The negro problem solved, or, Africa as she was, as she is, and as she shall be, her curse and her cure

Front matter

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Preface

slaves is alone concerned. Our duty here has a hearing on our nation, on Africa, and on the -world, of momentous interest. England — all Europe — is moved to its centre, waiting in profound suspense, deeply interested in the settlement of this great question. King Cotton trembles on his throne ; yet hopes, in the commotion, to enlarge his empire.

We have attempted to present Africa — her vast resources and capabilities in soil, 'mines, and forests — as a promising field, a field ready for the harvest, inviting capital, enterprise, intelligence, skill, civilization, and Christianity to come and ply their genial agencies for renovation and elevation among the nations of the earth ; and, more than all, extending the welcome hand to her exiled sons, that they may return to her shores, laden with all the good things, which, in the land of their bondage, and in the school of a rigorous discipline, they have acquired.

We expect a good future for Africa. We reason here from what Africa and African races have been to what they shall he. God has never left himself without witness there. We take the presage, the promise, the prophecy, the pledge of Providence, that that long-neglected, suffering continent shall come up in remembrance before God — that the long outcast posterity of Ham shall yet share richly in the benedictions of Heaven. Her rising star is seen in the world-wide interest that is aroused in her behalf — is seen through the clash of arms ; through the smoke of the

PEEFACE.

V battle-field, and garments rolled in blood— is seen in the peculiar religious character of the slaves ; in the simplicity, godly sincerity, and importunity of their prayers ; in their yearnings after freedom, and their beseechings of the throne of Grace for their deliverance. And it is seen in a corresponding readiness on the part of Africa, and her native population, to receive the Gospel.

Our hope for Africa lies in the prospect of a Christian negro nationality ; such as an enlightened commerce and an extensive scheme of colonization, and Christian government, laws, and institutions, all baptized in the spirit of Christianity, shall produce. We rely on the unfailing favor of God to the oppressed, that Africa shall yet arise, and shine, her glory being come. We have, therefore, taken the occasion to urge on philanthropists and Christians the duty to do what lies in their power, by their prayers and benefactions, and by all suitable means, to emancipate that long-forgotton continent, and to give her a name and a place among the nations of the earth.

In the following pages colonization is advocated, not as an adequate remedy for slavery— though its legitimate bearings on that whole system of bondage and degradation are not to be overlooked — but as a boon to the colored man, a privilege to every one who is fitted to profit by it, and the most suitable and hopeful agency by which to raise Africa from her present debasement, and to assign her an honorable

VI

PEEFACE.

place among the nations. We would most distinctly concede the right of the negro to remain in this country. It is his country as well as ours. Yet, we would not the less earnestly and kindly urge on him his privilege to go. Interest to himself, and duty to his fatherland and to his race, urge him, even if it be at a personal sacrifice, to go forth as the only agents that can rescue a continent from the low depths of social, civil, and moral debasement.

The reader may feel a temporary disappointment that the writer has not committed himself more unreservedly to the new order of things which are seemingly inaugurated by the present war. We doubt not what shall be the end, but we dare not be too sanguine of a speedy consummation. We have no expectation of peace, which shall deserve the name of peace, but in the extinction of slavery. The war will not, can not, cease, till its cause — its curse-provoking and war-invoking cause — be removed. Universal, unconditional emancipation we believe to be the first and immediate solution of the negro problem. Yet his final destiny, his attaining to a nationality, his emerging into a full manhood, involve time, events, changes, revolutions, which wait the sure, though often mysterious movements of Providence.

We feel safe in connecting the highest and best destiny of the colored man with his fatherland. If it be in his heart, and fortuitous circumstances favor, that he, like Israel of old, may quit the land of his

PREFACE.

vii

captivity, and return to the land of his fathers and the land marked out by Heaven for his habitation, we congratulate him as favored above his fellows. Ransomed by the mighty hand of God, they shall return and come to their land with songs and everlasting joy on their heads. “Rewarded double” for their long and bitter captivity, they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.

