Ateneo de Manila University Philippine Studies

The Enlightenment and the Philippine Revolution
Author(s): JOSE S. ARCILLA

Source: Philippine Studies, Vol. 39, No. 3 (Third Quarter 1991), pp. 358-373
Published by: Ateneo de Manila University
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Philippine Studies 39 (1991): 358-73
The Enlightenment and the Philippine Revolution
JOSE S. A R C I L L A, S. J.
It is beyond doubt that the South American wars of independence in

the first quarter of the nineteenth century were partially motivated
by ideas earlier received from the eighteenth-century intellectual revo-
lution of Europe.1 Can we say that the same influence had a similar
effect on the Philippine revolution which happened almost a hundred
years later in a place as distant as the Philippines?
The Enlightenment was the crossroads of European history, a crisis,
in a philosopher's view, of the European conscience.2 It denied the
past, and was in search of the new. Reason was the key to knowl-
edge and the solution of human problems, no longer tradition or faith.
Useful knowledge was prized and there was a marked zeal to edu-
cate the general populace. Philanthropy, resulting from the desire to
improve human life, found expression also in the clamor for the
removal of the tribute and other social distinctions to equalize vas-
sals into citizens of the nation. Through modern economic and scien-
tific progress, confidence* in human perfection was unlimited and the
golden age seemed at last within reach. Inevitably, a clash occurred
between accepted principles of authority and the new attitudes.
1. See among others, Arthur P. Whitaker, ed., Latin America and the Enlightenment
(Ithaca, 1961); J. Vicens Vives, ed., Historia de España y América (Barcelona, 1961), V, pp.
514 ff.; Antonio Ubieta, Juan Reglá, Jose Ma Jover Zamora, and Carlos Seco, Introducción
a la Historia de España (New York, 1965) esp. pp. 652-71.
2. Literature on the Enlightenment is overwhelming. But for the Spanish Enlighten-
ment, one should start with Jean Sarrailh, L'Espagne eclairée de la seconde moitié du XVIIle
siècle (Paris, 195 7). See also Angel Dominguez Ortiz, La Sociedad Española en el siglo XVIII
(Madrid: Instituto Balmes de Sociologia, Departamento de Historia Social Consejo Superior
de Investigaciones Cientificas, 195 7); Vicente Palacio A tard, El Despotismo ilustrado es-
pañol (Madrid, 1950); Richard Herr, The Eighteenth Century Revolution in Spain (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1958).
ENUCHTENMENT AND REVOLUTION 359
THE SOUTH AMERICAN EXPERIENCE
Recent studies warn against simplistic conclusions, but the South

American wars of independence in the first decades of the nineteenth
century occurred during this long clash between the new and the
old. Chronologically, the final defeat of the Spanish forces under
General Antonio José Sucre by the victorious troops of the revolu-
tionary government of Colombia occurred in 1824. But the revolu-
tion did not end there. A new phase in the search for political inde-
pendence began with the building of the new American republics
after the war. By the same token, although the South American wars
began with the famous grito de Dolores of 1808, the clamor for inde-
pendence had already been heard much earlier. For, like other revo-
lutions, the South American wars did not happen overnight but had
been in preparation for some time.
A good portion of Spain's economic life in the sixteenth century
depended on American silver. But by 1600, production in the Ameri-
can mines began to decline because of labor shortage and faulty
technology. At the same time, the colonies had other sources of wealth
which enabled them to compete in the trans-Atlantic trade. This led
to the attitude that American capital should no longer be sent to the
home government, but retained to finance local administration, de-
fense, education, and other needs. Likewise, while the native indio
population decreased, that of the criollos increased. Finally, because
of the decline in metal production, most of the colonists or peninsu-
lares invested in agriculture rather than in mining, sharpening the
economic rivalry between the Americans and the Spaniards. In other
words, America was coming into its own, forming its own distinc-
tive personality, and becoming the dominant partner in Spanish
economic life.3
Early in the eighteenth century, of course, the time was not yet
ripe for separatist ideas, but already a growing sense of identity based
on economic realities was palpable. Significantly, as in the Philippines,
the expulsion of the Jesuits during the liberal reign of Charles III of
Spain (1759-88) also meant the loss of certain privileges hitherto
enjoyed by the rest of the religious clergy. At this time, there was an
increase in criollo vocations to the priesthood, and although finally
the king decided against secularization, the native-born clergy which
3. A brief summary is in John Lynch, Spain Under the Hapsburgs , vol 2: Spam and
America, 1598-1700 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1969), especially chapter VII,
"American Trade: Contraction and Crisis."
360 PHILIPPINE STUDIES
sharpened the inchoate sense of American identity were another factor

