[79] Perhaps referring to the fact that Pardo was but fifteen years old when he entered the Dominican order, and to his high rank as a theologian and a prelate.
[80] The first of these citations reads in English: “The privilege that you enjoy through my favor you may not employ to my distress.” The second is a school axiom, derived from Aristotle, to be encountered in higher philosophy and metaphysics; it may be found in glossaries or expositions of terms used by schoolmen, but its explanation therein is usually somewhat prolix and even obscure. It may be translated thus: “Whenever any thing (or cause) is of such or such a character (or kind), it possesses that characteristic in higher degree than that which derives therefrom (i.e., than its effect or result).”—Rev. T. C. Middleton, O.S.A.
[81] This doctrine of the Manila cabildo and of the author might at that time be quite current; but since then, by the Concordat of 1851, and especially by the bull of his Holiness Pius IX, the Roman pontiff, issued on August 28, 1873, the church has sanctioned the opposite opinion.—Fray Tirso López.
[82] It should be remembered that this part of the Conquistas was written in 1718.—Fray Tirso López.
[83] This recapitulation or resumé of the labors of our missionaries in China was either not written by Father Diaz, or he wrote it in a separate book which we do not possess.—Fray Tirso López.
[84] One of the most important acts of this governor was the publication (October 1, 1696) of a revision of the “Ordinances of good government” which Corcuera had enacted in 1642; some account of these will be given in a later volume.
[85] “He devoted himself to the recovery of the immense sums which were due to the king from the citizens of Manila; and with these he rebuilt the governor’s palace, added to it the halls for the royal Audiencia, and in the lower story offices for the bureau of accounts, established the jail for the court, and began the royal storehouses. By various expedients he contrived the saving of thousands of pesos to the royal treasury, sums which now are deducted from the situado—although this was partly done by greatly curtailing the pay of both officers and soldiers, for which he deserves little praise. To the royal treasury of Mexico he saved more than five hundred thousand pesos which it was owing to that of Philipinas in situados.” (Zúñiga’s Historia, p. 394.)
[86] The sentence pronounced in the residencia of Governor Cruzat y Gongora (published June 6, 1602) is given in full in the Ventura del Arco MSS. (Ayer library), iv, pp. 209–234. Some forty charges were made against him; some were sustained, making him liable to judgments of about 31,000 pesos; others were referred to the home government; but on the majority he was acquitted.
[87] In the Ventura del Arco MSS. (Ayer library), iv, pp. 235–244, is a summary of a long document, a “Vindication of the official acts performed in the visitation of Camarines by Licentiate Don Francisco Gueruela, member of his Majesty’s Council and alcalde of court in the royal Audiencia of these islands, and visitor for the Audiencia in that province in the past year, 1702.” The summary reads as follows:
It is divided into three parts: the first contains, besides the preface, a brief summary of all the edicts which were published in those villages, and which are being brought out by his order. The second comprises a more than succinct relation of the false charges which the said visitation had encountered, and edicts about which with Christian impiety they had dissembled to him. The third is reduced to a brief legal demonstration of the authority which the visitor possesses to institute summary legal proceedings against the religious who are in charge of doctrinas, without danger from the bull In cæna or any other censure whatever.