it, I wish to warn your Lordship that concern for these things, and
the arrangement of them, and deciding who is to be here and who is to
be there, is my business--not only because it belongs to my office,
but because his Majesty particularly committed and entrusted it to
me, recommending me to do it in communication with your Lordship;
but the execution of it he leaves to me, as by right is proper. I say
this because I have heard that by virtue of some decree or other they
are persuading your Lordship that religious can establish themselves
without my consent in villages where they have never been. In this
they are misleading your Lordship, and they themselves are mistaken;
for that decree on the other side--which notifies the viceroy of
Nueva Espana, which has never been used in this land, and which no
governor has ever dared to use--is previous to the Council of Trent,
after which it has no force, because in it the contrary [i.e., to the
Council's decision] is decreed. So I beg of your Lordship, as I am
in quiet and peaceful possession, that no house whatsoever be taken
in my bishopric for religious without first seeking and obtaining my
permission. It was some days ago that I found this out; but because
your Lordship told me that you did not believe what they said to you,
I did not pay any attention to it until I learned, yesterday, that
the provincial of San Augustin says that, by decrees which they have
from the king, they can occupy houses without my permission. This I
believe your Lordship will not do; and I can not understand how they
can do it with any conscience With this understanding, let us come
to what you say.

The new settlement of La Ermita and that of Malate can very well
be under one religious administration, and it shall be that of the
priest whom I have placed there. The same seems to me to be true of
Cavite and Paranaque, of which the priest whom I have there shall have
charge. In this way the fathers of San Augustin can take away three
or four religious who are now in those two places, and put them in
other localities where they have great need of these men to fulfil
their responsibility. I say this on the one hand, on account of the
great satisfaction which I have in these two ministers; and on the
other hand, because they are already incumbents of those two districts,
and as such are, in equity, under obligations. Accordingly, I will not
and cannot give them to one who may tell me that he