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The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume 32, 1640: Explorations by early navigators, descriptions of the islands and their peoples, their history and records of the Catholic missions, as related in contemporaneous books and manuscripts, showing the political, economic, commercial and religious conditions of those islands from their earliest relations with European nations to the close of the nineteenth century.Aduarte, Diego

History

The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume 32, 1640: Explorations by early navigators, descriptions of the islands and their peoples, their history and records of the Catholic missions, as related in contemporaneous books and manuscripts, showing the political, economic, commercial and religious conditions of those islands from their earliest relations with European nations to the close of the nineteenth century.

Name: The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume 32, 1640: Explorations by early navigators, descriptions of the islands and their peoples, their history and records of the Catholic missions, as related in contemporaneous books and manuscripts, showing the political, economic, commercial and religious conditions of those islands from their earliest relations with European nations to the close of the nineteenth century.
Author: Aduarte, Diego

Aduarte, Diego

Demarcation line of Alexander VI; Missions -- Philippines; Philippines -- Discovery and exploration; Philippines -- History -- Sources

He was beloved by God and
man, and most observant of the rules of the order; and, although he
suffered from disease, yet he underwent the greatest hardships for
the conversion of the Indians and for sustaining them in the faith."





CHAPTER XVIII

The voyage of the holy Fray Luis Flores to the kingdom of Japon


[Father Fray Luis Flores was for many years engaged in the ministry
to the Indians of Nueva Segovia. Though his work was rewarded with
much fruit, he felt that it was not such as he desired it to be;
and he asked and received license to return to Manila, where,
by devoting himself to prayer and the reading of holy books, his
soul might obtain strength to be more fit for his labors. While he
was living in the convent in great quietude of spirit, the news of
the imprisonment of some of our religious in Japon reached Manila;
and--like that Antonius who, in the time of Constantius the Arian
emperor, [28] left the desert and went to Alexandria to confound the
heretics--father Fray Luis determined to leave his beloved quiet and
to go to Japon. Having received permission to go on this enterprise,
he departed without having had any companion assigned to him. God
provided one in the person of father Fray Pedro de Zuñiga, [29] an
Augustinian friar who had been driven from Japon at the time of the
banishment of the religious. They embarked as secretly as they could,
June 5, 1620. They dressed themselves in secular habits, and disguised
themselves as completely as possible. They met with storms and contrary
winds, and were obliged to land at Macan to renew their stores. They
reëmbarked July 2, and on St. Magdalen's day anchored off the island
of Hermosa to get wood and water. They were still within sight of
the island when they were captured by a ship of Dutch pirates. The
Japanese, when they saw that these were Dutch, were at ease because
of the peace between the Dutch and the Japanese; but the fathers and
the two Spanish passengers aboard were in great fear, because of the
mortal enmity between the Dutch and the Spanish. The Japanese tried to
hide them in the cargo, which was almost entirely composed of the hides
of deer, many of which are bought by the Japanese in the Philippinas
to be made into breeches. The moisture caused the stench from the
skins to be horrible, and the fathers suffered much from it during
the day and night while they were there. The Dutch caught them and,
suspecting them of being religious, offered them meat to eat on Friday,
and tried them with theological arguments. They also made prize of the
ship and cargo, for carrying Spanish friars. There were seven other
vessels, Dutch and English, with whom they divided their captives and
their booty. The fathers were threatened with death, and the letters
accrediting them to the religious orders in Japon were found. Although
these were in cipher, they increased the suspicion against them. On
the fourth of August they landed in the port of Firando in Japon,

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