lous
and heterogeneous because they cannot all be constructed in one and
the same syntax, does he go beyond the credence that can be given to
his ingenious hyperboles. The experience that the said Father Murillo
could have is of the Indians who go about in Manila and its environs,
who are interpreters, servants in accounting-rooms and secretarial
offices, who are accustomed to deal with Spaniards of all kinds, with
creoles, mestizos, Sangleys, and other kinds of people who assemble
there for trade. They have learned fraud and deceit, as well as the
bad morals and propensities of all and every one of them. As is seen,
one cannot judge of a whole nation--and much less of all the nations
of the islands, who are diverse and distinct in genius and customs
by the cases of these Indians who speak Spanish. And taking into
account so great diversity, I affirm that it is impossible to find
a definition that admits and includes all of them. For these persons
whom I have mentioned, reared among so many classes, and among people
so heterogeneous, and who are imbued with customs so diverse, cannot
form rules by which to explain their own nation, much less by which
to define the other nations.

Now if the statements of authors in regard to physical or moral matters
are so at variance that we can say that each author has a different
opinion--as says the proverb, Quot capita, tot sententiae--and if
thus far no ground and certain point has been found at which the
understanding may stop, how is it strange that they do not find,
in order to describe Indians with customs so unusual and artificial
as have those of Manila, a compound idea made up of all that they
have learned from the Spaniard, both good and evil; all that they
have learned from the Guachinango; [333] and what they have learned
from the mestizo, the Sangley, the Moro, the Malabar, the Cafre, and
all the other people with whom they have intercourse and with whom
they trade? Granting this to be true, it appears that the definition
of Father Murillo fits these Spanish-speaking Indians, but not the
others, who have not had any intercourse with diverse classes of
people. On this account it seems to me that father Fray Gaspar hit
the definition exactly, when he said in his letter that the Asiatic
Indians of Filipinas are almost the same as all the people of the
nations of Eastern India, in what concerns their genius, disposition,
and inclination; and are not distinguished one from