ove all, peacefulness had left those
shores, a loss which made it impossible to give signs of life and
social and religious increase. One hundred and ten years have elapsed
since the discalced Augustinians first entered Bohol. They did not go
there as conquistadors; they did not go to preach the name of Christ
to heathenism and idolatry; they did not go to make new vassals for
the king of Espana of a people who had not sworn their obedience. The
mission of the Recollect fathers to the island of Bohol was to continue
the tasks of the Jesuit fathers; to preach the divinity of our Lord
Jesus Christ, just as the Jesuits did; and to present themselves to
the observation of those natives in their apostolic and religious
bearing, as worthy imitators of so zealous priests. They also had
the thorny task of inculcating habits of gratitude and obedience in
discontented minds; and of reducing a considerable number of rebels
to the payment of the royal tribute, who had already begun a struggle,
with some pretensions to triumph. The hope of religion and society in
the discalced Augustinians, in the difficult circumstances through
which the island of Bohol was passing when they took charge of its
administration, was that peace would be extended to the remotest
corners of its territory, so that the religious beginnings would have
an efficacious influence on the misguided multitude, and Spanish
authority would completely dominate men and things which had been
separated from its beneficent influence. Facts are demonstrating with
the greatest clearness that the Recollects attained abundantly the
end of all their aspirations. At present we are experiencing that the
reality exceeds the hopes that could animate them when they entered
on their task. The universal harmony that this province enjoys in
the present century, and the state of prosperity in which all the
natives live, as well as the growth of population, and the increase
of culture, religious fervor, and instruction that they enjoy--all
this speaks very loudly in favor of the preaching of the Recollects
in Bohol. These considerations also demonstrate with the greatest
clearness that, even if the Recollects were not its conquistadors,
they are without dispute the instruments employed by Providence for
its political and religious advancement; and that they are with all
propriety the pacifiers and restorers of the beginnings of Christian
society in that island, which was in confusion un