Katipunan

“ Being by nature credulous, ignorant and superstitious, the indian fell an easy victim to the mysteries of freemasonry, which served him as are introduction to the semi-savage methods of the “Liga Filipina” and the barbarous practices of the Katipunan, the pacto-de-sangre of which, carried him back to the savage times of his remote ancestors who were drawn from their mountain and forest lairs and domesticated by the Religious Orders. ”

“ But of anything civilized men could call evidence against him or of reason for anything such men could call a trial there was no trace nor suggestion. Say that the Katipunan was all that hysteria described it; not a scrap of paper connected Rizal with it. He was not a member; he had expressly disapproved of its aims; he had been an exile in Dapitan while it was being formed. How then? And what then? In all such dilemmas it had been the practice of the Government of the Philippines to resort to those medieval precedents that best befitted the theory upon which its authority was based. ”

“ The writer goes on to show that the three main things needed for the Revolution were 1st: an active propaganda of separatist ideas; 2nd: funds to cover expenses and to purchase arms, and 3rd: a considerable number of persons ready to take up arms in the field. The first two of these main things were to be attended to by the Liga and the third by the Katipunan.
“In the greatest utility in attaining the ultimate end of the initiators and directors of the conspiracy, must be sought the distinction between the Liga and the Katipunan, and the difference which the one or the other society enjoyed.” ”

“ This society, the Katipunan, made great progress here in the Philippines, for they had to do greatly with the common people; they never had anything to do, or mixed at at all, with the higher class of people here in the Philippines49. As a result of this the society gained much credit and power, and undermined the forces which were in existence, especially the native regiments of Tagalogs. This was in 1896; the Revolution broke out at San Juan del Monte in August. A curious fact that must be noted was that a friar, who was the priest of Tondo, was the cause of its breaking out ”

“ All those who receive any position or employment in the service of the enemy.
(Signed) The Compatriots.
This race hatred is illustrated very clearly in the definition of the Katipunan given by Romualdo Teodoro de J., when he said that its aim was to kill all Spaniards and take possession of the islands. No particular hatred was shown to any class; it was all Spaniards of all classes and conditions who [241] were to be assassinated. It is also clearly depicted in the Act of Session of the Katipunan Sur already quoted (See page 81; also foot-note page 80) . ”

“ The malay instinct, like the volcano, vomits forth when least expected; the history of the revolt of the Tagalogs gives overabundant proof of it. Take one by one the many leading characters in the revolution, and the instinct will be found so plainly marked, that it is unmistakable. Take for instance Marcelo H. del Pilar, in whose brain was conceived the plot of the Katipunan farsical-tragedy; Andrés Bonifacio, whose duty was the materializing of the plot ”

“ Each degree had its pass words and the members only knew those of their own degree.
This was the latter form of the Katipunan in which it differed somewhat from the Liga.
Pilar’s plan was revolutionary; Bonifacio’s truly anarchistic.
Among the “chosen people” who testified before the Schurman Commission were two of the three native members of the present U. S. Commission, Tavera and Legarda. Both of these, among many other statements which will not hold water, had something to say on the subject of the Katipunan. ”

“ This Filipino was named Andrés Bonifacio, and later on he was chief of the revolution and chief of the Katipunan society. He took refuge in Cavite, and all that province rose up. Aguinaldo who was Municipal Captain in Cavite Viejo that time, was also a member of the Katipunan. When he heard that the Civil Guard was going to arrest him, he revolted too. He met a man who was his superior in the society—that is, Bonifacio—and as his ambition was his moving spirit, he caused Bonifacio to be shot. ”

“ To hold too fast to the excuse of ignorance is to profess oneself very ignorant. But whether it was ignorance or the wanting of even that species of patriotism which one expects to find in beasts of burden (for every horse knows his own stables) the black fact still remains that Spanish masonry gave birth to, and fostered, Filipino freemasonry or in other words, the katipunan. ”

“ To the vast majority of the oath-bound, the Katipunan was but the Liga under another form; and in order that the people should not know of the rivalry existing between himself and Pilar, Rizal [218] gave no signs of disfavor towards the foundation of the new society; in fact he rather favored it, seeing that under the circumstances it would make him figure as its “hero,” and he would thus be enabled to take the wind out of Pilar’s sails. The only objection raised by Rizal to the work of the Katipunan, was that which he made to Valenzuela: that the time had not yet come for armed rebellion. ”

“ Whilst Rizal was on board the cruiser Castilla which was awaiting orders, the Katipunan revolt broke out in Manila and the suburbs. Very soon afterwards his voyage Spainwards was commenced on board the S. S. Colon, the insurrection becoming more and more wide-spread daily. On finding to what an extent Rizal was complicated in the work of the revolution, his return to the Archipelago, as a prisoner, was demanded, and so our “hero” returned to be judged as were so many of his fellow agitators, for the crimes for which he was morally and physically responsible. ”

“ It is needless to say that Legaspi refused to perform such a savage, cannibalistic ceremony.
5 Worthy perhaps but certainly not legitimate. The Katipunan was illegitimate from all points of view; nor was it a child really of Bonifacio. The conception was of Pilar (Marcelo H.) and Bonifacio was but the foster father encharged with the bringing up of the child.
6 A people’s language is the expression of its sentiments. There are in this archipelago, native languages in which no word exists to express “thank you.” ”

“ From them, and with a perversion of the idea in Rizal’s still-born Liga, it was an easy transition to the Katipunan, which was to put aside all pretense of reconciliation with Spain, and at the appointed time rise to exterminate not only the friars but also all the Spaniards and Spanish sympathizers, thus to bring about the reign of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity, under the benign guidance of Patriot Bonifacio, with his bolo for a scepter. ”

