As "Filipinas dentro de Cien Anos", this article was originally
published serially in the Filipino fortnightly review "La Solidaridad",
of Madrid, running through the issues from September, 1889, to
January, 1890.
It supplements Rizal's great novel "Noli Me Tangere" and its sequel
"El Filibusterismo", and the translation here given is fortunately by
Mr. Charles Derbyshire who in his "The Social Cancer" and "The Reign
of Greed" has so happily rendered into English those masterpieces
of Rizal.
The reference which Doctor Rizal makes to President Harrison had in
mind the grandson-of-his-grandfather's blundering, wavering policy
that, because of a groundless fear of infringing the natives' natural
rights, put his country in the false light of wanting to share in
Samoa's exploitation, taking the leonine portion, too, along with
Germany and England.
Robert Louis Stevenson has told the story of the unhappy
condition created by that disastrous international agreement
which was achieved by the dissembling diplomats of greedy Europe
flattering unsophisticated America into believing that two monarchies
preponderating in an alliance with a republic would be fairer than
the republic acting unhampered.
In its day the scheme was acclaimed by irrational idealists as a
triumph of American abnegation and an example of modern altruism. It
resulted that "the international agreement" became a constant cause
of international disagreements, as any student of history could have
foretold, until, disgusted and disillusioned, the United States
tardily recalled Washington's warning against entanglements with
foreign powers and became a party to a real partition, but this time
playing the lamb's part. England was compensated with concessions
in other parts of the world, the United States was "given" what it
already held under a cession twenty-seven years old,--and Germany
took the rest as her emperor had planned from the start.
There is this Philippine bearing to the incident that the same stripe
of unpractical philanthropists, not discouraged at having forced
the Samoans under the ungentle German rule--for their victims and not
themselves suffer by their mistakes, are seeking now the neutralization
by international agreement of the Archipelago for which Rizal gave
his life. Their success would mean another "entangling alliance"
for the United States, with six allies, or nine including Holland,
China and Spain, if the "great republic" should be allowed by the
diplomats of the "Great Powers" to invite these nonentities in world
politics, with whom she would still be outvoted.
Rizal's reference to America as a possible factor in the Philippines'
future is based upon the prediction of the German traveller Feodor
Jagor, who about 1860 spent a number of months in the Islands and later
published his observations, supplemented by ten years of further study
in European libraries and museums, as "Travels in the Philippines",
to use the title of the English translation,--a very poor one, by the
way. Rizal read the much better Spanish version while a student in the
Ateneo de Manila, from a copy supplied by Paciano Rizal Mercado who
directed his younger brother's political education and transferred to
Jose the hopes which had been blighted for himself by the execution of
his beloved teacher, Father Burgos, in the Cavite alleged insurrection.
Jagor's prophecy furnishes the explanation to Rizal's public life. His
policy of preparing his countrymen for industrial and commercial
competition seems to have had its inspiration in this reading done
when he was a youth in years but mature in fact through close contact
with tragic public events as well as with sensational private sorrows.
When in Berlin, Doctor Rizal met Professor Jagor, and the distinguished
geographer and his youthful but brilliant admirer became fast friends,
often discussing how the progress of events was bringing true the
fortune for the Philippines which the knowledge of its history and the
acquaintance with its then condition had enabled the trained observer
to foretell with that same certainty that the meteorologist foretells
the morrow's weather.
A like political acumen Rizal tried to develop in his countrymen. He
republished Morga's History (first published in Mexico in 1609) to
recall their past. Noli Me Tangere painted their present, and in El
Filibusterismo was sketched the future which continuance upon their
then course must bring. "The Philippines A Century Hence" suggests
other possibilities, and seems to have been the initial issue in the
series of ten which Rizal planned to print, one a year, to correct the
misunderstanding of his previous writings which had come from their
being known mainly by the extracts cited in the censors' criticism.
Jose Rizal in life voiced the aspirations of his countrymen and as
the different elements in his divided native land recognized that
these were the essentials upon which all were agreed and that their
points of difference among themselves were not vital, dissension
disappeared and there came an united Philippines. Now, since his death,
the fact that both continental and insular Americans look to him as
their hero makes possible the hope that misunderstandings based on
differences as to details may cease when Filipinos recognize that
the American Government in the Philippines, properly approached,
is willing to grant all that Rizal considered important, and when
Americans understand that the people of the Philippines, unaccustomed
to the frank discussions of democracy, would be content with so little
even as Rizal asked of Spain if only there were some salve for their
unwittingly wounded amor propio.
A better knowledge of the writings of Jose Rizal may accomplish this
desirable consummation.
"I do not write for this generation. I am writing for other
ages. If this could read me, they would burn my books, the
work of my whole life. On the other hand, the generation which
interprets these writings will be an educated generation; they
will understand me and say: 'Not all were asleep in the night-time
of our grandparents'."
--The Philosopher Tasio, in Noli Me Tangere.