edward wilmot blyden--the african problem, and the method of its solution (1890)

7/31/2019 Edward Wilmot Blyden--The African Problem, And the Method of Its Solution (1890)

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THE AFRICAN PROBLEM.AND

u u TXI t

The Annual Discourse Delivered at the Seventy-third Anniversary of the American Coeoniza-

ion Society, ik the Church of the Covenant,Washington;/ D. C., January 19, 1890,BY

DWARD W. BLYDEN, IX. D.Author Of 'CHRISTIANITY, ISLAM; AND THE NEGRO RaC,""FrQMWest Africa to Palestine." &c..&c.

Published by Request

WASHINGTON !Gibson Bros., Printers and Bookbinders.

1890.


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THE AFRICAN PROBLEM,AND

THE METHOD OF ITS SOLUTION.

The Annual Discourse Delivered at the Seventy-third Anniversary of the American Coloniza-

tion Society, in the Church of the Covenant,Washington, D. C, January 19, 1S90,BY

EDWARD W. BLYDEN, LL. D.

Published by Request.

WASHINGTON" IGibson Bros., Printers and Bookbinders.

1S90.


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THE AFRICAN PROBLEM.Acts xvi. 9.

I am seriously impressed with a sense of the responsi-bility of my position to-night. I stand in the presence ofthe representatives of that great organization which seemsfirst of all the associations in this country to have distinctlyrecognized the hand of God in the histwrv of the Negrorace in America to have caught something of the mean-ing of the Divine purpose in permitting their exile to andbondage in this land. I stand also in the presence of what,for the time being at least, must be considered the fore-most congregation of the landthe religious home of thePresident of the United States. There are present, also,I learn, on this occasion, some of the statesmen and law-makers of the land.My position, then, is one of honor as well as of respon-

sibility, and the message I have to deliver, I venture tothink, concerns directly or indirectly the whole human race.I come from that ancient country, the home of one of thegreat original races, occupied by the descendants of oneof the three sons to whom, according to Biblical history,the whole world was assigneda country which is nowengaging the active attention of all Europe. I come, also,from the ancestral home of at least five millions in thisland. Two hundred millions of people have sent me onan errand of invitation to their blood relations here.Their cry is, " Come over and help us." And I find amonghundreds of thousands of the invited an eager and enthu-


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siastic response. They tell me to wave the answer acrossthe deep to the anxious and expectant hearts, which, dur-ing the long and weary night of separation, have been con-stantly watching and praying for the return to the Rachelsweeping for their children, and refusing to be comfortedbecause they are notthey tell me, " Wave the answerback to our brethren to hold the fort for we are coming."They have for the last seventy years been returning throughthe agency of the Society whose anniversary we celebrateto-night. Some have gone every year during that period,but they have been few compared to the vast necessity.They have gone as they have been able to go, and are mak-ing an impression for good upon that continent. My sub-ject to-night will be, The African Pkohlem and the Methodof its Solution.

This is no new problem. It is nearly as old as recordedhistory. It has interested thinking men in Europe andAsia in all ages. The imagination of the ancients peopledthe interior of that country with a race of beings shut outfrom and needing no intercourse with the rest of mankindlifted by their purity and simplicity of character abovethe necessity of intercourse with other mortalsleadinga blameless and protracted existence and producing intheir sequestered, beautiful, and fertile home, from whichflowed the wonderful Nile, the food of the Gods. Notmilk and honey but nectar and ambrosia were supposed toabound there. The Greeks especially had very high con-ceptions of the sanctity and spirituality of the interiorAfricans. The greatest of their poets picture the Godsas vacating Olympus every year and proceeding to Ethio-pia to be feasted by its inhabitants. Indeed, the religionof some portion of Greece is supposed to have been in-troduced from Africa. But leaving the region of my-thology, we know that the three highest religions known


