diced b Jos e S. Arc a, - non

humility";'' the surprising notice of the civil wedding of CeledonioHernandez, the former Franciscan treasurer of the order in the Philippines. Inconnection with the Philippine Franciscans' wealth denounced by Arriaga inLa Armonia, a new scandal jumped out of the pages of La Esparta Radicalwhen it published the story—we suppose sent by Arriaga--that theFranciscan lay brother Pascual Adeva had recently left for Cadiz "with thepurpose of dispatching to Manila valuable merchandise for the importanttrade the Franciscan missionaries maintain in those islands."Although La Armonia was limited in circulation, the press in Madridquickly reprinted its articles and notices. The conservative press denouncedthem as "calumnies and falsehoods,"" emphasizing the "sacrilegious andtreacherous frenzy to reform the missionaries."5 It is, however, El Debatethat most strongly attacked the weekly for which Arriaga was writing, aswell as El Eco Filipino which was taking up common cause with La Armonfa.In its issue for 16 September 1871, El Debate carried an item under the title"Let Us Be Responsible" to rebut an accusation from Arriaga that in thePhilippines "moral and material anarchy reigns among the religious clergy."Evidence was sought to prove the "exactness of the accusation" and show"the immorality in general of the religious communities, the only time, as thepriests of La Armonia will understand, when no one will dare qualify theirattacks as calumnies."6' The reform which Arriaga 's writings suggested forthe religious orders — cession of their parishes to the secular clergy, return toreligious observance, and evangelization in the active missions—wasabsolutely not feasible, according to El Debate.The snare was laid as it had been two years earlier, but in the oppositeway. In 1869 it was the Regidor brothers and Labra who cast the hook to baitthe conservatives; now it is the latter who challenge Arriaga and, indirectlythe liberali, to join a comprehensive debate mainly on issues that werestrictly ecclesiastical and at times even merely domestic, in order to ventilatethem openly before every kind of reader and politician interested in knowingthe intimate secrets of the religious orders to obtain weapons against them.Francisco Arriaga, a Franciscan until a little more than a year earlier,accepted the challenge and, hoping to do a favor to the Philippine Church andthe Province of Saint Gregory, publicized a series of abuses and defects of hisformer brothers. This found a quick echo in the papers of all persuasions, butespecially those interested in the Philippine problem.Provoked, Arriaga responded accordingly to the El Debate article "LetUs Be Responsible" with his own titled "Proofs and Appearances," in LaArmonta (23 September 1871) in order to place on the table the proofs76