On account of merely the expectation of a great harvest in the Indias many popes conferred on the regulars the authority to be parish priests, with complete independence from the ordinaries, rendering null and void whatever the latter might do in opposition to this privilege. No one has said that by this the supreme pontiffs placed the ordinaries in danger of rendering their accounts to God unsatisfactorily, or hindered them from feeding and edifying their flocks; and the result itself has given testimony, with the great success of the propagation of the gospel, how successful has been that method of having the regulars as curas, seeing that the hope of a harvest has now grown to be its actual possession, and realms so extensive have been conquered. And therefore the reverend archbishop of Manila might have had confidence in commands so sovereign--especially in that of Pius V, whose brief is now in full force in Filipinas, as on the first day when it was issued; and even the motive therefor, since there is so great a deficiency of secular priests that, if the regulars should be lacking, the faith would perish in islands so widespread, and the people would be as much heathens and idolaters as before. Answer is made, second: that the generals, the provincials, and the main body of the provinces say the same in regard to the religious who have professed their rule, that the latter are sheep also of the flocks that God has placed in their charge, so long as the government remains in their hands; and whatever care and attention the reverend archbishop of Manila may give to his sheep the Indians, the regular prelates will give to their subordinates in regard to the same account which they will have to render for these to God. But with a very important difference: for the Indians who are not converted are under the most serious obligations to join the assembly of those who are already converted, and for this object can be forced to hear the divine word; and those who have heard and believed it [can be obliged] not to forsake what they believed, or depart from the bosom of the Church, for it is not possible to be saved in any other manner. And when for the attainment of two objects so great as these there are no secular priests, and there are only religious, who have attained those ends and are still doing so while they are exempt curas, it would seem to be also the greatest obligation of the ordinary to reconcile himself with such curas, in order not to deprive the Church or defraud the blood of Christ of so much fruit.