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to mankindif they had not their origin in Africaweredomiciled there in the days of their feeble beginnings,Judaism, Christianity, and Mohammedanism.A sacred mystery hung over that continent, and manywere the aspirations of philosophers and poets for somedefinite knowledge of what was beyond the narrow fringethey saw. Julius Caesar, fascinated while listening to atale of the Nile, lost the vision of military glory. Thephilosopher overcame the soldier and he declared himselfready to abandon for a time the alluring fields of poli-tics in order to trace out the sources of that mysteriousriver which gave to mankind Egypt with her magnificentconceptions and splendid achievements.The mystery still remains. The problem continues un-solved. The conquering races of the world stand perplexedand worried before the difficulties which beset their enter-prise of reducing that continent to subjection. The}' haveovercome the whole of the Western Hemisphere. FromBehring Straits to Cape Horn America has submitted totheir sway. The native races have almost disappearedfrom the mainland and the islands of the sea. Europehas extended her conquests to Australia, New Zealand, andthe Archipelagos of the Pacific. But, for hundreds ofyears, their ships have passed by those tempting regions,where "Afric's sunny fountains roll down their goldensands," and though touching at different points on thecoast, they have been able to acquire no extensive foot-hold in that country. Notwithstanding the reports we re-ceive on every breeze that blows from the East, of vast" spheres of influence " and large European possessions,the points actually occupied by white men in the boundlessequatorial regions of that immense continent may be accu-rately represented on the map only by microscopic dots. Iwish that the announcements we receive from time to time


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with such ;i flourish of trumpets, that a genuine civilizationis being carried into the heart of the Dark Continent, weretrue. But the fact is, that the bulk of Central Africa isbeing rapidly subjected to Mohammedanism. That systemwill soon beor rather is nowknitting together the con-querors and the conquered into a harmonious whole ; andunless Europe gets a thorough understanding of the situ-ation, the gates of missionary enterprise will be closed ;because, from all we can learn of the proceedings of some,especially in East Africa, the industrial regime is beingstamped out to foster the militant. The current numberof the Fortnightly, near the close of an interesting articleon " Stanley's Expedition," has this striking sentence :" Stanley has triumphed, but Central Africa is darker thanever !

It would appear that the world outside of Africa hasnot yet stopped to consider the peculiar conditions whichlift that continent out of the range of the ordinary agenciesby which Europe has been able to occupy other countriesand subjugate or exterminate their inhabitants.They have not stopped to ponder the providential les-

sons on this subject scattered through the pages of history,both past and contemporary.First. Let us take the most obvious lesson as indicated

in the climatic conditions. Perhaps in no country in theworld is it so necessary (as in Africa) that the stranger ornew comer should possess the mens sana in corpore sanothe sound mind in sound body ; for the climate is mostsearching, bringing to the surface any and every latentphysical or mental defect. If a man has any chronic orhereditary disease it is sure to be developed, and if wrongmedical treatment is applied it is very apt to be exaggeratedand often to prove fatal to the patient. And as with thebody so with the mind. Persons of weak minds, either


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man Catholic Church constructed a mighty influence inthe saint 1 region, but the interior of the continent receivedno impression from it.

In the fifteenth century the Congo country, of which wenow hear so much, was the scene of extensive operationsof the Roman Catholic Church. Just a little before thediscovery of America thousands of the natives of the Congo,including the most influential families, were baptized byCatholic missionaries ; and the Portuguese, for a hundred .years, devoted themselves to the work of African evangel-ization and exploration. It would appear that they knewjust as much of interior Africa as is known now after thegreat exploits of Speke and Grant and Livingstone, Bakerand Cameron and Stanley. It is said that there is a mapin the Vatican, three hundred years old, which gives allthe general physical relief and the river and lake systemsof Africa with more or less accuracy ; but the Arab geog-raphers of a century before had described the mountainsystem, the great lakes, and the course of the Nile.

