The Works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 16

He arrived at length at Meaco with his three companions in February 1551. The name of that celebrated town, so widely spread for being the seat of empire and religion, where the Cubosama, the Dairy, and the Saso kept their court, seemed to promise great matters to Father Xavier; but the effect did not answer the appearances: Meaco, which in the Japonian tongue signifies a thing worth seeing, was no more than the shadow of what formerly it had been, so terribly wars and fires had laid it waste. On every side ruins were to be beheld, and the present condition of affairs threatened it with a total destruction. All the neighbouring princes were combined together against the Cubosama, and nothing was to be heard but the noise of arms.

The man of God endeavoured to have gained an audience from the Cubosama, and the Dairy, but he could not compass it: He could not so much as get admittance to the Saso, or high-priest of the Japonian religion. To procure him those audiences, they demanded no less than an hundred thousand caixes, which amount to six hundred French crowns, and the Father had it not to give. Despairing of doing any good on that side, he preached in the public places by that authority alone which the Almighty gives his missioners. As the town was all in confusion, and the thoughts of every man taken up with the reports of war, none listened to him; or those who casually heard him in passing by, made no reflections on what he said.

Thus, after a fortnight's stay at Meaco to no purpose, seeing no appearance of making converts amidst the disturbance of that place, he had a strong impulse of returning to Amanguchi, without giving for lost all the pains he had taken at Meaco; not only because of his great sufferings, (and sufferings are the gains of God's apostles) but also because at least he had preached Christ Jesus in that place, that is to say, in the most idolatrous town of all the universe, and opened the passage for his brethren, whom God had fore-appointed in the years following, there to establish Christianity, according to the revelations which had been given him concerning it.

He embarked on a river which falls from the adjoining mountains, and washing the foot of the walls of Meaco, disembogues itself afterwards into an arm of the sea, which runs up towards Sacay. Being in the ship, he could not turn off his eyes from the stately town of Meaco; and, as Fernandez tells us, often sung the beginning of the 113th Psalm, In exitu Israel de Ægypto, domus Jacob de populo Barbaro, &c. whether he considered himself as an Israelite departing out of a land of infidels by the command of God, or that he looked on that barbarous people, as one day destined to be the people of God. As for what remains, perceiving that presents are of great force to introduce foreigners to the princes of Japan, he went from Sacay to Firando, where he had left what the viceroy of the Indies and the governor of Malacca had obliged him to carry with him to Japan, that is to say, a little striking clock, an instrument of very harmonious music, and some other trifles, the value of which consisted only in the workmanship and rarity.

Having also observed, that his ragged habit had shocked the Japonese, who judge by the outside of the man, and who hardly vouchsafe to hear a man ill clothed, he made himself a new garment, handsome enough, of those alms which the Portuguese had bestowed on him; being verily persuaded, that an apostolic man ought to make himself all to all, and that, to gain over worldly men, it was sometimes necessary to conform himself a little to their weakness.

Being come to Amanguchi, his presents made his way for an audience from the king, and procured him a favourable reception. Oxindono, who admired the workmanship of Europe, was not satisfied with thanking the Father in a very obliging manner, but the same day sent him a large sum of money, by way of gratification; but Xavier absolutely refused it, and this very denial gave the king a more advantageous opinion of him. "How different," said Oxindono, "is this European Bonza from our covetous priests, who love money with so much greediness, and who mind nothing but their worldly interest!"

On the next morning Xavier presented to the king the letters of the governor and of the bishop of the Indies, in which the Christian faith was much extolled; and desired him, instead of all other favours, to grant him the permission of preaching it, assuring him once again, that it was the only motive of his voyage. The king increasing his admiration at the Father's generosity, granted him, by word of mouth, and also by a public edict, to declare the word of God. The edict was set up at the turnings of streets, and in public places of the town. It contained a free toleration for all persons to profess the European faith, and forbade, on grievous penalties, any hinderance or molestation to the new Bonzas in the exercise of their functions.

