"I pray you," said he to two missioners of Comorine, "to go to the Isles del Moro; and to the end you may the better have occasion of meriting by your obedience, I positively command you."
But it is impossible to relate, with what tenderness he loved the Society, or how much he concerned himself in all their interests, though of the smallest moment. Being in Portugal, before his voyage to the Indies, he wrote not any letters to Rome, wherein he did not testisfy his great desire to know what progress it made in Italy. Writing to the Fathers, Le Gay, and Laynez, he says thus: "Since our rule is confirmed, I earnestly desire to learn the names of those who are already received into our order, and of such as are upon the point of being admitted. He exhorts them, to thank the king of Portugal, for the design which his majesty had to build a college, or a house for the Society: and we ought to make this acknowlegment to the king," said he, "to engage him thereby to begin the building."
The news which he received from Father Ignatius, and the other Fathers who were at Rome, gave him infinite consolation. "I have received your letters, which I expected with much impatience; and have received them with that joy, which children ought to have in receiving some pleasing news from their mother. In effect, I learn from them the prosperous condition of all the Society, and the holy employments wherein you engage yourselves without intermission." He could scarcely moderate his joy, whensoever he thought on the establishment of the Society. Thus he wrote from the Indies to Rome: "Amongst all the favours which I have received from God in this present life, and which I receive daily, the most signal, and most sensible, is to have heard that the institute of our Society has been approved and confirmed by the authority of the Holy See I give immortal thanks to Jesus Christ, that he has been pleased his vicar should publicly establish the form of life, which he himself has prescribed in private to his servant, our Father Ignatius."
But Xavier also wished nothing more, than to see the Society increased; and he felt a redoubling of his joy, by the same proportion, when he had notice of their gaining new houses in the East, or when he heard, from Europe, of the foundation of new colleges.
To conclude, he had not less affection for the particular persons, who were members of the Society, than for the body of it. His brethren were ever present in his thoughts; and he thought it not enough to love them barely, without a continual remembrance of them. "I carry about with me (thus he writes to the Fathers at Rome) all your names, of your own handwriting, in your letters; and I carry them together with the solemn form of my profession." By which he signifies, not only how dear the sons of the Society were to him, but also how much he esteemed the honour of being one of their number.
The love which he bore to gospel-poverty, caused him to subsist on alms, and to beg his bread from door to door, when he might have had a better provision made for him. Being even in the college of Goa, which was well endowed, he sought his livelihood without the walls, the more to conform himself to the poverty of his blessed Saviour. He was always very meanly clothed, and most commonly had so many patches on his cassock, that the children of the idolaters derided him. He pieced up his tatters with his own hand, and never changed his habit till it was worn to rags; at least, if the honour of God, and the interest of religion, did not otherwise oblige him. At his return from Japan to Malacca, where he was received with so much honour, he wore on his back a torn cassock, and a rusty old hat on his head.
The Portuguese, beholding him always so ill apparelled, often desired him to give them leave to present him with a new habit; but seeing he would not be persuaded, they once devised a way of stealing his cassock while he was asleep. The trick succeeded, and Xavier, whose soul was wholly intent on God, put on a new habit, which they had laid in the place of his old garment, without discovering how they had served him. He passed the whole day in the same ignorance of the cheat, and it was not till the evening that he perceived it; for supping with Francis Payva, and other Portuguese, who were privy to the matter,—"It is perhaps to do honour to our table," said one amongst them, "that you are so spruce to-day, in your new habit." Then, casting his eyes upon his clothes, he was much surprised to find himself in so strange an equipage. At length, being made sensible of the prank which they had played him, he told them, smiling, "That it was no great wonder that this rich cassock, looking for a master in the dark, could not see its way to somebody who deserved it better."
As he lived most commonly amongst the poorer sort of Indians, who had nothing to bestow, and who, for the most part, went naked, he enjoyed his poverty without molestation. All his moveables were a mat, on which he lay sometimes, and a little table, whereon were his writings, and some little books, with a wooden crucifix, made of that which the Indians call the wood of St Thomas.
He cheerfully underwent the greatest hardships of poverty; and, writing from Japan to the Fathers of Goa, his words were these:—"Assist me, I beseech you, my dear brethren, in acknowledging to Almighty God the signal favour he has done me. I am at length arrived at Japan, where there is an extreme scarcity of all things, which I place amongst the greatest benefits of Providence."
Mortification is always the companion of poverty, in apostolical persons. Xavier bore Constantly along with him the instruments of penance; haircloth, chains of iron, and disciplines, pointed at the ends, and exceeding sharp. He treated his flesh with great severity, by the same motive which obliged St Paul, the apostle, to chastise his body, and to reduce it into servitude, lest, having preached to other men, he might himself become a reprobate.