Just about the time that Portugal was on the way toestablish a great empire on that continent, based upon thereligious system of Rome, America was discovered, and,instead of the Congo, the Amazon became the seat of Port-uguese power. Neither Egyptian, Carthaginian, Persian,or Roman influence was allowed to establish itself on thatcontinent. It would seem that in the providential purposeno solution of the African problem was to come from aliensources. Africans were not doomed to share the fate ofsome other dark races who have come in contact with theaggressive European. Europe was diverted to the WesternHemisphere. The energies of that concpiering race, it wasdecreed, should be spent in building up a home for them-selves on this side. Africa followed in chains.


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The Negro race was to be preserved for a special andimportant work in the future. Of the precise nature ofthat work no one can form any definite conception. It isprobable that if foreign races had been allowed to entertheir countiy they would have been destroyed. So theywere brought over to be helpers in this country and atthe same time to be preserved. It was not the first timein the history o the world that a people have been pre-served by subjection to another people. We know thatGod promised Abraham that his seed should inherit theland of Canaan ; but when He saw that in their numer-ically weak condition they would have been destroyed inconflicts with the indigenous inhabitants, he took themdown to Egypt and kept them there in bondage four hun-dred years that they might be fitted, both by disciplineand numerical increase, for the work that would devolveupon them. Slavery would seem to be a strange schoolin which to preserve a people ; but God has a way ofsalting as well as purifying by fire.The Europeans, who were fleeing from their own coun-try in search of wider areas of freedom and larger scopefor development, found here an aboriginal race unable toco-operate with them in the labors required for the con-struction of the material framework of the new civiliza-tion. The Indians would not work, and they have sufferedthe consequences of that indisposition. They have passedaway. To take their place as accessories in the work tobe done God suffered the African to be brought hither,who could work and would work, and could endure theclimatic conditions of a new southern country, which Eu-ropeans could not. Two currents set across the Atlantictowards the "West for nigh three hundred yearsthe onefrom Europe, the other from Africa. The one from Africahad a crimson color. From that stream of human beings


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10millions fell victims to the cruelties of the middle passage,and otherwise suffered from the brutal instincts of theirkidnappers and enslavers. I do not know whether Africahas been invited to the celebration of the fourth centenaryof the discovery of America ; but she has quite as muchreason, if not as much right, to participate in the demon-stration of that occasion as the European nations. En-glishman, Hollander, and Huguenot, Nigritian and Congocame together. If Europe brought the head, Africa fur-nished the hands for a great portion of the work whichhas been achieved here, though it was the opinion of anAfrican chief that the man who discovered America oughtto have been imprisoned for having uncovered one peoplefor destruction and opened a field for the oppression andsuffering of another.But when the new continent was opened Africa was

closed. The veil, which was being drawn aside, was re-placed, and darkness once more enveloped the land, forthen not the country but the people were needed. Theywere to do a work elsewhere, and meanwhile their countrywas to be shut out from the view of the outside world.The first Africans landed in this country in the State of

Virginia in the year 1619. Then began the first phase ofwhat is called the Negro problem. These- people did notcome hither of their own accord. Theirs was not a volun-tary but a compulsory expatriation. The problem, then, ontheir arrival in this country, which confronted the whitepeople was how to reduce to effective and profitable servi-tude an alien race which it was neither possible nor de-sirable to assimilate. This gave birth to that peculiar in-stitution, established in a country whose raison d'etre wasthat all men might enjoy the " right to life, liberty, and thepursuit of happiness." Laws had to be enacted by Puri-tans, Cavaliers, and Roundheads for slaves, and every con-


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trivance had to be devised for the safety of the institution.It was a difficult problem, in the effort to solve

which bothmaster and slave suffered.