Besides this, Oxindono assigned them, for their lodgings, an old monastery of the Bonzas, which was disinhabited. They were no sooner established in it, than great numbers of people resorted to them: Some out of policy, and to please the king; others to observe their carriage, and to pick faults in it; many out of curiosity, and to learn something that was new. All in general proposed their doubts, and disputed with so much vehemence, that most of them were out of breath. The house was never empty, and these perpetual visits took up all the time of the man of God.

He explains himself on this subject, and almost complains, in the letters which he writes to Father Ignatius concerning his voyage to Japan. For after he had marked out to him the qualities which were requisite in a labourer of the Society, proper to be sent thither, "That he ought, in the first place, to be a person of unblameable conversation, and that the Japonese would easily be scandalised, where they could find occasion for the least reproach; that, moreover, he ought to be of no less capacity than virtue, because Japan is also furnished with an infinite number of her own clergymen, profound in science, and not yielding up any point in dispute without being first convinced by demonstrative reasons; that, yet farther, it was necessary, that a missioner should come prepared to endure all manner of wants and hardships; that he must be endued with an heroic fortitude to encounter continual dangers, and death itself in dreadful torments, in case of need," Having, I say, set these things forth, and added these express words in one of his letters, "I write to Father Simon, and, in his absence, to the rector of Coimbra, that he shall send hither only such men as are known and approved by your holy charity," he continues thus:

"These labourers in the gospel must expect to be much more crossed in their undertaking than they imagine. They will be wearied out with visits, and by troublesome questions, every hour of the day, and half the night: They will be sent for incessantly to the houses of the great, and will sometimes want leisure to say their prayers, or to make their recollections. Perhaps, also, they will want time to say their mass or their breviary, or not have enough for their repast, or even for their natural repose, for it is incredible how importunate these Japonians are, especially in reference to strangers, of whom they make no reckoning, but rather make their sport of them. What therefore will become of them, when they rise up against their sects, and reprehend their vices?" Yet these importunities became pleasing to Father Xavier, and afterwards produced a good effect. As the Japonese are of docible and reasonable minds, the more they pressed him in dispute, they understood the truth the more: So that their doubts being satisfied, they comprehended easily, that there were no contradictions in our faith, nothing that would not abide the test of the most severe discussion.

It was in the midst of these interrogations, with which the saint was overburdened, that, by a prodigious manner of speech, the like of which was scarcely ever heard, he satisfied, with one only answer, the questions of many persons, on very different subjects, and often opposite to each other; as suppose, the immortality of the soul; the motions of the heavens; the eclipses of the sun and moon; the colours of the rainbow; sin and grace; hell and heaven. The wonder was, that after he had heard all their several demands, he answered them in few words, and that these words, being multiplied in their ears, by a virtue all divine, gave them to understand what they desired to know, as if he had answered each of them in particular. They frequently took notice of this prodigy; and were so much amazed at it, that they looked on one another like men distracted, and regarded the Father with admiration, as not knowing what to think or say. But as clear-sighted and able as they were, for the most part, they could not conceive that it was above the power of nature. They ascribed it to I know not what secret kind of science, which they imagined him only to possess. For which reason, Father Cozmo de Torrez, being returned from Firando to Amanguchi, the Bonzas said, "This man is not endued with the great knowledge of Father Francis, nor has the art of resolving many doubts with one only answer."

The process of the saint's canonization makes mention of this miracle; and Father Antonio Quadros, who travelled to Japan four years after Father Xavier, writes it to Father Diego Moron, provincial of Portugal, These are his words: "A Japonese informed me, that he had seen three miracles wrought by Father Xavier in his country. He made a person walk and speak, who was dumb and taken with the palsy; he gave voice to another mute; and hearing to one that was deaf. This Japonian also told me, that Father Xavier was esteemed in Japan for the most knowing man of Europe; and that the other Fathers of the Society were nothing to him, because they could answer but one idolater at a time, but that Father Xavier, by one only word, decided ten or twelve questions. When I told him, that this might probably happen because those questions were alike, he assured me it was not so; but that, on the contrary, they were very different. He added, lastly, that this was no extraordinary thing with him, but a common practice."

