Mislang, Ian H.

June 2, 2021

05 eLMS Task 2 Rizal's Life and Works

1. Filipinos were seen as indolent because of lack of proper education, lack of culture and propriety, lack
of working government and lack of religion. Spaniards saw that natives lacked Western enlightenment
and disregarded the existing form of literature. They saw the societal customs as primitive. They didn’t
see fit the hierarchical structure of datuship as a government. Lastly, the belief in multiple gods and
superstitions made them see Filipinos as naïve.

2. Along with others who argued against and defended Filipinos from De Morga’s book, Rizal annotated
De Morga’s account to correct the distorted view of Filipinos. Rizal argued that pre-colonial Philippines
had a working government system capable of ensuring law and order in their governing lands. He
argued that there were already an established trading partnership and trading relations with
neighboring nations. He argued that natives were self-sufficient because of our natural resources and
the pre-colonial society was rich with culture in arts and literature. He even cited that Philippines was
exploited, demoralized, decimated, an eventually ruined by Spain resulting in a lack of human flourishing
for the conquered indios.