It would seem, however, that in the first years of Africanslavery in this country, the masters upon many of whomthe relationship was forced, understood its providentia]origin and purpose, until after a while, avarice and greeddarkened their perceptions, and they began to inventreasons, drawn even from the "Word of God, to justify theirholding these people in perpetual bondage for the advan-tage of themselves and their children forever. But evenafter a blinding cupidity had captured the generality byits bewitching spell, there were those (far-sighted men, es-pecially after the yoke of Great Britain had been thrownoff) who saw that the abnormal relation could not be per-manent under the democratic conditions established bythe fundamental law of the land. It was Thomas Jeffer-son, the writer of the Declaration of Independence, whomade the celebrated utterance : " Nothing is more clearlywritten in the Book of Destiny than the emancipation ofthe blacks ; and it is equally certain that the two raceswill never live in a state of equal freedom under the same iGovernment, so insurmountable are the barriers which ]nature, habit, and opinion have established between them.For many years, especially in the long and weary periodof the anti-slavery conflict, the latter part of this dictumof Jefferson was denounced by many good and earnestmen. The most intelligent of the colored people resentedit as a prejudiced and anti-Christian conception. But asthe years go by and the Negroes rise in education andculture, and therefore in love and pride of race, and inproper conception of race gifts, race work and race des-tiny, the latter clause of that famous sentence is not onlybeing shorn of its obscurity and repulsiveness, but is being


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12welcomed as embodying a truth indispensable to the pres-ervation and prosperity of both races, and as pointing tothe regeneration of the African Fatherland. There aresome others of the race who, recognizing Jefferson's prin-ciple, would make the races one by amalgamation.

It was under the conviction of the truth expressed bythat statesman that certain gentlemen of all political shadesand differing religious views, met together in this cityin the winter of 181G-'17, and organized the AmericanColonization Society. Though friendly to the anti-slaveryidea, and anxious for the extinction of the abnormal in-stitution, these men did not make their views on that sub-ject prominent in their published utterances. They werenot Abolitionists in the political or technical sense of thatphrase. But their labors furnished an outlet and en-couragement for persons desiring to free their slaves, giv-ing them the assurance that their freedmen would be re-turned to their Fatherland, carrying thither what lightof Christianity and civilization they had received. Itseems a pity that this humane, philanthropic, and far-seeing work should have met with organized oppositionfrom another band of philanthropists, who, anxious for aspeedy deliverance of the captives, thought they saw inthe Colonization Society an agency for riveting instead ofbreaking the fetters of the slave, and they denounced itwith all the earnestness and eloquence they could com-mand, and they commanded, both among whites andblacks, some of the finest orators the country has everproduced. And they did a grand work, both directly andindirectly, for the Negro and for Africa. They did theirwork and dissolved their organization. But when theirwork was done the work of the Colonization Society reallybegan.


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In the development of the Negro question in this coun-try the colonizationists might be called the prophets andphilosophers; the abolitionists, the warriors and politi-cians. Colonizationists saw what was coming and patientlyprepared for its advent. Abolitionists attacked the firstphase of the Negro problem and labored for its immediatesolution ; colonizationists looked to the last phase of theproblem and labored to get both the whites and blacksready for it. They labored on two continents, in Americaand in Africa. Had they not begun as early as they didto take up lands in Africa for the exiles, had they waitedfor the abolition of slavery, it would now have been impos-sible to obtain a foothold in their fatherland for the return-ing hosts. The colonizationist, as prophet, looked at theState as it would be

;the abolitionist, as politician, lookedat the State as it was. The politician sees the present

and is possessed by it. The prophet sees the future andgathers inspiration from it. The politician may influencelegislation ; the prophet, although exercising great moralinfluence, seldom has any legislative power. The agitationof the politician may soon culminate in legal enactments ;the teachings of the prophet may require generations be-fore they find embodiment in action. The politician hasto-day ; the prophet, to-morrow. The politician dealswith facts, the prophet with ideas, and ideas take root veryslowly. Though nearly three generations have passedaway since Jefferson made his utterance, and more thantwo since the organization of the Colonization Society, yetthe conceptions they put forward can scarcely be said tohave gained maturity, much less currency, in the publicmind. But the recent discussions in the halls of Congressshow that the teachings of the prophet are now beginningto take hold of the politician. It may take many years yetbefore the people come up to these views, and, therefore,


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before legislation upon them may be possible, but there isevidently movement in that direction.The first phase of the Xegro problem was solved at Appo-mattox, after the battle of the warrior, with confused noiseand garments rolled in blood. The institution of slavery,for which so many sacrifices had been made, so many ofthe principles of humanity had been violated, so many ofthe finer sentiments of the heart had been stilled, was atlast destroyed by violence.Now the nation confronts the second phase, the educa-tional, and millions are being poured out by State govern-ments and by individual philanthropy for the education ofthe freedmen, preparing them for the third and last phaseof the problem, viz: Emigration.

