Jose Rizal quotes:

The government that governs from afar absolutely requires that the truth and the facts reach its knowledge by every possible channel, so that it may weigh and estimate them better, and this need increases when a country like the Philippines is concerned, where the inhabitants speak and complain in a language unknown to the authorities.

No one ceases to be a man, no one forfeits his rights to civilization merely by being more or less uncultured, and since the Filipino is regarded as a fit citizen when he is asked to pay taxes or shed his blood to defend the fatherland, why must this fitness be denied him when the question arises of granting him some right?

He who does not love his own language is worse than an animal and smelly fish.

My countrymen, I have given proofs that I am one most anxious for liberties for our country, and I am still desirous of them. But I place as a prior condition the education of the people, that by means of instruction and industry our country may have an individuality of its own and make itself worthy of these liberties.

Routine is a declivity down which many governments slide, and routine says that freedom of the press is dangerous.

I may be what my enemies desire me to be, yet never an accusation are they able to hurl against me which makes me blush or lower my forehead; and I hope that God will be merciful enough with me, to prevent me from committing one of those faults which would involve my family.

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 nighttime of our grandparents.'

The divine flame of thought is inextinguishable in the Filipino people, and somehow or other it will shine forth and compel recognition. It is impossible to brutalize the inhabitants of the Philippines!

Wealth brings with it refinement, the spirit of conservation, while poverty inspires adventurous ideas, the desire to change things, and has little care for life.

If the Philippines must remain under the control of Spain, they will necessarily have to be transformed in a political sense, for the course of their history and the needs of their inhabitants so require.

Experience has everywhere shown us, and especially in the Philippines, that the classes which are better off have always been addicted to peace and order because they live comparatively better and may be the losers in civil disturbances.

The youth is the hope of our future.

One only dies once, and if one does not die well, a good opportunity is lost and will not present itself again.

As God has not made anything useless in this world, as all beings fulfill obligations or a role in the sublime drama of Creation, I cannot exempt from this duty, and small though it be, I too have a mission to fill, as for example: alleviating the sufferings of my fellowmen.

My mother is not a woman of ordinary culture. She knows literature and speaks Spanish better than I do. She even corrected my poems and gave me advice when I was studying rhetoric.

The Filipino embraces civilization and lives and thrives in every clime, in contact with every people.

He who does not know how to look back at where he came from will never get to his destination.

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 nighttime of our grandparents.

We young Filipinos are trying to make over a nation and must not halt in our march, but from time to time turn our gaze upon our elders. We shall wish to read in their countenances approval of our actions.

It is probable that England will look favorably upon the independence of the Philippines, for it will open their ports to her and afford greater freedom to her commerce.

To doubt God is to doubt one's own conscience, and in consequence, it would be to doubt everything; and then what is life for?

While a people preserves its language; it preserves the marks of liberty.

The Spaniard is gallant and patriotic, and sacrifices everything, in favorable moments, for his country's good. He has the intrepidity of his bull.

Our liberty will not be secured at the sword's point... We must secure it by making ourselves worthy of it. And when the people reaches that height, God will provide a weapon, the idols will be shattered, tyranny will crumble like a house of cards, and liberty will shine out like the first dawn.

No one blames a pilot who takes refuge in port when the storm begins to blow. It is not cowardice to duck under a bullet; what is wrong is to defy it only to fall and never rise again.

Nasa isip ng lahat na ang gobyerno, bilang isang institusyong likha ng tao, ay nangangailangan ng tulong ng lahat, nangangailangan ito ng magpapakita at magpapaalam sa mga tunay na pangyayari."

Travel is a caprice in childhood, a passion in youth, a necessity in manhood, and an elegy in old age.

Filipinos don't realize that victory is the child of struggle, that joy blossoms from suffering, and redemption is a product of sacrifice.

Friar! What a strange name. I don't remember having created such a thing!

Would that I could die, reduce myself to nothing, leave a glorious name to my country, die in the cause of defending it against a foreign invasion and afterwards the sun will shine on my body like a permanent sentinel in these ocean rocks!"

