The rule of the Governors-General of the Islands was, upon the whole, benignant with respect to the natives who manifested submission. Apart from the unconcealed animosity of the monastic party, the Gov.-General's liberty of action was always very much locally restrained by the Supreme Court and by individual officials. The standing rule was, that in the event of the death or deprivation of office of the Gov.-General, the Civil Government was to be assumed by the Supreme Court, and the military administration by the senior magistrate. Latterly, in the absence of a Gov.-General, from any cause whatsoever, the sub-inspector of the forces became Acting-Gov.-General. Up to the beginning of the last century the authority of the King's absolute will was always jealously imposed, and the Governors-General were frequently rebuked for having exercised independent action, taking the initiative in what they deemed the best policy. But Royal Decrees could not enforce honesty; the peculations and frauds on the part of the secular authorities, and increasing quarrels and jealousies amongst the several religious bodies, seemed to annihilate all prospect of social and material progress of the Colony. As early as the reign of Philip III. (1598-1621) the procurators of Manila had, during three years, been unsuccessfully soliciting from the mother country financial help for the Philippines to meet official discrepancies. The affairs of the Colony were eventually submitted to a special Royal Commission in Spain, the result being that the King was advised to abandon this possession, which was not only unproductive, but had become a costly centre of disputes and bad feeling. However, Fray Hernando de Moraga, a missionary from the Philippines, happened to be in the Peninsula at the time, and successfully implored the King to withhold his ratification of the recommendation of the Commission. His Majesty avowed that even though the maintenance of this Colony should exhaust his Mexican Treasury, his conscience would not allow him to consent to the perdition of souls which had been saved, nor to relinquish the hope of rescuing yet far more in these distant regions. During the first two centuries following the foundation of the Colony, it was the custom for a Royal Commission to be appointed to inquire into the official acts of the outgoing Governor before he could leave the Islands--_Hacerle la residencia_, as it was called.