In regard to usurers, there may be some among them who are addicted to trade, since the business carried on in the provinces consists chiefly in advancing money at seed-time, in order to receive the fruits at harvest time at a much lower price than is current in the market. Surely the cura who embarks in these speculations not only fails in his most sacred duty, [103] but even gnaws at and gives a deathblow to the principal base upon which rests the prestige and veneration enjoyed by the religious of Filipinas. Nothing infuses these weak and greedy islanders with so much love, surprise, and respect as does contempt for gold and for earthly goods. The generous minister, he who gives, will be considered as good, most good, and will obtain whatever he wants from his parishioners. The greedy and avaricious, he who does what common and vile men do, will, notwithstanding the habit in which he is clad, notwithstanding the sermons he preaches, be considered as mean, if he does not end by being despised and abhorred. Nevertheless, I can affirm that the religious who trade are very few, and among the Dominicans, not any. And this, and their anxiety for saving their stipends and for making money, proceeds in great measure from the information which they receive concerning the wretched condition of the religious in Espana, and their fear of falling into the same condition. In respect to their pride and ambition to govern, all men have that, for this is our most powerful instinct; and the priests of all times and countries have had it. The royal decrees and the articles of which we have spoken demonstrate quite clearly that those of Filipinas have not escaped from falling into this sin. Up to a certain point, one can affirm that the civil government itself--or, to speak more accurately, circumstances--have placed them in a position where they must take part in the temporal administration. In a whole province, there is no other Spaniard in authority except the alcalde-mayor, and he never knows a word of the idiom of the country (see my remarks on the administration of justice). Hence it necessarily arises that the alcalde-mayor does not know more than the natives allow him to know; and that the gobernadorcillos of the villages are masters, inasmuch as in everything they do whatever they think proper. In order to obviate these inconveniences, scarcely is any document asked in which the government does not require the supervision of the cura; and in this way it obliges him to be acquainted with matters quite at variance with his ministry. The cura possesses the language, resides in the village, has the means of the confessional, [104] and when he wishes there are but few matters, even the most trivial, that can be hidden from him. On the contrary the alcalde, not having any of these advantages, can have knowledge of but few things, if the parish priest does not communicate them. I shall quote here what father Fray Manuel del Rio says on this point.