In this essay of Rizal, he observed and described the behavior of the people in other countries.

Some countries who have warm climate do not work a lot especially at noon time because of the suns heat. Having a hot climate is a reasonable predisposition for indolence. For example, we students love to sleep whenever the air is warm. Some countries have four seasons and they work hard during spring and fall. Its because they cannot easily work on summer because of excessive heat and on winter. We as human being must adopt to our environment whatever its condition. Therefore, being indolent as they say during conditions is reasonable. I can prove without the text in the book that Filipinos in those days, Spaniards and pre-colonial period were not indolent. This can be verified through Filipinos at the dawn before the sunrise are ready to start planting and keeping their vegetables and harvests. Then the Spaniards came to our lands, they burned many houses, eradicated some goods and resources, killed many Filipinos, and stop our economic and commercial cycle. They controlled almost all farms and villages. Many areas were become unpopulated. Almost two thirds of the populations were declined. Many boys especially the teenagers were asked to do the Polo y Servicios. Farms were left uncultivated and encomienda was implemented. Only the friar and Spanish officials could benefitfrom high taxes to church offerings. To be able to start a business and work, the permission from the administration was required, and not all were granted. For that, many Filipino gave their work, lands and even their life. They viewed their life of hopeless and they thought themselves as inferiors. Following Rizals method, we might however shift our focus from the symptoms to the social context. Why do Filipinos not follow rules? Why do they not fall in line and wait for their turn? Why do they turn to influential persons or patrons to obtain access to public services and institutions? There are two basic reasons, I believe. The first is ignorance, and the second is distrust of the system. Many Filipinos do not follow the rules because they dont know them, or if they do, they dont know how they are supposed to work. Its easy to say ignorance excuses no one, but shouldnt the first duty of government be to explain the laws to its citizens, their logic and justification? In the absence of such learning, people will improvise or stick to habit. But the more important reason for lack of discipline is distrust of the system. It is the belief that following the rules gets you nowhere. If you fall in line, you may wait forever; others will find a way to get ahead of everyone. The idea is to devise your own trick, or to find a fixer you can pay or a powerful person whose influence you can tap in order to quickly get what you want. The assumption is that the system doesnt work, and is not meant to work. Looking at our social reality today, one finds that this way of thinking is not too far off the mark. Our system of rules does provide discretionary powers to some people -- powers essential to a social order based on large gaps in wealth and privilege, and on layers of dependence and patronage. In such a system, corruption is only the other face of patronage, a vital ingredient in the highly unequal society we have. This kind of society is becoming obsolete in the modern world. To prolong its life, pre-modern elites who run government are resorting to authoritarianism, while the citizens who cannot stand living in it are fleeing. But, because we too are evolving as a society, there is hope. After reading this essay of Rizal, I learned many things. One of the many is that Filipinos are not born to be indolent. That Filipinos laziness started when the Spaniards colonized the Philippines. And I strongly believed that Filipinos at that time are hardworking and independent people. I learned that the Spanish administrations reign in the Philippines was indeed a great suffering for the Filipinos. They fully took advantage and only think of themselves. Despite among all the writings of Rizal, the Spanish administration did not change and remained their cruelty to the Filipinos. In my opinion, the Filipinos had already lost all their human rights in that time. And as a result of the Spanish colonization in the Philippines, the Filipinos became indolent in many aspects, especially in the international economic relations. And as far as Filipinos are concerned, I know that despite the causes of this indolence, we still have the strength to be more productive and less indolent. Its just a matter of discipline.