HOPE FOR AFRICA.
A SERMON ON BEHALF OF THE LADIES' NEGRO EDUCATION SOCIETY.
Preached at Hotwell's Church, Clifton, Bristol, England,
April 21st, 1852.
Shall drink at noon . . . . .
The palm's rich nectar; and lie down at eve
In the green pastures of remembered days;
And walk, to wander and to weep no more
On Congo's mountain-coast, or Guinea's golden shore."
"In the unreasoning progress of the world
A wiser spirit is at work for us,
A better eye than ours."
SERMON.
Psalm lxviii. 31.—"Ethiopia shall soon stretch out her hands unto God."
I am requested to plead this evening on behalf of the Society established in this country, for the education of the Negro race in the British West Indies. I most readily comply with this request, because I regard this as one of the chief among the charities of England; and because I feel, that to advocate the claims of this Society is, as it were, to plead for my own life and blood, and to vindicate my own personal interests and advantages.
I use the paragraph which I have announced as my text, since it is singularly appropriate to the objects of this excellent association, and, also, remarkably coincident with the train of thought I purpose presenting to your consideration. The Ladies' Negro Education Society aims at and desires the mental and spiritual regeneration of the Negro race in the West Indies; but it also entertains another important purpose, in close connection with this high end. It is a cherished idea of many of its supporters, that by their endeavors, and through the objects of their benevolence, they may send abroad healthful influences and a saving power, far beyond the limits of their immediate field of labor;—even to the benighted father-land, whence the ancestors of the sable dwellers upon these islands were first brought; and thus help to raise up the great African family, in its several sections, to civilization and enlightenment;—to bring up a people, who for centuries "have lain among the pots,"[1] to the fine adornment, and the beauteous proportions of grace,—and to aid in that which seems just now, the great work of christendom—the regeneration of a continent!
Falling in with these purposes and aims, I wish to avail myself of the prophetic announcement I have emoted, by calling attention to some facts, in order to show, first of all, that in the work of the Divine Providence, this withered arm of the human species—the Negro race—is gradually, nay rapidly, resuming life and vitality, and hastening with a pace quick beyond all precedent, to the open day of the Gospel: and then I wish to employ the evidences of this fact which I may present, as the grounds for increased zeal and energy, in the particular department this Society aims to fulfil.
The term Ethiopia is, in the original, Cush. This Cush was one of the four sons of Ham. His descendants, in part, settled in Asia between the Euphrates and the Tigris, and there first distinguished themselves. There Nimrod, his son, laid the first foundations of empire of which we have any record, and founded Nineveh. Subsequently, the Cushites spread themselves abroad through Arabia, from the Persian Gulf to the Red Sea. By and by, in process of time, a portion of them crossed the Red Sea and settled in Africa; and afterwards, as the remainder of the Cushite amily, who were settled in Asia, were gradually merged into other races, the seat of their strength and empire was transferred to Africa: and consequently in history, the African section of the Cushite family stands forth as the representative of the race. For although two other of the sons of Ham, that is, Mizraim and Phut, settled in Africa; yet they have had but little to do with generating that mighty hive of human beings which peoples the continent of Africa, whose numbers seem ever to swell more and more beyond all ordinary calculation as the missionary or the traveller advances toward the interior. The name Mizraim and his race seem connected only with ancient Egypt; for, from a very early period down to the present, the invasion of the Persian, the Greek, the Roman, and the Turk, has obliterated the distinctive marks of the sons of Mizraim: and hence in these our modern days, we find in Egypt a mixed race of people, and only the faint memory and the doubtful tracings of the aboriginal population. And so, to a certain extent, was it with Phut; he settled in the northwestern part of Africa; and although his family, too, in a partial degree, have remained intact, yet the presence, the influence, and the power of the Moors and the Romans can be seen in their mixed blood and the foreign control to which they are subjected. The history of the Cushites, in its African section, has been entirely different, Shut in by the great desert from the rest of the world, and, until the discovery of America, protected from foreign aggression by the then, to them, mysterious ocean, they have peopled the vast interior of the African continent with numerous tribes and nations; of most of whom we have but vague, indefinite, and almost fabulous reports, and concerning whom the world is now in nearly as much doubt and incertitude, as it was two thousand years ago, in the time of Herodotus and Ptolemy.
This ignorance, with respect to the Cushite or Negro family, long continued as it was, has in more modern days become greatly lessened. It was broken up by that remarkable activity of the human intellect which the discovery of the magnet, the invention of printing, and the geographical adventures of Columbus, produced in the fifteenth century. These events led to a complete acquaintance with the coast of Africa, and the tribes dwelling thereon. Another influence tended to the same result: the peculiar social condition of the newly-discovered islands in the West—a condition produced by the ruthless waste of aboriginal life by Spain—caused a strong demand for a new supply of labor. In this originated the Slave Trade: and this effectually broke the spell of African seclusion. The demand for West Indian labor was met by the forcible substitution of the Negro for the Indian.
And thus the children of Cash are scattered over the face of the whole earth. The Negro race is to be found in every quarter of the globe. Stolen from their homes, and reduced to abject vassalage, they are gathered together by thousands and tens of thousands, and even millions, in lands separated, by thousands of miles, from the primitive seat of their ancestors, and the rude hamlets of their sires.
Now it is with respect to the Negro race, as thus scattered abroad through the world, as well as dwelling in their homes in Africa, that I shall apply my text: my purpose is to show that, in the merciful providence of God, the Negro race is fast approacing the day of complete evangelization. And as proof of this position, I shall call your attention,—
I. To secular evidences of its correctness and truth, manifested during the last fifty years.
II. To the spiritual progress of the Negro race during the same period.
III. To the unusual spiritual solicitude exhibited in the race, during this period, and at the present time.
I. In the first place, I am to refer you to secular evidences—to some temporal providences, that are alike recent and remarkable; which show that the day of the regeneration of Africa and her children is fast drawing nigh.