Could the present volume have appeared with the most befitting title, it would have been called the Hand of God in Africa, and her Races ; for such, indeed, is the book. We have watched this all-controlling Hand in vain, if it be not now stretched out over that long-neglected continent, and that longabused race. And we expect, from this time onward, more distinctly to discern there the stately steppings of Him who has gone forth to the conquest of the world. H. R.

Elizabeth, N. J., 1864.

Chapter V

African Races— Pioneers and First Cultivators of the Arts and Sciences — The Negro a Primitive Race — The Pure Negro Superior to the Mixed Races — No Race ever so Far Advanced under so Unfavorable Circumstances — A Blessing for Ham . . 79

Chapter XIX

The Future of Africa— A Higher Type of Civilization and Christianity— Hope in her protracted Afflictions — The great Negro Problem of world-wide interest — What Prophecy, History, Analogy, and the Signs of the Times warrant us to Expect — Nothing to Fear from Emancipated Negroes — The West Indies — Emancipation Day 370

Chapter XX

The Interior of Africa — Recent Developments — Their Bearing on the Future of Africa— British Trade — The Liberia College... 398

THE GREAT NEGRO PROBLEM SOLVED.

Chapter I

Africa little known— Ancient Africa— Plan of the Work — Africa as she was, as she is, and as she shall be.

In directing attention to Africa, I ask you to survey a very extraordinary portion of tire globe.

Africa lias long been known as the neglected continent, a land never destitute of interest, and in many respects a land of intense interest, and yet very much of a forgotten land. But this neglected, forgotten land is once more coming up in remembrance. “In a historical view, Africa is deserving the minutest investigation, as one of the richest archives of former times and of the ancient world. It guards, couched in mysterious characters, innumerable annals of man’s progress from the earliest times down to the overthrow of the Roman Empire.” No part of the world presents so varied a history, none a history so extraordnary. It has an ancient history of great interest, extending further back than that of any other nation ; and a modern history — unwritten for the most part, and the most forbidden and melancholy. When Greece was yet young, and Rome was unknown — before Abraham was, or the Jewish Commonwealth had a name, Africa could boast of old and civilized kingdoms. When nations in Afri-

THE GREAT NEGRO PROBLEM SOLVED.

ca had made great advance in science and the arts, and had excelled all modern nations in architecture, Europe was languishing in barbarism, and America was unknown.

No portion of the world presents a more singular and interesting theme for study. The philosophic historian, especially, will here find abundant materials for endless speculations, and as abundant for the profoundest contemplation. In no portion of the world will he meet with so much to excite wonder, so much to perplex, so much to interest.

Africa is a land of the most singular contrasts. No where else do such extremes meet — fertility and barrenness— beauty and deformity — civilization and barbarism— light and darkness — human elevation and human depression. Though one of the earliest known, and the earliest civilized quarters of the globe, yet Africa has remained for the last three thousand years the least known, and the least civilized ; sometimes the most blessed, but generally the most cursed of any part of the world.

The continent of Africa, though probably the most ancient field of geographical enterprise, is still the least explored portion of the globe. “ Though once the nursery of science and literature, the emporium of commerce, and the seat of an empire which contended with Rome for the sovereignty of the world — the cradle of the ancient church, and the asylum of the infant Saviour, yet Africa still presents a comparative blank on the map, as well as in the history of the world. Though, according to Herodotus, it was circumnavigated by the Phoenicians long before the Christian era, and its coast was the first field of maritime discovery after the com-

AEKICA YET TO BE KNOWN.

pass had inspired seaman with confidence to leave shores and landmarks, and stand forth on the boundless deep, yet to this day its interior regions continue a mystery to the white man, a land of darkness and of terror to the most fearless and enterprising traveler. Although in no country has there been such a sacrifice of men to the enterprise of discovery — of men the most intelligent and undaunted — of men impelled, not by gross cupidity, but by refined philanthropy — yet, notwithstanding such suffering and waste of human life, we are only acquainted with the fringes of that immense continent, and a few lineaments at no great distance from the shore.

