Page:Vol 3 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/729

Rh that there were no righteous men among the friars. The records of the chroniclers show that many excellent and worthy members, of high principle and noble intent, labored in New Spain during this period of backsliding. But their numbers were comparatively few, and they were unable, by the exemplary lives which they led, to leaven the heavy mass of ungodliness into which they had been cast.

So rapidly did the number of the regulars increase, and so tempting were the inducements to the idle and vicious to join societies which offered to them opportunities of indulgence in indolence, lust, and pleasure, that the king in 1754 decreed, in accord with the holy see, that for the ten succeeding years no person should be admitted into any of the religious orders in New Spain under any pretext. Of the actual number of friars resident in the country previous to the close of the eighteenth century, little information can be obtained. According to Alzate, in 1787, there were in the city of Mexico alone 1,033 regulars, and Humboldt states that in 1803 in the twenty-three convents of friars then existing in the capital, there were about 1,200 members, 580 of whom were priests and choristers. The same author estimates the number of friars throughout the country, including lay brothers and servants, at between 7,000 and 8,000.

While convents and friars thus multiplied, religious