We stand now, my hearers, in the central period of the present century: we are living in the year of grace eighteen hundred and fifty-three. Now just go back with me to the commencement of this century, and look at this race of which we are speaking. What then incuts our eyes? Why we find one universal fact connected Avith the Negro race—the fact of universal slavery, and the slave trade. If we turned to the West Indies, whether under Danish, Spanish, Dutch or English, rule, the black man, everywhere, was a chattel. If we turned to the American continent, we would have found the race in the same position there, whether under the Protestant rule of the North American colonies, or under the Romish rule of the South American States. If we turned to Africa herself, we would have seen the whole extent of that vast continent given to the spoiler, robbed of her children—the vast interior converted into a hunting-ground for capturing miserable and wretched human beings;—drenched on every side with fraternal blood;—and the long line of the coast, for thousands of miles, evidencing, at every point, how prolific was the slave trade, in woes and agonies and murders, by the bleached bones, or the bloody tracks of its countless victims!
And what was the status of the Negro race at this time, in cither Europe or America? It is one of the sad results of crime that its deadly influences strike down deep into every part of the human constitution: it both dementates and demoralizes men. The slave trade not only lowered the nations that engaged in it, in the scale of humanity, and in the tone of their morals, but it robbed them of the clearness of their mental virion. They not only robbed the Negro of his freedom—they added another crime thereto: they denied his humanity. Yes, at the commencement of this century it was a debated question among cultivated, thoughtful, nay even scientific minds, whether the Negro was indeed an integral member of the human species.
This, then, was the condition of the Negro race fifty years ago—this the estimation in which that race was held.
And now I desire to call your attention to the great change which has taken place in both these respects, since that period.
Since the commencement of this century, the leading European and American Governments have renounced all participation in that nefarious traffic which has barbarized Africa; and some of them have declared the slave trade piracy. The black man, thus held in a state of servitude, has been emancipated. The cheerful voice of freedom has been heard all around the islands of the Caribbean Sea; and eight hundred thousand human beings, under British rule, have been awakened by its grateful tones, to liberty and manhood. Influenced by this gracious example, France has stricken the shackle and the fetter from the limbs of three hundred thousand men and women. And Denmark has given the promise that she too will follow, at an early day, in the same benevolent pathway.
In America, the civil condition of the Negro race presents, in many places, the same signs of a half century's progress. From Mexico,[2]Bolivia, Peru, Columbia, and Guatemala, the signs and tokens of Negro slavery were obliterated long before the system was abolished in your own western possessions. And although it still exists in Brazil, in the United States, and in Cuba, we have nevertheless some few signs of advancement, some evident indications that it must ere long yield and come to an end: for the commerce of the world is against slavery; the free-trade principle of the age is against it; science in her various developments is against it; the literature of the day is just now being brought to bear, in a most marvellous manner, against it; and the free sentiments of the world are against it, and doom it to an early utter oblivion!
Turning again to the coast of Africa we meet with most cheerful evidences of progress. Along a coast extending some two thousand five hundred miles in length, the slave trade has been entirely uprooted and destroyed; and from "more than three-fourths of the strongholds"[3] once occupied by the traders, they have been driven out, never more to return. Along this region—including some of the richest and most productive portions of the African continent—legitimate trade has sprung up; and instead of a revolting commerce in the "bodies and souls of men," and women, and even babes, we see industrious communities springing up, civilization introduced, and a trade commenced which already has swelled up, in exports alone to Europe and America, to more than two millions of pounds per annum.[4]
In connection with these general facts of African improvement, there are a few particular details which deserve special notice. One of these is, that from the midst of this race, various individuals have arisen who, on many accounts, merit consideration. If I had time, I could mention the names of scores of negroes who have achieved fame and celebrity: philanthropists like Howard; scholars, classical and mental; scientific men—one, a Doctor of Philosophy in a German university; distinguished painters and artists; officers, well known iu Europe;[5] and one—a statesman, a general, and a hero, now a historical character, who was the father of his country, and achieved her liberties; one of the ablest commanders of the age; a man for whom the highest notes of minstrelsy have been struck, around whose name and history all the attractions of romance have hung. I mean the great and mighty chief of Hayti, Toussaint L'Ouverture.[6]
Besides these various evidences of the progress of my race during the last half century, I must not fail to notice one striking fact: that is, that within this period, the black government of Hayti has come into existence; the African colony of Sierra Leone has been established—a colony which has already become the cradle of missions, the mother of churches, the parent of colonies. And, moreover, we see now rising with, we trust, hopeful indications, on the western coast of Africa, the lone star of the black Republic of Liberia.
And still another movement of a similar character is now projected by Englishmen, from your own West India Islands: a movement of brightest promise, even while yet in the bud; which contains within its folds the germs of a new African nationality of a civilized and Christian type. In the island of Barbadoes a society has been formed, under the patronage of the Governor, the Bishop, and other chief personages, whose object is to transplant colonies of black men from the West Indies to the coast of Africa. The black population have become interested, and have formed societies, and declare their strong spiritual yearnings for Africa. They are to go in communities with clergymen, physicians, mechanics, and laborers, and form themselves at once into organized settlements. An agent has been in this country seeking funds for the foundation of a college. An important society has been formed in England, under the patronage of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the leading dignitaries of the Church, and great statesmen. Already two African youths are under a system of instruction for missionary usefulness.
The locality they have chosen is that rich and precious portion of the coast which lies south of Liberia, and which is contiguous to the powerful kingdoms of Ashantee and Dahomey; and thus, in a corporate state, they will be enabled, at an early day, to act with a civilizing power and a Christian influence upon all the wide spaces, yea, at the very heart of the great life which beats in that vast continent. And here you cannot but notice that which has struck my own mind as one of the most distinct, unequivocal, and peculiar providences of the Almighty, which has been seen during the last three centuries. It is now three hundred years since the commencement of the slave trade. During this period millions of negroes have been stolen from Africa, and subjected to all the bitter but unimaginable horrors of domestic slavery on the American continent and its isles. Why all this agony and anguish—continued from generation to generation, to the only portion of helpless humanity—dragging down the people of a single race on two continents;—why all this agony and anguish should have been permitted by the Divine will and providence, lias been perhaps the most puzzling question which ever agitated the mind uf Christian men, who could not doubt the justice and equity of Heaven. Well, three centuries have passed, and the mystery is being solved: the recaptured Africans taken to Sierra Leone, civilized and Christianized, feel all of a sudden, an irresistible desire to return to the land of their birth: they charter vessels, and a large number go down the coast a thousand miles and more, bearing the Gospel to Abbeokuta.[7]
Again, emancipation takes place in your British West Indian Islands, and eight hundred thousand men, women, and children are changed, by a single act in one day, from chattels into men. So soon as they are freed from the fetter and from thraldom, a strong spiritual yearning arises in their souls for their father-land, and they stretch forth the arms of a sacred affection for Africa. The feeling is so wide, so general, so earnest, that an organized system is fallen upon; and soon Christian communities of black men in large numbers from your British West Indies, will be seen planted on the west coast of Africa, proffering the boon of salvation to all the large tribes and nations of that continent.
