and, above all, the endless things that may be said about the people and their life, health, peace, and plenty; and how, with and by all this, there is offered to his Majesty the greatest occasion and the grandest beginning that ever in the world was offered to a monarch.  Here lies before him all that the human mind can desire or comprehend of riches and eternal fame, and likewise all that a Christian heart, desirous of the honor of God and his faith, can wish for, in the salvation and restoration of myriad souls, created for Him, and redeemed by His blood, and now deluded and possessed by the devil, and by his blindness and wickedness.

Second:  If we, who are here, and see and hear these things, should neglect for any consideration whatsoever—­either to escape the labor, anxiety, danger, and cost, or for any other reason—­to advise his Majesty of this and to persuade him to undertake so grand a work, we would fulfil neither our duty to heaven, which we owe to God and to the souls of our kinsmen; nor the faith and loyalty, which in such a juncture we owe to our king, our religion, and our fatherland.  Surely, we should all be known as vile-spirited cowards, and men of little valor, since, standing on the threshold that bounds so much good, we are content with the little we now possess; and by dint of idling and amusing ourselves with the little that we have here, we fail to look or reach for an object so important for the world, for God, for our king, for ourselves, and above all for the people of this country.

Third:  Let his Majesty come to a decision in this matter, for we who dwell here know that either this matter must be left, and entirely given over, and lost forever, or it must be taken up now, because the chance is slipping by, never to return.  Thus, a few years ago, it might have been accomplished with no labor, cost, or loss of life; today it cannot be done without some loss, and in a short time it will be impossible to do it at any cost.  For the Chinese are each day becoming more wary, and more on their guard.  They are even laying in munitions of war, fortifying themselves, and training men—­all which they have learned, and are still learning, from the Portuguese and our people.  Seeing the Portuguese in that country, and us here, they are fearful, and especially so from the accounts the Portuguese give them of us, telling how we go about subjecting foreign lands, overthrowing native kings and setting up our own, and that this has so far been our sole object in coming, and other things that the father has heard from the mouths of the mandarins themselves, and which he will recount.  Besides, there is the passage of the fragatas, which they have seen on their way from here to Macan, having met nearly all of them in their ports or with their fleets; and, most of all, the course of affairs in these islands, which, if it were presently made known, would be understood in such wise as to destroy all hope of success.