Since these chapters were prepared for the press there has come to hand from the ex-missionary, referred to in the previous pages more than once, additional and valuable information.1 Though it embraces various matters, we think it better to give it altogether, as it possesses a peculiar authority and interest of its own, coming as it does from a Friar who lived in the Philippines for twenty-seven years, and who knew the country well in its normal and peaceful state, long before the Freemasons had wrought havoc in the relations between the priests and the people.

1. Those who were principally engaged in writing against the Friars for the past few years, and injuring their prestige at home, were the civil functionaries and military officers, who for the most part lived at Manila and knew next to nothing about them and their doings. These men were biased by anti-religious ideas implanted in them by an irreligious education. It is easy to estimate the effect of an enormous correspondence of this kind, leaving Manila every fortnight, and passing into the hands of politicians in the mother-country, especially as there was nothing to counteract its influence on the part of the Friars, who did their work quietly and earnestly, and had very little correspondence with Spain at all.

2. The parish priests were ex-officio inspectors of the primary schools, but, having no voice in the appointment of masters and mistresses, and finding unsuitable persons thrust on them, were forced in many cases to retire from the schools in disgust, and limit their connection with them as much as possible.

3. The parish priests were also ex-officio presidents of certain municipal committees, and were supposed to help in the appointment of justices of the peace and petty governors, by sending in reports of the qualifications or otherwise of the nominees. The system worked well for a long time. But, latterly, owing to the new spirit in Manila, where the persons in office seemed leagued against the Friars, these privileged communications invariably leaked out; and if the parish priest, as in duty bound, laid bare defects and deficiencies the first to hear of it would be the person of whom they were told. This was naturally a constant source of irritation and loss of prestige. The officials seemed to take a delight in lowering the parish priest in the eyes of the better class of natives. If the parish priest ventured to advise the governors as to what was best to be done in the interests of the communes, especially with regard to the secret societies, the governors would laugh, call him a visionary—an innocent man. No wonder, then, that the parish priests gradually began to retire within themselves, and leave growing evils unchecked, when they saw all their endeavor balked by the powerful opposition of the civil and military governors. This untoward state of things left the rebels free to mature and carry out their plans.

4. Here is an instance of how badly this state of things reacted on the country. The introduction of the new Penal Code was a great blunder of the Government. It was unnecessary; the natives were all opposed to it, and the strength and extent of that opposition was well known to the Friars who lived in the midst of the people. Under normal conditions they would have advised the repeal of the Code, and their advice would have been taken. But they were forced to remain silent while the Government in its folly was putting the obnoxious Code in force. If they had warned the Government, instead of getting the respectful hearing to which they were entitled, by their long experience and their intimate knowledge of the people, they would simply have been dubbed reactionists.

5. How foolish it was of the Government to alienate the most loyal Spaniards in the whole Archipelago, the most distinctively Spanish element,—the Friars. They were almost ultra-loyal, and did their best to inspire feelings of loyalty in the breasts of the natives. They were powerful bodies with a strong bond of cohesion, having large interests in the country. They had glorious traditions to look back upon and keep them up to the ideal they had formed of their mission martyrs, a history to remember with pride; and all around them a Christian people, the fruit of their apostolic toil and that of their predecessors. The officials, on the other hand, were mere birds of passage, who took no real interest in the country. It was a case of every one for himself; every official keeping his eye on Spain with a view to an early return, while he went through his appointed work. It is remarkable too that in the Philippines there is no class of old rich Spanish families such as are to be found in other colonies; the families are all of yesterday—the riches in the hands of Chinese merchants, and the foreign trade in the hands of the English and Germans.

6. It used to be said that the Friars wished to have a hand in everything. The three important departments of justice, finance, and military affairs were outside their province altogether, and these as purely secular matters they never touched. The complaint arose from their being ever ready to preach against sedition and disloyalty, and to use their moral influence publicly and privately for that purpose. But the Friars for the sake of the people did take part in other than purely spiritual concerns, and the activity of mind it engendered was personally a great help and relief to them. The general rule is that young priests, coming over for the first time, suffer a great deal from that ennui to which all classes of Europeans are subject to in the Archipelago. Gradually the sense of the sublime duties to which they have vowed themselves, and the example of the older brethren work a wonderful change in them for the better. They then begin to throw themselves with ardor into their work, and identifying themselves with the people among whom their ministrations lie, take a great interest even in their temporal affairs, and are glad to help them over their difficulties, especially those arising between them and the governors. Any friction between the governors and the Friars has generally arisen from the latter being prompt to defend the rights of the natives.

7. It is untrue to say that the Friars did not wish to spread the Spanish language. What they were opposed to was the folly of trying to teach the Christian doctrine and some other elementary knowledge in a language not understood by the people. In this matter they gave their candid opinion to the Government that it was impossible to teach Spanish in out-of-the-way rural schools. But in towns they taught in Spanish, and taught the Spanish language and literature. They used to induce parents to send their children to Manila for the purpose of learning Spanish.

8. Regarding their opposition to the rebellion from the pulpit, in private conversation, and by means of the press, they fought the secret societies, its principal cause, and the propagation of evil and irreligious literature. They pointed out these evils on several occasions since 1887 to the governors, and were told in reply that these societies were of no importance, that they had nothing to do with the rebellion, and, in fact, that the preparations of the rebels were of no serious consequence. General Weyler was the only governor who gave them a hearing. With that solitary exception the official element remained incredulous. The secret society of the “Katipunan,” the compact of blood, and the enrolment of levies, were all discovered by the Prior of Guadalupe, who sent a report of it to General Blanco three months before the rising took place. Padre Mariane Gol exposed the intentions of the lodges a long time before Aug. 19, 1898, and also gave notice of concealed deposits of arms, and a detailed account of what took place at Manila on the arrival of the Japanese ship Konga.