And yet again: the children of Africa have been sojourning nigh three centuries in America, and in the course of time, large numbers of them have become free. The free blacks of America are a disturbing; element in the midst of the white inhabitants of the paradoxical Republic; and hence, by the force of the oppressive principle, thousands of them have been led to emigrate to the coast of Africa. There they have formed a Republic—the Republic of Liberia, with free institutions, with schools and churches, and missions to their heathen kin.
Here, then, in the providence of God, we see three distinct movements, in the Negro race itself, of a civilized and Christian character, tending towards the coast of Africa; and it presents this singular, this cheering and auspicious aspect, that after three centuries of slavery and outrage, this people are emerging from the shades, and, all at once, from three different quarters of the globe, are carrying in a combined and organized manner, in three different streams, civilized institutions and the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, not only to the coast of Africa, but to the banks of the Niger—to the very beart of that vast benighted continent!
II. I must not dwell any longer upon these. topics of temporal regard. Interesting and gratifying though they be, they are not nigh so grateful to the Christian mind, as the facts which pertain to the spiritual progress of the Negro race during the last fifty years.
The contrast I have just presented between the commencement of this century and the present moment, holds in an equal degree with respect to the spiritual condition of this race, as to their civil and political status.
Prior to the commencement of this century, the Negro race had been left in a state of almost absolute spiritual neglect. Along the whole line of the west coast of Africa, not a mission had been commenced to evangelize nations; not a spire pointed its silent finger, with a heavenly significancy, to the skies. The masses of the black population of America and the West Indies were in a state of heathenism, though surrounded by the Christian institutions of the whites. Both custom and law forbade the instruction of Negroes, and superadded fear prevented the formation of schools. Nay, more than this: the conquerors of the black race were as yet undecided whether their bondmen were capable of spiritual illumination, or were heirs of immortality.
Now let us take a general view of the advance which has been made in the Negro race in Christian culture and enlightenment. I have not time to trace the stream of improvement, from the first flowings of the generous waters to the present full and grateful supply. I cannot linger on my way to mark the first signs of a noble revolution of feeling on this subject—to note the kindly endeavors and the zealous efforts which ensued, the encouraging fruits which they yielded, and the present state of cheering advancement and hopeful promise. Let it suffice that I present the more notable changes—the almost incredible contrast which meets our eyes this day almost everywhere where the children of Cush, the Negro race are living.
Fifty years have sped their flight, and now, at the present day, there is not a spot on earth where members of the Negro race are gathered together in any considerable numbers, but what there enlarged facilities are now opened to them for mental and spiritual culture, or where their religious interests have not become questions of vast importance. Turn to the West India Islands. Immediately on emancipation, nay, in justice it must be said, hefore that glorious event, efforts had been commenced to give religious instruction to the black population. Even then this Society had commenced its benign and saving labors; and now, in all the lovely isles of the West, where "Britain's power is felt," there are hundreds and thousands of African youth who this day have been appropriating the rich advantages of mental and spiritual instruction. During the few years which have elapsed since emancipation, there has been a marvellous increase of schools, and churches, and chapels. A number of intelligent and thoughtful African young men, among the different bodies into which Christendom is unfortunately divided, have been trained up as teachers and ministers. In the Church a class of this kind act as catechists and lay-readers. Some of the children of these people have been sent to Europe, to avail themselves of the higher discipline of education in the universities of the old world, and have returned home again to serve their people in civil and spiritual functions. A few have remained in Europe. I know myself of three of these sons of Africa now in England, who, having taken orders, are acting as curates in the Church; another, a personal acquaintance, lias recently commenced his ministry in one of the West India Islands.
In the United States of America, although wicked laws and a bad public sentiment have seriously retarded the spiritual progress of the African race, yet in the slave States a greater attention is now paid to this duty than ever before; and in the Xorth a class of free black men has arisen, who, as ministers and teachers, in their own persons vindicate their race, and at the same time elevate and bless it.
And now, when we turn to Africa, how great the change! How wonderful and pleasing the contrast! "Previous to the year 1832, there was not a mission anywhere between Sierra Leone and the Cape of Good Hope." Now, "during the last fifteen or sixteen years"—I use the words of another[8]—"there have been established as many as twelve independent missions, at the distance of 100 or 200 miles from each other, embracing three times that number of outstations along the coast, and a still greater number of outstations interiorward." To hundreds of thousands of the nations, on the coast and in the interior, the Gospel of glad tidings is regularly preached. Its life-giving power is manifested in the marked revolution which is going on in their tastes and habits, and in the change of their customs. Chri-tian communities are being gathered together; civilized and Christian institutions are formed, and are extending themselves. Christianity has made itself felt in the family, in the domestic relations of life, in trade, in law in the "modus operandi" of their Governments. Thousands of children are now regularly receiving instruction in our holy religion, and the enlightenment which comes from mental training.[9] Already one high-school has furnished a score and more of catechists and teachers; has produced three native young men, fit candidates for holy orders in the Church, who are preaching the Gospel to their own kith and kin in heathen darkness. This same school—the Fourah Bay Institution—has now a dozen young men fit candidates for holy orders; and another set of youths trained in the languages and in science, also preparing for sacred duties and the ministerial call. At another place on the coast, two other high schools are already in operation; two colleges, one on a large scale, are projected, and will soon commence operations. Indeed, so great, so increasing, and so important are the spiritual interests of the nations, that the Episcopal Church of America is now strengthening all its posts on the coast of Africa; and, to use the words of its Foreign Secretary, in a letter to myself, she expects that the Church there, that is, in Liberia, will soon be permanently established; and last year she commissioned a Bishop to head her movements in the mission there, in the Republic of Liberia. And since the consecration of Bishop Payne, the mother Church of England has met the needs and the demands of your own missions and African colonies by the consecration of the Bishop of Sierra Leone.
