The Reign of Greed
suggestions. Like a wise diplomat, Padre Fernandez not only recognized
the fact but even took his stand upon it.
“Good enough!” he said. “But don’t look upon me as your professor. I’m
a friar and you are a Filipino student, nothing more nor less! Now I
ask you—what do the Filipino students want of us?”
The question came as a surprise; Isagani was not prepared for it. It
was a thrust made suddenly while they were preparing their defense, as
they say in fencing. Thus startled, Isagani responded with a violent
stand, like a beginner defending himself.
“That you do your duty!” he exclaimed.
Fray Fernandez straightened up—that reply sounded to him like a
cannon-shot. “That we do our duty!” he repeated, holding himself erect.
“Don’t we, then, do our duty? What duties do you ascribe to us?”
“Those which you voluntarily placed upon yourselves on joining the
order, and those which afterwards, once in it, you have been willing to
assume. But, as a Filipino student, I don’t think myself called upon to
examine your conduct with reference to your statutes, to Catholicism,
to the government, to the Filipino people, and to humanity in
general—those are questions that you have to settle with your founders,
with the Pope, with the government, with the whole people, and with
God. As a Filipino student, I will confine myself to your duties toward
us. The friars in general, being the local supervisors of education in
the provinces, and the Dominicans in particular, by monopolizing in
their hands all the studies of the Filipino youth, have assumed the
obligation to its eight millions of inhabitants, to Spain, and to
humanity, of which we form a part, of steadily bettering the young
plant, morally and physically, of training it toward its happiness, of
creating a people honest, prosperous, intelligent, virtuous, noble, and
loyal. Now I ask you in my turn—have the friars fulfilled that
obligation of theirs?”
“We’re fulfilling—”
“Ah, Padre Fernandez,” interrupted Isagani, “you with your hand on your
heart can say that you are fulfilling it, but with your hand on the
heart of your order, on the heart of all the orders, you cannot say
that without deceiving yourself. Ah, Padre Fernandez, when I find
myself in the presence of a person whom I esteem and respect, I prefer
to be the accused rather than the accuser, I prefer to defend myself
rather than take the offensive. But now that we have entered upon the
discussion, let us carry it to the end! How do they fulfill their
obligation, those who look after education in the towns? By hindering
it! And those who here monopolize education, those who try to mold the
mind of youth, to the exclusion of all others whomsoever, how do they
carry out their mission? By curtailing knowledge as much as possible,
by extinguishing all ardor and enthusiasm, by trampling on all dignity,
the soul’s only refuge, by inculcating in us worn-out ideas, rancid
beliefs, false principles incompatible with a life of progress! Ah,
yes, when it is a question of feeding convicts, of providing for the
maintenance of criminals, the government calls for bids in order to
find the purveyor who offers the best means of subsistence, he who at
least will not let them perish from hunger, but when it is a question
of morally feeding a whole people, of nourishing the intellect of
youth, the healthiest part, that which is later to be the country and
the all, the government not only does not ask for any bid, but
restricts the power to that very body which makes a boast of not
desiring education, of wishing no advancement. What should we say if
the purveyor for the prisons, after securing the contract by intrigue,
should then leave the prisoners to languish in want, giving them only
what is stale and rancid, excusing himself afterwards by saying that it
is not convenient for the prisoners to enjoy good health, because good
health brings merry thoughts, because merriment improves the man, and
the man ought not to be improved, because it is to the purveyor’s
interest that there be many criminals? What should we say if afterwards
the government and the purveyor should agree between themselves that of
the ten or twelve cuartos which one received for each criminal, the
other should receive five?”
Padre Fernandek bit his lip. “Those are grave charges,” he said, “and
you are overstepping the limits of our agreement.”
“No, Padre, not if I continue to deal with the student question. The
friars—and I do not say, you friars, since I do not confuse you with
the common herd—the friars of all the orders have constituted
themselves our mental purveyors, yet they say and shamelessly proclaim
that it is not expedient for us to become enlightened, because some day
we shall declare ourselves free! That is just the same as not wishing
the prisoner to be well-fed so that he may improve and get out of
prison. Liberty is to man what education is to the intelligence, and
the friars’ unwillingness that we have it is the origin of our
discontent.”
“Instruction is given only to those who deserve it,” rejoined Padre
Fernandez dryly. “To give it to men without character and without
morality is to prostitute it.”
“Why are there men without character and without morality?”
The Dominican shrugged his shoulders. “Defects that they imbibe with
their mothers’ milk, that they breathe in the bosom of the family—how
do I know?”
“Ah, no, Padre Fernandez!” exclaimed the young man impetuously. “You
have not dared to go into the subject deeply, you have not wished to
gaze into the depths from fear of finding yourself there in the
darkness of your brethren. What we are, you have made us. A people
tyrannized over is forced to be hypocritical; a people denied the truth
must resort to lies; and he who makes himself a tyrant breeds slaves.
