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the english language in liberia.
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which brings with, its utterance, wealth and gratification.

2. It is commanding, too, as well as attractive. When used merely as the language of trade, it brings to these people the authority of skill, ingenuity, and art, in tasteful fabrics, in finely-wrought domestic articles, in effective instruments of warfare. The acquisition of it is elevation. It places the native man above his ignorant fellow, and gives him some of the dignity of civilization. New ideas are caught up, new habits formed, and superior and elevating wants are daily increased. Then the instruction in schools, and service in our own families for a few years, put the native boy so far in advance of his tribe that he must either become head-man or revolutionist; and if the latter, dividing the nation and carrying his party to a higher mode of living, and to a closer connection with Liberians or foreign traders.

As to the future results of this rivalry there can be no doubt; for, first of all, it is a superior tongue; and in all the ideas it expresses, it comes to the native man with command and authority; next, it appeals to him in the point of his cupidity; and his selfish nature yields to an influence which gratifies his desires and his needs. And it is thus, by the means of commerce, and missions, and government, that this language is destined to override all difficulties, and to penetrate to the most distant tribes, until it meets those other streams of English influence which flow from Sierra Leone on the north and from Abbeokuta on the east; and so, at the last, the English language and the English religion shall rule for