III. In the third and last place, I beg to direct your attention to the unusual spiritual solicitude now everywhere manifest in the Negro race.
This characteristic has had its chief manifestation during the half-century which has just expired, and seems peculiar to it. There is a stirring up now in the spiritual desires and yearnings of this race, such as the world has never before witnessed. From every side we hear the earnest call, from yearning hearts, for Christian light. There is no quarter of the globe, where the children of Africa are gathered together, but where we see this trait of character more discovered than any other. Indeed, risking the imputation of partiality of race, I think I may say that religious susceptibility and moral dispositions are the more marked characteristics of the Negro family, and the main point in which they differ from other races. There is a peculiar fact which proves this point: where the white man goes he first builds a bank or a trading-house: the first effort of the black man is to erect a meeting-house. The enlightenment of the one seeks, first of all, to express itself in mere civilization: the native disposition of the other tends toward some religious manifestation.
During the last few years there has been a more than usual—a most marked expression of these features of character. We have the testimony of West Indian pastors, missionaries, and teachers, to the eager craving of the African peasantry for instruction. In America, the gravest hindrances cannot repress this desire; and among the free black population, I can testify from personal acquaintance and observation that this, the religious solicitude, is the master principle of that people. Turn to Africa, and there we see almost fulfilled the prediction of the Prophet—"The Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising."[10] I doubt much whether, if ever, the history of missions has discovered such a wide-spread and earnest seeking for Christian knowledge, as is seen among the Pagan tribes on that suffering coast. A missionary on his way down the coast, lands at a certain spot. The news of a God-man, as they term him, having come, flies like lightning through the neighborhood. Three kings visit him; several chiefs bring him their sons, and desire him to take them under his care for instruction; numbers of the people assemble, all expressing their sorrow that he will not abide with them, and teach them. When Mr. Freeman went some two hundred miles in the interior to visit the king of Ashantee, the whole kingdom was thrown into excitement. "Never since the world began," said the king, "has there been an English missionary in Ashantee before." Thousands of troops attended him on his approach to the sable monarch; and in the midst of the grossest superstition and most cruel rites, the ambassador of Christ was received with the most marked respect; and full permission was given him to establish Christian institutions in the capital of the kingdom.[11] All along the coast where missions are established, kings and princes and great men are bringing their children forward to be trained up in our holy faith. I do not know of a single mission but where there are two or three or more of these youthful princes, who are intrusted to the care of these missionaries. Sometimes their parents come from the far interior with their children—so great is their desire; and so numerous are the recmests of this kind, that, not unfrequently, the missionaries are obliged to decline receiving them. In several cases they have sacrificed their parental feelings—parted with their little ones, and sent them across the ocean for instruction. In England, at the present time, there cannot be less than a hundred Negro children at school, in different parts of the country. Kor does this solicitude spend itself in anxieties for the yonng only—it is fully participated in by the adult population. The missionary, wherever he goes from his station, is sure to get a large, patient, inquiring auditory, whether in a hut, or in a rude heathen temple, or in the temporary Christian Church, or beneath the shade of the palm, upon the passing highway. Sometimes the chief of a tribe refuses an escort through to a neighboring town, lest the missionary should stay with the other people and not come back and proclaim the good news to him and his people. At times it is both ludicrous and tearful to hear of a missionary being kept captive by a heathen king, for fear that, should he suffer him to depart, he might never come back again to preach the Gospel. It is only last year that the people of a village formed a stratagem to keep a travelling mhsionary to themselves. They attempted to bribe is boatmen to go away, so that he would be obliged to remain with them. And what is singular is, that this desire for the Gospel, vague, undefined, and ignorant as it surely is, comes from every quarter—from the north and the south, the east and the west. The missionaries on the Gambia find themselves utterly unable to meet the earnest solicitations of the Foulahs, the Jalofs, and other tribes in Senegambia. The American missionaries in Liberia are pleading with tears for more help—for more teachers—for more clergymen. The call is so earnest at Lagos, at Abbeokuta, and in the interior from the banks of the Niger, that Mr. Townsend sends the cry across the ocean for a band of many missionaries; and the Church Missionary Society is using every possible effort to meet the call.[12]
At Calabar, and at the Gaboon, the missionaries have been obliged to refuse the earnest request of the natives for more teachers and ministers. You are, doubtless, aware of the fact that the chiefs in South Africa, in many places—chiefs representing tens of thousands of needy men, have gone hundreds of miles to the Bishop of Cape Town for teachers and clergymen,—yea, have written across the ocean to the Queen, pleading for help. And Dr. Krapf, that modern Paul, has the kings of mighty nations in Zanguebar—nations extending four and five hundred miles in the interior, numbering millions of people—begging him to come and settle in their midst; and he is almost the only man in East Africa, to meet the demand!
I have brought these facts before you, Christian friends and brethren, because to my mind they assume a most marked importance, and seem to me to have a most clear and striking significance. It is but probable that to your minds their import may seem less weighty, and that through peculiarity of position, my own view of them may appear exaggerated. I think, however, that a few considerations will show that I ought not to be regarded as sanguine; and will cause the remarks I have made to stand out before your own minds as possessing an almost wondrous significance, and as being among the first marked fulfilments of the prophecy, that "Ethiopia shall soon stretch out her hands unto God." Just look at these facts—note the great progress of the African race. See the civil and religious improvement they have made alike in Africa and in the lands of their captivity. Mark the religious solicitude they are manifesting on every hand. Observe the peculiar providences which are just now occurring in connection with them; and then remember that nearly all these events, all this progress, has taken place during the short period of fifty years; while in all the centuries past of the race, from the very dawn of history, the intellect, the moral nature, society, and civil government, had remained dormant and inert! In his "History of the Decline and Fall of Rome," Gibbon remarks that "the rude ignorance of the Negro has never invented any effectual weapons of defence or of destruction: they appear incapable of forming any extensive plan of government, or of conquest; and the obvious inferiority of their mental faculties has been discovered and abused by the nations of the temperate zone."[13] Gibbon made this assertion as a fact of history, not many years before the commencement of this century. Never before had the nations beheld any thing the reverse of his description. Nigh thirty centuries of the world's existence had rolled along, and yet an almost palpable gloom had brooded over the multitudinous masses of that thickly crowded continent. During the flight of those dark ages, not a healthful motion was given to the almost deadened life of its crowded population. The discoveries of Columbus took place, the Reformation ensued, and the art of printing was invented. These events revived the languid pulse of Europe, and stirred into activity the energies and skill of India, and broke up the perpetual solitudes of America, and poured therein life, civilization, and enlightenment.
