Note 67 — Chapter LXI

Biographical sketches of all these martyrs are given in Reseña biográfica, i, pp. 258–276.

It is well to note, in this connection, the fact that the persecutions of Christians in Japan were not, in the main, on religious grounds. The Japanese government was tolerant to the new religion until it had reason to fear that its authority was being subverted by the influence of the missionaries, and the independence of the nation threatened by the foreign nations who sent to Japan the priests and traders. See Griffis’s Mikado’s Empire, pp. 247–259, Rein’s Japan, pp. 290–293, and Murdoch and Yamagata’s History of Japan, pp. 457–506. The last-named cites at length the writings of Charlevoix, Léon Pagés, and other historians.