Buckle, the historian of Civilisation, points out that superstition is
most rampant where men are most oppressed by external nature. Wild and
terrible surroundings breed fear and awe in the human mind. Those
who lead adventurous lives are subject to the same law. Sailors, for
instance, are proverbially superstitious, and military men are scarcely
less so. The fighter is not always moral, but he is nearly always
religious.
No one acquainted with this truth will be surprised at the piety of
explorers. There is a striking exception in Sir Richard Burton, but we
do not remember another. From the days of Mungo Park down to our own
age, they have been remarkable for their religious temperaments. Had
they remained at home, in quiet and safety, they might not have been
conspicuous in this respect; but a life of constant adventure, of daily
peril and hairbreadth escapes, developed their superstitious tendencies.
It is so natural to feel our helplessness in solitude and danger,
and perhaps in sickness. It is so easy to feel that our escape from a
calamity that hemmed us in on every side was due to a providential hand.
Whether Stanley, who is now the cynosure of all eyes, began with
any considerable stock of piety, is a question we have no means of
determining; but we can quite understand how a very little would go a
very long way in Africa, amid long and painful marches through unknown
territory, the haunting peril of strange enemies, and the oppressive
gloom of interminable forests. Indeed, if the great explorer had become
as superstitious as the natives themselves, we could have forgiven it
as a frailty incident to human nature in such trying circumstances.
But when he brings his mental weakness home with him, and addresses
Englishmen in the language of ideas calculated for the latitude of
equatorial Africa, it becomes necessary to utter a protest. Stanley has
had a good spell of rest in Egypt, and plenty of time to get rid of the
"creeps." He should, therefore, have returned to Europe clothed and in
his right mind. But instead of this he deliberately sits down and writes
the following rubbish for an American magazine, with one eye on God
above and the other on a handsome cheque below:
"Constrained at the darkest hour humbly to confess that without God's
help I was helpless, I vowed a vow in the forest solitudes that I would
confess his aid before men. Silence, as of death, was round about me; it
was midnight; I was weakened by illness, prostrated by fatigue, and
wan with anxiety for my white and black companions, whose fate was a
mystery. In this physical and mental distress I besought God to give me
back my people. Nine hours later we were exulting with a rapturous joy.
In full view of all was the crimson flag with the crescent, and beneath
its waving folds was the long-lost rear column."
Danger and grief are apt to make us selfish, and no one would be hard
on Stanley for showing weakness in such circumstances. But he rather
glories in it. The danger is gone, and alas! the egotism remains. Others
perished miserably, but he escaped. Omnipotence took care of him and
let them go to the Devil. No doubt they prayed in their extremity as
heartily as he did, but their prayers were unheard or neglected. Stanley
was the lion of the party. Yes, and in parading his egotistic piety in
this way, he is in danger of becoming a _lion comique_.
There is something absolutely farcical in Stanley's logic. While he
was praying to God, millions of other persons were engaged in the same
occupation. Agonised mothers were beseeching God to spare their dear
children; wives were imploring him to restore the bread-winner of the
family to health; entombed miners were praying in the dark depths of
coalpits, and slowly perishing of starvation; shipwrecked sailors were
asking for the help that never came. Providence could not, apparently,
take on too much business at once, and while Stanley's fate trembled in
the balance the rest of mankind might shift for themselves.
But the farce does not end here. Stanley's attitude was much like
Jacob's. That smooth-skinned and smooth-tongued patriarch said that if
God would guarantee him a safe journey, feed him, clothe him, find him
pocket money, and bring him safe back again--well, then the Lord should
be his God. Stanley was not so exacting, but his attitude was similar.
He asked God to give him back his people (a few short, killed or
starved, did not matter), and promised in return to "confess his aid
before men." Give me the solid pudding, he says, and I will give you the
empty praise. And now he is safe back in Europe he fulfils his part
of the contract, and goes about trumpeting the praise of Omnipotence;
taking care, however, to get as much cash as possible for every note he
blows on the instrument.
Even this does not end the farce. Stanley's piety runs away with his
arithmetic. He reminds us of a Christian lady we heard of the other day.
She prayed one night, on going to bed, for news from her daughter, and
early the next morning a letter came bearing the Edinburgh post-mark.
This was clearly an answer to her prayer. But a sceptical friend showed
her that the letter must have been posted at Edinburgh before she prayed
for it. Now Stanley reasons like that lady. Nine hours is no time in
central Africa. The "long-lost rear column" must have been near, though
invisible, when Stanley struck his little bargain with the Almighty. Had
it been two or three hundred miles off, and miraculously transported,
the hand of Providence would have been unmistakable; but in the
circumstances its arrival was natural, and the miracle is obviously the
creation of Stanley's heated brain. He was "weakened by illness" and
"prostrated by fatigue," and the absurdity was pardonable. We only
protest against his playing the child when he is well and strong.