69. They are very material and literal in their conversations, and one cannot say the slightest word to the women in jest, however slight it be; for the most discreet thing that they will answer to one will be, Tampalasanca, which means, “You are a[150] shameless fellow;” and, if not that,[151] a tempest of words, that will make him repent having given occasion for them.[152] This alone is their custom with the Spaniards.[153]
70. It is a thing to be wondered at that even the dogs have another disposition, and have a particular aversion toward Spaniards. When they see Spaniards, they choke themselves with barking. And when the children see a father they cry immediately,[154] and thus from their cradle they begin to hold every white face in horror.[155]
71. They are so cowardly that they fear any Indian who becomes a bully among them—so much that, if they only see him with a poor knife, they fear him so greatly that he can do whatever he wishes. All the village together will not be bold enough to arrest him, for they say that he is posong, which is the same as “bold.” I have had many examples of this.[156]
72. The vice of drunkenness is regarded by them as rank in the fourth degree,[157] and they have made it a point of nobility; for the chiefest men think that they are the best workmen at this occupation.[158] It is a fact that those most given to this vice are the Ilocans, then the Visayans, and then our Tagálogs.[159] The Pampangos can be exempted from this rule, for they are very temperate in this wretched habit, as well as in all the other things which we have mentioned. They are very different: for they are truthful, and love their honor; are very brave, and inclined to work; and are more civil, and of better customs. In regard to the vices here mentioned (for they are, in the last analysis, Indians like the rest), they keep them more out of sight and covered. In all things the Pampangos have a nobleness of mind that makes them the Castilians of these same Indians. Consequently, that people must be distinguished from the rest in its character, in all that we have said.
73. Returning now to the others, in general, they possess vanity without honor; for among them it is no reason for less esteem to be drunkards, robbers, or connivers in evil deeds, or [to practice] other like virtues.[160] They lose reputation and honor only if they get the reputation of being sorcerers. Consequently, in the opinion of a very learned minister, there is no case of a restitution of honor, unless some accusation of this infamous sin is imputed to them. In their marriages and among their kindred their disgust is not moved except by this, for the others are excused by self interest, but this fault is not.[161]
74. All that I have said of the men is very different in the women, saltem quoad modum.[162] For they are of better morals, are docile and affable, and show great love to their husbands and to those who are not their husbands. They are really very modest in their actions and conversation, to such a degree that they have a very great horror of obscene words; and if weak nature craves acts, their natural modesty abhors words.[163] The notion that I have formed of them is that they are very honorable, and, most of all, the married women. Although beans are boiled, it is not by the kettleful, as in other regions.[164] Scarcely will one find a Tagálog or Pampango Indian woman, who will put her person to trade; and they are not so abandoned as we see in the women in other regions. They are very averse toward the Spaniard, and love the equality [in marriage] of their own nation; and, as a foreign religious said, are suited “each man to each woman.” They rarely have any love for a Spaniard. They have another peculiarity, which if the Indian women of America had, that land would not be so full of mulattoes, who are a ferocious and wicked race. This is their horror for Cafres and negroes, which is so great that they would sooner suffer themselves to be killed than to receive them. The Visayan women, however, are ready for everything, and are not so fastidious. On the contrary, they are very ready to consent to any temptation.[165]
75. The women are very devout, and in every way of good habits. The cause for this is that they are kept so subject and so closely occupied; for they do not lift their hands from their work, since in many of the villages they support their husbands and sons, while the latter are busied in nothing else but in walking,[166] in gambling, and wearing fine clothes, while the greatest vanity of the women is in the adornment and demeanor of these gentlemen, for they themselves are very poorly and modestly[167] clad.
76. In all that I have said, to this point, concerning the nature and morals of these poor people, I have done no more than to approximate [to the truth], as the mathematicians have done in the squaring of the circle. For an essential, substantial, and exhaustive definition[168] is for some other person, to whom divine Providence chooses to communicate this difficult matter.[169] Very praiseworthy is Barclayo, for in his Eupormion and his Argenis,[170] he succeeded in discerning the natures of nations; as did Juan Rodemborgio,[171] and our Gracian in his Criticon.[172] But had they treated of the Filipinos, they would not have been so successful.
77. The bishop of La Puebla, Don Juan Palafox,[173] wrote a keen treatise on the virtues of the Indians of Nueva España, in which his uncommon intellect and his holy and good intention are displayed more clearly than is the truth of his argument on the subject; for in a curious way he endeavors to make virtues of all their vices and evil inclinations. For in what they merit before God through their wills, they do not merit if it be the impelling force of their natural inclination and manner of living, because absuetiis non fit passio.[174] One cannot, indeed, compare the voluntary poverty of St. Francis with that of the Indians, which is born of laziness and full of greed; for theirs is the infamous poverty which Virgil places in hell: et turpis egestas.[175] And just as the economy of a poor wretch is not reckoned as fasting, so it will not be proper to say that if St. Antony[176] went barefoot, the Indians do the same; and that they live on certain roots, as did the fathers of the Thebaid.[177] For the fasting and the austerities of St. Arsenius[178] had a different impelling motive—since he left the pleasures and esteem of the court of the emperor Theodosius[179]—than that which they can have, being so born and reared, and never having seen anything else. Hence, Ovid says of the Getas that they left the delights and comforts of Roma, and returned to seek the poverty and misery to which they were accustomed in Pontus:
Roma quid meltus scyt[h]ico[180] quid frigore peius?