The manner in which the ecclesiastical was connected with the civil power tended to restrict the authority of the governorsgeneral by creating a jealous coordinating authority eager to maintain its rights and privileges and willing to absorb those of the civil authorities. The audiencia had the legal right to share the executive and legislative power with the governor-general, and at times, when the chief executive was not a strong man it was the master. Le Gentil regarded it as the only safeguard against the arbitrary disposition of the governors. But Zuñiga, writing a generation later, pronounced it ineffective. "The royal audiencia," says he, "was established to restrain the disposition of the governors which it has never prevented; for the gentlemen of the gown are always weak-kneed, and the governor can send them under guard to Spain, pack them off to the provinces to take a census of the natives, or imprison them, which has been done several times."2 Until after the murder of Bustemente, the audiencia was authorized to assume control of the government upon the death of the governor-general. Thereafter until after the British occupation, the archbishop succeeded the governor-general during an ad interim vacancy. But the weakness displayed by Archbishop Rojo led the king to doubt the qualifications of archbishops for the position of governorgeneral, and the office of lieutenant-governor was created. Subsequently it was so arranged that in the absence of the governor and captain-general, the commander of the army, and in his absence, the admiral of the navy should assume the duties of chief executive. During his term of office a governor-general could not be criticized with impunity. He was given free rein as far as the public and individuals were concerned. But there was for him a very serious hereafter.

The position was never a bed of roses. The vexatious controversies with the ecclesiastics, the disposition of the officials to abuse their powers and misappropriate funds, the remoteness from Spain, and the general inconveniences and hardships of the life rendered it attractive only to the few who were filled

2 Estadismo, I, p. 244, quoted, B. & R., I, p. 50, note.

3

with high enthusiasm for the extension of the power of the king and the realm of the true faith, and to the many who desired to amass fortunes regardless of methods. One of the early officials paints the portrait of the ideal governor, such as he did not find in the islands, in terms which are not yet without interest. "The Governor must," he wrote, "understand war, but he must not be over-confident of his abilities. Let him give ear to the advice of those who know the country where things are managed very differently from what they are in Europe. Those who have tried to carry on war in the islands as it is carried on in Flanders and elsewhere in Europe have fallen into irreparable mistakes. The main thing, however, is to aim at the welfare of the people, to treat them kindly, to be friendly towards foreigners, to take pains to have the ships for New Spain sail promptly and in good order, to promote trade with the neighboring people, and to encourage ship-building. In a word, to live with the Indians rather like a father than like a governor.

The Spaniards devised an institution known as the residencia, under which the governors and other officials were required to remain in the country of their service for a certain length of time after ceasing to hold office, during which time an investigation was made into their conduct during their entire term of

3 See B. & R., I, p. 53.

In an interesting volume entitled Many Memories, Col. Rivett-Carnac says that for an ideal governor-general of India, "a very clever man is not what is wanted. Such a one will probably be full of fads and will rub every one the wrong way. If you employ a clever man, the effect will be somewhat the same, as I have seen it described, of using a sharp pen-knife in cutting the leaves of your book. The very sharp blade will run off the line and commence to cut out curves on its own account, irrespective of direction. What is wanted for the purpose is in the nature of a good, solid, sound paper knife which, working steadily through the folds of the pages, will do its work honestly and neatly."

The Norman Baron's advice to his son as to the way to govern his Saxons, done into English by Kipling, may well be remembered―

"Appear with your wife and the children

At their weddings and funerals and feasts;
Be polite, but not friendly to bishops;

Be good to all poor parish priests;

Say 'we', 'us' and 'our' when you're talking,
Instead of 'you fellows', and 'I'.

Don't ride over seeds; keep your temper,
And never you tell 'em a lie."

4

office. Any one from his successor to the poorest native was then at liberty to file charges against him. And a plentiful crop of charges was certain.

