The Indolence of the Filipino by José Rizal (fiction novels to read txt) 📕

compelling obedience, for commanding to get rich, for getting rich to be happy. If the former, the government may act with the security that some day or other it will reap the harvest and will find a people its own in heart and interest; there is nothing like a favor for securing the friendship or enmity of man, according to whether it be conferred with good will or hurled into his face and bestowed upon him in spite of himself. If the logical and regulated system of exploitation be chosen, stifling with the jingle of gold and the sheen of opulence the sentiments of independence in the colonies, paying with its wealth for its lack of liberty, as the English do in India, who moreover leave the government to native rulers, then build roads, lay out highways, foster the freedom of trade; let the government heed material interests more than the interests of four orders of friars; let it send out intelligent employees to foster industry; just judges, all well paid, so that they be not venal pilferers, and lay aside all religious pretext. This policy has the advantage in that while it may not lull the instincts of liberty wholly to sleep, yet the day when the mother country loses her colonies she will at least have the gold amassed and not the regret of having reared ungrateful children.

 

1. Sancianco y Goson, Gregorio: El progreso de Filipinas. Estudios econ�micos, administrativos y pol�ticos. Parte econ�mica. Madrid, Imp. de la Vda. de J M. Perez, 1881 Pp XIV-260.

An eminent student of Philippine life and history, James A. LeRoy in his “The Philippines, 1860-1898—Some comment and bibliographical notes” published in volume 52 of Blair and Robertson, Philippine Islands 1493-1898, praises this book (p. 141) as “especially valuable on administrative matters just prior to the revision of the fiscal regime in connection with the abolition of the government tobacco monopoly”, and for its “data on land, commerce, and industry”

2. Before 1590, one of the Spanish officers in the Philippines, commenting on the climate of the Islands, declared, with considerable acumen, that Europeans could stand life and work here if they observed continence in regard to the use of alcoholic beverages.

3. See Morga’s “Report of conditions in the Philippines (June 8, 1598)” in Blair and Robertson vol. 10. pp. 75-80, in which various abuses of the friars are set forth. This should be compared with the following pages of the same relation (pp. 89-90) on secular affairs, from which it will be recognized that the condition was not so much the resultant of one class as of Spanish national character. Cf. also, Anda y Salazar B. and R, vol. 50, pp. 137-190; and Le Gentil, Voyage (Paris, 1779-81), vol. 1, pp. 183-191. It would be hardly fair not to call to mind that the Filipinos are debtors to the friars in many ways, and the Filipinos themselves should be the last to forget this. For a good exposition from the friar point of view, see Zamora, Las Corporaciones-Religiosas en Filipinas: Valladolid, 1901.

See also Mallat, Les Philippines (Paris, 1846), vol. 1, pp. 374-389.

4. The history of the Philippines is full of references to Chinese who came here for the reasons assigned by Rizal. The antiquarian will be interested in consulting a small work entitled Notes on the Malay Archipelago and Malacca, compiled from Chinese sources, by W. P. Groeneveldt.

5 See B. and R., vol 34, pp. 183-191 for a description of the early Chinese trade in the Philippines, also translated by Hirth from Chinese sources, but evidently not the same as referred to by Rizal,

6. This citation is translated directly from the original Italian Ms. Rizal’s account is seen to be slightly different and arises from the fact that he made use of Amoretti’s printed version of the Ms., which is wrong in many particulars. Amoretti attempted to change the original Ms. into modern Italian, with disastrous result. It is to be regretted that Walls y Merino followed the same garbled text, in his Primer viaje alrededor del Mundo (Madrid, 1899).

Dr. Antonio de Morga’s book is perhaps the most famous of all the early books treating of the Philippines. Its full title is as follows: “Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas: Dirigido � Don Cristoval Gomez de Sandoval y Rojas, Duque de Cea, Mexico, En casa de Geronymo Balli, 1609.” The original edition is very rare, and is worth almost its weight in gold. The manuscript circulated for some years before the date of publication.

