Manuel de Antiquia, notary and secretary.
[1] This document was printed in the Manila newspaper La Democracia (the organ of the Federal party), on November 25, 1901; it was furnished to that paper by Hugo Salazar, a young Filipino—a native of Luzón, educated as a pharmacist, prominent in the Federal party during 1901–04, and in 1903–04 governor of Surigao province, Mindanao—under the pen-name of “Ambut.” It was printed with accompanying comments written by him, which here appear as foot-notes, signed “Ambut.” We are indebted to the courtesy of James A. LeRoy (now [1906] U. S. consul at Durango, Mexico) for a copy of the above issue of La Democracia, and for the above information. [↑]
[2] Cf. pp. 141–143, post, note 63. [↑]
[3] In view of these abuses which occurred in the middle of the eighteenth century, which have been repeated in our own time (up to the year ’97) with an outcome favorable to the friars because the latter found support in the venality or the pliancy of the authorities, will it be possible still to deny the justice and good reason with which the Filipinos reject the friars, demanding the suppression of the religious corporations, which always and everywhere have had pernicious consequences? Libertas, in its No. 686, shows bad faith and shamelessness in addressing to a co-religionist of ours these questions in its editorial columns: “Can Don Leocadio inform us whether these popular tumults which keep him so preoccupied were known in Filipinas before the year ’96? Is it not public and notorious that certain conspicuous attorneys, resident in Manila, are the ones who are deceiving the people, promising them impossible things, and obtaining from them beforehand enormous sums of money?” Don Leocadio does not answer, in order not to waste his time; but he recommends the reading of this royal decree, in which all the friar-lovers will find a complete answer if they will reason with their brains. As the organ of the friars, it is natural that Libertas should speak thus, displaying the blessing of his Holiness Leo XIII as a banner for concealing error and falsehood; it is likewise natural that those who reason with the stomach should form a chorus for that sort of scribbling; but it is truly regrettable that our women and other persons should aid, through their lack of instruction, through the influence of the confessional, and through religious fanaticism, in falsifying historical truth.—“Ambut.” [↑]
[4] It results, then, that the friars usurped not only the lands of individuals, but those of the State; this is called “filling both sides of the mouth with food” [comer á dos carrillos]—which they were doing, receiving salaries from the State and collecting dues from their parishioners.—“Ambut.” [↑]
[5] This work was composed by Joseph González Cabrera Bueno, a native of Teneriffe, and at the time of its publication (Manila, 1734) the chief pilot for the Manila-Acapulco line of galleons. He was a sailor of great ability and long experience, which, with this book, gave him a very high rank among the mariners of his day. He dedicated the book to Governor Valdés y Tamón; its censura (or examination by the censor) was made by Murillo Velarde; and its illustrations were engraved by the native Filipino artist Nicolás de la Cruz Bagay. (Vindel, Catálogo biblioteca filipina, no. 819.) [↑]
[6] This direction to the alcaldes-mayor naturally suggests the query, “How many of the provinces were supplied with printing-offices in 1753?” and reminds one of Dickens’s “Circumlocution Office,” and its efforts “how not to do it.” [↑]
[7] The pernicious character of the religious corporations, as an evil to society, is sufficiently proved; for even Catholic France is expelling them from her bosom. It only remains, then, to decide whether the prohibition of their existence is opposed to the principle of the separation of Church and State. To conform to the principle that the welfare of the people is a supreme law, and in virtue of that to deny legal existence to such associations as are hostile to the said principle, is not to fail in [loyalty to] the separation of the Church and the State, inasmuch as the prohibition has nothing to do with religious dogmas or ecclesiastical discipline; and, in order to be just and thoroughly impartial, it does not oppose itself to any specified community or sect, for it entirely sets aside the religious character of the corporations, considering them simply as groups of human beings in their relation to the general good. The State, in this case, legislates without passing beyond the bounds of its proper and exclusive jurisdiction, and does not invade the attributes of the ecclesiastical power.