in the later American independence movement.4
Two other groups encouraged the growth of a separatist mental-
ity: the expelled Jews from Spain who migrated to the Americas, and
secret societies, especially, freemasonry. The Jews never forgave Spain
for their expulsion and, from the records of the American Inquisi-
tion, never really became part of American society. They kept their
contact with other Jews elsewhere and supported subversive move-
ments by means of covert propaganda. Cool and calculating, thor-
oughly acquainted with the ideals of the Enlightenment, they were a
powerful group that fomented separatist ideas. The wealthy Jewish
merchants in Amsterdam, Leyden, and London were the source of
subversive writings which, despite the Inquisition, circulated in
America, and at times passed around by the native-born American
clergy.5
Another source of separatist plans was freemasonry. First intro-
duced into Spain in 1726, by 1748 it had 800 members in Cadiz, which
was the gateway to and from the Americas. Under Charles III, free-
masonry enjoyed the most ample freedom. The leading political and
social figures of the period were members of the lodges, and they
succeeded in obtaining from the king limitations on the authority of
the Inquisition. It was therefore not surprising that three years later,
in 1751, the American Inquisition had its first case against a French
surgeon in Lima, Perú, who admitted that in that city there were at
least forty initiates of freemasonry.6
These factors, which on occasion worked together, fomented the
dissatisfaction or, at least, the sense of a separate criollo identity in
the eighteenth century. A historian described this identity and dis-
4. The literature on the expulsion of the Jesuits from the Spanish dominions and their
subsequent suppression as a religious order is abundant. As a start, see Magnus Morner
(ed.), The Expulsion of the Jesuits from latin America (New York; Alfred A. Knopf, 1965); -
For the problem of the native clergy in the Philippines, see Horacio de la Costa, S.J. and
John N. Schumacher, S.J., The Filipino Clergy: Historical Studies and Future Perspectives
(Quezon Qty: Loyola Papers Board of Editors, 1979); John N. Schumacher, S.J., Father
Burgos: Priest and Nationalist (Quezon Qty: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1972);
Antolin V. Uy, S.V.D., The State of the Church in the Philippines, 1850-1875 (Tagaytay Qty:
Divine Word Seminary, 1984).
5. Vicens Vives, Historia de España , 408-89.
6. See among others, Jose Antonio Ferrer Benimeli, S.J. Masonería e inquisición en
Latinoamerica durante el siglo XVIII (Caracas: Universidad Católica Andres Bello, 1973);
Masonería , Iglesia e Ilustración. Un conflicto ideologico, politico, religioso (Madrid: Fundación
Universitaria Española, 1976-1979)); La Masonería despues del concilio (Barcelona, 1968);
Josef Stimpfle, "L'impossible Cohabitation entre l'Eglise Catholique et la Franc-
Masonerie," La Pensee Catholique 226 (198 7): 64-75.
ENLIGHTENMENT AND REVOLUTION 361
satisfaction as the "primary element" which resulted in the Ameri-

