726. Nor does it avail the opposition that Pope Clement XI determined and declared, at the petition of the said archbishop, on January 30, 1705, "that the right of visiting the regulars in what concerns the care of souls and the administration of the holy sacraments belongs to the archbishop of Manila and the other bishops of the Philipinas Islands." For besides the defects of misrepresentation and surreptitious measures [obrepcion y subrepcion] which were then made manifest, contained in that brief, the said pontifical declaration, whether it be conceived as a law, as an order, or as a sentence, cannot fail to be appealed from. This is what the orders did, appealing to his Holiness, alleging before the archbishop who put the brief into execution the motives which, according to law, they rightfully had for resisting that visitation. In order to establish the truth that the religious had many arguments in their favor, it is not necessary to adduce other proof than what results from the fact that the said archbishop, who was the person most interested, desisted from the execution of the brief. Other diocesans of the islands who, notwithstanding the above-cited brief, have tolerated and tolerate the exemption of the orders for no other reason than the actual scarcity of secular priests, have authorized that procedure. Therefore, they practically admit that the indult of St. Pius remains in force, and that the mandate of Clement XI is impossible whenever the religious abandon the curacies.