When Xavier and his companion Fernandez were a little disengaged from these importunities, they set themselves on preaching twice a day, in the public places of the town, in despite of the Bonzas. There were seven or eight religions in Amanguchi quite opposite to each other, and every one of them had many proselytes, who defended their own as best; insomuch, that these Bonzas, who were heads of parties, had many disputes amongst themselves: But when once the saint began to publish the Christian law, all the sects united against their common enemy; which, notwithstanding, they durst not openly declare, against a man who was favoured by the court, and who seemed, even to themselves, to have somewhat in him that was more than human.

At this time God restored to Father Xavier the gift of tongues, which had been given him in the Indies on divers occasions; for, without having ever learned the Chinese language, he preached every day to the Chinese merchants, who traded at Amanguchi, in their mother-tongue, there being great numbers of them. He preached in the afternoon to the Japonians in their language; but so naturally and with so much ease, that he could not be taken for a foreigner.

The force of truth, against which their doctors could oppose nothing that was reasonable in their disputations; the novelty of three miracles, which we have mentioned, and of many others which Xavier wrought at the same time; his innocent and rigid life; the Divine Spirit which enlivened his discourses; – all these together made so great an impression on their hearts, that in less than two months time, more than five hundred persons were baptized; the greatest part men of quality and learning, who had examined Christianity to the bottom, and who did not render up themselves for any other reason, than for that they had nothing farther to oppose.

It was wonderful, according to the report of the saint himself, to observe, that there was no other speech but of Jesus Christ through all the town; and that those who had most eagerly fought against the Christian law in their disputes, were now the most ardent to defend it, and to practise it with most exactness. All of them were tenderly affectionate to the Father, and were ever loath to leave his company They took delight in making daily questions to him, concerning the mysteries of faith; and it is unspeakable what inward refreshments they found, in seeing that all was mysterious even, in the most ordinary ceremonies, – as, for example, in the manner wherewith the faithful sign themselves with the cross.

The Father, on his side, had as ample a satisfaction; and he confesses it himself, in a letter which he directed some time after to the Jesuits in Europe: "Though my hairs are already become all hoary," says he to them, "I am more vigorous and robust than I ever was; for the pains which are taken to cultivate a reasonable nation, which loves the truth, and which covets to be saved, afford me matter of great joy. I have not, in the course of all my life, received a greater satisfaction than at Amanguchi, where multitudes of people came to hear me, by the king's permission. I saw the pride of their Bonzas overthrown, and the most inflamed enemies of the Christian name subjected to the humility of the gospel. I saw the transports of joy in those new Christians, when, after having vanquished the Bonzas in dispute, they returned in triumph. I was not less satisfied, to see their diligence in labouring to convince the Gentiles, and vying with each other in that undertaking; with the delight they took in the relation of their conquests, and by what arguments and means they brought them over, and how they rooted out the heathen superstitions; all these particulars gave me such abundant joy, that I lost the sense of my own afflictions. Ah, might it please Almighty God, that, as I call to my remembrance those consolations which I have received from the fountain of all mercies in the midst of my labours, I might not only make a recital of them, but give the experience also, and cause them to be felt and considered as they ought, by our universities of Europe, I am assured, that many young men, who study there, would come hither to employ all the strength of their parts, and vigour of their minds, in the conversion of an idolatrous people, had they once tasted those heavenly refreshments which accompany our labours."

These inward delights of God's servant were not yet so pure, but that some bitterness was intermixed. He was not without sorrow for Oxindono king of Amanguchi; who, though persuaded of the excellence of Christianity, was retained in idolatry by carnal pleasures: and for Neatondono, first prince of the kingdom, who, having noble and virtuous inclinations, might have proved the apostle of the court, if some trivial reasons had not hindered him from becoming a Christian. He, and the princess his wife, respected Xavier as their father, and even honoured him as a saint. They also loved the faithful, and succoured them in all their needs. They spoke of our faith in terms of great veneration; but, having founded many monasteries of Bonzas, it troubled them, as they said, to lose the fruit of charity: and thus the fear of being frustrated of I know not what rewards, which the Bonzas promised them, caused them to neglect that eternal recompence of which the holy man assured them.