can revolutionary wars. If one adds to this the ideologies popular-
ized during this period, one can appreciate the factors that prepared
for the American wars of independence.
Two principal political theories were being debated among think-
ers and writers opposed to the absolute exercise or claim of state
power: the "populist," and the "contractual." Basically Thomist,7 the
populist theories taught that public authority is shared by the eccle-
siastical and the civil power. Both aimed at the external order and
the common good of the community, the perfection of its individual
members, and salvation in the life to come. That there might be
harmony between the two powers, the civil should be subordinate to
the ecclesiastical. State authority, however, is limited by the demands
of human freedom and justice. Otherwise, it would be tyranny.
On the other hand, the Suarezian doctrine insisted that sovereign
ppwer was rooted in the community, and must never be exercised
despotically. If it were, the people had the right to rebel and depose
the tyrant. This is the famous doctrine of regicide wrongly attributed
to the Jesuit Francisco Suarez (1548-1617), but actually already ex-
pressed by another Jesuit, Juan de Mariana, in the earlier De Rege et
Regis Institutione ad Philippum III (1589).8
The contractual doctrine of state power was described by the
Calvinist Philippe Du Plessy-Mornay (1549-1623), author of the well
known Vindiciae contra tyrannos (1679). Royal power, he wrote, must
not impose absolute norms or decisions. In succeeding to power, the
ruler was under contract to his people. But, while the ruler was
expected to govern justly, the community for their part were obliged
to obey him. Public authority was delegated both by God and by the
people. If abused, the people could legitimately take up arms to oust
the ruler. This "right to resist" was justified by the social nature of
public authority.
Contractualism reappeared in one form or another during the
seventeenth-century English revolution. Earlier, in 1366, John Wycliff
(c. 1320-84) had refused to pay the royal tax which King John Lack-
land (1199-1216) had promised to the pope. He had his own rea-
sons, and when summoned to court, the English reformer declared,
among others, that because sovereignty belonged to the nation, the
king could not make promises unilaterally in the latteťs name with-
7. Thomas Aquinas, De re gim, princ. 1.6; In 2 sent. 44, 2, 2, 5; l-2ae 2, 4 ad 2um; 2-2ae,
65, 3 ad lum.
8. Francisco Suarez, De diaritate, disp. 13; Defensio fidei 6, 4, 7 a. Juan de Mariana, S.J.,
De Rege et Regis Institutione ad Philippum III (1589), ch. VI.
out its consent.9 Later in 1647, the New Model Army of Oliver
Cromwell (1599-1688) held the same view. Called the "People's Pact/'
it declared that all state powers came from the people. Accordingly,
the people could rightly demand the extension of suffrage, a
Constitution and a Parliament elected every six months, the suppres-
sion of monopolies, the death penalty, primogeniture, and feudal
dues, and a share in the common good.
This was the inspiration of the universally acclaimed Treatise on
Two Governments (1690) authored by John Locke (1632-1704), although
its contents were not original with him and had a long history behind
them. From Locke, it passed to the U.S. Declaration of Independence
in 1776 and the French Declaration of Human Rights in 1789. Trans-
lated into Spanish by Antonio Nariño of Bogota in 1794, it enjoyed
widespread acceptance all over the American continent.10 Thus, when
the South American revolutions occurred in the first quarter of the
nineteenth century, two major historical precedents, based on long-
standing political theories, had already proved to the South Ameri-
cans that they were on the right road. Public authority belonged
to the people, and they determined who and how it was to be
exercised.
Doubtless, the South American revolution had its peculiarities.
Bourbon Spain had already begun to introduce colonial reforms, but
they were based on outmoded principles of authority: economic
protectionism, political paternalism, racial assimilation, and Catholi-
cism. The entire program was galling to the American intellectuals
who, conscious now of who they were, demanded the treatment they
thought they deserved.
Technically, Spain did not rule an empire. The Spanish colonies
were "kingdoms" dynastically united under one Crown. But when
in 1807 Napoléon Buonaparte (1769-1821) ousted the legitimate king,
Charles IV (1788-1808), the Spaniards rose in revolt, introducing for
the first time what we know as "guerrilla" (minor war) tactics. In
the Americas, however, it occasioned a seminationalist and semimon-
archist resistance against the new Napoleonic order. American lead-
ership traditionally reserved for peninsular Spaniards was assumed
by the American-born Spaniards, the criollos. It was in defense of
the old legitimacy that the smouldering hostility between the penin-
9. See among others, George M. Trevelyan, England in the Age of Wy cliff (London,
1899), or any other good history of England.
10. Antonio N arino, a man of wide literary tastes, eventually amassed a private
library and owned a small printing press. See Enciclopedia universal ilustrada Europeo-
americana (Espasa-Cal pe), XXXVII, 1104-1106.
sulars and the criollos flared into open war. The movement for free-
dom against the French invader in Spain was paralleled by the move-
ment for freedom from the Spanish colonizer in South America.
THE PHILIPPINE EXPERIENCE
How did this affect the Filipinos? The idea of justice, equality, good
government was not new to them. But independence became a clear
alternative for the Filipino propagandists of the last quarter of the
nineteenth century once it was clear that Spain was reluctant to grant
the reforms they were peacefully demanding. However, this occurred
much later than the South American political movements. One, there-
fore, seeks an explanation for, first, this delay and, second, the source,
of just exactly how the Enlightenment influenced the Filipino cam-
paign for reforms, if at all.
Because of the distance and the lack of economic opportunities in
the Philippines, Spanish migration here was not as heavy as in South
America. Besides, the few Spaniards who did come remained in
Manila to invest in the galleon trade, and only a handful lived in the
provinces. But by the last quarter of the nineteenth century, the
economic boom in the Philippines led to the formation of a new elite,
distinct from the old hereditary principalia. The latter continued their
political role as representatives of the central government in Manila,
mainly as recruiters for the hated polo or corvee labor and collectors
of the cédula , a role which victimized them, since they had to reim-
burse any deficit in the expected revenue. But having lost their lands,
they were no longer the economic leaders of the community. Not
respected by their constituents because of their political role, they were
despised by the nouveaux riches who had money but exercised no
political power. The latter sent their sons to higher institutions of
learning in Manila or abroad. Eventually, the latter took on a new
sophistication in their dress, and attitudes, and spoke, read, and wrote
in Spanish. Their ideal was a new Filipinized Hispanidad , distinct from
that of the ordinary indio, except that both the wealthy and the poor
maintained their ties with the Church, until they came into contact
with Spanish liberalism in the peninsula.
Thus one finds the paradoxical situation in which those who had
no position in the colonial government profited most from the new
industrial growth. They were the same ones who sought the greatest
Hispanization in their lives and identity with peninsular Spaniards.
They invoked the law, for the Philippines had been made a Spanish
province and its inhabitants had been put on an equal legal standing
with the peninsulars.
But the law was one thing, the reality completely another. To the
Spaniards the indios were exactly that, indios , on a lower rung of the
social ladder. In the Philippines, their own country, they were by-
passed, and peninsulars were appointed to government offices. Phil-
ippine-born military career men were subordinated to peninsular
officers. And the Philippine-born clergy were perpetual assistants to
the foreign-born missionaries. It was about this time that the deroga-
tory phrase was used, hijos del pais.
A minor episode dramatized this anomaly. In 1886, an exposition
was held in Spain to show the progress of the Philippines under her
benign rule. Placed on exhibit before the curious gawking of the
peninsulars were living members of Philippine minority tribes as
types of the races Spain had civilized. Naturally, the Filipinos in Spain,
criollos or Chinese mestizos, felt insulted. They felt demeaned as a
race. Then they realized that they were Filipinos, not just Ilocanos,
or Tagalogs, Bicolanos, Visayans, etc., a people different from the
Spaniards, and with their own God-given human dignity and hu-
