And we faithfully believe that that means of regeneration ought to be placed in practice as soon as possible, the government removing on its part every kind of obstacle, especially of documents and information. That is the point on which these initiatives are wrecked, or are indefinitely detained, as happened to the zealous and untiring Señor Gainza in regard to his school of Santa Isabel—the normal school for women teachers in Nueva Cáceres—who after having struggled for a long time in the offices of the superior government, of administration, instruction, and engineers, was compelled to resolve his cherished project by presenting it personally to Queen Doña Isabel, who fully and kindly acceded to his supplication, and even thus with the valuable license of her Majesty communicated in due form, that eminent prelate still met all sorts of difficulties, from the provincial chief, which only disappeared with his departure from the same. In order that these labors might have a homogeneous result and those normal schools respond efficaciously to the concept of the fatherland, it is not advisable that the instruction in them be given by others than Spanish corporations, and consequently, by Spanish religious, who are the ones who can really impress that love, prohibiting, as a consequence of this standard, the teaching of the schools already established, be they private or not, from being given in any other language than the Spanish, or in ordinary conversation, that any other language than the Castilian be used, without this at all preventing other languages from being taught.
For the better order, progress, and homogeneity, it is indispensable that one bear in mind the capacity of the natives, in order to assign the list of studies which they are to take. That must be proportioned in all institutions to their nature, and those studies, as is evident, must be suppressed, which either give an unadvisable or useless result, because of being outside the intellectual sphere of the native. Still more evident is the necessity of the instruction for the natives obeying a uniform plan of method and social education, in order to avoid ill feeling among the teaching communities, and peculiarities and comparisons, which by themselves are always odious, and which cause not a little mischief among the natives, who, if they are not distinguished by their character and reasoning, yet are by nature very observant, and lay great stress on all external details, so that without troubling themselves in seeking the cause, they form their opinion or standard; and from that time on they will not be inclined toward those things which the masons and separatists are pursuing with the greatest of rancor by finding in those same things more obstacles for the attainment of their evil purposes.
The list of studies, as well as the method of teaching and of education will be the first and immediate end of the studies, opinion, and formula which the Superior Board of Public Instruction shall bear to its conclusion with singular interest. This board shall form the consequent schedules and above-mentioned methods, which it shall subject to the approbation of the general government of the archipelago.
The abovesaid superior board may be composed of the following gentlemen: the archbishop of Manila; the intendant of the public treasury; the president of the Audiencia; civil governor of Manila; secretary of the superior government; one councilor of administration; the provincials of the Augustinians, Franciscans, Dominicans, and Recollects; the rectors of the university, of the normal school, and of the seminary. To it shall be submitted the revision of the present schedules, both for the normal schools and in so far as the schedules of the studies of primary and secondary and higher education need to be revised; and at the same time the method of teaching and of education for both sexes, the execution of which, as I have just said, will be accomplished under the character of its importance and immediate necessity.
The attention of every studious and observing man, who has lived in residence in the Filipino provinces, is not a little struck by the excessive number of young men, who having taken more or less courses in Manila, but without concluding the course begun, or even taking the degree of bachelor, after their parents have spent considerable sums on them, return to their villages with very little or no virtue, but with many vices. At first sight one notes in these young men an irritating radical attitude and a freedom mixed with unendurable arrogance and vanity. Their fellow countrymen, whom they disdain because they possess, although in a superficial manner, the Castilian speech full of phrases and sounds, which would make the most reserved Viscayan laugh, and of high-sounding words which they use without understanding their real significance, immediately look up to them as so many Senecas. They are persuaded that they are perfect gentlemen, for by dint of seeing them practiced they have learned a few social formulas; they wear a cravat, and boots, and pantaloons of the latest style. For the rest, they are completely devoid of fundamental knowledge, and of the fundamentals of knowledge in the studies which they have taken, and have acquired only a slight tint of the part, let us say the bark of those studies, which they conclude by forgetting in proportion as time passes and their passions increase. These young men who forget what they have learned with so great facility, do not, as a general rule, devote themselves to any work, for they do not like work and cannot perform any; for the habits that they have contracted are very different—habits of pastime, idleness, and the waste of their paternal capital. In such condition are those who, as a rule, furnish the contingent of the staff of those who are employed without pay, of aspirants, and amanuenses with little pay of the offices and municipalities, while the most intelligent and skilful devote themselves to making writs for parties in litigation, a very handy matter, and one never finished among the natives, not even by force of many deceptions and the loss of great interests.