But to my poor father-land they brought chains and slavery, and the cruel desolations and the harrowing atrocities of the slave trade, and the untold horrors of the mid-passage, and a deeper depth of misery and anguish than Africa had ever known in all her dark histories before. And thus from 1562, down to the commencement of this century, the dark and bloody history of Africa was lengthened out and prolonged, with, alas! aggravations and intensities unknown in all her long previous eras.
And now but fifty years have elapsed, and all this history is being reversed. The dark curtain is removed, and a brighter scene meets the view. God seems to have compressed in this single half-century the work and the blessings of thousands of years. And now I say that, looking at these facts as they stand before us—comparing them with the history of Africa, nigh three thousand years of a previous era—they appear marked, distinct, and marvellous. I say, that if the providences of God may be regarded as indications of His purposes and will; then, inasmuch as these providences are, in a marked degree, peculiar, so we may regard them as highly significant.
I am aware that it is the part of a wise man not to be too sanguine. I know, too, that, looking at the untold, the unknown millions in Central Africa, upon whom the eyes of civilized man have never fallen, the work is yet but begun. But when I note the rapidity of God's work during the brief period I have mentioned, and know that God allows no obstacles to stand against Him and His cause, whether it be a pestilential shore, or a violent population, or a sanguinary king, or vindictive slave-dealers, or a slave-trading town like that of Lagos; when I see these things, I cannot but believe that we are now approaching the fulfilment of this prophecy. When I see, moreover, how this great continent is invested on every side by the zealous ardent missionary or the adventurous traveller; how, almost weekly, something is brought to our cars across the ocean, of new discovery, or of startling incident; how that now there is every probability that soon the very heart of that continent, and all its centuries of mystery, will be revealed .to the gaze and scrutiny of the civilized world; and then, that by the common road, by trade, by commerce, by the flying wings of steamers, by caravans, by converted Africans, by civilized and pious Negroes, from the West Indies or America, the Bible, the Prayer-Book, and Tracts, and the Church in all her functions and holy offices, will almost at once be introduced among the mighty masses of its population;—when I see these things, my heart is filled with confident assurance—I cannot but believe that the day of Africa's redemption fast draweth nigh! And vast and extensive as the work may be, it seems that it will be a most rapid one; every thing gives this indication: for first, you will notice, that since the abolition of the slave trade, this race, in all its homes, has been going forward: it has had nowhere any retrograde movements. And next, you will notice, that the improvement of this race, social, civil, and religious, has been remarkably quick, and has been, almost all, included in a very brief period; and therefore I think that the work of evangelization in this race will be a rapid one. So God, at times, takes "the staff of accomplishment" into His own hand, and fulfils His ends with speed. The children of Israel were thirty-nine years performing a journey, which could have been accomplished in a few days: but in the fortieth year they marched a longer distance than all the years preceding, and entered, in a few weeks, at once, into the Promised Land. So God, now, unseen to human eyes, may be leading on His hosts to a mighty victory over Satan; and in the briefest of all the periods of the Church's warfare, may intend to accomplish the most brilliant and consummate of all His triumphs. And this is my conviction with regard to Africa. In my soul I believe that the time has come. I have the strongest impression of the nigh approach of her bright day of deliverance. The night, I am convinced—the night of forlornness, of agony and desolation—is far spent, the day is at hand! The black charter of crime and infamy and blood, which for nigh three centuries, has given up my father-land to the spoiler, is about to be erased! The malignant lie, which would deliver up an entire race, the many millions of a vast continent, to rapine and barbarism and benightedness, is now to be blotted out! And if I read the signs of the times aright—if I am not deceived in supposing that now I see God's hand graciously opened for Africa —if to my sight now appear, with undoubted clearness,
———"the baby forms
Of giant figures yet to be,"
what a grand reversal of a dark destiny will it not be for poor bleeding Africa! What a delightful episode from the hopeless agony of her unmitigated, unalleviated suffering! For ages hath she lain beneath the incubus of the "demon of her idolatry." For ages hath she suffered the ravages of vice, corruption, iniquity, and guilt. For ages hath she been "stricken and smitten" by the deadly thrusts of murder and hate, revenge and slaughter. Fire, famine, and the sword have been her distressful ravaging visitations. War, with devastating stride, has ravaged her fair fields, and peopled her open and voracious tombs. The slave trade—that fell destroyer! has fired the hamlets of her children—has sacked her cities—has turned the hands of her sons upon each other—and set her different communities at murderous strife, and colored their hands with fraternal blood! Yea, every thing natural has been changed into the monstrous; and all things harmonious turned into discord and confusion. Earth has had her beauty marred by the bloody track of the cruel men who have robbed my father-land of her children: and the choral voice of ocean, which should lift up naught but everlasting symphonies in the ears of angels and of God, has been made harsh and dissonant, by the shrieks and moans and agonizing cries of the poor victims, who have either chosen a watery grave in preference to slavery, or else have been east into its depths, the sick and the emaciated, by the ruthless slave-dealer! And then, when landed on the distant strand—the home of servitude, the seat of oppression—then has commenced a system of overwork and physical endurance, incessant and unrequited—a series of painful tasks, of forced labor, of want and deprivation, and lashings, and premature deaths, continued from generation to generation, transmitted as the only inheritance of poor, helpless humanity, to children's children!
But now there is a new spirit abroad—not only in the Christian world, but likewise through the different quarters of her own broad continent. There is an uprising of her sons from intellectual sloth and spritual inertness; a seeking and a stretching forth of her hands, for light, instruction, and spirituality, such as the world has never before seen; and which gives hopes that the days of Cyprian and Augustine shall again return to Africa; when the giant sins and the deadly evils, which have ruined her, shall be effectually stayed; and when Ethiopia, from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean—from the Mediterranean to the Cape, "shall stretch out her hands unto God!"
But it may be asked, What relation have the remarks I have made this evening, to the subject of the Ladies' Negro Emancipation Society? Much every way: and I proceed now to point out this relation, and the obligation which it appears to me to ensue thereon.
