Rizal for all times

Title

Rizal for all times

Creator

Romulo, Carlos P.

Language

English

Year

1961

Rights

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Fulltext

RIZAL FOR ALL TIMES Gen. Carlos P. Romulo 'Philippine Ambassador to the United: States The survival of a great na tion was at stake. On the bat tle field of Marathon a crucial battle was being fought. If the Persians won, a rising ci vilization would have been nipped in the bud. The Greeks were fighting for their life. They won — and the news oftheir victory was car ried by * a Greek runner who ran all the way for many miles to give the great tidings to his people. But as he ar rive in Athens he fainted and he could only gasp one word as he expired: “Xantippe!” meaning, rejoice. He did not announce, "We won!” He did not exclaim “We defeated the enemy!” It was not the ela tion, nor the pride, nor the arrogance of triumph. It was the spiritual expression of re lease from a dreadful sus pense; it was not so much exultation as inspiration, ins piration for a nation to rise to the nobility of the heroism of those who fought and died that their nation may not pe rish. It was to rejoice that a civilization could continue to live and flourish. Thirty-three years ago. on December 30, 1928, I said that the greatest merit of this great Malayan is that there will al ways be the unknowable Jose Rizal. For over two decades since Jose Rizal gave his life for his country, we have been prolific interpreters of his life and of the deeds that have translated that life into a power dominating the thoughts of our people.At times he is the states man guarding the hard-won and harder-kept political con quests now in our hands; at other times he is the divinity jealously imposing the pre cepts ruling our moral con duct. On occasions, we ap proach him as the loved and lasting arbiter of our loyalty to our present leaders; on other occasions we acclaim him the ultimate standard for our conduct in the home and out of it, for our ideals of a model childhood, of youth ma turing into useful manhood. There is not a phase of our life upon which we cannqt bring to bear the telling aqd permanent influence of Rizal. He is with us, present with his support, when we are in the right. He is against us, convincing in his opposition when we are in the wrong If, drooping in spirit, we give way to disappointment and discouragement, the whole story of his epic death dec lares us renegades to the cause of which he is the mar tyr. Our Last Resort We thus feel that we know him, that we have sounded the depth of his being, that we hold him the companion ,of all the hours when we give ourselves to the companion ship of our country.. Just as he comes to us and in an unfailing priesthood, ordain ed us into beings greater than what we might be, — be cause before us are tasks de manding greatness in charac ter, greatness in thought, and greatness in deed, — so we go to him in the hope that we discover, for our fortitude, the dimensions of his mind and the deeper and larger di mension of his sacrifice. Learning to Know Him And we have flattered our selves that we have ventured successfully into this loving inquest into the proportions of his glory. There is no creed or dogma in his politic al bible but we have reduced into simple terms that even the unlettered among our people shall commune with him and joyously and loyally pledge their support of his leadership. There is no facet of his many-sided genius but we have long and painstak ingly and searchingly examin 4 Panorama ed, and, to our increasing wonder found each developed by him, disciplined by his stern ethical principles into service for the Motherland. Supremely a Patriot Even his art as a writer is the art of the political writer. He was the reformer, the fighter for privileges and the recognition of the inherent rights of his people, before he was the poet, the novelist, or the pamphleteer. * H i s means and methods were those of the artist; his aims and his objectives were those of a patriot. He made beauty the handmaid of patriotism. Underlying all his inspirations was his undying devotion to a country under alien domi nation, t.o a people feeling, at the climax of his era, su preme confidence in their power to achieve self-rule and a supreme contempt for imposed authority. Built for All Time We sense also that wher ever he addressed his ener gies, his leadership of a sec ret society, for example, the one dominating urge that un sphered his capacity to com mand others, was his desire to give permanence to his high-hearted dreams for his people. He joined the Ma sons, not to adjure the church, but to feel that at that time he had in his power one more force with which to free his people from a double tyran ny; the tyranny of supersti tion over the hearts of the Filipinos, and the tyranny of the defective system of gov ernment over the Philippines. It comes to us, also, as an overpowering realization that he knew the economics of preparedness for the self erected authority over our