The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume 35, 1640-1649 / Explorations by early navigators, descriptions of the islands and their peoples, their history and records of the Catholic missions, as related in contemporaneous books and manuscripts, showing the political, economic, commercial and religious conditions of those islands from their earliest relations with European nations to the close of the nineteenth century

by Unknown

Another paragraph from the letter of father Fray Antonio de Santa Maria

“They say also that the following prodigies have occurred in the kingdom of China. In Pequin, where the court is, they say there was a dense darkness for the space of three days; cinders rained in other parts. The earth gushed forth blood, and a quantity of it was caught in vases. A bell in one of their temples rang of its own accord; and the rocks, when struck with blows, sounded like the beat of drums. Two or three towns, not many days’ journey from Macan, were swallowed up by the earth with their people and buildings. And even now in another town, not far from there, they say that serpents are coming out of the sea—very large and hideous, with horns—and with their assault they overthrow the buildings and houses, and slay the people; and that returning to the water they again come out, make a capture, and immediately return to the sea.”

Besides the above-mentioned news from Japon concerning our religious, the said father Fray Antonio, while drawing up authentic information on behalf of our order, writes in his letter the following paragraph:

“In the year 1637, they also say, there were in Japon some three or four religious of the Order of St. Francis who traveled through that country to the remotest regions of the kingdom on the far north, to a province of the said kingdom of Japan called Canga.[3] It is said that the emperor commanded that the tono, or petty king, of that province be notified that he should be most vigilant and careful that no Christian whatever should enter his lands; and that he responded to the emperor that quiet reigned in his territory, and that there was no necessity to treat his vassals harshly. This petty king, they say, is an uncle or relative of the true king of Japon, who has disappeared.[4] This I saw in one of the relations written by the Portuguese there in Japon.”

I have just completed the official statements regarding our martyrs, and have finished transcribing them; two copies of them I send now, the other I will carry or send to your Lordship. The martyrs of whom this report is made are: Fray Luys Gomez, Fray Gabriel, Fray Juan Torrilla, Fray Gines de Quesada, and Fray Geronimo de la Cruz—who is that Japanese priest who, when I came from Spain, was in that church of the Japanese (in our war of Dilao[5]) at the side of, or a little behind the well. The holy Fray Luys Gomez is one of those who in former years were summoned by the emperor in order to question them about our holy faith; he was eighty-four years of age and had spent forty in Japon. He died hanged in a cave, head down, with two Japanese helpers [dogicos], in company with Father Sebastian Viera, and four other native helpers of theirs. In the official account which the Society drew up about their father, our Fray Luys is also included. The holy Fray Gabriel de la Madalena, or Fonseca, after having suffered the torture of hot water was burned alive, in company with Fray Geronimo, a Japanese, in the little cottage of the latter, on the third of September, 1632; Fray Luis, on the sixth of June, 1634. Marvelous things, enough to fill a large book are related of Fray Gabriel. It is common knowledge that when he prayed he was many times raised above the ground, and that he often disappeared for a time from the eyes of those present. From various small herbs that he gathered he made medicines, with which he wrought miraculous cures. While he was being burned, they say, he rose in the air two cubits [codos], and while praying in the mountains this was an ordinary occurrence.

Besides the conversions in China and Japon, the Lord has revealed, through the medium of his servants the sons of our father Saint Francis, another and by no means small multitude of people who desire with all sincerity to receive holy baptism, and to attain the knowledge of the truth—regarding whom the governor of Terrenate already mentioned says, in the following paragraph taken from one of his letters: