in speaking of our misfortunes, I have laughed over them,
for no one would wish to weep with me over our woes, and laughter
is ever the best means of concealing sorrow. The deeds that I have
related are true and have actually occurred; I can furnish proof of
this. My book may have (and it does have) defects from an artistic
and esthetic point of view--this I do not deny--but no one can dispute
the veracity of the facts presented." [8]

But while the primary purpose and first effect of the work was to
crystallize anti-friar sentiment, the author has risen above a mere
personal attack, which would give it only a temporary value, and by
portraying in so clear and sympathetic a way the life of his people
has produced a piece of real literature, of especial interest now as
they are being swept into the newer day. Any fool can point out errors
and defects, if they are at all apparent, and the persistent searching
them out for their own sake is the surest mark of the vulpine mind,
but the author has east aside all such petty considerations and,
whether consciously or not, has left a work of permanent value to
his own people and of interest to all friends of humanity. If ever a
fair land has been cursed with the wearisome breed of fault-finders,
both indigenous and exotic, that land is the Philippines, so it is
indeed refreshing to turn from the dreary waste of carping criticisms,
pragmatical "scientific" analyses, and sneering half-truths to a story
pulsating with life, presenting the Filipino as a human being, with
his virtues and his vices, his loves and hates, his hopes and fears.

The publication of _Noli Me Tangere_ suggests the reflection that
the story of Achilles' heel is a myth only in form. The belief that
any institution, system, organization, or arrangement has reached
an absolute form is about as far as human folly can go. The friar
orders looked upon themselves as the sum of human achievement in
man-driving and God-persuading, divinely appointed to rule, fixed
in their power, far above suspicion. Yet they were obsessed by the
sensitive, covert dread of exposure that ever lurks spectrally under
pharisaism's specious robe, so when there appeared this work of a
"miserable Indian," who dared to portray them and the conditions
that their control produced exactly as they were--for the indefinable
touch by which the author gives an air of unimpeachable veracity to
his story is perhaps its greatest artistic merit--the e