“Africa once had her churches, her colleges, her repositories of science and learning, her Cyprians and bishops of apostolic renown, and her noble army of martyrs ; but now the funeral pall hangs over her wide-spread domains, while her millions, exposed to tenfold horrors, descend like a vast funeral mass to the regions of woe. Christendom has been enriched by her gold, her drugs, her ivory, and the bodies and souls of men— and what has been the recompense ?”*

But shall Africa always remain the same blank in creation as she has heretofore ? She was not made for naught. She is, no doubt, yet to be as remarkably honored and blessed as she has been remarkably debased and cursed. Her history possesses, especially at this time, just that kind of interest which can scarcely fail to secure the attention of the observing, thinking, philanthropic, and Christian mind. Could the writer convey to the mind of the reader the interest he has expe-

* MoffUtt’s Southern Africa.

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THE GREAT NEGRO PROBLEM SOLVED.

rienced in the investigation of this portion of history, quite sure would he feel of a respectful attention.

The sacred bard of Israel often calls Africa the land of Ham ; and it seems very generally conceded that this grand division of the earth was given by Noah to his “ younger ” son. Yet the posterity of Ham seem not to have confined themselves to Airica. Late researches make it quite probable that Ham shared, at least with his brother Shem , the southern portions of Asia, extending through India and Siam, as far as J apan. The monumental history of Egypt and of India exhibit some remarkable resemblances. We trace the footsteps of the same race in the primitive works of Egypt, in the pyramids and temples of Ethiopia, and in the excavated temples of Elephanta, Ellora, and Kanarah in Hindostan. Strangely, indeed, has the ill-fated race of Ham, for centuries, disappeared from among the nations, and almost ceased to act any part on the great theatre of human affairs. And as strangely are they beginning to reappear. The black races are beginning to loom again above the horizon, below which they have been so long sunk, and may soon play a no insignificant part among the nations of the earth. Already have African races shared largely in the philanthropic feelings of man, and they seem destined soon to engross a much larger share of these feelings.

In what I have to say of Africa, and things pertaining to Africa, I shall speak of her as she ivas, as she is, and as she shall be — Africa past, present, and future. And whether her past, present, or future be before us, we shall make her curse and her cure our prominent theme.

AFRICA A MYSTERY.

Our design is to present the claims of that mysterious and long-suffering continent to the prayers, the sympathies, and benefactions of all whom it may concern. And deeply indeed does it concern the philanthropist and the Christian of every name and nation. For a great wrong has been committed ; the wrong-doers shall come up in remembrance before the righteous Arbiter of nations. He will take part with the oppressed. A great continent is to be reclaimed ; an injured race, who have sat in darkness and the shadow of death, are about to see a great light. The Lord seems about to visit them in his mercy, and to reward them double for all their afflictions.

Before speaking of the curse which mysterious Heaven has been pleased to inflict on that truly mysterious continent, or of the remedy which Providence seems to be designating as the cure of her protracted woes, w'e shall say a few things concerning Africa herself.

1. Africa is very much of a terra incognita — a land of mystery and romance — quite an enigma in the world’s history. From century to century she has remained the same mysterious and unknown land. With a few illustrious exceptions, the mere chronicler of historical events finds on this singular continent little to admire or to register among the annals of the nations ; while the Christian and the philosophic historian find more to lament over, more to interest, and more to perplex, than in any other portion of the globe. Though she has for ages lain in sight of the most civilized and refined nations of the earth, yet she has, for the most part, remained uncivilized and unknown. Up to the present day, we know little of Af-

THE GREAT NEGRO PROBLEM SOLVED.