There is no morality, you say, so let it be—even though statistics can
refute you in that here are not committed crimes like those among other
peoples, blinded by the fumes of their moralizers. But, without
attempting now to analyze what it is that forms the character and how
far the education received determines morality, I will agree with you
that we are defective. Who is to blame for that? You who for three
centuries and a half have had in your hands our education, or we who
submit to everything? If after three centuries and a half the artist
has been able to produce only a caricature, stupid indeed he must be!”
“Or bad enough the material he works upon.”
“Stupider still then, when, knowing it to be bad, he does not give it
up, but goes on wasting time. Not only is he stupid, but he is a cheat
and a robber, because he knows that his work is useless, yet continues
to draw his salary. Not only is he stupid and a thief, he is a villain
in that he prevents any other workman from trying his skill to see if
he might not produce something worth while! The deadly jealousy of the
incompetent!”
The reply was sharp and Padre Fernandez felt himself caught. To his
gaze Isagani appeared gigantic, invincible, convincing, and for the
first time in his life he felt beaten by a Filipino student. He
repented of having provoked the argument, but it was too late to turn
back. In this quandary, finding himself confronted with such a
formidable adversary, he sought a strong shield and laid hold of the
government.
“You impute all the faults to us, because you see only us, who are
near,” he said in a less haughty tone. “It’s natural and doesn’t
surprise me. A person hates the soldier or policeman who arrests him
and not the judge who sends him to prison. You and we are both dancing
to the same measure of music—if at the same note you lift your foot in
unison with us, don’t blame us for it, it’s the music that is directing
our movements. Do you think that we friars have no consciences and that
we do not desire what is right? Do you believe that we do not think
about you, that we do not heed our duty, that we only eat to live, and
live to rule? Would that it were so! But we, like you, follow the
cadence, finding ourselves between Scylla and Charybdis: either you
reject us or the government rejects us. The government commands, and he
who commands, commands,—and must be obeyed!”
“From which it may be inferred,” remarked Isagani with a bitter smile,
“that the government wishes our demoralization.”
“Oh, no, I didn’t mean that! What I meant to say is that there are
beliefs, there are theories, there are laws, which, dictated with the
best intention, produce the most deplorable consequences. I’ll explain
myself better by citing an example. To stamp out a small evil, there
are dictated many laws that cause greater evils still: ‘corruptissima
in republica plurimae leges,’ said Tacitus. To prevent one case of
fraud, there are provided a million and a half preventive or
humiliating regulations, which produce the immediate effect of
awakening in the public the desire to elude and mock such regulations.
To make a people criminal, there’s nothing more needed than to doubt
its virtue. Enact a law, not only here, but even in Spain, and you will
see how the means of evading it will be sought, and this is for the
very reason that the legislators have overlooked the fact that the more
an object is hidden, the more a sight of it is desired. Why are
rascality and astuteness regarded as great qualities in the Spanish
people, when there is no other so noble, so proud, so chivalrous as it?
Because our legislators, with the best intentions, have doubted its
nobility, wounded its pride, challenged its chivalry! Do you wish to
open in Spain a road among the rocks? Then place there an imperative
notice forbidding the passage, and the people, in order to protest
against the order, will leave the highway to clamber over the rocks.
The day on which some legislator in Spain forbids virtue and commands
vice, then all will become virtuous!”
The Dominican paused for a brief space, then resumed: “But you may say
that we are getting away from the subject, so I’ll return to it. What I
can say to you, to convince you, is that the vices from which you
suffer ought to be ascribed by you neither to us nor to the government.
They are due to the imperfect organization of our social system: qui
multum probat, nihil probat, one loses himself through excessive
caution, lacking what is necessary and having too much of what is
superfluous.”
“If you admit those defects in your social system,” replied Isagani,
“why then do you undertake to regulate alien societies, instead of
first devoting your attention to yourselves?”
“We’re getting away from the subject, young man. The theory in
accomplished facts must be accepted.”
“So let it be! I accept it because it is an accomplished fact, but I
will further ask: why, if your social organization is defective, do you
not change it or at least give heed to the cry of those who are injured
by it?”
“We’re still far away. Let’s talk about what the students want from the
friars.”
“From the moment when the friars hide themselves behind the government,
the students have to turn to it.”
This statement was true and there appeared no means of ignoring it.
“I’m not the government and I can’t answer for its acts. What do the
students wish us to do for them within the limits by which we are
confined?”
“Not to oppose the emancipation of education but to favor it.”
The Dominican shook his head. “Without stating my own opinion, that is
asking us to commit suicide,” he said.
“On the contrary, it is asking you for room to pass in order not to
trample upon and crush you.”
“Ahem!” coughed Padre Fernandez, stopping and remaining thoughtful.
“Begin by asking something that does not cost so much, something that
any one of us can grant without abatement of dignity or privilege, for