But how powerful soever the example of princes is usually in matters of religion, yet on all sides Christianity was embraced; and an action of Xavier's companion did not a little contribute to the gaining over of the most stubborn. Fernandez preached in one of the most frequented places of the town; and amongst his crowd of auditors were some persons of great wit, strongly opinioned of their sect, who could not conceive the maxims of the gospel, and who heard the preacher with no other intention than to make a sport of him. In the midst of the sermon, a man, who was of the scum of the rabble, drew near to Fernandez, as if it were to whisper something to him, and hawking up a mass of nastiness, spit it full upon his face. Fernandez, without a word speaking, or making the least sign that he was concerned, took his hand-kerchief, wiped his face, and continued his discourse.

Every one was suprised at the moderation of the preacher: – the more debauched, who had set up a laughter at this affront, turned all their scorn into admiration, and sincerely acknowledged, that a man who was so much master of his passions, as to command them on such an occasion, must needs be endued with greatness of soul and heroic courage. One of the chief of the assembly discovered somewhat else in this unshaken patience: He was the most learned amongst all the doctors of Amanguchi, and the most violent against the gospel He considered, that a law which taught such patience, and such insensibility of affronts, could only come from heaven; and argued thus within himself: "These preachers, who with so much constancy endure the vilest of all injuries, cannot pretend to cozen us. It would cost them too dear a price; and no man will deceive another at his own expence. He only, who made the heart of man, can place it in so great tranquillity. The force of nature cannot reach so far; and this Christian patience must proceed alone from some divine principle. These people cannot but have some infallible assurance of the doctrine they believe, and of the recompence which they expect; for, in line, they are ready to suffer all things for their God, and have no human expectations. After all, what inconvenience or danger can it be to embrace their law? If what they tell us of eternity be true, I shall be eternally miserable in not believing it; and supposing there be no other life but this, is it not better to follow a religion which elevates a man above himself, and which gives him an unalterable peace, than to profess our sects, which continue us in all our weakness, and which want power to appease the disorders of our hearts?" He made his inward reflections on all these things, as he afterwards declared; and these considerations being accompanied with the motions of grace, touched him so to the quick, that, as soon as the sermon was ended, he confessed that the virtue of the preacher had convinced him; he desired baptism, and received it with great solemnity.

This illustrious conversion was followed with answerable success. Many who had a glimmering of the truth, and feared to know it yet more plainly, now opened their eyes, and admitted the gospel light; amongst the rest, a young man of five-and-twenty years of age, much esteemed for the subtlety of his understanding, and educated in the most famous universities of Japan. He was come to Amanguchi, on purpose to be made a Bonza; but being informed that the sect of Bonzas, of which he desired to be a member, did not acknowledge a first Principle, and that their books had made no mention of him, he changed his thoughts, and was unresolved on what course of living he should fix; until being finally convinced, by the example of the doctor, and the arguments of Xavier, he became a Christian. The name of Laurence was given him; and it was he, who, being received by Xavier himself into the Society of Jesus, exercised immediately the ministry of preaching with so much fame, and so great success, that he converted an innumerable multitude of noble and valiant men, who were afterwards the pillars of the Japonian church.

As to what remains, the monasteries of the Bonzas were daily thinned, and grew insensibly to be dispeopled by the desertion of young men, who had some remainders of modesty and morality. Being ashamed of leading a brutal life, and of deceiving the simple, they laid by their habits of Bonzas, together with the profession, that, coming back into the world, they might more easily be converted. These young Bonzas discovered to Xavier the mysteries of their sects, and revealed to him their hidden abominations, which were covered with an outside of austerity.

The Father, who was at open defiance with those men, who were the mortal enemies of all the faithful, and whose only interest it was to hinder the establishment of the faith, published whatsoever was told him in relation to them, and represented them in their proper colours. These unmasked hypocrites became the laughter of the people; but what mortified them more, was, that they, who heard them like oracles before this, now upbraided them openly with their ignorance. A woman would sometimes challenge them to a disputation; and urge them with such home and pressing arguments, that the more they endeavoured to get loose, the more they were entangled: For the Father, being made privy to the secrets of every sect, furnished the new proselytes with weapons to vanquish the Bonzas, by reducing them to manifest contradictions; which, among the Japonese, is the greatest infamy that can happen to a man of letters. But the Bonzas got not off so cheap, as only to be made the derision of the people; together with their credit and their reputation they lost the comfortable alms, which was their whole subsistence: So that the greater part of them, without finding in themselves the least inclinations to Christianity, bolted out of their convents, that they might not die of hunger in them; and changed their profession of Bonzas, to become either soldiers or tradesmen; which gave the Christians occasion to say, with joy unspeakable, "That, in a little time, there would remain no more idolaters in Amanguchi, of those religious cheats, than were barely sufficient to keep possession of their monasteries."

