“Religion in Japan within this thirty-eight years past, when St. Francis Xaverius sowed, the first seeds in that uncultivated soil, has now grown so fair and flourishing that one might well compare it to an orange tree loaded on all sides with fruits and blossoms. It was a field cultivated by the workmen of the vineyard, and watered with kindly showers from heaven, which gave fair hope of a rich and plentiful harvest. It was a ship under full sail drove by the wind of the Holy Ghost, discovering daily new places and countries. “In the year 1587 they reckoned above 200,000 Christians in Japan, among whom were several persons of distinguished merit--kings, princes, generals of armies, principal lords of the court, and, in a word, the flower of the Japonian nobility. Moreover, what by Cambacundono’s [Taikosama’s] esteem of our religion, and kindness to the missioners that preached it, and what by his contempt of the bonzes, whom he persecuted with fire and sword, burning their temples and pulling down their idols wherever he came--what, also, by vesting the Christian lords in the most considerable places of the government, and indulging liberty to all his court to receive baptism, over and above, by erecting so many churches to the true God, and so particularly countenancing the fathers of the Society--the number of them daily increased. For, not content with sending frequently for the fathers to his palace, he went one day himself to visit the Provincial on board of his ship, and discoursed him after a familiar way for several hours together. Not that he had any thoughts of religion, for he was so proud that he pretended equality with Divinity itself, but by this had a mind to gain a reputation among the princes of Europe. “Nevertheless, these fair appearances put several of the principal lords in a humor of being instructed, and the number of the proselytes was so great that the fathers could rest neither day nor night. They were taken up continually with preaching, baptizing, and instructing such as earnestly desired this sacrament, among whom was Cambacundono’s own nephew, a prince about nineteen years of age, presumptive heir to the crown.