The second Spanish edition of the work was published by Rizal himself, who was always a sincere admirer of the book. It bears the following title-page: “Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas por el Doctor Antonio de Morga. Obra publicada en Mejico el a�o de 1609 nuevamente sacada � luz y anotada por Jos� Rizal y precedida de un pr�logo del Prof. Fernando Blumentritt. Paris, Libreria de Garnier Hermanos, 1890.” Shortly before Rizal began work on his edition, a Spanish scholar, Justo Zaragoza, began the publication of a new edition of Morga. The book was reprinted, but the notes, prologue, and life of Morga which Zargoza had intended to insert, were never completed because of that editor’s death. Only two copies of this edition, so far as known, were ever bound, one of which belongs to the Ayer collection in Chicago, and the other by the Tabacalera purchase to the Philippine Library, in Manila. Still one other Spanish edition has appeared, namely: “Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas por el Dr. Antonio de Morga. Nueva edici�n enriquecida con los escritos in�ditos del mismo autor ilustrada con numerosas notas que amplian el texto y prologada extensamente por W. E. Retana, Madrid, Libreria General de Victoriano Suarez, Editor, 1909.” Retana adds a life of Morga and numerous documents written by him. An English edition was published as follows: “The Philippine Islands, Moluccas, Siam, Cambodia, Japan, and China. at the close of the sixteenth century. By Antonio de Morga. Translated from the Spanish, with notes and a preface, and a letter from Luis Vaez de Torres, describing his voyage through the Torres Straits, by the Hen. Henry E. J. Stanley, London, Printed for the Hakluyt Society, 1868”. However, Stanley’s translation is poor, and parts of passages are not translated at all. [It was this edition then in preparation by the Hakluyt Society, which Sir John Bowring, a director of the society, mentioned on his visit to Rizal’s uncle in Bi�an, so that to make the book available to Spaniards and Filipinos became an ambition from childhood with Rizal.-C.] A second English translation appears in B. and R. vols. 15 and 16. A separate copy of this translation was also published in a very limited edition, with the title: “History of the Philippine Islands from their discovery by Magellan in 1521 to the beginning of the XVII century; with descriptions of Japan, China and adjacent countries, by Dr. Antonio de Morga, alcalde of criminal causes, in the Royal Audiencia of Nueva Espa�a, and counsel for the Holy Office of the inquisition. Completely translated into English, edited and annotated by E. H. Blair and J. A. Robertson. Cleveland, Ohio, The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1907.” See B. and R. vols. 9-12 for other documents by Morga, and vol. 53 (or Robertson’s Bibliography of the Philippine Islands, Cleveland, 1908), for bibliographical details regarding Morga and titles to documents. Perhaps the most famous of all his writings outside of his book is his relation mentioned ante, note 3.

7. Published at London in 1783. See p. 346.

8. See B. and R., vol. 4, pp. 221, 222, for an old boatsong.

9. Colin’s Labor evangelica, published in Madrid, 1663; a new edition, in three volumes, and greatly enriched by notes and was published by Pablo Pastells, S. J. (Barcelona, 1900-1902).

10. See B. and R., vol. 33, pp. 233-235. The original says the ransom included 150 chickens; hence 450, an error due again to Amoretti.

11, Conquistas do las Islas Fillpinas (Madrid, 1698). There is no doubt of the frequency of inter-island trade among the peoples of the Philippines at an early period. Trade was stimulated by the very fact that the Malay peoples, except those who have been driven into the mountainous interiors, are by their very nature a seafaring people. The fact of an inter-island traffic is indicative of a culture above that possessed by a people in the barbarian stage of culture. Of course, there was considerable Chinese trade as well throughout the islands.

12. This estimate is somewhat high. A writer in speaking of the population of Manila, the metropolis of the Philippines then as now, about 1570 says that its population scarcely reached 80,000, instead of the 200,000 reported.

13 Licentiate Pedro de Rojas, of the Manila Audiencia, in a letter to Felipe II, June 30, 1586—Vol.6, pp. 265-274 says (p. 270): “If there were no trade with China, the citizens of these islands, would be richer; for the natives if they had not so many tostons, would pay their tributes in the articles which they produce, and which are current, that is, cloths, lampotes, cotton, and gold.—all of which have great value in Nueva Espa�a. These they cease to produce because of the abundance of silver; and what is worse and entails more loss upon your Majesty, is that they do not, as formerly, work the mines and take out gold”. The old records contains numerous references to the decline of the native industries of the Philippines after the arrival of the Spaniards and the increase of Chinese trade.

14. See ante, note 13.

15. The decrease of population among native people in the Philippines after the arrival of the Spaniards compares in no degree with what occurred in America. A most distressing picture of conditions in the Philippines is given by Bishop Domingo de Salazar in his relation written about 1583 (see B. & R., vol 5, pp. 210-255. See especially p. 212.) It is well to balance Salazar’s account with those of others

(A “tributary” was generally reckoned as five persons, one “tribute” being required for each adult male. Hence “tributaries” and “families” may here be taken to mean about the same number,—D.)

16. The forced labor required by the Spaniards in shipbuilding formed one of the legitimate causes of complaint among the people almost from the beginning.

17. See ante, note 15, also note 16.

18. The early friars, although many of them fell into some of the very faults which they condemned, inveighed boldly against the cruelty of the Spaniards. Doubtless their attitude did encourage their converts to withdraw from industry to a certain degree.

19. See B. & R, vol. 4, pp. 148-303.

20 See B & R., vol. 6, for early accounts of Chinese trade and Spanish measures affecting it The hostility between Spaniards and Portuguese enters largely into the question. The effects of the deplorably bad economics of Spain in its trade relations are still felt in the Peninsula.

21. See ante, note 20.

22. See ante, note 20. The arrival and departure of the annual galleon were times of activity, but otherwise Manila was a dull town, with little industry. The Chinese usurped all the petty trade.

23 It is to the credit, of the Sociedad Econ�mica de Amigos del Pais de Filipinas, founded by the energetic governor Basco y Vargas in 1781, that it extended its many-sided interests to the destruction of the devastating hordes of locusts that visit the Philippines so frequently.

24 The Spanish policy remained to the end one of exclusion, and the privileges granted were almost all because of coercion, and the penetrating force of modern ideas.

25. A loose use of the word “monk”, which is properly used of a cloistered ecclesiastic who does not leave his convent. “Friar” would be a more exact term. The Benedictines are monks; the Augustinians, Dominicans, Franciscans, and Recollects, are friars.

26. This was