Note 11 — Chapter VIII · The Philippines Three Hundred Years Ago.

Conversion of the Filipinos to Christianity.—The population had been very rapidly Christianized. All accounts agree that almost no difficulty was encountered in baptizing the more advanced tribes. “There is not in these islands a province,” says Morga, “which resists conversion and does not desire it.”11 Indeed, the Islands seem to have been ripe for the preaching of a higher faith, either Christian or Mohammedan. For a time these two great religions struggled together in the vicinity of Manila,12 but at the end of three decades Spanish power and religion were alike established. Conversion was delayed ordinarily only by the lack of sufficient numbers of priests. We have seen that this conversion of the people was the work of the missionary friars. In 1591 there were 140 in the Islands, but the Relacion de Encomiendas calls for 160 more to properly supply the peoples which had been laid under tribute.