[La Concepción (Hist. de Philipinas, vi, pp. 89-113) blames the Jesuits for the loss of Formosa--alleging, as grounds for this, their desire to monopolize the missions to China, to which Formosa was a stepping-stone for other orders; and their resentment against the friars (especially the Dominican Morales) for accusing them at Rome of undue laxity and conformity to heathen observances (in the noted controversy over the "Chinese rites"). To this end, he thinks, they exerted their influence with Corcuera, inducing him to neglect Formosa and to send his troops to Mindanao, where the missions were in charge of the Jesuits.] LETTER FROM FELIPE IV TO CORCUERA The King. To Don Sebastian Hurtado de Corcuera, knight of the Order of Alcantara, my governor and captain-general of the Filipinas Islands: In my royal Council of the Indias, and in the military conference for those regions, some letters have been considered which you wrote to me about various matters of government, war, and revenue; and reply is here made to the points therein on which a decision has been reached. By a certificate which you send it appears that there has been a saving to my royal exchequer of certain amounts of money, the proceeds of donations that have been made of two-thirds of the year[ly dues to persons in my service], for which satisfaction should be made to the creditors of pay-warrants in arrears, giving them what is due them; because my royal intention is, that what is justly due them should be paid to them in full, without giving any opportunity for such remissions [of debt as these]. You are duly notified that for the future this innovation shall not be put into practice in any way, but that every person shall be paid that which is clearly his due; and this mode of saving has been severely censured, because it is to the injury of the parties concerned. You know how much I regard and cherish all the Indian natives of my western Indias, and that the preservation of those provinces is dependent on their prosperity and kind treatment. Accordingly it has seemed fitting to me to charge you anew with this; and I command that you, attentive to the decrees which declare in their favor, be very heedful of the kind treatment of those natives, and not allow them to receive any wrong from the officials or from other persons. You say that you have appointed the chief notary of the government to the office of judge for the usual licenses of the Sangleys, in order that that office may by this combination not only increase in money value, but be held in greater repute; I have approved your arrangement to this end.