1606 by the principal actor in some of the most stirring scenes of
the formative period of the Philippine government. It is a record
of prime importance in Philippine history, and the resuscitation of
it was no small service to the country. Rizal added notes tending to
show that the Filipinos had been possessed of considerable culture and
civilization before the Spanish conquest, and he even intimated that
they had retrograded rather than advanced under Spanish tutelage. But
such an extreme view must be ascribed to patriotic ardor, for Rizal
himself, though possessed of that intangible quality commonly known
as genius and partly trained in northern Europe, is still in his own
personality the strongest refutation of such a contention.

Later, in Ghent, he published El Filibusterismo, called by him a
continuation of Noli Me Tangere, but with which it really has no
more connection than that some of the characters reappear and are
disposed of.[10] There is almost no connected plot in it and hardly
any action, but there is the same incisive character-drawing and
clear etching of conditions that characterize the earlier work. It
is a maturer effort and a more forceful political argument, hence
it lacks the charm and simplicity which assign Noli Me Tangere to a
preeminent place in Philippine literature. The light satire of the
earlier work is replaced by bitter sarcasm delivered with deliberate
intent, for the iron had evidently entered his soul with broadening
experience and the realization that justice at the hands of decadent
Spain had been an iridescent dream of his youth. Nor had the Spanish
authorities in the Philippines been idle; his relatives had been
subjected to all the annoyances and irritations of petty persecution,
eventually losing the greater part of their property, while some of
them suffered deportation.