In this second phase, we have that organization, whichmight be called the successor of the old Anti-Slavery So-ciety, taking most active and effective part. I mean theAmerican Missionary Association. I have watched withconstant gratitude and admiration the course and opera-tions of that Society, especially when I remember that, or-ganized in the dark days of slavery, twenty years beforeemancipation, it held aloft courageously the banner onwhich was inscribed freedom for the Negro and no fel-lowship with his oppressors. And they, among the first,went South to lift the freedmen from the mental thraldomand moral degradation in which slavery had left him.They triumphed largely over the spirit of their opponents.They braved the dislike, the contempt, the apprehensionwith which their work was at first regarded, until they suc-ceeded by demonstrating the advantages of knowledge overignorance, to bring about that state of things to which Mr.Henry Grady, in his last utterances, was able to refer withsuch satisfaction, viz., that since the war the South hasspent $122,000,000 in the cause of public education, and


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15this year it is pledged to spend $37,000,000, in the benefitsof which the Negro is a large participant.

It is not surprising that some of those who, after havingbeen engaged in the noble labors of solving the first phaseof the problemin the great anti-slaverv warand arenow confronting the second phase, should be unable toreceive with patience the suggestion of the third, which isthe emigration phase, when the Negro, freed in body andin mind, shall bid farewell to these scenes of his bondageand discipline and betake himself to the land of his fathers,the scene of larger opportunities and loftier achievements.I say it is not surprising that the veterans of the past andthe present should be unable to give much enthusiasm tothe work of the future. It is not often given to man tolabor successfully in the laud of Egypt, in the wildernessand across the Jordan. Some of the most effective work-ers, must often, with eyes uudimmed and natural forceunabated, lie down and die on the borders of full freedom,and if they live, life to them is like a dream. The youngmust take up the work. To old men the indications of thefuture are like a dream. Old men are like them thatdream. Young men see visions. They catch the spirit ofthe future and are able to place themselves in accordwith it.But things are not yet ready for the solution of the

third and last phase of the problem. Things are notready in this country among whites or blacks. The in-dustrial condition of the South is not prepared for it.Things are not yet ready in Africa for a complete exodus.Europe is not yet ready ; she still thinks that she cantake and utilize Africa for her own purposes. She doesnot yet understand that Africa is to be for the African orfor nobody. Therefore she is taking up with renewedvigor, and confronting again, with determination, the


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16African problem. Englishmen, Germans, Italians, Bel-gians, are taking up territory and trying to wring from thegrey-haired mother of civilization the Secret of the ages.Nothing has come down from Egypt so grand and im-pressive as the Sphinxes that look at you with calm andemotionless faces, guarding their secret to-day as theyformerly guarded the holy temples. They are a symbol ofAfrica. She will not be forced. She only can reveal hersecret. Her children trained in the house of bondagewill show it to the world. Some have already returnedand have constructed an independent nation as a begin-ning of this work on her western borders.

It is a significant fact that Africa was completely shutup until the time arrived for the emancipation of herchildren in the Western World. When Jefferson andWashington and Hamilton and Patrick Henry were predict-ing and urging the freedom of the slave, Mungo Park wasbeginning that series of explorations by English enterprisewhich has just ended in the expedition of Stanley. Justabout the time that England proclaimed freedom through-out her colonies, the brothers Lander made the great dis-covery of the mouth of the Niger ; and when Lincoln issuedthe immortal proclamation, Livingstone was unfoldingto the world that wonderful region which Stanley hasmore fully revealed and which is becoming now the sceneof the secular and religious activities of Christendom.The King of the Belgians has expended fortunes recentlyin opening the Congo and in introducing the appliancesof civilization, and by a singular coincidence a lull hasbeen brought forward in the U. S. Senate to assist theemigration of Negroes to the Fatherland just at the timewhen that philanthropic monarch has despatched an agentto this country to invite the co-operation in his great workof qualified freedmen. This is significant.