The elder Bonzas, in the mean time, more hardened in their sect, and more obstinate than the young, spared for nothing to maintain their possession. They threatened the people with the wrath of their gods, and denounced the total destruction of the town and kingdom; they said, "The God whom the Europeans believed, was not Deos, or Deus, as the Portuguese called him, but Dajus, that is to say, in the Japonian tongue, a lie, or forgery." They added, "That this God imposed on men a heavy yoke. What justice was it to punish those who transgressed a law, which it was impossible to keep? But where was Providence, if the law of Jesus was necessary to salvation, which suffered fifteen ages to slide away without declaring it to the most noble part of all the world? Surely a religion, whose God was partial in the dispensation of his favours, could not possibly be true; and if the European doctrine had but a shadow of truth in it, China could never have been so long without the knowledge of it." These were the principal heads of their accusation, and Xavier reports them in his letters; but he gives not an account of what answers he returned, and they are not made known to us by any other hand. Thus, without following two or three historians, who make him speak according to their own ideas on all these articles, I shall content myself with what the saint himself had left in writing. The idolaters, instead of congratulating their own happiness, that they were enlightened by the beams of faith, bemoaned the blindness of their ancestors, and cried out in a lamentable tone, "What! are our forefathers burning in hellfire, because they did not adore a God who was unknown to them, and observed not a law which never was declared?" The Bouzas added fuel to their zeal, by telling them,

"The Portuguese priests were good for nothing, because they could not redeem a soul from hell; whereas they could do it at their pleasure, by their fasts and prayers: that eternal punishments either proved the cruelty or the weakness of the Christian God; his cruelty, if he did not deliver them, when he had it in his power; his weakness, if he could not execute what he desired; lastly, that Amida and Xaca were far more merciful, and of greater power; but that they were only pleased to redeem from hell those who, during their mortal life, had bestowed magnificent alms upon the Bonzas."

We are ignorant of all those particular answers of the saint, as I said above: we only know from his relation, that, concerning the sorrow of the Japonians for having been bereft for so many ages of Christian knowledge, he had the good fortune to give them comfort, and put them in a way of more reasonable thoughts; for he shewed them in general, that the most ancient of all laws is the law of God, not that which is published by the sound of words, but that which is written in hearts by the hand of nature; so that every one who comes into the world, brings along with him certain precepts, which his own instinct and reason teach him. "Before Japan received its laws from the wise men of China," said Xavier, "it was known amongst you, that theft and adultery were to be avoided; and from thence it was that thieves and palliards sought out secret places, wherein to commit those crimes. After they had committed them, they felt the private stings of their own consciences, which cease not to reproach the guilty to themselves, though their wickedness be not known to others, nor even so much as prohibited by human laws. Suppose an infant bred up in forests amongst the beasts, far from the society of mankind, and remote from the civilized inhabitants of towns, yet he is not without an inward knowledge of the rules of civil life; for ask him, whether it be not an evil action to murder a man, to despoil him of his goods, to violate his bed, to surprise him by force, or circumvent him by treachery, he will answer without question, 'That nothing of this is to be done.' Now if this be manifest in a savage, without the benefit of education, how much more way it be concluded of men well educated, and living in mutual conversation? Then," added the holy man, "it follows, that God has not left so many ages destitute of knowledge, as your Bonzas have pretended" By this he gave them to understand, that the law of nature was a step which led them insensibly to the Christian law; and that a man who lived morally well, should never fad of arriving to the knowledge of the faith, by ways best known to Almighty God; that is to say, before his eath, God would either send some preacher to him, or illuminate his mind by some immediate revelation. These reasons, which the fathers of the church have often used on like occasions, gave such satisfaction to the Pagans, that they found no farther difficulty in that point, which had given them so much trouble.