The poetical form in which this pasquinade is written dates from an early period in Castile. Cervantes has a poem of this class in Chapter xxvii of the first part of Don Quijote; while Lope de Vega has also employed it. The second, fourth, and sixth lines form a sort of echo to the first, third, and fifth lines (the six lines being, however, written as three in the pasquinade). See Clemencin’s edition of Don Quijote (Madrid, 1894), iii, pp. 7–9.
[7] See the book of Esther. This is the Hamah of the King James Bible.
[8] Father Fray Juan Mateos says of this passage: “The author seems to use the word ‘quesos’ [cheeses], alluding to ‘casos’ [cases] (a practical question of moral theology). I imagine that the text refers to the accusation made against those fathers of being casuists or adapters of the moral doctrine to their own convenience. From the context, one can deduce that ‘cera’ [wax] is used in the meaning of ‘dinero’ [money], and the meaning in that case might be, that the Jesuits were trying to get money by fitting up the consciences of men with moral doctrines easy of fulfilment.”
[9] This is a very obscure stanza, although the allusions were doubtless well understood in Manila. The second line might be translated “And who in hanging apples, saw tares;” although the translation as given above is to be preferred.
[10] There is evidently a play on the word “cura,” which may mean either “cures,” or “priests” [i.e.,“cures”]. The meaning of the last line seems to refer to the ecclesiastical term.
[11] This may be another play on words, for “sinzera” may be the adjective “sincere” or the two words “sin zera,” “waxless,” and hence in this last meaning, an allusion to the third line of the third stanza.
Letters from Governor Hurtado de Corcuera
Ecclesiastical
Most potent Sir: