at
the curacies could be surrendered to these as they became vacant--thus
carrying into effect the decree of 1757, when they should be ready
for it. This same order was confirmed by another decree of December
11, 1776, and another of September 7, 1778--although in this last,
in consideration of a representation of Don Pedro Sarrio, which will
be seen later, it was provided that there should be no innovation in
what was contained in the decree of '76, without the express order of
the Council and of the king. In 1822, in consequence of a decree of
the Cortes, the curacies which fell vacant were presented at a meeting
of opponents. In regard to the first, which was that of the village of
Malate, the superior of the calced Augustinians, Fray Hilarion Diez,
made a representation; but the archbishop, Don Fray Juan Zulaybar, was
interested in complying with the decrees of the Madrid government. In
1826, order was given to return that curacy to the religious, and all
[others] that they had, and what was declared to them by the decree
of 1776; and that the secularization of any curacy should not be
proceeded with except by express order of the king.

I am going to insert what Don Tomas de Comyn said about the religious
of Filipinas in a book which has not had the appreciation that it
merits, and which is already rare.

"The valor and constancy with which Legaspi and his worthy companions
conquered these natives would have been of little use, had not
the apostolic zeal of the missionaries aided in consolidating the
undertaking. The latter were the true conquerors--who, without other
weapons than their virtues, attracted the good-will of the natives,
made them love the Spanish name, and gave the king, as by a miracle,
two millions more of submissive and Christian vassals. They were the
legislators of the barbarous hordes who inhabited the islands of this
immense archipelago, thus realizing with their persuasive mildness
the allegorical prodigies of Amphion and Orpheus.

"As the means, then, which the missionaries employed to reduce and
civilize the Indians, were their preaching and other spiritual
instruments, and as, although they were scattered and working
separately, they were at the same time subject to the authority
of their superiors--who as chiefs, directed the great work of the
conversion--the government primitively established in these provinces
must necessarily have shared much of the nature of the theocratic;
and th