Spanish, and in later years it came to be applied especially to those
charged with stirring up discontent and rebellion. For three centuries,
in its early application to the losses of commerce, and in its later
use as denoting political agitation, possibly no other word in the
Philippines, outside of the ordinary expressions of daily life, was
so widely known, and certainly none had such sinister signification.

In contrast to this lawless association is a similarity of laws. The
followers of Cortez, it will be remembered, were welcomed in Mexico
as the long-expected "Fair Gods" because of their blond complexions
derived from a Gothic ancestry. Far back in history their forbears
had been neighbors of the Anglo-Saxons in the forests of Germany,
so that the customs of Anglo-Saxon England and of the Gothic
kingdom of Castile had much in common. The "Laws of the Indies,"
the disregard of which was the ground of most Filipino complaints
up to the very last days of the rule of Spain, was a compilation
of such of these Anglo-Saxon-Castilian laws and customs as it was
thought could be extended to the Americas, originally called the New
Kingdom of Castile, which included the Philippine Archipelago. Thus
the New England township and the Mexican, and consequently the early
Philippine pueblo, as units of local government are nearly related.

These American associations, English influences, and Anglo-Saxon ideals
also culminated in the life work of José Rizal, the heir of all the
past ages in Philippine history. But other causes operating in his
own day--the stories of his elders, the incidents of his childhood,
the books he read, the men he met, the travels he made--as later
pages will show--contributed further to make him the man he was.

It was fortunate for the Philippines that after the war of