And that our opinion is not formed from the smoke of straw, and lightly, is proved by the numerous lists of matriculations which accompany the conscientious and well written memorials by trustworthy Dominican fathers, especially those which were published in the years 1883 and 1887, because of the expositions of Amsterdam and Filipinas, in Madrid. We cannot resist the temptation to transcribe here a valuable paragraph, which wonderfully meets our purpose. It is taken from the writing signed by the excellent Dominican, Father Buitrago, for the last-mentioned exposition. It is as follows: “The first thing which offers itself to the consideration of the reader, is the multitude of the inscriptions of matriculation, and the small proportionate number of approvals. On this point, the first thing that offers is to investigate the causes of that disproportion, which is a great surprise to those who are ignorant of the special conditions under which secondary teaching in this country is found. Many of the young men who matriculate for it, have scarcely any or no desire to obtain a passing mark in their courses, their only object being to learn the Castilian language, and to know, in order that they may afterward occupy a more important position in their villages, some of the customs of the Spaniards. Those who come to Manila with the decided intention of terminating a literary career are relatively very few. In this matter their families exact but little also. And then there is added the method of living in this place, crowded together in their greatest part in private houses under the nominal vigilance of their landlords or landladies, as they call the owners of the houses in which they are lodged. Consequently, not few in this capital are reared in idleness and learn the vices of Europeans without taking on their good qualities. The rector of the university can do nothing on this point, for the rules allow students to matriculate two or three times or even more often, in the same course, in spite of their not passing in it.”
Before such an inundation of wise men, whose scholastic modesty suffers with a serene mind and with immovable resignation [resignación de estuco] three and more failures in one study, there is no other means, since the lash cannot be legally used, or the oak rod of the oldtime dominie, than to put in practice a salutary strictness in the examinations of the secondary education, and to revise the regulations more strictly, in order thereby to free the provinces of that inundation of learning which parches the fields for lack of arms to work them, uses up the savings of the wealthy families, fills the villages with vampires who suck the sweat of the poor or careless with impunity, increases the lawsuits and ill feeling in the villages, makes of the municipalities and offices a workshop of intrigue, and gives a numerous contingent to the lodges and to separatism.
And as the above-mentioned author of the said Memoria adds: “It is apparent to us at times that (the rector) actively negotiated to subject the lodging houses for students to one set of regulations, in order to watch over their moral and literary conduct better; but such efforts have had no result;” it is thoroughly necessary to create a law, in which the rector shall be authorized to extend his zeal, vigilance, and action to such houses, and also to subject all the day students of Manila, without distinction of establishments, to the university police of the rector and his agents, reëstablishing in this regard the ancient university right. For that purpose, full powers ought to be given to the rector, so that, now by himself in faults of less degree, and now by the university Council in the greater, he may impose academical fines, and even ask the aid of public force in case of necessity, beginning by demanding from each young man who wishes to matriculate, the certificate or report of good conduct given by the parish priest of the village whence he comes. This requirement is of exceptional advisability, not only for the general ends of the instruction, but also for the more perfect selection of the persons who, on devoting themselves to the noble employment of teaching, shall form the understanding and the heart of future generations.
Only in this manner can we succeed in getting the Filipino youth to acquire the conditions and habits of morality and study, until they reach the end of their capacity. Only in this manner can we succeed in giving to the fatherland, grateful children, to Filipinas, honored citizens, to society, useful members, to families, children who honor the white hairs of their parents, and to the public posts a suitable staff, without pretensions, and faithful in the performance of their duties; and that they shall be consequently, fervent Catholics, who shall never forget what the parish priest taught them when they were children, in his simple doctrinal lessons, and who shall be heard afterwards to repeat to their teachers, to bless the divine cross which illumined their intellects and saved their souls, and to bless España, which amid the folds of its yellow banner or crowning its standards, brought the cross triumphant to those shores, and with it Christian civilization and true progress.