How long have you been away from the country?" Laruja asked Ibarra."Almost seven years.""Then you have probably forgotten all about it.""Quite the contrary. Even if my country does seem to have forgotten me, I have always thought about it.

....let her be loved not only for her beauty and amiable character, but also for her strength of mind and loftiness of purpose, which enliven and raise the feeble and the timid and ward off all vain thoughts. Let her be the pride of her country and let her command respect.

I have observed that the prosperity or misery of each people is in direct proportion to its liberties or its prejudices and, accordingly, to the sacrifices or the selfishness of its forefathers. -Juan Crisostomo Ibarra

For myself I think that one wrong does not right the other, and forgiveness cannot be won with useless tears or alms to the Church.

No one has a monopoly of the true God, nor is there a nation or religion that can claim, or at any rate prove, that it has been given the exclusive right to the Creator or sole knowledge of His Being.

Spain, must we some day tell Filipinas that thou hast no ear for her woes and that if she wishes to be saved she must redeem herself?

The people no longer has confidence in its former protectors, now its exploiters and executioners. The masks have fallen.

There can be no tyrants where there are no slaves.

She was white, perhaps too white. Her eyes, which were almost always cast down, when she raised them testified to the purest of souls, and when she smiled, revealing her small, white teeth, one might be tempted to say that a rose is merely a plant, and ivory just an elephant's tusk.

I have recommended in my writings the study of civic virtues, without which there is no redemption. I have written likewise (and repeat my words) that reforms, to be beneficial, must come from above, that those which come from below are irregularly gained and uncertain.

Perhaps the great American Republic, whose interests lie in the Pacific and who has no hand in the spoliation of Africa, may someday dream of foreign possession.

History does not record in its annals any lasting domination exercised by one people over another, of different race, of diverse usages and customs, of opposite and divergent ideals. One of the two had to yield and succumb.

Of what use are all the codes in the world, if by means of confidential reports, if for trifling reasons, if through anonymous traitors any honest citizen may be exiled or banished without a hearing, without a trial?

There now exists a factor which was formerly lacking - the spirit of the nation has been aroused, and a common misfortune, a common debasement, has united all the inhabitants of the Islands.

If the Philippines secure their independence after heroic and stubborn conflicts, they can rest assured that neither England, nor Germany, nor France, and still less Holland, will dare to take up what Spain has been unable to hold.

The Philippine races, like all the Malays, do not succumb before the foreigner, like the Australians, the Polynesians and the Indians of the New World.

Justice is the foremost virtue of the civilizing races. It subdues the barbarous nations, while injustice arouses the weakest.

The batteries are gradually becoming charged, and if the prudence of the government does not provide an outlet for the currents that are accumulating, some day the spark will be generated.

China will consider herself fortunate if she succeeds in keeping herself intact and is not dismembered or partitioned among the European powers that are colonizing the continent of Asia.

Since it is necessary to grant six million Filipinos their rights, so that they may be in fact Spaniards, let the government grant these rights freely and spontaneously, without damaging reservations, without irritating mistrust.

When there is in nature no fixed condition, how much less must there be in the life of a people, beings endowed with mobility and movement!

It is a useless life that is not consecrated to a great ideal. It is like a stone wasted on the field without becoming a part of any edifice.

Orientals, and the Malays in particular, are a sensitive people: delicacy of sentiment is predominant with them.

On this battlefield man has no better weapon than his intelligence, no other force but his heart.

Ignorance is servitude, because as a man thinks, so he is; a man who does not think for himself and allows himself to be guided by the thought of another is like the beast led by a halter.

Treat your old parents as you would like to be treated by your children later.

To foretell the destiny of a nation, it is necessary to open a book that tells of her past.

I die without seeing dawn's light shining on my country... You, who will see it, welcome it for me...don't forget those who fell during the nighttime.

Genius has no country. It blossoms everywhere. Genius is like the light, the air. It is the heritage of all.

No good water comes from a muddy spring. No sweet fruit comes from a bitter seed.

It is enough for the evil people to succeed, for the good people to do nothing.

I have to believe much in God because I have lost my faith in man.

He who would love much has also much to suffer.