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17What the King of the Belgians has just done is an in-

dication of what other European Powers will do when theyhave exhausted themselves in costly experiments to utilizewhite men as colonists in Africa. They will then under-stand the purpose of the Almighty in having permitted theexile and bondage of the Africans, and they will see thatfor Africa's redemption the Negro is the chosen instrument.They will encourage the establishment and building up ofsuch States as Liberia. They will recognize the schemeof the Colonization Society as the providential one.The little nation which has grown up on that coast as aresult of the efforts of this Society, is now taking hold uponthat continent in a manner which, owing to inexperience,it could not do in the past. The Liberians have introduceda new article into the commerce of the worldthe Liberiancoffee. They are pushing to the interior, clearing up theforests, extending the culture of coffee, sugar, cocoa, andother tropical articles, and are training the aborigines inthe arts of civilization and in the principles of Christianity.The Republic occupies five hundred miles of coast with anelastic interior. It has a growing commerce with variouscountries of Europe and America. No one who has visitedthat country and has seen the farms on the banks of therivers and in the interior, the workshops, the schools, thechurches, and other elements and instruments of progresswill say that the United States, through Liberia, is notmaking a wholesome impression upon Africaan impres-sion which, if the members of the American Congress un-derstood, they would not begrudge the money required toassist a few hundred thousand to carry on in that countythe work so well begun. They would gladly spare themfrom the laboring element of this great nation to push for-ward the enterprises of civilization in their Fatherland, andto build themselves up on the basis of their race manhood.


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18If there is aii intelligent Negro here to-night I will say to

him, let me take yon with me in imagination to witnessthe new creation or development on that distant shore ; Iwill not paint you an imaginary picture, but will describean historical fact ; I will tell you of reality. Going from thecoast, through those depressing alluvial plains which fringethe eastern and western borders of the continent, you reach,after a few miles' travel, the first high or undulating coun-try, which, rising abruptly from the swamps, enchants youwith its solidity, its fertility, its verdure, its refreshing andhealthful breezes. You go further, and you stand upon ahigher elevation where the wind sings more freshly in yourears, and your heart beats fast as you survey the continu-ous and unbroken forests that stretch away from your feetto the distant horizon. The melancholy cooing of thepigeons in some unseen retreat or the more entrancingmusic of livelier and picturesque songsters alone disturbthe solemn and almost oppressive solitude. You hear nohuman sound and see the traces of no human presence.You decline to pursue your adventurous journey. Yourefuse to penetrate the lonely forest that confronts you.You return to the coast, thinking of the long ages whichhave elapsed, the seasons which, in their onward course,have come and gone, leaving those solitudes undisturbed. ,You wonder when and how are those vast wildernesses tobe made the scene of human activity and to contribute tohuman wants and happiness. Finding no answer to yourperplexing question you drop the subject from yourthoughts. After a few yearsa very few it may beyou return to those scenes. To your surprise and grati-fication your progress is no longer interrupted by the in-convenience of bridle-paths and tangled vines. Theroads are open and clear. You miss the troublesomecreeks and (trains which, on your previous journey,


