Father Xavier took compassion on this their miserable blindness, and the tears came into his eyes.  He rose on the sudden, (for they had been all sitting,) and distinctly repeated, in an audible tone, the apostles’ creed, and the ten commandments, making a pause at the end of every article, and briefly expounding it, in their own language; after which he declared to them what were heaven and hell, and by what actions the one and other were deserved.

The Brachmans, who had never heard any thing of Christianity before, and had been listening to the father with great admiration, rose up, as soon as he had done speaking, and ran to embrace him, acknowledging, that the God of the Christians was the true God, since his law was so conformable to the principles of our inward light.  Every one of them proposed divers questions to him; if the soul were immortal, or that it perished with the body, and in case that the soul died not, at what part of the body it went out; if in our sleep we dreamed we were in a far country, or conversed with an absent person, whether the soul went not out of the body for that time; of what colour God was, whether black or white; their doctors being divided on that point, the white men maintaining he was of their colour, the black of theirs:  the greatest part of the pagods for that reason being black.

The father answered all their questions in a manner so suitable to their gross understanding, which was ignorant alike of things divine and natural, that they were highly satisfied with him.  Seeing them instructed and disposed in this sort, he exhorted them to embrace the faith of Jesus Christ, and gave them to understand, that the truth being made known to them, ignorance could no longer secure them from eternal punishment.

But what victory can truth obtain over souls which find their interest in following error, and who make profession of deceiving the common people?  “They answered,” said the saint in one of his letters, “that which many Christians answer at this day, what will the world say of us if they see us change?  And after that, what will become of our families, whose only subsistence is from the offerings which are made to the pagods?  Thus, human interest, and worldly considerations, made the knowledge of the truth serve only to their greater condemnation.”

Not long afterwards, Xavier had another conference with a Brachman, who lived in the nature of an hermit.  He passed for the oracle of the country, and had been instructed in his youth at one of the most famous academies of the East.  He was one of those who was knowing in their most hidden mysteries, which are never intrusted by the Brachmans, but to a certain select number of their wise men.  Xavier, who had heard speak of him, was desirous to see him; and he, on his side, was as desirous to see Xavier.  The intention of the saint was to try, in bringing over this Brachman, if he could gain the rest, who were proud of being his disciples.