Quotes from Jose Rizal

Ang mga henyong ipinapalagay ng mga karaniwang tao na nauna sa kanilang panahon ay nagmistulang gayon sapagkat tinatanaw ng mga humahatol mula sa malayo o napagkakamalang isang buong siglo ang buntot na tinatahak ng mga naiwanan.

I die without seeing the dawn brighten over my native land. You who have it to see, welcome it ... and forget not those who have fallen during the night!

Nawalan muli ng isang oras ang buhay ng bawat kabataan, saka isang bahagi ng kaniyang karangalan at paggalang sa sarili, at kapalit ang paglaki sa kalooban ng panghihina ng loob, ng paglalaho ng hilig sa pag-aaral, at pagdaramdam sa loob ng dibdib.

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.

In every instance I noted that a people's prosperity or misery lay in direct proportion to its freedom or its inhibitions and, along the same lines, of the sacrifice or selfishness of its ancestors.

Night favors belief, and the imagination peoples the air with specters.

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!

Pinag-uusapan siya ng lahat dahil mayaman... Bumabalik ang mga sundalo mula sa mga kampanya, may sakit at sugatan, ngunit walang dumadalaw sa kanila!

Maria Clara did not faint, simply because the Filipinos do not know how to faint.

O, in the solitude of those mountains I feel free, free as the air, like a light blasting unharnessed through space. A thousand cities, a thousand palaces I would give just for a corner of the Philippines where far away from man I could feel truly free!

Isa rin akong Espanyol, pero bago ang pagiging Espanyol ay tao ako at bago ang Espanya ay sa ibabaw ng Espanya ay ang kanyang dangal, ang matataas na prinsipyo ng moralidad, ang mga walang-hanggang prinsipyo ng hindi nagbabagong katarungan!

Vice pays for its own freedom.

Religion, in refusing to degrade you, has placed in doubt the crime imputed to you; the government, in surrounding your case with mystery and shadow, gives reason for belief in some error, committed in fatal moments; and all the Philippines, in venerating your memory and calling you martyrs, in no way acknowledges your guilt.

Man understood in the end what man is. He renounces the analysis of God, penetrating the impalpable, in which he has not seen, to give laws to the phantasms of his brain. Man understands that his inheritance is the greater world whose dominion is within his grasp. Tired of useless and presumptuous labor he bows his head and looks about him, and now he sees how our poets are born. Little by little nature's muses open their treasures and start to smile upon us, and lead us far from such labors.

The just and the worthy have to suffer in order to spread their ideas and let them be known. One has to shake and break the glass in order to scatter the perfume. One has to scratch the surface of the rock to release the light. There is something providential in the persecution of tyrants, Señor Simoun.

The gods are leaving.

Pure intuitive faith differs as much from fanaticism as fire from smoke, or music from mere noise; those who confuse the two are like the deaf.

We want the happiness of the Philippines, but we want to obtain it through noble and just means. If I have to commit villainy to make her happy, I would refuse to do so, because I am sure that what is built on sand sooner or later would tumble down.

Sisa shut up the cabin and covered the few embers with ash so they wouldn't go out, as people do with their deepest feelings: cover them with life's ashes, which they call "indifference," so they don't go out completely as a result of day-to-day interaction with our peers.

Men are like turtles; they are classified and valued according to their shells. In

Truth does not need to borrow garments from falsehood.

Ay! tal me ha sucedido siempre en los momentos más dolorosos de mi vida. Mi lengua, asaz habladora, enmudece cuando mi corazón estalla en sentimientos.

Pero en los momentos critícos de mi vida siempre he obrado contra mi voluntad obedeciendo á distintos fines y á poderosas dusas.

Because you can be happy elsewhere, because you are not made for suffering, because you would hate your country if some day you were to find yourself outcast for her sake, and to hate one's own country is the greatest of misfortunes.