The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume 37, 1669-1676 / 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

CHAPTER XIV

Of the election of provincial in the person of the father commissary Fray Francisco de Paula; and of religious worthy of note who died during that time.

Father Fray Carlos Clemente Gant having completed his term of office with great glory, a chapter was held in the convent of our father Santo Domingo in Manila, On the twentieth of April, 1641, the reverend father Fray Francisco de Paula, commissary of the Holy Office, preacher-general, then lecturer in morning classes in our college of Santo Tomas, vicar-provincial of this district of Manila—a son of the noted convent of San Estevan of Salamanca, and native of Segovia, of noble parentage—whose superior talents will be told in due time, was elected provincial with much satisfaction. There was a great lack of religious in the province, for no mission had come for six years, except that brought by father Fray Diego Collado. Although some of those religious were incorporated with the order, still many of them were dissatisfied. In short, so long as the province does not have a number of religious in excess of the actual number of ministries, it is a great anxiety and a cause of sorrow for our souls that there is no supply in cases of sickness and government, and the burdens of many are laid upon few. Further, all this gives the devil a gleam of hope that is important to him, and most harmful to the common welfare; and occasion is given for the ministers to be sold very dear, and a very high value is placed on their abilities and knowledge of languages. Therefore, a regiment of religious, which would be too much, is never more than enough; for in this beautiful Judith, the garments that apparently drag one down are the most necessary. The most efficacious means, and in fact the only one that ought to be used in such straits, was the one which the father provincial-elect immediately put into effect; namely, to have recourse to our Lord and the intercession of the saints, laying most stress on his efforts with our father St. Dominic, who is the keystone of all this edifice, in whose name are held firm these religious stones. A novena of solemn masses was immediately begun to the saint at his altar of Soriano. The first one was chanted by the father provincial, and he also despatched patents throughout the province ordering the same supplications to be made in the convents for the said reason, and for the field of Christendom in Japon—which was then in its death throes, our religious having been killed and exiled, and only a scattering of priests of other orders being left there. The miraculous result of those prayers in regard to the coming of our religious will be told later.

[That chapter framed a memorial on the death of father Fray Diego Quero, who died in the Dominican convent at Manila. He took the habit at the island Española [i.e., San Domingo] and lived a life of great austerity and poverty. Being of an advanced age when he went to the Philippines, he was employed as master of novices, and afterward as a minister. Other religious who have yielded up their lives in the mission work are the following: Lorenço Alduayen of the province of Aragon, son of the convent of San Pedro Martir at Calatayud (Spain), who labored in the province of Cagayan, where he was greatly beloved. Juan del Moral, son of the convent of San Pablo in Cordova, native of La Rambla, who died at the Manila convent in 1642, where he had been master of novitiates. Geronimo de Belem, who died March 31, 1642, was a native of Beya, Portugal, and had fled to the Indias on account of a murder which he committed in his youth, taking the habit in the Mexican convent of the Augustinians because the Dominicans refused him. However, he was soon dismissed or left that order, and shortly after was given the Dominican habit in La Puebla de los Angeles; and on reaching the Philippines became a laborer in Bataan. He held several important positions in the order, being vicar-provincial, twice definitor, and minister in the province of Tagalos for many years. He was sent on an evangelical mission to Camboja, and after various other employments met his death by accident in an Augustinian convent in Pampanga, to which province he had been sent to adjust some repartimientos that had been imposed on the natives. Manuel de Berrio was a native of the town of Santa Maria el Real of Nieva, and son of the convent of Santa Cruz el Real at Segovia. He accompanied Diego Collado in his mission when still a young man, but deserted that body immediately upon his arrival. He was sent to Nueva Segovia in Cagayan, where he was well known for his virtue. He was vicar of Fotol at the time of his death. Chapter xv treats of certain troubles in 1642 growing out of the late Chinese insurrection. The governor had ordered the new Parián to be built on the other side of the river northeast of Manila in a barrio of the village of Binondo, between the sea and an estuary called La Estacada by the Spaniards, and Bayuay (or Baybay) by the natives.[1] Although it occasioned grave disadvantages to the city, as the people would be inconvenienced in going thither to supply their needs, and the natives would be in danger with so many infidels near by, the change was ordered; but in 1642 the Parián was accidentally destroyed by fire, with great wealth belonging to the Spaniards, and a large part of Binondo. This chapter recounts also the loss of the island Hermosa, which has been fully treated elsewhere.]