Japan and the Japanese

CHAPTER XXI.
SPANISH FRIARS IN JAPAN. EXTENSION OF JAPANESE TBADE. PROGRESS
OF THE DUTCH IN THE EASTERN SEAS. THEY OPEN A TRADE WITH JAPAN.
EMPEROR'S LETTER. SHIPWRECK OF DON RODRIGO DE VIVERO ON THE
JAPANESE COAST. HIS RECEPTION, OBSERVATIONS AND DEPARTURE.
DESTRUCTION OF A PORTUGUESE CARAC BY THE JAPANESE. ANOTHER
DUTCH SHIP ARRIVES. SPEX'S CHARTER. EMBASSIES FROM MACAO AND
NEW SPAIN. FATHER LOUIS SOTELO AND HIS PROJECTS. A. D. 1C07 1C13.
THE Dutch and English, though they had not yet reached Japan,
were already, especially the Dutch, making great progress
in the
Indian seas ; but it was not by them alone that the Portuguese
monopoly of Japanese commerce and Japanese
threatened.
conversion was
Taking advantage of the bull of Clement Y II., already referred to,
a multitude of Spanish friars from Manilla poured into Japan, whose
first and chief business it was, according to the Jesuit letter-writers
and historians, to declaim with vehemence against
the conduct of the
fathers of the Company, whom they represented as altogether too
circumspect, reserved and timid, in the publication of the Gospel.
The fanaticism of these Spanish friars was excessive, in illustration of
which the Jesuit historians relate, with malicious satisfaction, the fol-
lowing story : One of them, in a dispute with one of the shipwrecked
Hollanders of Adams' company (perhaps with Adams himself), to
sustain the
authority of the Catholic church, appealed to its miraculous
power, and when this obstinate Dutch heretic questioned the
reality of any such power, and challenged an exhibition of it, the
fanatical missionary undertook to convince him by walking himself
on the sea. A day was appointed for the miracle. The Spaniard
prepared himself by confession, prayer and fasting. A crowd of
Japanese "assembled to see it, and the friar, after a confident exhortation
to the multitude, stepped, crucifix in hand, into the water,