man rights.11 From then on, the possibility of separation from Spain
did not appear impossible. This tension must be considered when
studying the Philippine revolution of 1896.
How influential were the ideas of the Enlightenment on the local
separatist movement? Let us go back to the South American situ-
ation. One of the curious twists of history was the attitude of the
philosophes toward Spain and Latin America. In advocating humane
treatment for the indigenous Americans, Fray Bartolome de las Casas
(1474-1566), a former encomendero converted into a passionately pro-
Indian Dominican friar, had exaggerated the cruelty of the Spanish
conquistadores to discredit the secular government in the new world
and put it under Church control. His reports of Spanish cruelty on
the indigenous races were exploited by Spain's enemies and served
as fodder for the leyenda negra of Spanish cruelty, obscurantism,
inhumanity, etc.12 In the eighteenth century, French and other for-
11. John N. Schumacher, S.J., The Propaganda Movement: 1880-1895 (Manila: Solidari-
dad, 1973).
12. Literature on Fray Bartolome de las Casas, O.P. is abundant. One can start with
Lewis Hanke and Manuel Gimenez Fernandez, Bartolome de ias Casas (1474-1566). Bib-
liografia critica (Santiago dé Chile, 1954). The most famous oř Las Casas' works is his
Brevísima relación de la detruickm de las Indias (1552) which he wrote for Philip II of Spain.
This, together with the sketches of Theodore de Bry occasioned the negative conclusions
about the Spanish colonial program in the new world. Ironically, it was Antonio Perez,
a deposed secretary of the Spanish king who fanned the antiSpanish fever outside of
Spain. See Romulo D. Carbia, Historia de la leyenda negra en Hispano- America (Madrid,
1944); Sverker Anderson, La Leyenda negra. Estudios sobre sus orígenes (Gotenberg, 1960);
Julian Juderias, La Leyenda negra (Madrid, 1917).
eign authors picked up the Spanish black legend for a totally differ-
ent purpose, namely, to discredit religion, in order to establish secu-
lar power over the Church. But, partly because of Las Casas who
had imbibed the political doctrine of the scholastics, partly because
of the principles of the gospel, the Spanish crown had spared no
efforts to treat the indigenous Americans humanely. This is reflected
in the famous Recopilación de leyes de los reynos de las Indias , the
comprehensive collection of royal decrees for the administration of
the colonies. In other words, right from the start, Spanish colonial
policy, despite its shortcomings, was not an all-out exploitation of
the natives, as Spain's enemies portrayed it, but was deeply imbued
with the Christian tradition of respect for the human person. In the
Americas, there was what historians today call the "fight for justice"
for the native Americans. That is why Enlightenment ideas found an
easy welcome in South America because the ground had been pre-
pared for them. They were not a novelty. The only difference was
that these ideas of freedom, justice, equality, etc. which had ener-
gized the people into war, appeared not only to have been born of
rational deduction , but also confirmed by the success of such noncon-
fessional states as the new North American republic and the anti-
clerical France created by Napoleon.
This doctrine was brought across the Pacific by a disciple of Las
Casas, Fray Domingo de Salazar, the first bishop of the Philippines.
Still not fully studied, the Salazar theory insisted that rather than
despoiling a man, the gospel perfected what he already had.13 In other
words, the freedom, the right to rule themselves in peace and justice
were not to be denied the indigenous tribes of the Philippines if
certain conditions were fulfilled. The Spanish Crown could rule the
Filipinos only on condition that it promoted the gospel message of
Christ, a view legalized by the Spanish patronato real de Índias.
That is why, according to Rizal, at the time of the conquest and in
the later 300 years, the indigenous tribes had accepted the Spanish
government. The Spaniards treated the people humanely. Against
abuses by Spanish encomenderos, Spanish friars stood up to defend
them. Native troops fought side by side with Spanish, some govern-
13. Jose S. Arcilla, S.J., "Christian Missions to China and the Philippines/' Philippine
Studies 31 (1983): 468-76; John L. Phelan, 'Some Ideological Aspects of the Conquest of
the Philippines," The Americas 13 (1957): 221-39; Lucio Gutierrez, O.P., "Domingo Salazar,
O.P., Primer Obispo de Filipinas (1512-1594). Trabajo Misional y Civilizador en Méjico
y Filipinas (1512-1594). Trabajo Misional y Civilizador en Méjico y Filipinas (1553-1596)/'
Phüippiniana Sacra 12 (19 77): 514-68; "Labor Evangelizadora y Misional de Domingo de
Salazar en Filipinas/' XIII (1978): 430-96; "Domingo de Salazaťs Struggle for Justice and
Humanization in the Conquest of the Philippines (1579-1596)/' XIV (1979): 219-82.
ment offices were even open to Filipinos. But by the second half of
the nineteenth century this was no longer true. When rich Filipinos
went to Spain, the excesses of the French revolution had already
soured the Englightenment for a good number of Spaniards. But
liberal anticlericalism pervaded the air. It was a heady freedom that
intoxicated the Filipino expatriates. Not without cause. As described
by Blumentritt, Rizal, for example, found out that
. . . the Philippines was a land where hypocrisy had its seat; where the
Spaniards, friars, officials, military men, etc. enjoyed unlimited power over
body and soul. In Madrid, he could see the opposite: free-thinkers and
atheists speaking freely about one's religion and his Church without
shedding his blood. He found minimal exercise of government authority.
He did not see the fight which he was expecting between liberals and
clericals. He saw, on the contrary, that the republicans sind carlists [i.e.,
conservatives] were many times united in order to realize a political ideal.
Observing all this, a feeling of bitterness overwhelmed him when he
compared the difference existing between the untrammeled freedom in
the motherland and the theocratic absolutism in his land.14
This was precisely the period when in the Philippines the secu-
larization of the parishes was a burning issue. Just as in America,
the expulsion of the Jesuits caused a severe shortage of priests. Had
there been enough secular priests in the country, there would have
been no problem. But, first, despite the king's plan to secularize the
parishes - in order to control the Church better - the badly trained
Philippine-born clergy made him change his mind. Second, because
the South American wars had been started by a native-born priest in
Mexico, the Madrid government, not wanting a repetition of the
events in the Philippines, adopted a policy of repressing the Philip-
pine-born priests. Parishes they administered were handed over to
the friars.
We need not repeat the details of this spoliation, the protests by
Frs. Pelaéz and Burgos, and their climax with GOMBURZA. They are
sufficiently well known. But let me bring out a few points.
Throughout this polemic, neither Pelaez nor Burgos ever descended
to personal attacks, but limited themselves to the issue of church law,
justice, and natural or inalienable rights, arguments based on reason
and legal tradition. It was the friars who kept hammering at the
personal shortcomings of the Filipino priests, their alleged ineptitude,
suspicious orthodoxy or loyalty, and lack of culture. They dung to
outmoded claims of racial superiority at a time when Rousseau's
admiration for the noble savage had already inspired writings like
14. Escritos de ]ose Rizal (EJR) I, 106.
ENUGHTENMENT AND REVOLUTION 367
Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (1719) and other fictional travel books.
If the charges against the Filipino clergy were true, the solution was
not to deprive them of their parishes, but to train them better and
impose stricter norms for priestly ordination.
So far, the problem was within the Church. But the controversy
catapulted Burgos into the public eye, and a trigger-happy govern-
ment kept him under surveillance. Governor Carlos Ma. de la Torre
(1869-71), anticlerical because he was a liberal, ordered the censor-
ship of the mail, not only of Burgos, but of other prominent figures
in Manila. When Burgos was finally implicated in the Cavite mutiny,
the death sentence imposed by the military tribunal received imme-
diate confirmation from Izquierdo, the new Governor General, noto-
rious in Philippine history for his refusal to show the trial records to
the Archbishop. But, historians agree, the public execution of three
very probably innocent priests spelled the doom of the Spanish gov-
ernment in the Philippines.15
The sequel is well known. GOMBURZA, an internal problem of
Church discipline, had repercussions outside of the Church. As Rizal
later admitted, had it not been for 1872, he would have become
a Jesuit, and, instead of Noli me tangere , would have written the
opposite.16
JOSE RIZAL
Rizal is without doubt the greatest protagonist for recognition of