I have endeavored to show this evening that God is laying bare His arm just now for Africa and the Negro race;—is bringing to a rapid end their long and grievous servitude;—and is showing, in His mysterious providence, that, however grievous, in the past, to flesh and blood, has been their lot, that He meant it for good. Now the Almighty has placed a very considerable section of this race under your care, control, and government. They inhabit all those islands in the Caribbean Sea, which have come into your possession by discovery, or which have been purchased by the heroic sacrifice of blood, or won by bravciy or prowess. They are the dwellers of some of the most productive portions of the globe, lying in the bright and genial bounds of the tropics. They are the laboring population of lands which yield those articles, once termed luxuries, but which are now the most important and lucrative articles of commerce. And they are the peasantry of provinces which soon will be the high road of the globe—the central depots of the world's trade; and through which, ere long, will be poured the vast and magnificent treasures of the East.
These islands must, without doubt, be held in high estimation by you as their owners and proprietors. It may be, however, that you have adopted the new and current dogma, that is, that colonies are a useless, costly burden, which should be disposed of as soon as possible; and, if you have, then there is no need that I should further press this subject upon your attention. But if you have not adopted this opinion, and if you do value your colonial possessions, then you must see the need that these people—the Negro peasantry—should be trained to be honest, moral, industrious, intelligent, and thrifty. But in order that they may become fixed in moral and industrious habits, they must receive a moral and religious training. Heretofore, as you know, the school in which they have been educated was the school of slavery—a school which yields naught but the productive spawn of vice, and sloth, and ignorance, and superstition—a school in which indolence was respectability, and labor was degradation and vileness. Since emancipation, however, vigorous efforts have been made to extend to them the advantages of education. To a very large extent this has been done by the Ladies' Negro Emancipation Society, with zeal and with success; for hundreds of schools have been founded by them, thousands of children have been instructed, churches and chapels have been called into existence, and teachers and ministers have been supplied. These have been the direct and the indirect results of this Society's efforts. But what is remarkable is, that while the wide and merciful blessings of this Society have been falling "like gentle dew from heaven" upon the objects of its benevolence, its work has been silently done; its operations have been carried on quietly and unostentatiously; so much so, indeed, that thousands of intelligent persons do not know of even the existence of the Ladies' Negro Emancipation Society. But however much like gentle woman it may be that these generous Christian ladies should thus, at once, "silent and unseen," exert themselves, it can be so no longer. Events have occurred which drive them before the public, and which require them to make most earnest appeals for aid. Formerly they were aided by grants from Government and from the Colonial Legislatures, and they received considerable contributions from the emancipated blacks themselves. But now the sad wreck of pecuniary resources, the blight of bankruptcy which has fallen upon the West India proprietors, has completely cut off these sources of aid and assistance. The planters and the Local Government can no longer help them; the Home Government lias withdrawn its grants. And though I must say, as my firm belief and conviction—a conviction founded on a careful study of reports and documents—that amid the general wreck the black population, on the whole, is rising, yea, in some places, rising on the ruins of the planters,[14] yet it is also the sad fact, that, in some places, they are going down to rain with the proprietors: a ruin, alas! which involves the wreck of immortal souls, with the lesser evil of confused and disastrous material interests. And surely this melancholy state of affairs cannot but have its due and powerful influence upon your minds and upon your charity.
But besides this claim upon your interest, your generosity, and your zeal, as Englishmen, there is another earnest consideration, and one which appeals to you on a higher principle, that is, as Christians.
When I commenced my remarks I said that it was a cherished idea of many of the supporters of this Society, that their labors might eventually tell upon Africa. Christian friends, this is no longer a mere idea. It is, in very deed, one of the results which God's providence has already wrought, in a partial degree, for Africa, through your West Indian islands. The ways of God are most mysterious— past finding out! lie sees what man's short sight cannot perceive; and takes the direst human workings into his own hands, for enlarged and most beneficent ends. And herein we may see the plastic power and the transforming energy of that perfect wisdom and that omnipotent hand, which knoweth all things, and which worketh as it wills, His own great ends. It seems now quite clear that the children of that very people, who for nearly three centuries have been passing through the dread ordeal of slavery in your West Indian colonies, are yet to be the special messengers of glad tidings to their father-land. Already several missionary companies of black men from your islands have gone to the land of their fathers. One case I may mention: some African converts from Jamaica, feeling that they ought to do something for their father-land, went, four years ago, as teachers, to the Calabar, at the mouth of the Niger; and already as the first fruits of their labors, the king of one of the small tribes has been converted, and is attempting to introduce civilized habits, and has already established the observance of the Sabbath. Indeed, so important has this movement become, that a Society has been formed, as I have before remarked, to give it form, order, system, and distinctness; and there is every probability that soon it will become one of the great colonizing movements of this colonizing age, with this difference, that is, that it will be conducted on a principle, and that it will have as its main object the glory of God!
The train of thought I have presented this evening furnishes ground, I think, for the following suggestions:
1. It shows, first of all, that the Negro race possesses strong vital power. I think the facts to which I have already called your attention evince this: they show that, amid the most distressful allotments, this race clings to life; and that God has most benignantly cared for them, in times past, notwithstanding all their fiery trials. The contrast between this people, in this respect, and some others, is most striking. Wherever European civilization has been planted, there generally the natives have vanished, as the morning mist before the rising of the sun. The Indians of North America are fast fading away. The natives of Van Dieman's Land are gone. The many millions that once peopled the clustering islands of the West Indian Archipelago hare vanished before the presence and the power of the white man, and will never again return from the deep repose of the tomb, until they arise at the final day for accusation as well as for judgment. The aborigines of the South Sea islands, of New Zealand, of Australia, are departing, like the shadow, before the rising sun of the Anglo-Saxon emigrant. It is said that no statesmanship, no foresight, no Christian benevolence can preserve the Sandwich Islanders. There is something exceedingly sorrowful in this funereal procession of the weak portions of mankind, before the advancing progress of civilization and enlightenment! But amid all these sad general facts there seems to be one exception—the Negro! The ravages of the slave trade would seem sufficient to produce extermination: the mid-passage alone is enough to destroy any people! It has not destroyed the vitality of the Negro! The vast interior of Africa teems with the countless millions of an unnumbered population; and in the land of the Negro's enthralment, the race increases with a rapidity which surprises the keenest calculator, and which carries fear to the heart of the oppressor. These facts I take and mention as indications that Divine Providence designs a future for this people. They appear to me tokens and evidences that this particular section of the human species is not doomed to destruction, but that the elevation, the civilization, the evangelization of the Negro are determined purposes of the Divine mind for the future. "Ethiopia shall stretch forth her hands unto God."
