Amid all the calamities and miseries which it has pleased the Lord to inflict on these islands, the chief has been the loss of some ships which were wrecked, including among others the flagship and the ship of the second in command. They set sail from this coast during the last year, 1600, for Nueva España, being laden with a large amount of treasure and merchandise; and by them the records of this province and the letters from Japan for your Paternity were sent. But, after sailing for eight months, these ships encountered a violent contrary wind, and, having on board a great number of sailors, were gradually driven back by sickness, hunger, and the fury of the waves, which swept the men from the very decks of the ships to be drowned in the waters. The vessels struck on rocks and were wrecked, a few men only being rescued, like the servants of Job, from the immediate danger, to announce the destruction—which, being increased by one misfortune and mishap in war after another, heaped sorrow upon us. On one of these ships, called the "San Geronimo," was Father Pedro Lopez de Parra, a professed religious of our Society—who, as we trust, after this long voyage (or rather that longer one of thirty-seven years in religion), has entered the gate of eternal life, laden with a rich treasure of good works. He taught philosophy and theology in Nueva España, having been one of the first members of the Society formerly sent thither; he trained our ministers with fruitful results. Although we have heard nothing certain with regard to the details of his death, yet, as he took great delight in the duty of hearing confessions and helping souls, it is likely that with great devotion he aided all in that extremity of danger. [33]
In another disaster we have lost another priest and a brother, if loss be the proper name to give to the death of those who have been slain for the gain of souls, and while aiding their brethren in a just war against heretic pirates. These were Hollanders and Zeelanders who were driven to the Philippine Islands in the year 1600, and came to get booty on the sea called the Northern Ocean, or "Mar del Norte" (for they had already made spoil of a Portuguese ship), and, after passing the Strait of Magellan, had, in that southerly ocean called "Mar del Sur," done likewise with a small vessel from Peru. Their leading vessels, the flagship and the almiranta, took a station six leagues from Manila, where the Spanish, Japanese, and Chinese ships had to unload their cargoes, and to which all the smacks and other small boats that left the city had to hold their course. Against these ships of the enemy there were sent out from Manila two ships provided with three hundred of the best soldiers of these islands, together with many bombards and other equipments of war. In the chief ships were Father Diego de Santiago and Brother Bartolomeo Calvo, at the request of the general, Antonio de Morga, auditor of the royal Audiencia, and of other officers of rank, who were accustomed to confess to the said father.
Now when the father had exerted himself to receive the confessions of the soldiery, and had exhorted them to fight bravely, on the fourteenth of December they came in sight of the enemy; and the flagship spread its sails and bore down so swiftly on the other flagship that the passage from one to the other was easy. In the conflict our men tore away the enemy's flags and carried them back to their own ship, shouting, "Victory!" with joyful voices. Just then our ship, having taken in a great quantity of water from all sides, was by the permission of God suddenly swallowed in the waves with all the sailors, except a few who by the help of a skiff captured from the Dutch, or by swimming, made their way to land. The general was one who threw himself into the water with two flags of the enemy's.
Then the almiranta, having encountered the enemy's almiranta, captured it, and carried it away to Manila, where punishment was inflicted on all the sailors. Among the number of those on our side who were slain or drowned, a hundred and fifty-nine in all, Father Diego was drowned. He had heard, as it appeared, the confessions of all; and as he was making the effort to throw himself clear into the sea, he was called back by the voice of a captain desiring to make his confession. While he was hearing the confession he was drowned, with the brother and the rest. The father was in the twenty-ninth year of his age, and had lived fifteen years in the Society. The brother, his companion, was of the same age, and had lived in the Society seven years; he had entered it in these regions. He was a man endowed with every virtue, being especially noteworthy for his obedience, to which he was always greatly inclined.
Of the brethren there has also died Martin Sanchez, a native of these islands, who was for a decade a member of the Society, and who left a glorious example in life and death. There remain in this vice-province thirty priests and twenty-nine brethren (of whom two are scholastics and four novices)—those nine being included whom your Paternity has sent hither with Father Gregorio Lopez, in whom this vice-province assuredly receives a great assistance. As it is of later birth, more scantily supplied with workers, and further from Rome, it is likewise poorer; and, as the younger daughter, ought to be the dearer and more precious to your Paternity.
College of Manila
There live in this college (the leading one [34] in this vice-province) seventeen of Ours—seven priests and ten brethren. All of them, by the favor of divine Providence, have by their example and labor brought in a rich harvest from the spiritual tilling of this city. This has been added to on account of the war and the earthquake, the loss of the ships, and other calamities; and we have learned by experience that piety grows more rapidly in adverse than in prosperous fortune. The earthquake has made us hesitate to go on with the completion of the college buildings, for we are compelled first to repair what has already fallen or is on the verge of ruin. Last year we wrote that on the twenty-first of June the main part of the nave of the church had fallen; but in this year of 1601, on the sixteenth of January, the other part corresponding to it was overthrown, and the rest so shaken that it had to be leveled with the ground. We regard it as a great blessing that these buildings fell without injuring anyone, although the first of the earthquakes came while the people were in the church at mass, the other when it was least expected. The people of Manila have accordingly been warned by Ours of the daily peril of life on earth, and have begun to lift up their hearts to heaven, and to pray for its care and protection. By a happy lot it has been obtained for them by the patronage and advocacy of St. Polycarp, [35] bishop and martyr, the disciple of St. John the Evangelist; and in his honor they have begun to celebrate an annual feast with a solemn procession.
The beginning of another pious work has been made this year with marked results. This is the practice of scourging, not as hitherto on three days in Lent, but every Friday throughout the year, in our church. There is a great concourse of people at that time to hear the fiftieth psalm, Miserere, by the melancholy harmony of which they are most moved to devotion and to doing penance. Not infrequently the royal auditors and the governor himself have been present, as well as other leading men.
Those in prison also have been aided by the reception of sacramental confessions and by pious exhortations; and—a thing that has edified the people not a little—the necessary food was for some days carried all the way to the prisons on our shoulders. From children, too, the food of Christian doctrine has not been withheld on Sundays; and with the children arranged in the form of a procession we went out during Lent to the military barracks, where after delivering sermons we reaped fruit not to be ashamed of.
The congregation of scholastics begun this year has made the best of progress. Every month, according to the rules, they make their confession to the priest, and partake of the divine food. On feast-days they spend the afternoons in listening to spiritual reading and in commemorating the examples of the saints. The solemn feasts of the Blessed Virgin they celebrate with the greatest fervor and joy. On one of these they go with their cloaks cast off, each with a silver ewer and basin in his hands, and carry food to the prisons, marching in the finest order and system; and with great readiness and humility they serve the unhappy men. They are believed to have taken their manner of procedure, in all respects, from the congregation at Rome. The privileges of the Sodality, also, have so much attracted laymen that it has been necessary to divide them into two orders. As for the adult men and householders who look forward to spending Sundays and feast-days to advantage in the Sodality, the father-visitor has made a beginning, by delivering to them familiar exhortations, and narratives of pious examples taken from the Lives of the Saints; and we have every reason to hope that the undertaking will succeed to the greater glory of God, with the most noble of advantages to the city. Even now there are some who, having heard one or another sermon, have entered upon more holy and profitable ways of living than they followed before.