Filipino rights and equality before the law. A product of the best
schools in his country, his contact with liberal rationalism in Spain
reoriented his life. Befriended by the leading anticlericals, he gave
up the external practices of the religion of his youth. One of the
authors he most admired was Voltaire, who served both as his ideo-
logical and artistic inspiration. He even urged del Pilar to study
French in order to be able to read the works of Voltaire, the chief
conteur et philosophe of the Enlightenment.17 Among Rizal's sketches -
at least, those preserved in the manuscript section of the Newberry
Library (Chicago) - several depict Voltaire. Later, as an exile in
15. Leandro Tomo Sauz, "The Cavite Mutiny: Five Unknown Trials/' in Jose S.
Arcilla, S. J., ed., Understanding the Noli: Its Historical Context and literary Influences (Quezon
Gty: Phoenix Publishing, 1988), pp. 45-56; 1872, trans. Antonio M. Molina (Manila: His-
torical Conservation Society, 1973).
16. Rizal to Mariano Ponce, 18 April 1889: EJR, II, 3, 1, 356.
17. Rizal wrote to del Pilar, . . you will be able to read the complete works of
Voltaire, whose beautiful, simple, and correct style is admirable besides being in har-
mony with his manner of thinking." EJR III, 2, 1, 274.
Dapitan and using rational arguments in an epistolary debate with