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19harassed and fatigued you. Bridges have been con-structed, and without any of the former weariness you findyourself again on the summit, where in loneliness you hadstood sometime before. What do you now see ? Thegigantic trees have disappeared, houses have sprung upon every side. As far as the eye can see the roofs of com-fortable and homelike cottages peep through the wood.The waving corn 'and rice and sugar-cane, the graceful andfragrant coffee tree, the umbrageous cocoa, orange, andmango plum have taken the place of the former sturdydenizens of the forest. What has brought about thechange ? The Negro emigrant has arrived from America,and, slender though his facilities have been, has producedthese wonderful revolutions. You look beyond and takein the forests that now appear on the distant horizon.You catch glimpses of native villages embowered in plan-tain trees, and you say these also shall be brought undercivilized influences, and you feel yourself lifted into man-hood, the spirit of the teacher and guide and missionarycomes upon you, and you say, "There, below me and be-yond lies the world into which I must go. There must Icast my lot. I feel I have a message to it, or a work init ;" and the sense that there are thousands dwelling there,some of whom you may touch, some of whom you may in-fluence, some of whom may love you or be loved by you,thrills you with a strange joy and expectation, and it is athrill which you can never forget ; for ever and anon it comesupon you with increased intensity. In that hour you areborn again. Y'ou hear forevermore the call ringing inyour ears, " Come over and help us."These are the visions that rise before the Liberian set-tler who has turned awav from the coast. This is the viewthat exercises such an influence upon his imagination, andgives such tone to his character, making him an inde-


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pendent and productive man on the continent of his fath-ers.As I have said, this is no imaginary picture, but the em-

bodiment of sober history. Liberia, then, is a fact, an ag-gressive and progressive fact, with a great deal in its pastand everything in its future that is inspiring and uplifting.

It occupies one* of the most charming countries in thewestern portion of that continent. It has been called byqualified judges the garden spot of West Africa. I loveto dwell upon the memories of scenes which I have passedthrough in the interior of that laud. I have read of conn-tries which I have not visitedthe grandeur of the RockyMountains and the charms of the Yosemite Valley, andmy imagination adds to the written description and be-comes a gallery of delightful pictures. But of Africanscenes my memory is a treasure-house in which I delightto revel. I have distinctly before me the days .and dateswhen I came into contact with their inexhaustible beau-ties. Leaving the coast line, the seat of malaria, and whereare often seen the remains of the slaver's barracoons, whichalways give an impression of the deepest melancholy, Icome to the high table-lands with their mountain sceneryand lovely valleys, their meadow streams and mountainrivulets, and there amid the glories of a changeless andunchanging nature, I have taken off my shoes and on thatconsecrated ground adored the God and Father of the Af-ricans.

This is the country and this is the work to which theAmerican Negro is invited. This is the opening for himwhich, through the labors of the American ColonizationSociety, has been effected. This organization is more th\ma colonization society, more than an emigration society.It might with equal propriety and perhaps with greateraccuracy be called the African Repatriation Society ; or


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21since the idea of planting towns and introducing extensivecultivation of the soil is included in its work, it might becalled the African Repatriation and Colonization Society,for then you bring in a somewhat higher idea than merecolonizationthe mere settling of a new country bystrangersyou bring in the idea of restoration, of com-pensation to a race and country much and long wronged.

Colonizationists, notwithstanding all that has been saidagainst them, have always recognized the manhood of theNegro and been willing to trust him to take care of him-self. They have always recognized the inscrutable provi-dence by which the African was brought to these shores.They have always taught that he was brought hither tobe trained out of his sense of irresponsibility to a knowl-edge of his place as a factor in the great work of human-ity ; and that after having been thus trained he could findhis proper sphere of action only in the land of his originto make a way for himself. They have 'believed that ithas not been given to the white man to fix the intellectualor spiritual status of this race. They have recognizedthat the universe is wide enough and God's gifts are variedenough to allow the man of Africa to find out a path ofhis own within the circle of genuine human interests, andto contribute from the field of his particular enterprise tothe resourcesmaterial, intellectual, and moralof thegreat human family.But will the Negro go to do this work ?

Is he willing to separate himself from a settled civiliza-tion which he has helped to build up to betake himself to thewilderness of his ancestral home and begin anew a careeron his own responsibility ?

I believe that he is. And if suitable provision weremade for their departure to-morrow hundreds of thousandswould avail themselves of it. The African question, or the


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Negro problem, is upon the country, and it can no more beignored than any other vital interest. The chief reason, itappears to me, why it is not more -seriously dealt with isbecause the pressure of commercial and political exigenciesdoes not allow time and leisure to the stronger and richerelements of the nation to study it. It is not a question ofcolor simplythat is a superficial accident. It lies deeperthan color. It is a question of race, which is the out-come not only of climate, but of generations subjected toenvironments which have formed the mental and moralconstitution.

