Storia do Mogor 361.1.2

361.1.2

Gentlemen, having already replied at length to this letter of the Lord Bishop in the previous letter which I did myself the honour of writing to you, I will say no more than merely pray you to observe if any permission could be given more authentic than the one above recorded. Yet his Lordship has written to your Council, and also said in his Pastoral, that we have published the decrees without his permission, and makes use of this assertion to take away our mission to the Malabāris, and to fulminate his anathemas against the Reverend Father Esprit. To speak the truth, gentlemen, do not all these things cry aloud for vengeance in the presence of God ? The French themselves, who know the innocent and irreproachable life of the said Reverend Father Fra Esprit, flee from him as if he were a wild beast. Should they not rather blush with shame, and at least spare us the fatigues, the afflictions, the sadness, to which we are daily subjected by them ? Yet it is thus that they act against a poor friar, who suffers persecution in the cause of justice — a humble man, if ever there has been one in this world. To see the Reverend Father Esprit declared excommunicated by a Portuguese bishop, whose nation is at this time warring and contesting with France, does not afflict us, knowing most thoroughly that they hate to the very death the French nation.