Rizal
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
JOSÉ, a Filipino patriot; born in Calamba, Luzon, in 1861. He was the son of unmixed Tagal parents, who destined him for the Church. He received his early education in his native town under a Tagal priest. Later he was sent to Manila, where he entered a Jesuit school, the Ateneo Municipal. At this time José assumed the name of Rist priest ily name, Mercado, into great disfavor had brought the famwith the Spaniards. In Manila José soon learned of the reproach attached to his Tagal origin. He was denied the honors due him as head of his class, and met with derision and hatred from the Spanish students. In many ways his prejudices against the Spanish were roused. Though he had been destined for the Church, he studied for and took his medical degree at Manila. Then he went to Paris, Heidelberg, Leipsic, and in all these cities he continued his medical studies. At the same time he developed his interest in social and political problems. He learned that Europe was almost ignorant of the Philippines, so he wrote a novel, portraying his birthland, which was published in Berlin in 1887. This book was forbidden by the Church. He wrote a sequel to it which was published at Ghent in 1891. His portrait-bust of the Filipino-Creole, Dr. T. H. Pardo, was exhibited in the Salon. In 1887 Rizal went to Hong Kong where he organized the famous Liga Filipino, or Philippine League, which was the source of the "Revolutionary Society of the Sons of the Nation." During several years of travel he constantly agitated Filipino revolt, and then in May, 1892, returned to Manila. He was arrested and exiled to Dapitan. In 1895 he was permitted to return to Luzon. He was, however, arrested at Barcelona and transshipped to Manila, tried and condemned to death. His last wishes, that he might be united by civil marriage with Miss Josephine Bracken, whom he first met in Hong K Kong, and the other, that he should be shot through the breast, were granted. He was shot by a picket of native soldiers, Dec. 30, 1896, and his last words were, "Consummatum est!" 65 ROAD AND STREET MACHINERY
What Has Changed in the Last Century
When Collier's wrote this in 1921 the Philippines was an American possession and Rizal was still just "a Filipino patriot" of recent memory; he is now the country's national hero, executed on ground that became Rizal Park in Manila, where the monument raised over his remains in 1913 still stands. Independence came in 1946, and Rizal Day, 30 December, is a national holiday; the Rizal Law of 1956 made his two novels, Noli Me Tangere (Berlin, 1887) and El Filibusterismo (Ghent, 1891), required reading in Philippine schools. Modern scholarship reverses the entry's claim that he "constantly agitated Filipino revolt": Rizal was a reformist who sought representation within Spain and repudiated the 1896 uprising when Bonifacio's Katipunan launched it, which is itself now a live argument about whether an executed non-revolutionary was the right hero for the state to choose. The details have also been corrected — the Liga Filipina was founded in Manila in 1892, not Hong Kong in 1887, and his 1896 arrest came while he was travelling to serve as a doctor in Cuba.
Written for this edition, 2026.