Page:The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 (Volume 07).djvu/200

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196
THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS
[Vol. 7

lage of rest." They say that those who go to this place are the just, and the valiant, and those who lived without doing harm, or who possessed other moral virtues. They said also that in the other life and mortality, there was a place of punishment, grief, and affliction, called casanaan, which was "a place of anguish;" they also maintained that no one would go to heaven, where there dwelt only Bathala, "the maker of all things," who governed from above. There were also other pagans who confessed more clearly to a hell, which they called, as I have said, casanaan; they said that all the wicked went to that place, and there dwelt the demons, whom they called sitan.

All the various kinds of infernal ministers were, therefore, as has been stated: catolonan; sonat (who was a sort of bishop who ordained priestesses and received their reverence, for they knelt before him as before one who could pardon sins, and expected salvation through him); mangagauay, manyisalat, mancocolam, hocloban, silagan, magtatangal, osuan, mangagayoma, pangatahoan.[1]

There were also ghosts, which they called vibit; and phantoms, which they called Tigbalaang. They had another deception—namely, that if any woman died in childbirth, she and the child suffered punishment; and that, at night, she could be heard lamenting. This was called patianac. May the honor and glory be God our Lord's, that among all the Tagalos not a trace of this is left; and that those who are now marrying do not even know what it is, thanks to the preaching of the holy gospel, which has banished it.

  1. For much curious and interesting information regarding these superstitions, beliefs in demons, etc., see Blumentritt's "Diccionario mitológico" in Retana's Archivo, ii, pp. 345–454.