In the Philippines the residencia for the governor-general lasted for six months, and was conducted by his successor in office. Such an institution must have constituted a very effective restraint, but it was capable of infinite abuse. When, as sometimes happened, the governor's successor was his personal enemy, the temptation to blacken the preceding administration generally proved irresistible. In some instances, the governors were subjected to very severe penalties for misconduct during their terms of office. Governor Corcuera was brought to trial and compelled to pay a heavy fine, and after having been imprisoned for five years, was released by royal order and returned to Spain. The investigation into the affairs of Governor Gargas was so extensive that the preparation of the report required four years. A statement of charges, some grave and others frivolous, filled twenty volumes. Acting-Governor José Talba was charged with embezzlement of great sums of money. After an elaborate investigation he was sentenced to pay a fine of approximately $1,000,000 and the cost of the trial, to deprivation of public office and banishment from the Philippines and Madrid. Other governors were charged with embezzlement of public funds and various other forms of official malfeasance, and unless these officials were victims of false charges or malicious persecution, as many of them possibly were, the institution of the residencia seems to have justified its existence. Verily, the consciousness that an inquiry into his conduct would be conducted by his successor, who might be a personal enemy, may well have been a terrible trial, the strain of which, as one writer says, "would sometimes break their hearts." Many a governor quarreling with the Church and facing the ordeal of the residencia must have felt with the Knight of La Manche that it were better "to

• See Morga's Sucesos, B. & R., XVI, p. 166.

It would be interesting to see the residencia applied to the adminstrations of certain modern governors-general.

be Sancho Panza and go to heaven than be governor and go to hell."

De Pons, after describing the residencia, says, "I request the reader not to infer from my opinion of the tribunals of residencia, my confidence in their efficacy. My homage is immediately and solely addressed to the wisdom of the law. I resign all criticism on its operation to those who know the seductive influence of Plutus over the feeble and pliant Themis.

As the propulsive power back of the colonizing movement came from the ecclesiastical authorities, it was but natural that the influence of the Church in the colonies should be great and often controlling. The early Spanish kings recognized the right of the Pope to dispose of territory not already occupied by Christians. As the expenses connected with the discovery of the Indians were borne by the king, the Pope by a Bull of September 3, 1501, granted to him the right to collect tithes, on condition that he would endow and maintain the churches to be established in the colonies. These churches and the clergy were thereafter supported by appropriations made by the king, who possessed, in virtue of this arrangement, certain powers ordinarily exercised by church officials.

The ecclesiastical system in the Philippines was well organized." "Here," says Bourne, "we find the real vital organization of the Philippines governing system." The archbishop of Manila was the head of the organization and under him as suffragans were the bishops of Cebu, Segovia and Caceras. The Dominican, Augustinian, Franciscan and Jesuit orders were under the direct and independent control of their own provincials. Each maintained a representative in Madrid, through whom it could always reached the ear of the king without the intervention of the civil authorities at Manila.

The persistent claim of the members of the monastic orders to exemption from the supervision and control of the bishops

Voyage to the Eastern Parts of Terra Firma, etc., II, p. 25 (1806); B. & R., I, p. 52, note.

For an account of the ecclesiastical machinery, see the translation from Buzeta y Bravo, Diccionario de los Filipinas (Madrid, 1850), in B. & R., XXVIII, p. 266, et seq.

led to many violent controversies in which the civil authorities also were generally involved. The friars, or regulars, always greatly outnumbered the secular clergy, but the statistics convey a very inadequate idea of their relative power and importance.

8

The vows of the friars required them to live in monasteries, but the Pope was induced to absolve them from this particular obligation and permit them to act as curates in the parishes, in the same manner as the secular clergy. This arrangement, which was intended to be but temporary, became permanent and laid the foundation for the practical control of the country by the representatives of the monastic orders. The question whether the friars who were in charge of the parishes were subject to visitation by the bishop was never actually settled. When the pressure became too strong, a threat to withdraw from the islands was always sufficient to win the victory, as the king fully realized the necessity for the services of the friars in the work of governing, civilizing and Christianizing the country.

When Archbishop Poblete attempted to enforce the Bull of Pope Urban VIII and subject them to the orders of the bishops, all the friars resigned their positions. Archbishop Camancho was foiled in the same way. Between 1744 and 1753 the Pope issued four bulls in which the friars who acted as curates were placed under the authority of the bishops and Ferdinand VI strictly enjoined the observance of these bulls. But with the usual threat of resignation the friars were able to defy the orders

8 In 1750 of 569 parishes with 904,116 souls, but 148 with 147,269 persons were under secular priests. The rest were distributed among the various orders as follows:

In 1898, according to the Church records in Manila, there were 746 regular parishes, 116 mission parishes, 346 Augustinian friars, 107 Franciscans, 233 Dominicans, 327 Recolletos, 42 Jesuits, 16 Capuchins, and 6 Benedictans. On January 4, 1904, there were 246 friars in the islands. Practically all soon thereafter left, but many have returned.

See Dr. Pardo de Tavera's "The Power of the Monastic Orders," in Census of Philippine Islands (1905), I, p. 340, et seq.