2. The remarks I have made show us, in the second place, that God has given this race a strong moral character.
Although the Christian zeal and endeavor of the Church are by no means to be determined by the richness or the hardness of the soil in which the truth is to be planted, still it is cause of great encouragement, and an incentive to higher effort, when we find a people in whose nature there is congruity, so far as that can be in wretched humanity, with the spirit of our Holy Faith, and who desire the possession of it. The Negro race manifests this peculiar trait of character: it is a race, I think I may say, remarkably docile, affectionate, easily attached, and when attached, ardently devoted—a race with the strongest religious feelings, sentiments, and emotions—a race plastic in nature, with a native mobility and adaptedness which at once saves them from those deadly shocks and antagonisms which destroy races when placed in juxtaposition with elements diverse from and stronger than their own—a race patient and enduring; ambitious as any other for freedom; but when, in the stern collisions of this forceful, heartless life of ours, stricken down by the iron hand of mere brute power, not given to despair, but content to use the genial teachings of Hope, and to wait for the future, in calm abidance and with confident assurance. These elements of character—these qualities and dispositions, show that God has kindly bestowed a nature upon this race, which is a gracious preparation for the entrance of His Gospel—a nature which seems the highest natural type of Christian requirement.
3. I remark, in the last place, that in His gifts of nature and in His preserving favor upon my race, we may see the training hand of God upon them, in all their scattered homes, for high ends and purposes, in the future, and also the Church's opportunity and her duty.
I need not dwell upon this point, for I have already, in a general way, disclosed the wondrous providences of God upon the race, in every quarter of the globe where they are living. Dark and dreary has been their way through their many avenues of pain, and distress, and agony, during the long centuries of their distressful pilgrimage, and yet they have not been deserted of God. Surely their history warrants the affirmation that "the angel of His presence saved them;" and now, when all His purposes of trial and of training, of suffering and of sorrow, are well nigh fulfilled, the Almighty easts down all the barriers of restraint: a light seems of a sudden to shine into their dark prison-house, and a divine voice to say unto them, "Arise up quickly; and their chains fall off from their hands;"[15] and a mission appears to be given them, whether in Sierra Leone, or the West Indies, or America, to start up from the ashes, and go forth to their needy kin in heathenism:—"Go stand and speak . . . to the people all the words of this life."[16]
This aspect of the matter, that is, God's training of the people for His own great work in Africa, I have brought before you already in preceding remarks; and in it you can easily see the importance of your black West Indian population with reference to Africa, and likewise the Church's opportunity and duty for the glory of God and the honor of our Lord Jesus Christ. You see herein also the great value and importance of this Society for which I am pleading. In aiding the Society, you are not only building up your own possession, but you are also becoming co-workers with God in some of His greatest purposes. In contributing to the funds of this association, you touch, with a gracious saving influence, the needy people of two hemispheres. In joining in the labors of these benevolent ladies, you are evangelizing both the West Indies and Africa.
I repeat, therefore, that this is one of the chief among the charities of England; and therefore, as a son of Africa, deeply interested in the welfare of a race which, of all others, may be called the "suffering race," anxious that the precious things of Jesus may be known of them for comfort and for consolation, I venture to ask you this evening most generous contributions to this important Society, and a zealous, affectionate interest in Africa and the Negro race. If an English Christian grieves at the remembrance of wrongs inflicted upon Africa;—if his deepest sensibilities are affected at the darkness and the sin which still prevails through all her borders;—if he anxiously desires the spread of the Gospel through all her quarters;—if he wishes to see her sons, in every part of the earth, stand up erect, blessed with the liberty wherewith the Gospel makes men free; then, I say, that by participating in the labors, and sharing the burdens of this Society, he is privileged, in the Divine providence, to realize, to a measurable degree, all his desires. For thereby he can be giving to the children of Africa the best compensation, even the Gospel; and be turning back the stream of misery into a tide of blessing; and joining in with God in directing most marvellous purposes, and proclaiming abroad, through those who—by birth and color, by the sympathy of suffering, by common hopes and aspirations—seem pointed out as the fittest agents, the marvels of that grace, and the wondrous efficacy of that blood, and the power of that name which is above every name—even of Him "who is above all, and through all, and in you all." "To whom," &c.
- ↑ Psalm lxviii. 13.
- ↑ Slavery was abolished in Mexico, September 15, 1829, by the following decree:—"Slavery is forever abolished in the Republic; and consequently all those individuals who, until this day, looked upon themselves as slaves, are free."
- ↑ The "British Squadron on the Coast of Africa": by the Rev. J. Leighton Wilson, an American Missionary, p. 10.
- ↑ Ibid., p. 18
- ↑ Eustace, a Negro of the Island of St. Domingo, was an eminent philanthropist: he devoted all his means to providing for the sick and needy, nursing and sheltering orphans, and apprenticing destitute youth. He lived and labored only to make others happy. In 1832, the National Institute of France awarded him the sum of 1,000 dollars. Job Ben Solomon; Antony William Amo, (of the Universities of Halle and Wittenburg,) Doctor of Philosophy; Ignatius Sancho, and Francis Williams; ranked high as scholars: Annibal was a Lieutenant-General in the Russian Army; Ltslet Groffroy was an officer of artillery in the Isle of France.
- ↑ Lamartine and Miss Martineau have both made Toussaint the hero of one of their works; and most readers are acquainted with the fine sonnet of Wordsworth, which I cannot resist repeating:
"Toussaint, the most unhappy man of men!
