Note 15 — San Agustin’s Letter on the Filipinos

3. It is a fact that the difficulty of knowing these Indians is not in the individuals, but in the race; for, if one be known, then all are known, without any distinction—so much so that the Greek word monopantos15 fits them, and which another critic gave to another race of people, because they were all homogeneous and uniform among themselves. At the eighth meeting of the last Lateran Council, held in the time of Leo X, the opinion of the Monophysite philosophers16—who give but one single soul to all men, each body having a part of it—was condemned. Doubtless that impious opinion originated from some nation as alike in customs as these Indians; and it is not the worst thing to have been able to give this humble judgment, although it is defective.17