The election as provincial of father Fray Juan de Sancto Thomas,
and the death of father Fray Damian Valaguer.
[On the second of June, 1600, the electors assembled in the
convent of Manila to elect a successor to father Fray Bernardo de
Sancta Cathalina. The example of father Fray Bernardo was so grand
that it was difficult for his successor to reach the same pitch of
excellence. Although all felt that father Fray Juan de Sancto Thomas,
or Ormaca, was fitted for the position by character and abilities,
there was some doubt whether his ill-health would permit him to fill
the office as it ought to be filled. He was constantly under the
necessity of receiving dispensations from the severity of the rules;
and though this did no harm in a private friar, it was most unfortunate
in a superior. It was also feared that he would be physically unable
to perform the duties of the situation. One of the best physicians
of the city was called in, without the knowledge of father Fray Juan,
to express his opinion as to the ability of father Fray Juan to fulfil
the duties of the office. His judgment was favorable, and father Fray
Juan was elected. The election was a most fortunate one, for father
Fray Juan was able, learned, and holy; and his nature was so gentle
that the vicar-general, Fray Juan de Castro, who had a gift from heaven
of special insight into character, chose him as his usual associate,
and appointed him to the first position as superior in a mission to
Indians. He filled the office well, and not only lived out the four
years of his provincialship, but has seen ten other elections of
provincials since his own; and he is still alive while this is being
written, in the year 1637. Since he is still living, let us content
ourselves with what has been said--leaving the rest till the time
when, after the end of his life, it may be discussed with greater
freedom. During his term, the Lord opened the gates for the entrance
of the order to Japan, as will be narrated later; this was a great
reward for the hardships suffered by the religious of this province,
and by him in particular, from the perils and miseries of travel by
land and by sea. Many new convents were admitted at this chapter,
both in Pangasinan and Nueva Segovia; for the duties of the ministry
in these regions were constantly increasing, and the religious kept
constantly reaching out to new places. Many excellent ordinances were
passed for the exercise of the ministry to the Indians, and also for
the better maintenance of the rules affecting us--especially in the
matter of showing ourselves disinterested, and careful not to annoy
the Indians.
In the province of Nueva Segovia the religious labored hard in the
search throughout mountains and valleys, and other secret places,
for the huts where the devil had been adored, to which those people
used to make pilgrimages in search of health or other favors,
giving offerings of bits of gold, or of stones regarded by them as
precious. The natives dared not take anything from those places, or
cut a reed or a tree from the natural growth of the earth in them,
for fear of death, with which the devil had threatened them. In the
villages on the coast many such little huts were found, with many
little figures and idols in them. The religious burnt and broke the
boxes with the offerings; took the gold and the stones, and all the
other offerings; and burnt and ground to dust everything, and cast it
into the sea, that it might not remain to be a stumbling-block to the
Indians. When the heathen saw that the threats of the devil were not
being carried out, their eyes were opened and they were very eager
to be baptized. Great aid was received from an epidemic of smallpox
which attacked a whole region. In this way the Lord took to himself
many souls, especially of children; for there were many newly baptized
in the province of Pangasinan and in that of Nueva Segovia.] Many of
those who seemed to be near their end recovered after they received
the water of baptism. All, therefore, came to be baptized, and the
Lord, by means of those who recovered, gave authority to the baptism;
while of the vast number who died baptized He peopled heaven with
new angels. This brought great comfort to the missionaries, who,
although worn out and greatly fatigued by going from house to house
baptizing and confessing, and giving the sacraments to sick persons,
saw their labors successful and rewarded by the sending to heaven of
so many souls, and also by the strengthening of their hope that they
should go to accompany those souls in glory; for it is not possible
that these should not be grateful, and pray and strive to obtain
salvation for those who labored, with such zeal, to give it to them
by the means of baptism, without which it cannot be obtained.
[Soon after the provincial chapter, one of the definitors, father
Fray Damian Balaguer, died. He had lived but a short time in the
province, but had gained great reputation in it; and his early death
was much mourned. He was a native of the kingdom of Valencia, and had
two brothers in the same order--one, the present Fray Pedro Martyr de
Balaguer; and the other master Fray Andres Balaguer, at one time bishop
of Albarracin and afterward of Origuela. Father Fray Damian took the
habit in the convent of the Preachers in Valencia, which has been happy
in giving saints to the church. During all his novitiate, the master of
the novices never had occasion to discipline him, even for the merest
trifle--although by the advice of another father he assigned him some
discipline, without any fault on the part of Fray Damian, but not
without a cause; for it is necessary for the novices to be initiated
in these punishments of the order, that they may not afterward be new
and strange to them. He was constant in prayer and fasting, given to
speaking of the things of God, and to mortification. For many years he
was accustomed to repeat the whole of the Psalter of David daily, in
imitation of St. Vincent of Ferrara. He studied at Origuela, becoming a
lecturer in arts in the same college, and afterward in theology--having
a singular grace given him to declare with clearness the gravest and
most profound difficulties of this holy science. He was an excellent
and a moving preacher, having the power to change the hearts of many
of his hearers, who selected him as their spiritual guide. Whenever
he left the convent, which he did only on important occasions, he
was followed by a troop of his disciples, who gathered not only to
honor him, but to profit by what they heard him say. He showed all
his life the greatest humility, and from day to day did not change,
except by the augmentation and advance of his virtue. Being eager for
the conversion of souls, he went to Mexico with master Fray Alonso
Bayllo, who was going out to Mexico with authority to divide the
province of Vaxac from that of Santiago. [28] For the space of two
years he directed the schools in the city of Vaxac; but, as that was
not the end which he had intended, he was dissatisfied. When he heard
that many ministers of the holy gospel were needed in the Philippinas,
he took advantage of the arrival in Mexico of father Fray Francisco
de Morales to ask that he would take him to the islands with the
rest of the company whom he was bringing over. Arriving in 1598,
he was assigned to Nueva Segovia, where in a short time he learned
enough of the language to be able to hear confessions. Father Fray
Damian was first vicar and superior of the mission of Abulug. As such,
he was a definitor in the provincial chapter, and returned to Nueva
Segovia as vicar of the village of Pata. He died greatly mourned.
At this time there died in the same province of Nueva Segovia brother
Fray Domingo de San Blas, a lay religious of much virtue and known
sanctity, a son of the convent of San Pablo at Sevilla, who came to
these islands in the year 1594. He was of much use to the Indians,
of whose language he learned enough to be understood by them and to
teach them to pray, to attract the Christians to the church, and to
teach the heathen the knowledge of the doctrine of Christianity. He
was fervent in prayer, being often moved to sighs and tears during
his devotions. He strove to hide them from his companion, father Fray
Ambrosio de la Madre de Dios, but was unable to do so. Father Fray
Ambrosio said to him that, as they two lived alone and like brothers,
there was no reason why one should try to conceal anything from the
other. With this permission from his superior he broke out in sobs,
and his heart melted away in tears, directed mainly to the conversion
of these heathen and to the perfecting in Christianity of the already
baptized. Two extraordinary things happened in this village of Pata
while this brother lived there: One was the receiving of a fish on the
day of St. Dominic, under such circumstances that there could be no
doubt that the Lord had sent it to enable them properly to celebrate
the feast of the holy founder of this order. The second event was
the marvelous recovery or restoration to life, at the intercession of
St. Dominic, of an Indian who had been given over for dead. It was the
very man who had given them the fish. Father Fray Domingo died from
exposure to the sun. He was sent back to the convent of Manila for
care, and there grew worse; and, after having very devoutly received
the holy sacraments, exchanged this wretched life for the eternal one.]