If the Philippines secure their independence after heroic and stubborn conflicts, they can rest assured that neither England, nor Germany, nor France, and still less Holland, will dare to take up what Spain has been unable to hold.

The Spaniard is gallant and patriotic, and sacrifices everything, in favorable moments, for his country's good. He has the intrepidity of his bull.

Justice is the foremost virtue of the civilizing races. It subdues the barbarous nations, while injustice arouses the weakest.

There now exists a factor which was formerly lacking - the spirit of the nation has been aroused, and a common misfortune, a common debasement, has united all the inhabitants of the Islands.

If you persist in your purpose of secession, there will be war - a bloody and cruel war. Not only will the North fight, but she will also triumph. The experiment of secession will fail, and the South, in ruin and desolation, will bitterly repent the day when she attempted to overthrow a wise and beneficent government.

I just feel like I'm a very lucky person to have a new life outside of politics.

Over the years, I think, more and more, I've come to recognize that my parents - not in a didactic or explicit way, but in a very powerful way by their example - gave me a sense that government could be a force for good.

Eleven years of acting it has been for me, and I still sometimes think I am not cut out for this. I hate the people-pleasing that goes with it, and the stupid politics, but that is with every kind of work and job.