The perverse spirit of discord which had in charge the incitement of that litigation in which the prince of darkness profited by a great number of scandals, discords, and tumults, was suspended and remained as if asleep for forty-four years--until it awakened, in the year 1697, because of our sins. Archbishop Doctor Don Diego Camacho y Avila, [90] a native of Badajoz and former magistral canon of that holy church, and fellow of the chief college at Cuenca in Salamanca, came to these islands [in that year]. He was a great prelate, and very vigilant in his pastoral office. He died later (the year of 1712) as bishop of Guadalajara and was well remembered for his zeal and integrity. [Here follows an account of the attempt of Archbishop Camacho to enforce the visitation of the regulars, which we omit in this place, as it will be sufficiently noticed later.]
In the beginning, the provinces of América were founded entirely in accordance with the regular institutes of communal houses and convents, with a great number of conventuals; they did not need to take these from the provinces of España, as they could choose plenty from the country. On the contrary in Filipinas we have no more than the convents of Manila, Cebú, and Guadalupe as communal convents--although only the convent of Manila preserves that character; while the others, more than seventy-four in number, are only missions where one single religious lives, and, in a very few, two ministers, according to the size of the village and the ability of the province. The latter is wont often to consist of as many priests as missions, until reënforcements of religious come from España; and if that reënforcement is very slow, then there are generally more missions than religious as priests. What I say here of our order is the same of all the others. It is not so in América, Perú, and Nueva España, where the convents are established totally independent of the missions. They have plenty of religious, and those who belong to the land itself, so that they do not have to send to España for them. Those convents have their incomes by which they are sustained, so that they do not need any of the fees of the missions; and consequently, the orders who wished to retain some missions subject to the ordinary could do so very easily, by assigning some religious to that mission who knew the language of those villages. Such religious are presented to the vice-patron, who presents them to the bishop. The latter examines them, and gives them the collation of the curacy in regular appointment. They administer that office in subjection to the priors of the convents, and to their visitation and correction in matters concerning the order; and in subjection to the bishops, who hold jurisdiction and visitation over them in regard to any transgressions in their office as curas. Those religious are maintained perpetually in their offices, and the chapters cannot change them to other convents; for they cannot leave their curacies without the intervention of the vice-patron and bishop, who are very loth to change them because of the investigations demanded by the presentation, examination, and collation. Those religious (who are very few) having been dedicated to that office of curas, the others, who consist of almost all the religious of the province who are exempt from that occupation, hold their chapters and change their priors according to the constitutions of the order.