enacted by it were an ecclesiastic code of discipline, a newly arranged catechism, and many other rules and regulations to improve the civil and ecclesiastical government of New Spain. The proceedings embraced five hundred and seventy-six paragraphs, divided into five books under various titles. Neither those of the first council in 1555 nor those of the second in 1565, whose chief end had been to recognize and enforce the acts of the ecumenical council of Trent concluded in 1563, had been approved by the holy see. Owing to this, all the chapters of the two preceding councils were embodied in the third, so as to secure the pontifical sanction to all. It was also necessary to accommodate the exigencies of the church to the peculiar traits of Indian character and administration of the Indies; hence the expediency of this provincial synod. The bishops wished to carry out at once the acts passed, but the viceroy, in obedience to a royal order of May 13, 1585, suspended their execution till the king's approval. This was given on the 18th of September, 1591, when the viceroy, audiencia, and all officials, civil or ecclesiastic, in New Spain, were commanded to aid in every possible way the enforcement of the decrees passed by the council. That cédula was reiterated February 2, 1593, and again February 9, 1621.[1]
- ↑ Concilios Provinciales Mexicanos, MSS., 4 parts, fol. Nos. 1-4, bound in parchment. Being the original records and minutes of the three ecclesiastic councils held under the presidency of the archbishop of Mexico as metropolitan in the years 1555, 1565, and 1585.No. 1, 320 folios, gives all the orders, correspondence, and other proceedings, as well as the chapters or acts passed by the three councils, and every paper connected therewith in Spanish or Latin, to which are appended the signatures of the archbishops and bishops who took part therein; also the catechism adopted by the third council.No. 2, 100 folios, is an authenticated copy in Spanish, under the seal of the archbishopric of Mexico, of the acts passed by the third council in 1585, with the autograph signatures of Archbishop Moya and the suffragan bishops of Guatemala, Yucatan, Michoacan, Nueva Galicia, Antequera, or Oajaca; countersigned by Doctor Juan de Salcedo, secretary of the council.No, 3, 455 folios. Correspondence, edicts, decrees, in Latin and Spanish, and others papers relating to the qualifications and duties of priests.No. 4, 354 folios. Papers that the third council consulted, including copies of the acts of the first council of Lima in 1582, and that of Toledo of 1583.The acts of the first council, and the original minutes, as well as those of