Whether the whistling rustic tend his plough
Within thy hearing, or thy head be now
Pillowed in some deep dungeon's earless den;—
O miserable Chieftain! where and when
Wilt thou find patience! Yet die not; do thou
Wear rather in thy bonds a cheerful brow:
Though fallen thyself, never to rise again,
Live, and take comfort. Thou hast left behind
Powers that will work for thee; air, earth, and skies—
There's not a breathing of the common wind
That will forget thee; thou hast great allies;
Thy friends are exultations, agonies,
And love, and man's unconquerable mind!" - ↑ This Emigration commenced in 1839. I shall not enter into the particulars pertaining to it: but I would beg the reader to procure a copy of "Abbeokuta, or Sunrise within the Tropics," by the accomplished and philanthropic Miss Tucker, author of "South India Sketches" and the "Rainbow in the North." Chap. III. gives a full account of the "foundation of Abbeokuta," and the "Siena Leone Emigrants."
- ↑ The "British Squadron on the Coast of Africa": by the Rev. J. Leighton Wilson, an American Missionary, p. 21.
- ↑ Mr. Wilson says, (p. 24,) "more than 10,000 youths are now receiving a Christian instruction in the schools connected with the missions."
- ↑ Isaiah lx. 3.
- ↑ See "Journal of various Visits to the kingdoms of Ashantee, &c," by the Rev. Thomas B. Freeman.
- ↑ The root of all this disposition seems to be the yearning of the native African for a higher religion; and it is illustrated by the singular fact that Mohammedanism is rapidly and peaceably spreading all through the tribes of Western Africa, even to the Christian settlements of Liberia.
- ↑ Book 5. In quoting this remark, I would be understood as referring it to the tribes and nations south of the desert only.
- ↑ This I believe to be a true statement of the case: the black population generally, are advancing, to the disadvantage of the planters. The West Indian party in this country, and the pro-slavery party in the United States, maintain, that emancipation is a failure, and that the black population are fast degenerating into barbarism. As proof of this, they refer to Jamaica:—in the other islands the proprietors have suffered but little; but in Jamaica there has been an almost utter prostration of this class. The inference drawn from this is, that emancipation is a failure.
A few items will enable us to see whether this representation is altogether correct:
1. For whose benefit was emancipation effected? For the planting population only, or the black also? The census of the island of Jamaica will help decide this matter, if even the past history and injuries of the Negro race do not. According to the received estimate of 1850, of the 400,000 people in the island, 16,000 were white, and 384,000 black and colored. It is but fair, then, that this large black and colored population should have a very considerable interest in the results of emancipation.
2. Have the black and colored population received any advantage through emancipation? In 1833, they were, nearly all, "chattels," "marketable commodities," poor, penniless,—not even possessing themselves. Is their condition any better now? I answer this question, by quoting from a valuable and impartial work entitled "Jamaica in 1850," by J. Bigelow, Esq., an American gentleman. He says: "I was surprised to find how general was the desire among the Negroes to become possessed of a little land, and upon what sound principles that was based," (see p. 115.) "I was greatly surprised to find the number of these colored proprietors—over one hundred thousand, and constantly increasing," (p. 116.) "When one reflects that only sixteen years ago there was scarcely a colored landholder upon the island, and that now there are a hundred thousand, it is unnecessary to say that this class of the population appreciate the privileges of free labor, and a homestead, &e.," (p. 116.) "They raise not only what they require for their own consumption, but a surplus which they take to market, &c, &c," (p.117.) "Of course it requires no little self-denial and energy for a Negro, upon the wages now paid in Jamaica, to lay up enough with which to purchase one of these properties," (p. 118.)
3. Political power. "The political power of the island is rapidly passing into the same hands, (the black people's.) The possession of four or live acres of land confers a right to vote on the selection of members of Assembly. The blacks are ambitious to possess and exercise this privilege; it causes them to be courted and respected. It is only a short time since there were no colored people returned to that body. In the last Assembly there were a dozen. No Negro ever had a seat there till the session before the last, when one was returned. In the last session there were three. It is safe to say, that in a very few years the blacks and browns will be in a clear majority. They already hold the balance of power," (p. 157.)
4. Distinguished Negroes and colored men. "One of the most distinguished barristers on the island is a colored man, who was educated at an English University, and ate his terms at Lincoln's Inn," (p. 23.) Speaking of the Surrey Assize, he says, (p. 25 :) "Two colored lawyers were sitting at the barristers' table, and the jury-box was occupied by twelve men, all but three of whom were colored."
In a statement made by G. W. Alexander, of London, who recently visited the West Indies, I find that there arc between 30 and 40,000 black voters in Jamaica.
The Rev. Mr. Dowding, who has lived many years in the West Indies, thus speaks of the black population in general: "They are now in the fullest career of improvement, and after knowledge of them, as parishioners, both young and old, in the school, in the family, and at the sick bedside, it is impossible not to call them a most promising people; intelligent, orderly, and (for the most part) religious.
"It is not necessary for our purpose that we should make out a case, and I have no wish to hide either their foibles or their faults. It would be strange indeed if they had not both; but let it be remembered that within the last twenty years these people were salable like the brutes that perish; suffered (almost encouraged) to live as the brutes; and it needs, must be considered a most significant fact, that they have risen to the requirements of their condition so rapidly, and taken possession of their freedom with so little effort. Whilst in these regions many are still thinking of the Negro as an animal who wears a monkey-face, and says 'massa,' with just wit enough to be cunning, and just English enough to lie, there is a race growing up in those Western Islands, seemly in their bearing, and very often handsome, (civilization and improvement fast creolizing their features, and effacing the uncomeliness of the African type ;) their peasants as intelligent and intelligible as our own; their advanced classes already a powerful bourgeoisie, of whose future position we have an instalment in this, that even now (and I pray it be carefully marked) it has its merchants, its barristers, its clergymen, its magistrates, its members of Assembly, and (even) its members of Council."—"Africa in the West," by Rev. W. C. Dowding, M. A.
Both Mr. Dowding and Mr. Bigelow speak impartially of the character of the West Indian blacks, and mention their failings as well as their virtues; yet their common testimony evidences the improvement of my race in the British West Indies. But why is it, it may be asked, that so many writers declare emancipation a failure, and that the Negro race is degenerating? The reasons are briefly these: 1. Because most persons think that the only important parties in the British West Indies, are the planters; and consequently that the ruin of this small item of the population, is the ruin of the population itself; forgetful of the fact that their numbers are inconsiderable; that they have always been in pecuniary embarrassment; and above all that, from the nature of the case, there is no hope for slave-holders: they must go to ruin! - ↑ Acts xii. 7.
- ↑ Acts v.20.