nationals. And again, in this, as in the other activities of which he was the directing inspiration, if not the actual chieftain, he flooded the plan and the movement that might have embodied it with the energy of his self-sacrificing spirit. Filipino, First and Foremost Along the horizon where his service to the native land broods as in an unappealable judgement, over the service of which we of this genera tion and of the remnants of his generation would also render, his genius for gui dance is the central circums tance. His is the personality drawn in heroic details. His the words that wander from sense to sense to upgather the counsels he has brought to us. His the direct consent when the consent was pat riotic. His the direct denial December 1961 5 when to refuse was patriotic. And in equal measure his was the direct challenge of the ini quities of his age and the di rect immolation that his age may be freed from tyranny, that we may be like him, Fi lipinos before we are follow ers or leaders, Filipinos be fore we are Visayans or Tagalogs. But this which we vaunt is . our complete resume of his great life, is it really com plete? Have we outlined his great personality, and reveal ed all the splendor of its po wer and its proportions? Is there depth to his thoughts unknown to us, direction in his ideals undetected, drift and dispensation in his prin ciples undiscovered, unscru tinized, unstudied? We say there are. There is an unknowable Jose Rizal, always there shall be an un fathomable Rizal. ' He would not be the great character that he is were he sufficient unto a generation. He would belong then only to an epoch and not to all epochs. His real greatness is not that he grows with a progressive people, but that he cannot be outgrown by his country and by his people. He shall be with the Filipinos of the fu ture in the climax of every conquest, nay, no superlative moments of victory shall be achieved without Rizal stand ing as a presence sharing its moving hours and its moving minutes. Ever Old, Ever New Thus each generation that shall build its share of our na tional edifice shall discover Rizal. That which we of to day can never know about him they shall know. The circumstances and conditions of their times shall bring out new points in his character, new shades of ipeaning in his thoughts, which we never sus pected to exist. He shall fit into their drama of life, as he fits into ours, and as their problems shall be in many as pects different from our pro blems, they shall see in Rizal elements of greatness and lea dership to harmonize with their particular concern. Always With Us So Rizal is Rizal the inscru table. We can no more know him than we can the future. In our time he has attained full maturity. . But although the years shall leave us, he shall be given to those who come after us. Their problems shall have no height but . he shall rise to equal them. No matter how deep their trage dies, how exultant their triumphs, he shall share them 6 Panorama and share them as the domi nant leader. Who would essay to know Rizal of the future would es say to predict these tragedies and these triumphs. There is and there must be this un knowable Rizal. He, more than any other Filipino im-^ mortal, embraces in his great ness the fullness of our possi ble destiny. Should it ever come to pass — and God for bid it — that we shall, in an internecine, a suicidal war fare, the natural off-shoot of the birth pangs of nationhood, become arrayed, brothers against brothers, Filipinos against Filipinos, Rizal like a God shall tread the fields of strife, and calm the passions down to one loyalty to a com mon country; to one love of a common native land, by giv ing one name only for all. the name Filipinos, because Rizal was first and last a Filipino! His Mandate And his mandate in this shall be his mandate in all the events of the future, testing the temper of our national spirit, touching it to a fiery, adamant, achieving power. May I thus plead the thought that the Rizal of our own generation is the only Rizal we know? Whoever thinks he could transfer him to a permanent pedestal, and say here is our national hero revealed in all "his possibili ties, is guilty of self-conceit. A new Rizal shall be born with each new era, a Rizal adaptable to every opportu nity for service, a Rizal as glorious as any achievement yet greater than it, a Rizal responsive to every crisis yet emerging from each a more colossal Rizal, a Rizal calm in the midst of any frenzied generation, self-contained in the hour of mutual revilement and accusation, a Rizal as sacrosanct as the cause he defended and as immortal as that sacred causfe. * * * DOG During the siege of Paris in the Franco-Ger man war, when everybody.was starving, one aris tocratic family had their pet dog served for din ner. The master of the house, when the meal was ended, surveyed the platter through teardimmed eyes, and spoke sadly: “How Fido would have enjoyed these bones!” December 1961 7

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