Rizal

"Through Education the Country Receives Light" (1876) [NOTE: See below].

"Reading, a Great Consolation in Severe Misfortune" (1877)

He had already decided that education was the hope of salvation for his country,

and from this faith he did not swerve to the end of his life.

When in later years he was surrounded by revolutionists in Europe and in the Philippines,

he resolutely opposed the pathway of violence and clung to education not only in theory but by his example.

He became not only the best educated Malay, but one of the most astonishingly versatile scholars of his day in any race.

The following poem, written at the age of fifteen, is a clue to the inner motive of Rizal's intense life.

Is there a parallel in history from the pen of a boy so young?

Dr. Pardo de Tavera writes: "We remain dumbfounded and cannot discover whence he took such ideas expressed with such sureness.

What mysterious Power had given that brain such confidence in education?" (05)

THROUGH EDUCATION OUR MOTHERLAND RECEIVES LIGHT

The vital breath of prudent Education

Instills a virtue of enchanting power;

She lifts the motherland to highest station

And endless dazzling glories on her shower.

And as the zephyr's gentle exhalation

Revives the matrix of the fragrant flower,

So education multiplies her gifts of grace;

With prudent hand imparts them to the human race.

For her a mortal-man will gladly part

With all he has; will give his calm repose;

For her are born all science and all art,

That brows of men with laurel fair enclose.

As from the towering mountain's lofty heart

The purest current of the streamlet flows,

So education without stint or measure gives

Security and peace to lands in which she lives.

Where Education reigns on lofty seat

Youth blossoms forth with vigor and agility;

He error subjugates with solid feet,

And is exalted by conceptions of nobility.

She breaks the neck of vice and its deceit;

Black crime turns pale at Her...