rica beyond lier outlines ; and even these outlines were not known till the fifteenth century. It is true that Pharaoh Necho had sailed round Africa more than sis centuries before Christ ; and, ages earlier, its eastern coast, and perhaps its western, had been navigated by the ships of the wise King of Israel ; yet it remained a land of darkness, and its people covered with gross darkness. Prom generation to generation it has lain a blank on the map of nations. More was known of Africa two thousand years ago than at the present time. It was one of the earliest inhabited portions of the globe. There the scientific and industrial arts first flourished ; there man, after the Deluge, first attained to a high state of civilization ; and thence radiated, both eastward and westward, the light of civilization and learning. But now it is the least known and the least civilized of any. While the world has been advancing, Africa has been stationary or retrograding. While the resources of other portions of the world have been developing, and their powers augmenting, Africa has been dwindling into nothingness. So limited are her commercial relations, and so little does she contribute to the improvement, happiness, or productive industry of the world, that, if her circumjacent waters were to close over her, and her name were blotted out from the catalogue of nations, and all that pertains to her were sunk in the deep, she would scarcely be missed. Faint and few would be the tones of lament. Truth, science, commerce, the arts, would in no appreciable degree be impoverished. Nor woxdd religion and philosophy scarcely feel the loss. Ignorance and barbarism reign almost without interruption, from one end of that vast continent to

AFRICA LONG STATIONARY.

the other ; and, with just exceptions enough to keep the world apprised of the capabilities of the land, and of the sons of Ham, ignorance and barbarism always have reigned. These exceptions have abundantly shown, we believe, the capabilities of the Africans, and of their soil, to reach the first rank among the civilized, the learned, and the religious, and the designs of Providence yet to elevate this unfortunate race, and to realize their capabilities.

It is our design, in these pages, after having said more of Africa herself, to present slavery and the slave-trade as the withering curse, which has so long kept Africa in her present degraded condition ; and colonization and commerce as the remedy which shall, more effectually and permanently than any other, the Gospel excepted, bring relief to Africa, and blessings to her sons. The present system of colonization from this country will be brought forward, not so much as a remedy of slavery, as of the slave-trade — not so much the individual benefit of the colonists, as the general benefit of the whole continent. Yet we believe that the bearings of colonization on American slavery are by no means insignificant, and that the benefit to the colonist is immense.

What a wonderful continent is this rounded, smoothshored Africa, known from the earliest dawn of time, yet so unknown ; the granary of nations, yet sterile and fruitless as the sea ; swarming with life, yet dazzling the eyes with its vast tract of glittering sand! No land presents, either in its present aspects or its past history, such singular contrasts ; such fertility and barrenness ; such beauty and deformity ; so high a state of civilization and so low a state of barbarism. Since Africa, the

THE GREAT NEGRO PROBLEM SOLVED.

mother of civilization, lias grown gray and been languishing under the decrepitude of age, mighty empires in Asia and Europe have sprung into being, and passed their youth, their manhood, their decline, and extinction. Unchanged, the land of Ham has v/itnessed the rise and fall, during a long succession of ages, of the Assyrian, the Persian, the Greek, and the Homan empires. Asia has been again and again revolutionized ; civilized Europe has, in the mean time, sprung into existence, and the sun of some of its nations has long since set ; England has grown, in the mean time, into a colossal empire ; the youth, the manhood, and decline of Home, though extending to some twenty centuries, has interposed and passed away before the dim vision of Afric’s sable sons ; a new world has been discovered beyond the western ocean ; its forests reclaimed from the dominion of wild men, and the empire of freedom established. The world has been rapidly advancing. In science, civilization, government, religion, there has been a signal progress ; while Africa, the mother of civilization, the cradle of science and the arts, has been sitting solitary, languishing in decrepitude, and not able to rise, by reason of weakness.

