The people of the Philippines, their religious progress and preparation for spiritual leadership in the Far East,

AMERICA ARRIVES

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to the Katipunan. It was therefore inevitable that General
Aguinaldo and America should join hands against their common enemy. Aguinaldo was in Singapore when hostilities
began and did not catch Dewey's fleet as it sailed from Hongkong. He did, however, send a proclamation to his people
urging them to join with the Americans. Nineteen days later
he himself arrived. For a time it looked doubtful whether
Aguinaldo would be able to win the Filipinos to the American
side. He proved that he had not spent the "Pact of Biac-nabato" money for himself, but had purchased arms for the new
revolution. He assured the Filipino people that "Divine
Providence is about to place independence within our reach,
in a manner most respectable to a free and independent people,"
that America's "constitution [he was thinking of the Monroe
doctrine] forbids the absorption of territory outside of
America."
At the same time the Spaniards were making the strongest
bid they could for the Filipinos. Three days before Aguinaldo
reached the rebel camp, another Filipino had arrived, sent
thither by Archbishop Nozaleda, that he might offer the
Filipinos autonomy, independence, anything, if they would
help the Spaniards. This man was the secular priest Father
Gregorio Aglipay, who now looms up as the most important
Filipino priest in the religious history of the Islands.2
Aguinaldo had the better cards to play, for America was
known to be helping Cuba, and might turn out a blessing to
the Philippines, while Spain had been tried and nothing could
2 Gregorio Aglipay y Labayen was born on May 9, x860, in the province
of Ilocos Norte. When he was sixteen years of age he had an unforgettable
experience of Spanish oppression. He and his father were thrown into prison
because they had not set out the number of tobacco plants demanded by the
government tobacco monopoly. That they had been prevented by a drought
made no difference to the authorities. Upon his release Aglipay went to
Manila, and pretty largely worked his way through college. After graduating
from the course in Arts and Science in the Dominican College of San Juan
de Letran, he studied in the Recollect Theological Seminary in Vigan and
was ordained in Manila in 1889. He was unusually apt and faithful as a
student and was highly regarded by the Spanish friars.
He took no part in the uprising of I896, but after Aguinaldo had signed
the pact of Biac-na-bato, Aglipay was sent to one of the insurgent leaders
named Makabulos to induce him to sign the pact. Aglipay succeeded, but
Proved too liberal for the friars of Tarlac where he had been priest, and only
escaped arrest by fleeing to Manila, where he was given refuge by the Canon
of the Cathedral.