“ The chief element in the uprising was a secret society, called the Katipunan, the device of which, on flags and so forth, was K K K, and to make this fact memorable, or to prove his power, Aguinaldo ordered the hard letter C to be replaced [12] by K in all names in the Philippines, making Mactan, Maktan; Capiz, Kapiz; Catbologan, Katbologan, and so on. This alteration the Americans, some think unwisely, have not taken the trouble to abandon, so the revolutionary spelling remains a monument of the success of disloyalty, to say nothing of the names having thus lost all philological significance. ”

“ However, be the degree of ignorance what it may, we cannot overlook the fact that the actions of the Tagalog freemasons, the katipunan if you will, for the one and the other are the same thing under different names, were the cause of no little surprise to the Grand Oriente Español. The filipino mason was a traitor to the mother which gave him being and nourished him into activity: a traitor who used the cover of the freemason lodge only that he might the easier and safer hatch out his plot to gain, by the most brutal means imaginable, [78] the independence of his country. ”

“ The friars who were murdered by the rebels were not murdered for being friars but because they were Spaniards. The documents captured, the result of the trials held in judgement of persons guilty of treason, show clearly that the revolution was for the purpose of gaining the independence of the country from Spain, and not merely to bring about the expulsion of the Religious Orders. Aguinaldo, the leader of the Katipunan hordes, desired to send the friars who fell prisoners into his hands, over to Hong-Kong, where they would be at liberty to return to their own country ”

“ The vanity of Bonifacio was comparable only to that of Aguinaldo. Among the number of chief workers of the Katipunan was a certain Valenzuela, a doctor who had, according to his own confession, been forced into the membership by Bonifacio, on the strength of a “love” affair; he was given the choice of membership or death. He chose the former but later on resigned. Whilst a member he enjoyed a salary of 30 pesos a month as medical officer, but only with difficulty could he collect his pay. ”

“ For the past hundred years, at least, the more spirited part of the native population has been restive under the misrule and its burdens, and frequent attempts at insurrection have been made. Such an outbreak in 1872 was suppressed and punished with a vengefulness, in executions and banishment, which rankled ever afterwards in the hearts of the people. A secret society, called the "Katipunan," or League, was then formed, which became a revolutionary organization, and from which sprang the most serious of Filipino rebellions, in 1896. ”

“ The aspirations of the association were, to say the least, anti-patriotic; they were always underhand; they were the aspirations of the “Liga”, of the “Compromisarios” and of the Katipunan. [156]
Note 34. “In the following year, Pedro Serrano arrived from Spain and then was masonry introduced into the Philippines, the first lodge instituted being the “Nilad”23 its first Venerable being José Ramos.” Testimony of Moises Salvador y Francisco (fol. 1,138 to 1,143) . ”

“ They then drew up the programme of the Society. This programme was composed of 6 articles, viz.: 1st: to constitute a secret society known as the Katipunan; 2nd: that the organization was to be by triangles, to the end that no more than three members should know one another; 3rd: that the initiated should pay one real entrance fee, and a half real as a monthly subscription; 4th: that as the number of the members increased they should found one or more balang̃ay in each district; 5th: to try to gather funds to carry out the purposes of the society ”

“ The terrible President of the Katipunan ultimately became a victim of one of these blood-thirsty tribunals.
Their military organization was curious. The province was sub-divided into military zones. First Silang, second Imus, third Bacoor, fourth San Francisco de Malabon, fifth Alfonso. Each zone had an army which consisted of all the population able to work, and was divided into two parts, the active or fighting force and the auxiliary but non-combatant part. ”

“ P. Mariano Gil, parish priest of Tondo (98) , a suburb of Manila; to this Rev. Father, [54] Patiño repeated all that he had manifested, and all that he could know, he being only a simple initiated member. He affirmed that in the printing establishment of the Diario receipts and proclamations were printed, and daggers were secretly made for the Katipunan, and he offered, moreover, to make known where the lithographic stones used for the printing were hidden. ”

“ When a people suffer under the oppression of its rulers, all the world admires the man who rises to throw off the hateful yoke. But when the oppression is imaginary and when the so-called hero is but a marionette in the hands of political schemers who seek their own advantage under the shelter of a pretence to throw off a yoke which does not exist, one cannot admire the part played by the deluded “tool”. The emancipation from the mother-country was the key-note of the revolt. It was the aim of the Filipino freemasons, of the Liga Filipina, of the Compromisarios and of the Katipunan. ”

“ If the vast network of spies and agents provocateurs, with which Spanish, like Russian, rule was maintained, brought in no hint of the mine that was being driven beneath the feet of the governing class, the spies must have made their first recorded failure, and that concerning the one thing most important to their employers. Filipinos, one may say, had not so known these ever busy birds of ill omen. [275]
The deportation of Rizal gave to the Katipunan a great impetus; the masses of people bitterly resented the cowardice and perfidy that had contrived at last to drag down the popular champion. ”

“ Morayta was at one time Gr∴ Master of the Gr∴ Or∴ de España, but was later on expelled therefrom, according to a masonic publication. In 1888 he founded the Gr∴ Or∴ Español, the mother of the Katipunan. In 1890 he took over the proprietorship of La Solidaridad then published by Marcelo del Pilar for separatist ends. Morayta was the idol of the Filipino students who sought education in the Peninsula. ”

“ If the natives were going to succeed in the battle, they (the half-castes) would want to be the peaceful wire-pullers after the storm. On the other hand, they had so long striven to be regarded as on a social equality with the Spaniards that they could not now abstain from espousing their cause against the rebels without exciting suspicion. Therefore, in the course of a few days, the half-castes resident in the capital came forward to enlist as volunteers. But no one imagined, at that time, how widespread was the Katipunan league. ”