The past history of Africa we have seen wrapped in a profound mystery. Her soil has been abundantly fertile in some of the best and many of the worst of human productions. There have mingled, for centuries, the extremes of good and bad government ; of liberty and despotism; of freedom and slavery; of learning and ignorance ; of civilization and barbarism ; of the grossest darkness and the clearest light. History there records some of her brightest ornaments and some of her blackest deformities. There, in all the romance

HER MYSTERIOUS ANTIQUITY.

of an Eastern tale, a Hebrew slave becomes the ruler of millions. Tliere, an outcast child, mysteriously picked up by a king's daughter, becomes the deliverer and leader of that equally mysterious people, who, after their singular wanderings during forty years in the deserts of Arabia, settle down amid the hills of Palestine, and soon expand into one of the most extraordinary nations that ever existed. The progenitors of the Hebrew commonwealth were there schooled and disciplined, and prepared for their national existence. Moses, the most extraordinary man that ever lived, than whom no mere man has left so much of the impress of his mind upon every succeeding generation, was reared and schooled in Africa. In no other court than Pharaoh’s could such a man have been reared. In no other nation could the Hebrews have been qualified to form that civil polity and that church organization which now, in the purposes and arrangements of Providence, became needful in carrying on the great work of human salvation.

There, too, was the home of Dido, of Hannibal ; the scene of Scipio’s triumph and Jugurtha’s crimes. There lived Tertullian, Athanasius, and Augustine ; the romance of the Moors dwelt there ; the last breath of Louis of France was drawn there. And there, .too, is the home of the mysterious negro races, whose past history has baffled the most philosophic speculations of the historian, whose present condition is an anomaly among the nations of the earth, and whose destiny is evidently not yet revealed.

And not only has Africa been the home of the scholar, the theologian, the philosopher, the statesman, and the soldier ; not only was she the cradle of the arts and the nursery of the sciences, but in later ages, in the first days of Christianity, she contributed more than her proportion of the early agents for the propagation over the earth of the new religion. How many of these do you suppose were from Africa, or of African descent ? More, undoubtedly, than you have supposed. The names of some, and the localities or native places of others, will enable us to judge on this subject with some degree of correctness. Luke, the beloved physician, was from Cyrene ; he was an undoubted African, by birth at least, if not by blood. If Luke be not the same as Lucius of Cyrene, we then have here another of the first teachers of Christianity, from the same African region. Simon, the father of Rufus and Alexander, was also a Cyrenian ; and, to leave no ground for mistake as to his country, he is called the Cyrenian (from Cyrene, a city in Lybia, in Africa, west of Egypt). It was this black man, this native of an African city, who was compelled to bear the cross for the exhausted Sufferer as he went up Calvary to be crucified ; a coincidence not to be overlooked. Again: we meet, among the prophets and teachers, at Antioch, one Simon, who was called Niger (black). We have here, at 'least, one evangelist and four of the early disciples and teachers of Christianity, who were Africans. And, as successors to this first generation of disciples, Africa supplied her full quota of Christian bishops and teachers. Origen, Bishop of Alexandria, was an African. Julius Africanus, as the name seems most obviously to import, was a native of the same country ; and so we shall venture to assume that Athanasius and Dionysius, celebrated Bishops of Alexandria, and

CHRISTIAN FATHERS OF AFRICA.

Cyprian, Bisliop of Cartilage, were of tlie crisped hair and the thick lip.*

No doubt an African soil is capable of producing mem It has been rich in such productions, and its capabilities are not exhausted. Paul chose for his traveling companion and his intimate friend, an African ; Paul’s Master chose that some of the first and brightest ornaments and most efficient agents and teachers of the early Christian Church should be men of the same kindred and color. Yea, the suffering Jesus chose that he who should perform for him the last act of kindness on earth, who should bear with him his cross up the hill of Calvary, should be an African. Oh! is there not a deep significance here? Poor Africa was allowed to bear the cross ; and heavily, indeed, from century to century, has she borne the cross. But shall she not wear the crown ? Shall that humble act, done at such a time, be passed by and forgotten ? No ! Africa shall yet come up in remembrance before her King, and she shall be rewarded double for all her sorrows.