his former spiritual guide and confessor at the Ateneo, he remained
unconvinced of the claims of the Church, even to the extent of fore-
going his plan at the time to marry the Roman Catholic Josephine
Bracken.
What were Rizal' s ideas which historians say planted a separatist
attitude among his readers? By his time, Rizal wrote, relations be-
tween Spaniards and Filipinos needed to be changed.18 The traditional
master-subject relationship between the two belonged to the past. To
continue that would be counterproductive. The question was whether
Spain would be willing to direct this change, or, by neglect, leave
the initiative to the Filipinos, and risk a violent revolution. Change
from above would always be peaceful, but no one could guarantee
that change from below would be bloodless.
Spain had no choice actually, Rizal claimed. In Rizal' s words, not
only were the Filipinos despised, but they were insulted, denied the
basic human capacity to reason so that they did not have even the
ability to commit crime. They were described as brutes, mere muscles
without brains! And, during the secularization campaign, and espe-
cially after the Spanish-American revolution, the government carried
out an outmoded program of insult and degradation. Discrimination
against native-born Filipinos was official policy. Parishes were taken
from Filipino priests, not because they were inept, or heretical, but
simply because they were Filipino. Legally equal to the peninsulars,
the Filipino ilustrados , hispanized, well educated, many of them loyal
to the Catholic Church, were despised by the peninsulars. And so,
as in South America earlier, the Filipino criollos found themselves
pitted against the peninsulars. This gave birth to their sense of being
different, and at the same time gave them a sense of oneness among
themselves. They no longer considered themselves as Tagalogs, or
Visayans, or Bicolanos, but Filipinos. What physical and legal abuse
could not effect, psychological abuse did. Thus was born the Philip-
pine nation.
But still it was hoped Spain would change its mind. Revolution
could still be avoided. Spain could continue in her benighted ways
and abuse the Filipinos in one of four ways: brutalize the Filipinos,
impoverish them, stop them from increasing in numbers, or divide
in order to conquer them. None would succeed, Rizal thought. The
more Spain brutalized or kept the Filipinos ignorant, the greater the
possibility of a violent reaction. For it would not be the wealthy, the
18. Jose Rizal, Filipinos dentro de cien anos (Manila, 1922).
contented, or the educated, but the poor, the desperate, the ignorant
who would risk anything to effect a change. And as a matter of fact,
against all odds, the Filipinos had succeeded in educating themselves,
in cases even better than the Spaniards. Stop the population from
increasing? Perhaps, Rizal wrote, this could be possible with the
Caucasians, but not the Malays. How many plagues, floods, typhoons,
battles for and with the Spaniards had taken Filipino lives? And yet,
the population had increased! Divide and conquer, then? Not in
Rizal' s time. Previously, military units were sent to regions other than
their own, the Visayan troops to llocos, the Tagalogs to the Visayas,
the Bicolanos to the Tagalog area. But, instead of dividing the people,
they came to realize they had the same grievances, or that they had
one common adversary. Instead of dividing, the practice had united
them into a people.
Repression, then, was imprudent. Quoting Voltaire, one of his
favorite authors, Rizal wrote that every increase of pressure built up
a greater counter-pressure, a greater head of steam behind the deter-
mination of the Filipinos to win equality with the white man and a
share in their own government. It was no longer whether changes or
reforms should be introduced, but what these ought to be.
It is here that Rizal clearly stands head and shoulders above all
the other propaganda writers. For while the others were negative, he
approached the matter positively and wrote that both Filipinos and
Spaniards needed to reform. The Spaniards, first, by granting free-
dom of speech and representation in the Cortes. Separated by two
oceans from each other, these two measures were needed for proper
legislation. There were many others, but this was basic, in Rizal's
mind. Rizal advocated a total moral regeneration of his countrymen,
without which they did not deserve self-rule. That is why, to the end,
he refused to think of violent revolution against Spain.
The Filipinos needed two basic social virtues: economia and tansi-
gencia . Economia, that is, making the best use of existing resources,
for no nation has all the resources it needs. And transigencia, that is,
mutual give and take. For if the people wanted a democratic state,
they should be ready for it. Democracy is intelligent cooperation,
government by dialogue, not that one's opinion might prevail over
the rest, but to arrive at a consensus for the common good. This was
not easy, and the Filipinos, an extremely sensitive people, must learn
by hard discipline and education to cooperate with one another.
Exactly how many read Rizal will never be known, for only about
10 percent of the population knew Spanish. But one notes in Rizal,
as in the French philosophes, confidence in the power of reason. He
dreamed of educating his countrymen, training them to think and

