The town of Cochin being willing to found a college for the Society, he went thither to receive the offer; but he spoiled a good business by ill management. The captain of the fortress immediately gave him a church, called the Mother of God, against the will of the vicar of Cochin, and in despite of a certain brotherhood to which that church belonged. The donation being disputed in law, Gomez, who had it still about him to make a false step, that is, having much opiniatrete, great credit, good intentions, took upon him to stand the suit, and to get the church upon any terms. This violent procedure exasperated the people, who had been hitherto much edified by the charily of the Fathers; and the public indignation went so high, that they wrote letters of complaint concerning it to the King of Portugal and Father Ignatius.
This was the present face of things when Xavier returned from Japan; and it was partly upon this occasion that the letters which he received at Amanguchi so earnestly pressed his coming back. His first endeavours were to repair the faults committed by the rector; and he began with the business of Cochin: for, in his passage by it, at his return, knowing the violence of Gomez, he assembled in the choir of the cathedral the magistrate of the town, with all the fraternity of the mother of God, and, in the presence of the vicar, falling on his knees before them, he desired their pardon for what had passed, presented to them the keys of the church, which was the cause of the dispute, and yielded it entirely to them. But submission sometimes gains that, which haughty carriage goes without: The fraternity restored the keys into the hands of Xavier, and, of their own free motion, made an authentic deed of gift of their church to the college of the Society. As for what relates to Goa, the saint dismissed those Portuguese whom Gomez had received into the Society; and, having gathered up as many as he could find of those young Indians, who had either been expelled, or were gone out of the college of their own accord, he re-established the seminary, whose dissolution was so prejudicial to the Christianity of the Indies.