We have a guaranty in what Africa has done, for what she may do. Native Africans have shown themselves masters, as already intimated, in every station and avocation in life, in every art and science, in genius and eminent talent, in qualities intellectual or physical, and in moral and religious character. The past history of Africa leaves no doubt of the abstract capa-

* And in Peter’s well-known assembly on the day of Pentecost there was a large representation from Africa and the Stock of Ham ; men from Egj’pt and the parts of Lybia about Cyrcne; Cretes and Arabians; to these we may add “Arnobius, the African,” who, in the third century, wrote a copious and powerful defense of Christianity.

THE GREAT NEGRO PROBLEM SOLVED.

bilities of Africans to become the highest type of man. Whether in warriors or statesmen, philosophers or divines, Africa has shown herself equal to the exigences of any past age. This we may receive as a pledge that she shall not be found wanting when her sons shall be called to act in a more advanced age. Her present degradation and the inferiority of her races present no argument against her equality to any other portion of the human family. Her present degradation and evident inferiority is most obviously a result of circumstances simply, of external causes, and not an inherent and original incapacity ; a result, perhaps, of the malediction of Heaven. It is, at least, the fulfillment of some wise and inscrutable purpose of the King of nations, and argues nothing as to what the same race may become under other circumstances, and under the benediction of Heaven.

We have called Africa the land of Ham, and we shall undertake to show that, not only is this mysterious continent a land kept in reserve for some great future realizations in the progress of the Redeemer’s kingdom, but that there remains a blessing in reserve for the poor down-trodden sons of Ham. Shem largely and for a long time shared in the rich benedictions of Heaven. Up to the advent of the mediatorial King, the descendants of Shem were the favored race. Religion dwelt with them. Here were the patriarchs, the prophets, the living oracles of God, the city and temple where God chose to place his name and reveal his glory. Here were the revelations of Heaven by types and shadows, dreams and visions. But since the advent of the great Reality, the embodiment of old truths in the more practical form of Christianity, the ark has

SHEM WAS THE FAVORED RACE.

passed from the tents of Shem to the tabernacles of Japheth. But is there no blessing for poor Ham? Shall the curse of Canaan rest upon this unfortunate family forever? We think we hear the voice of a Father’s love speaking comfortably to this alienated and long-forsaken son. Shall the ark rest forever with Japheth? Shall not this other great branch of the human family come up in remembrance before the Lord, and he yet give them double for all their afflictions ?

We have assumed that Africa has been reserved for the development of a higher order of civilization and a better type of Christianity than has yet been known. Though this be not a proposition, in the nature of the case, to be proved, yet by pursuing a historical argument, already casually introduced, we shall, we think, make it appear exceedingly probable. The argument is drawn very much from the capabilities, which Africa has already evinced, to realize all that I have here intimated. Exhibitions have already been made on an African soil, and by Africans, which, I think, we are warranted in receiving as a sort of first-fruits to a plenteous harvest.

I shall, therefore, ask you, in a subsequent chapter, to go over some of those enchanted grounds, and take, at least, a cursory glance of some of those monuments of her ancient greatness. We shall, in such an excursion, learn what Africa has been, and at the same time find some substantial ground for our inference as to what she shall be.

Of the interior of Africa we know very little. It has always been an unknown land. Occasionally its vast regions have been penetrated by the solitary traveler,

THE GEEAT NEGRO PEOBLEM SOLVED.

wl j o lias sent back a report. Still it lias remained an unknown land. For aught we know, great empires may have flourished there — opulent cities — commerce — manufactures — the arts and science. We know just enough about the interior of Africa to throw a sombre romance over those vast unknown regions, and to make us desire to know more. Yet Africa has been known to the world from the earliest ages of the earth’s history ; and she has been the theatre of some of the most thrilling events of its history. Yet, except a narrow skirting upon her borders, we know scarcely more of her than we do of the same track of territory on Marsor Yenus. Evidently Africa is a grand reservation ground, kept back from acting any part on the great theatre of human activity and development till, in the fullness of time, she shall be needed.