The use of confessions, and the communion, were in a manner abolished;
and if any one by chance was struck with a remorse of conscience, and
desired to reconcile himself to God, at the foot of a priest, he was
constrained to steal to his devotions by night, to avoid the scandal to
his neighbour.

So strange a depravation of manners proceeded from these causes. Its rise
was taken from the licence of arms, which permit, and almost authorize,
the greatest disorders in a conquered country. The pleasures of Asia, and
the commerce of infidels, aided not a little to debauch the Portuguese,
as starched and regular as they naturally are. The want of spiritual
directors contributed largely to this growing mischief. There were not
four preachers, in all the Indies, nor any one priest without the walls
of Goa; insomuch, that in many fortified places whole years were passed
without hearing a sermon or a mass.

Behold a draught, not unresembling the face of Christianity in this new
world, when Father Xavier arrived in it.

The author of the relation from whence mine is copied, seems to have had
some kind of foresight of his coming; for, in the conclusion of his
memorial, he prays Almighty God, and earnestly desires the king of
Portugal, to send some holy man to the Indies, who might reform the
manners of the Europeans, by his apostolic instructions, and his
exemplary virtues.

As for the Gentiles, the life they led resembled that of beasts rather
than of men. Uncleanness was risen to the last excess amongst them; and
the least corrupt were those who had no religion. The greatest part of