I go where there are no slaves, hangmen or oppressors; where faith does not kill; where the one who reigns is God.

I can concede that the government has no knowledge of the people, but I believe the people know less of the government. There are useless officials, evil, if you like, but there are also good ones, and these are not able to accomplish anything because they encounter an inert mass, the population that takes little part in matters that concern them.

I wish to show those who deny us Patriotism that we know how to die for our country and convictions.

I honor the father in his son, not the son in his father. Each one receives a reward or punishment for his deeds, but not for the acts of others.

To live is to be among men, and to be among men is to struggle, a struggle not only with them but with oneself; with their passions, but also with one's own.

It is not the criminals who arouse the hatred of others, but the men who are honest.

The people do not complain because they have no voice; do not move because they are lethargic, and you say that they do not suffer because you have not seen their hearts bleed.

Cowardice rightly understood begins with selfishness and ends with shame.

I don't see why I should bow my head when I could hold it high, or place it in the hands of my enemies when I can defeat them.

The glory of saving a country is not for him who has contributed to its ruin.

To the questioning glance of love, as it flashes out and then conceals itself, speech has no reply; the smile, the kiss, the sigh answer.

No, let us not make God in our image, poor inhabitants that we are of a distant planet lost in infinite space. However brilliant and sublime our intelligence may be, it is scarcely more than a small spark which shines and in an instant is extinguished, and it alone can give us no idea of that blaze, that conflagration, that ocean of light!

To doubt God is to doubt one's own conscience, and in consequence it would be to doubt everything.

The example could encourage others who only fear to start.

To be happy does not mean to indulge in foolishness!

What is death to me? I have sown the seeds others will reap.

Why independence? If the slaves of today will be the tyrants of tomorrow.

Man works for an object. Remove that object and you reduce him into inaction.

Your enemies hate you more than they hate your ideas. Should you want a project to be undone propose it. Even if it were as useful as a bishop's mire it would be rejected. Once you are defeated let the humblest-looking among you sponsor it and your enemies to humble you will approve it.

God has made man a cosmopolite. He created seas for ships to glide on, the wind to push them, and the stars to guide them even in darkest night.

The tyranny of some is possible only through the cowardice of others.

I believe in revelation, but not in revelation which each religion claims to possess... but in the living revelation which surrounds us on every side - mighty, eternal, unceasing, incorruptible, clear, distinct, universal as is the being from whom it proceeds, in that revelation which speaks to us and penetrates us from the moment we are born until we die.

A God who chastises our lack of faith, our vices, the little esteem in which we hold dignity and the civic virtues. We tolerate vice, we make ourselves its accomplices, at times we applaud it, and it is just, very just that we suffer the consequences, that our children suffer them. It is the God of liberty ... who obliges us to love it, by making the yoke heavy for us - a God of mercy, of equity, who while He chastises us betters us and only grants prosperity to him who has merited it through his efforts. The school of suffering tempers, the arena of combat strengthens the soul.

Law has no skin, reason has no nostrils.

Oh how beautiful to fall to give you flight, to die to give you life, to rest under your sky; and in your enchanted land forever sleep.

Tomorrow at 7, I shall be shot; but I am innocent of the crime of rebellion. I am going to die with a tranquil conscience.

The world laughs at another man's pain.

Hold high the brow serene, O youth, where now you stand; Let the bright sheen Of your grace be seen, Fair hope of my fatherland!

Man is multiplied by the number of languages he possesses and speaks.

Let us not ask for miracles, let us not ask for concern with what is good for the country of him who comes as a stranger to make his fortune and leave afterwards.

Dying people don't need medicine, the ones who remain do.

But because their ancestors were men of righteousness, shall we consent to the abuses of their degenerate descendants? Because they did us a great good, would we be guilty if we prevented them from doing us evil?

Virtue lies in the middle ground.

The appetite is sharpened by the first bites.

Climate affects bipeds in the same way it does quadrupeds.

Each one writes history according to his convenience.

In the Middle Ages, everything bad was the work of the devil, everything good, the work of God. Today, the French see everything in reverse and blame the Germans for it.

Death has always been the first sign of European civilization when introduced in the Pacific.