were especially bestowed on the dead who had belonged to the confraternity, who were also honored by special funeral rites.

      Superstition and idolatry have been so thoroughly uprooted that there is hardly a trace or evidence of them left; if any had remained from former years, it was due to carelessness rather than to evil intent, and an end was put to them this year, through the favor of our Lord. Even the little plates and other insignificant articles which they were wont to use in making sacrifices they brought to the fathers, to be broken and burned. An Indian owned, growing on his land, a very luxuriant clump of the great reeds which they call cauayan [i.e., bamboo], which we have already described. This man came to notify us that this clump had formerly been offered to an idol, for whose service its canes had been cut; and he himself condemned it to be burned to the very roots, in order that it might not sprout again, and himself be thus reminded of an object which had been used for so evil purposes; accordingly, yielding to his feeling of devotion, orders were given that it be burned. Others showed a little house that was dedicated to another idol, and requested that it should be burned to the ground, which was done. The first to show their abhorrence of idolatry (in Which they surpassed the others) were the people of San Juan del Monte, where formerly this practice had reigned, and where there were so many priestesses of the idols, that there was hardly a street which did not contain three, four, or even more. But they have now turned their false superstitions into true religion and Christian piety, repairing to the church so regularly that on certain week-days, while the bell is rung for mass, the church is entirely filled with those who come to hear. They are wont to complain that, as there are so few fathers, they are unable to attend, as often and as regularly as they desire, confession and communion—which they seek with loving eagerness, not once, but many times during the year, to their own edification and profit. As a result, the sweet odor of this Christianity and esteem for the labors of Ours, have, to the glory of our Lord, reached other villages, so affecting and edifying them that the vicar-general of the archbishop, as well as other priests and religious, and even secular magistrates, have sent to that village for a few months, to be restrained, reformed, and kept in safety, certain persons who were sorely tempted. It has pleased our Lord that by good example and suitable instruction these persons should be delivered from danger and their lives reformed; they have made general confessions, and given other satisfactory proofs of the change in their lives.

      Among the mountains of this mission district, where the people are less experienced in the faith, there had remained a notorious catalonan, or priest, of a celebrated idol which had been hidden away, no one of those who knew about it daring to disclose the idol. This root was capable of producing many cursed shoots. But our Lord was pleased that it should be discovered through the praiseworthy diligence of Father Francisco Almerique, who obtained possession of the things pertaining to the adoration of the idol, and had them all burned. He was successful in converting the priest, and for greater security, made him live in a village where Ours usually reside. The devil, the father of lies, now that credence is no longer placed in him or importance attached to his superstitions and follies, transforms himself into an angel of light, striving to deceive the simple-minded. In this way he deluded a woman of rank with many visions and revelations which seemed to her real and true, and in which, according to her statement, he appeared in the form of our Lord Jesus Christ, taught her many things, and bade her instruct the people therein. The same father, as soon as he became aware of this, sought to undeceive her, enjoining her not to repeat those things to any one. But she paid no heed to this, and assembled secretly, at night, a number of persons; and, in order that they might go more willingly, she said that the father had told her to proceed. In this way she persevered in making known her fancies and illusions. Those who were present, noticing that her method of instruction and speech was similar to that employed by the priestesses of the idols when they are possessed by the demon—making a thousand gestures and movements like those of a madman or deranged person (which was the method formerly employed by the devil in making answers through the mouths of the catalonans)—hastened to give information of this proceeding. The father, learning for the second time of this, which was again taking place, assembled in the church the people who had heard this woman speak; and, showing them what it really was, undeceived them, pointing out the falsity of all those things, and the wiles of the devil. By these means an evil was corrected which doubtless would have been very great if so timely and appropriate a remedy had not been applied. In another instance a poor fellow was relieved by an Agnus Dei6 which one of our brethren gave him. The latter had sent some Indians to cut grass, and one of them fled inland, among the mountains, as if terrified and beside himself; and wandered from hill to hill during an entire day, until he was found in that condition by some other Indians, who conveyed him to his house. When the brother visited him, the Indian said that he wished to confess,

6

"The figure of a lamb stamped on the wax which remains from the paschal candles, and solemnly blessed by the pope on the Thursday after Easter, in the first and seventh years of his pontificate." (Addis and Arnold's Catholic Dictionary, pp. 17, 18.)