Reflecting people, who read of the immense multitudes converted to Christianity under his eloquent preaching, not only at Goa, but in other parts of India, will naturally wonder how all this could have occurred when the natives did not understand his language, nor he theirs! But the Jesuits have no difficulty on that score--nor, indeed, on any other--when the simple invention of a miracle will serve their purpose. Xavier became as famous as Loyola in this respect. Butler represents him as having "baptized ten thousand Indians with his own hand in one month," and "sometimes a whole village" in a single day; and as "having preached to five or six thousand persons together," but without stating in what language he preached. Seeming, however, to anticipate that there might be some to inquire how much of real Christianity there was in these professed conversions, and how he could have preached with so much effect to those whose language he could not speak and who could not understand his, he endeavors to remove the difficulty--evidently following the Jesuit story--by declaring that, while in India, "_God first communicated to him the gift of tongues_," so that "_he spoke very well the language of those barbarians without having learned it, and had no need of an interpreter when he instructed them_!"[84] It is impossible now to decide how this statement originated. Xavier reported only to Loyola--not to the pope or the Church--and whatsoever was circulated in Europe to aid the cause of the Jesuits, and to gain them popularity on account of the success of their missions, was derived from him. But whether it originated with Xavier or Loyola, or was invented after the death of both, neither the repetition of it now, nor its recent appearance in an authoritative ecclesiastical volume, published and extensively circulated in the United States, can relieve it from the suspicion of a fabulous origin.