use their minds properly. Call him a humanist or a romanticist, but
as Fr. Florentino in the Fili said:
I do not mean to say that our freedom must be won at the point of the
sword; the sword counts very little in the destinies of our times; but I do
say that we must win our freedom by deserving it, by improving the mind
and enhancing the dignity of the individual, loving what is just, what is
good, what is great, to the point of dying for it. . . . If Spain were to see
us less tolerant of tyranny and readier to fight and suffer for our rights,
Spain would be the first to give us freedom. . . .19
The number of those who read Rizal is not as important as that

he moved his readers to action, including, unfortunately, the Spanish
colonial government. But those who felt he had aimed at them wanted
to be rid of him; his friends wanted to make him their leader. Luna,
for example, did not leave Rizal in Hongkong in peace, urging him
to lead a revolution. But, convinced the Filipinos were not ready,
Rizal wanted rather to prepare the people before they should enjoy
self-rule.
One must note that Rizal was convinced the friars should not
meddle with the education, or even with the government of the
people. Clearly influenced by the rationalism of the Enlightenment,
he had lost respect for the friars in the Philippines, and was willing
to let them continue in the country, provided they limited themselves
to purely evangelical work.
THE MAKING OF A REVOLUTION
Four things are needed for a revolution to succeed: a complaint, a

perceived solution, a leader, and the means to carry out the revolu-
tionary plan. We can trace two of the elements that prepared for
change: a complaint, namely, the unequal treatment given to the
Filipinos; and a perceived solution, namely, the reforms demanded
by the propagandists best expressed by Rizal' s hope in education for
the Filipinos. Besides, one must note that, by their nature, colonies
are self-liquidating. Even the most egoistic and inhuman exploitation
of colonies develops the latter. In time, they become as good as the
mother country, as was the case of the Spanish colonies in South
America.
19. Jose Rizal, El filibusterismo. Tr. Leon Ma Guerrero (London, 1969), p. 297.
Will the home government, then, grant freedom to the colony it

has developed? This was the underlying issue in the propaganda
movement. It was occasioned by an ecclesiastical issue at a time when
the anticlerical liberalism spawned by the Enlightenment pervaded
Spain. To the end, Rizal refused to accept violent revolution as the
solution. But at one given moment, fortuitous circumstances unex-
pectedly converged, and a leader arose who channeled what other-
wise would have been an aimless outburst of energy.
Andres Bonifacio, though not personally known to Rizal, was
present during the organization of Rizal's Liga Filipina in Tondo. When
Rizal's exile aborted the Liga, Bonifacio organized his Katipunan.
Although not an intellectual, we know that Bonifacio had read about
the French revolution and Rizal's novels. But Emilio Jacinto, a younger
man inspired by Bonifacio, had the gift of writing. It is in Jacinto's
Ang dapat mabatid ng mga Tagalog, that we find perhaps an instance
of the influence of the Englightenment on the leaders of the Philip-
pine revolution. The Katipunan, he wrote,
. . . pursues a great and important object: to unify the hearts and minds
of the Filipinos by means of a sincere oath in order that this unity may
have the strength to tear the thick veil that binds the intelligence and in
order that the true road to Reason and Enlightenment may be found.20
And in Bonifacio's "What the Filipinos Should Know" we read:

What, then, must we do? The sun of reason that shines in the East clearly
shows to our eyes that have long been blinded the path that we ought to
follow: by its light we can see the claws of cruelty threatening us with
death. Reason tells us that we cannot expect anything but more and more
insults, more and more slavery. Reason tells us not to fritter away time
hoping for the promised prosperity that will never come and will never
materialize. Reason tells us to be united in sentiments, in thoughts and in
purposes, in order that we may have the strength to find the means of
combating the prevailing evils in our country.21
It is now time for the light of truth to shine. . . P
On 26 December 1896, the military court found Rizal guilty of the