It is a question in which two distinct races are Con^>cerned. This is not a question then purely of reason.It is a question also of instinct. Races feel; observerstheorize.The work to be done beyond the seas is not to be a re-

production of what we see in this country. It requires,therefore, distinct race perception and entire race devotion.It is not to be the healing up of an old sore, but the un-folding of a new bud, an evolution ; the development ofa new side of God's character and a new phase of humanity.God said to Moses,

" I am that I am ; " or, more exactly," I shall be that I shall be." Each race sees from its ownstandpoint a different side of the Almighty. "The Hebrewscould not see or serve God in the land of the Egyptians ;no more can the Negro under the Anglo-Saxon. He canserve man here. He can furnish the labor of the country,but to the inspiration of the country he must ever be analien.

In that wonderful sermon of St. Paul on Mars Hill inwhich he declared that God hath made of one blood allnations of men to dwell on all the face of the earth andhath deterinined the bounds of their habitation, he alsosaid, " In Him we live and move and have our being."


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23Now it cannot be supposed that in the types and raceswhich have already displayed themselves God has ex-hausted himself. It is by God in us, where we havefreedom to act out ourselves, that we do each our severalwork and live out into action, through our work, whateverwe have within us of noble and wise and true. What "wedo is, if we are able to be true to our nature, the repre-sentation of some phase of the Infinite Being. If we liveand move and have our being in Him, God also lives, andmoves and has His being in us. This is why slavery ofany kind is an outrage. It spoils the image of God as itstrives to express itself through the individual or the race.As in the Kingdom of Nature, we see in her great organictypes of being, in the movement, changes, and order of theelements, those vast thoughts of God, so in the great typesof man, in the various races of the world, as distinct incharacter as in work, in the great divisions of character,we see the will and character and consciousness of Goddisclosed to us. According to this truth a distinct phaseof God's character is set forth to be wrought out into per-fection in every separate character. As in every form ofthe inorganic universe we see some noble variation ofGod's thought and beauty, so in each separate man, ineach separate race, something of the absolute is incarnated.The whole of mankind is a vast representation of theDeity. Therefore Ave cannot extinguish any race either byconflict or amalgamation without serious responsibility.You can easily see then why one race overshadowed byanother should long to express itselfshould yearn forthe opportunity to let out the divinity that stirs within it.This is why the Hebrews cried to God from the depths oftheir affliction in Egypt, and this is why thousands andthousands of Negroes in the South are longing to go tothe land of their fathers. Thev are not content to remain


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24where everything has been clone on the line of anotherrace. They long for the scenes where everything is to beclone under the influence of a new racial spirit, underthe impulse of new skies and the inspiration of a freshdevelopment. Only those are tit for this new work whobelieve in the racehave faith in its futurea propheticinsight into its destiny from a consciousness of its possi-bilities. The inspiration of the race is in the race.Only one race has furnished the prophets for humanitythe Hebrew race ; and before they were qualified to do

this they had to go down to the depths of servile degrada-tion. Only to them were revealed those broad and preg-nant principles upon which every race can stand and workand grow ; but for the special work of each race the proph-ets arise among the people themselves.What is pathetic about the situation is, that numbersamong whites and blacks are disposed to ignore the seri-

ousness and importance of the question. They seem tothink it a question for political manipulation and to bedealt with by partisan statesmanship, not recognizing thefact that the whole country is concerned. I freely admitthe fact, to which attention has been recently called, thatthere are many Afro-Americans who have no more jpdo with Africa than with Iceland, but this does notdestroy the truth that there are millions whose"" life isbound up with that continent. It is to them that the mes-sage comes from their brethren across the deep, " Comeover and help us."


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edward wilmot blyden--the african problem, and the method of its solution (1890)

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