in life they are often misunderstood, but when time does them justice,
they come into a fame which endures.

Doctor Rizal knew that the real Spain had generous though sluggish
intentions, and noble though erratic impulses, but it awoke too late;
too late for Doctor Rizal and too late to save the Philippines for
Spain; tardy reforms after his death were useless and the loss of
her overseas possessions was the result. Doctor Rizal lost when he
staked his life on his trust in the innate sense of honor of Spain,
for that sense of honor became temporarily blinded by a sudden but
fatal gust of passion; and it took the shock of the separation to
rouse the dormant Spanish chivalry.

Still in the main Rizal's judgment was correct, and he was the victim
of mistimed, rather than of misplaced, confidence, for as soon as
the knowledge of the real Rizal became known to the Spanish people,
belated justice began to be done his memory, and then, repentant and
remorseful, as is characteristically Castilian, there was little delay
and no half-heartedness. Another name may now be grouped with Columbus
and Cervantes among those to whom Spain has given imprisonment in
life and monuments after death--chains for the man and chaplets for
his memory. In 1896, during the few days before he could be returned
to Manila, Doctor Rizal occupied a dungeon in Montjuich Castle in
Barcelona; while on his way to assist the Spanish soldiers in Cuba
who were stricken with yellow fever, he was shipped and sent back to
a prejudged trial and an unjust execution. Fifteen years later the
Catalan city authorities commemorated the semi-centennial of this
prisoner's birth by changing, in his honor, the name of a street in
the shadow of the infamous prison of Montjuich Castle to "Calle del
Doctor Rizal."

More instances of this nature are not cited since they are not
essential to the proper understanding of Rizal's story, but let it be
made clear once for all that whatever harshness may be found in the
following pages is directed solely to those who betrayed the trust
of the mother country and selfishly abused the ample and unrestrained
powers with which Spain invested them.

And what may seem the exaltation of the Anglo-Saxons at the expense of
the Latins in these pages is intended only to point out the superiority
of their ordered system of government, with its checks and balances,
its individual rights and individual duties, under which men are
"free to live by no man's leave, underneath the Law." No human being
can be safely trusted with unlimited power, and no man, no matter
what his nationality, could have withstood the temptations offered by
the chaotic conditions in the Philippines in past times any better
than did the Spaniards. There is nothing written in this book that
should convey the opinion that in similar circumstances men of any
nationality would not have acted as the Spaniards did. The easiest
recognized characteristic of absolutism, and all the abuses and
corruption it brings in its train, is fear of criticism, and Spain
drew her own indictment in the Philippines when she executed Rizal.

When any nation sets out to enroll all its scholarly critics among
the martyrs in the cause of Liberty, it makes an open confession of
guilt to all the world. For a quarter of a century Spain had been
ruling in the Philippines by terrorizing its subjects there, and
Rizal's execution, with utter disregard of the most elementary rules
of judicial procedure, was the culmination that drove the Filipinos
to desperation and arrested the attention of the whole civilized
world. It was evident that Rizal's fate might have been that of any
of his countrymen, and the thinking world saw that events had taken
such a course in the Philippines that it had become justifiable for
the Filipinos to attempt to dissolve the political bands which had
connected them with Spain for over three centuries.

Such action by the Filipinos would not have been warranted by a
solitary instance of unjust execution under stress of political
excitement that did not indicate the existence of a settled
policy. Such instances are rather to be classed among the mistakes
to which governments as well as individuals are liable. Yet even such
a mistake may be avoided by certain precautions which experience has
suggested, and the nation that disregards these precautions is justly
open to criticism.

Our present Philippine government guarantees to its citizens as
fundamental rights, that no person shall be held to answer for a
capital crime unless on an indictment, nor may he be compelled in any
criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life,
liberty or property without due process of law. The accused must have
a speedy, public and impartial trial, be informed of the nature and
cause of the accusation, be confronted with the witnesses against him,
have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and have
the assistance of counsel for his defense. Not one of these safeguards
protected Doctor Rizal except that he had an "open trial," if that name
may be given to a courtroom filled with his enemies openly clamoring
for his death without rebuke from the court. Even the presumption of
innocence till guilt was established was denied him. These precautions
have been considered necessary for every criminal trial, but the
framers of the American Constitution, fearful lest popular prejudice
some day might cause injustice to those advocating unpopular ideals,
prohibited the irremediable penalty of death upon a charge of treason
except where the testimony of two reliable witnesses established some
overt act, inference not being admissible as evidence.

Such protection was not given the subjects of Spain, but still, with
all the laxity of the Spanish law, and even if all the charges had been
true, which they were far from being, no case was made out against
Doctor Rizal at his trial. According to the laws then in effect, he
was unfairly convicted and he should be considered innocent; for this