Religious movements such as the cofradia and colorums express an inchoate desire of their members to be rid of the Spanish and discover a promised land that would reflect memories of a world that existed before the coming of the colonists.

Nationalism in the modern sense develops in an urban context, in Manila and the major towns and, perhaps more significantly, in Spain and other parts of Europe where Filipino students and exiles were exposed to modern intellectual currents.

Folk religion, for all its power, does not form the basis of the national ideology, yet the millenarian tradition of rural revolt will merge with the Europeanized nationalism of the ilustrados to spur a truly national resistance, first against Spain in 1896 and then against the Americans in 1899.