crimes of "founding illegal associations and of promoting and incit-
ing to rebellion, the first being a necessary means to the commission
of the second. . . ." In the judgment of the court, his writings had
20. In Teodoro A. Agoncillo, The Revolt of the Masses : The Story of Bonifacio and the
Katipunan (Quezon City: University of the Philippines, 1956), p. 85.
21. Ibid., pp. 92-93.
22. Ibid.
provided the inspiration and the strength that energized the people
to rise in arms against the government. Despite his denials of any
personal participation in the uprising or contact with, the rebels, he
was sentenced to die before a firing squad.23
A recent book, however, hints that the role of the ilustrados is not
enough to understand the Philippine revolution. Instead of looking
at the revolution "from above," as has been customary, the author
writes, we should also look at it "from below." Following the meth-
odology of structuralism, Ileto's Pasyon and Revolution2* seeks to prove
that it was the traditional verse compositions in Tagalog of Christ's
Passion and death that gave the ordinary people a form in which to
express their inner sentiments.25 The unlettered people identified
themselves with Christ, and they were willing to suffer and die,
confident that, like Christ, they would rise in glory, at the end of
their suffering. In other words, if we understand this theory rightly,
the leaders would not have found the followers to mount a revolu-
tion if the latter had not been motivated - not necessarily by the
Enlightenment but by their Christian values.
Scholars disagree on how valid this method is in historical research,
and I shall not join this debate. But we get a glimpse into some of
the followers' mentality from the acts of the trial of Rizal. He was
implicated in the uprising because, without his knowledge or con-
sent, the captured insurgents admitted using his portrait and his name
as a rallying point. At least, certainly, two important members of the
Katipunan, Emilio Jacinto and Jose Turiano Santiago, ended speeches
with almost identical words: "Long live the Philippines! Long Live
Liberty! Long live Dr. Rizal!" As the court sentence expressed it,
Jose Rizal Mercado is the principal organizer and the very soul of the
Philippine insurrection; the author of associations, periodicals and books
dedicated to the cultivation and dissemination of ideas instigating
the people to rebellion and sedition; and the supreme head of the re-
volution.26
23. The Trial of Rizal, trans. Horacio de la Costa, S.J. (Manila: Ateneo de Manila
University Press, 1961), 137.
24. Reynaldo C. lieto, Pasyon and Revolution. Popular Movements in the Philippines,
1840-1910 (Quezon Gty: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1979). See also Milagros
C. Guerrero, "Understanding Philippine Revolutionary Mentality," Philippine Studies 29
(1981): 240-56; Reynaldo C lieto, "Critical Issues in 'Understanding Philippine Revolu-
tionary Mentality"," Phūippme Studies 30 (1982): 92-119.
25. Rene 8. J avellana, S.J. (ed., annot., tr.) Casaysayan ruing Pasyong Mahal ni Jesucris-
tong Panginoon Natin na Sulat Jpag-alab nang Puso nang Sinomang Babosa (Quezon City:
Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1988).
26. See note 20 above.
CONCLUSION
We know that, although the Katipunan aimed explicitly to topple

the colonial government, an unforeseen incident precipitated the
events. The discovery of their plot left Bonifacio's group no other
choice but to fight. But revolutions do not happen overnight. A long
preparatory period, often unnoticed, always precedes the open clash
of arms. Like the South American wars, a major factor in the Philip-
pine Revolution certainly was the suffering of the people under a
less than ideal government. Against this was the gospel tradition
upholding the dignity of the human person, a tradition preached by
the missionaries, though perhaps in cases not always followed. But
the people had no voice and were resigned to their fate. They had to
be made conscious of their situation. Above all, they had to be given
an ideal, the courage and confidence that life could also be better.
As a friend enthusiastically wrote to Rizal after reading the Noli , what
everyone else felt and knew but was afraid to express was finally
said openly.27 The court, then, was right, but perhaps for the wrong
reason. Rizal, a man clearly influenced by the Enlightenment, was
the spokesman of the oppressed and silent Filipinos who finally found
a voice - and not only a voice, but the resolve to change things,
violently if necessary.
27. Perhaps the reaction to the Noli which Rizal most appreciated was that of Blumen-
tritt who had written that the novel was like a stone aimed at a beehive, and one written
mit Herzblut and speaks to the heart. Similarly appreciated was the critique by Fr.
Vicente Garcia, a native-born Filipino priest and doctor in theology, who wrote that
work was a piece of literature and should be judged accordingly. Neither did it attack
religion, but only its abuses. Several close friends sent their congratulations to Rizal.

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The Enlightenment and the Philippine Revolution

Author(s): JOSE S. ARCILLA

The Enlightenment and the Philippine Revolution

It is beyond doubt that the South American wars of independence in

THE SOUTH AMERICAN EXPERIENCE

Recent studies warn against simplistic conclusions, but the South

sharpened the inchoate sense of American identity were another factor

satisfaction as the "primary element" which resulted in the Ameri-

THE PHILIPPINE EXPERIENCE

14. Escritos de ]ose Rizal (EJR) I, 106.

Rizal is without doubt the greatest protagonist for recognition of

Dapitan and using rational arguments in an epistolary debate with

18. Jose Rizal, Filipinos dentro de cien anos (Manila, 1922).

dreamed of educating his countrymen, training them to think and

The number of those who read Rizal is not as important as that

THE MAKING OF A REVOLUTION

Four things are needed for a revolution to succeed: a complaint, a

Will the home government, then, grant freedom to the colony it

And in Bonifacio's "What the Filipinos Should Know" we read:

On 26 December 1896, the military court found Rizal guilty of the

We know that, although the Katipunan aimed explicitly to topple

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