substitute for Christianity in civilizing Africa, yet it is only just
that we should admit that Islam brings with it some influences for
good into that benighted land--influences that strongly appeal to the
higher instincts and aspirations of the people, and are, therefore,
an elevating power. First of all, the One True God of Islam tends to
lift the African above his idols, his fetich, his witchcraft and his
cannibalism. Then, the prohibition of wine and strong drink snatches
the people from what threatens to be the vortex of their
ruin--intemperance; while Christian nations are now, to their shame
and infamy, swelling the floods and increasing the velocity of that
vortex by larger importations of intoxicating liquors. Then, too, the
followers of Mohammed are using the school of the prophets in the
preparation of their missionaries. The great training school, the Old
University of Cairo, is said to number at times as many as ten
thousand students of the Koran, a number which may well challenge a
comparison with the Protestant Theological Seminaries of Europe and
America, not only by their numbers, but by the astonishing success of
their pupils as missionaries. They run where we halt, they win where
we fail.
It is now in order to ask if the Freedmen of America can be fitted to
take a special part in the evangelization of Africa. There are strong
reasons for believing that they can be; they have race advantages
similar to the Mohammedans, and they can readily obtain the acquired
advantages of the white missionary. In the first place, they are
numerous--eight millions now, and increasing rapidly. In physical
proportions they are stalwart and vigorous, inured to toil and
capable of great exertion. Their mental powers are quick and
susceptible of wide culture. Their capacity to acquire learning, even
in the higher branches, has been abundantly proved in the schools
they have attended.
The religious characteristics of the race are very marked; faith,
hope and love are leading traits. They endured a bondage that would
have crushed other races; their faith and hope never deserted them.
Their bitter experience in those long and weary years drove them to
God as their only source of help, and the "Slave Songs," with the sad
history out of which they grew, are among the most pathetic
utterances of patience, trust and triumphant hope that human
literature presents. So it was during the war, which was long and
sometimes of doubtful result, but they never lost their faith in
their ultimate deliverance. The Jew in his journey from bondage to
Canaan, often became despondent and murmured; the Negro never did
either.
Hear the Jew:
"Because there were no graves in Egypt, hast thou taken us to die in
the wilderness?"
"Let us make a Captain and let us return into Egypt."
Hear the Negro, in the Slave Songs:
"Way over in the Egypt land,
You shall gain the victory.
Way over in the Egypt land,
You shall gain the day.
_March on_, and you shall gain the victory,
_March on_, and you shall gain the day."
Such a people are surely destined to develop a rich and beautiful
Christian life. If they should be specially trained, and their warm
hearts inspired, for the work of missionaries to Africa, who can
doubt the success of their efforts? They would stand on a better
vantage ground there than the Mohammedan, for he is a foreigner
transplanted on the soil. They would come back to the home of their
fathers, and would meet the natives as brothers--long separated, yet
as brothers; their color and personal characteristics would attest
the kinship, their Christian love would kindle towards the degraded
of their race, and their holy ambition would be fired by the great
work to which they were called--the uplifting of the millions of
long-neglected Africa. It would be reasonable to expect that they
would endure the African climate better than the white man. They are
a tropical race, and, in America, they love and cling to the sunny
South, seldom migrating to the North; they do not suffer from the
malaria that is so fatal to the whites in the South.
These views and impressions are confirmed by actual experience. With
a view of learning the results of that experience, I addressed
letters to the Secretaries of all the larger societies in Europe and
America doing missionary work on that continent, and, in due time,
received courteous replies from nearly all of them, giving opinions
and facts with more or less fulness of detail. My inquiries mainly
centered around two points: first, the ability of the colored
missionary as compared with the white, to endure the climate; and
secondly, his relative success as a missionary. The opinions given in
those letters, as might be expected, are various, and the facts
themselves, gathered from widely different sources, and relating to
very different climates and local circumstances, point to somewhat
different conclusions.
The specific statements of these letters may be thus summed up:
1. No society reports that the colored man is _less_ healthy than the
white; one or two societies discern as yet no special difference; but
the larger number say that he endures the climate much better than
the white man.
2. On the second point--the comparative success of colored
missionaries--the testimony bears very decidedly, _as a rule_, and
_as yet_ against them; while a few and very favorable exceptions
indicate that the fault is with the individual and not with the race,
and hold out the hope that time and better training will remove the
difficulties.
The more full account may be thus given: Some of the societies charge
a want of carefulness, perhaps a want of integrity against the
colored missionaries--that "colored treasurers will not render
accounts, teachers will not make reports, missionaries desire to
control, and they seldom are sufficiently respected, especially when
of younger age." Now, these are manifestly the vices and infirmities
of an immature and imperfectly cultured race. We must recollect that
centuries of civilization and Christian influences are behind
Europeans and Americans, while the native African, converted and
trained in his own land, has behind him only the few years of his own
life separating him from the densest degradation of heathenism; the
African born and converted in the West Indies has been a freedman
only since 1840; and the American Negro was perhaps himself a slave,
and his race had the shackles struck from their bodies only in 1863,
while the fetters of ignorance and vice still manacle the minds and
hearts of the mass. We ought not, therefore, so much to wonder at the
failure of the many, as to rejoice and take courage at the success of
the few, especially as there is a bright side to the dark picture, to
which I now take pleasure in turning your attention.
There _have been_ some very successful colored missionaries in
Africa, whom the Christian world has known and honored, and the
letters I have received joyfully refer to them, and mention others
not yet widely known, but whose work attests their wisdom, piety and
usefulness. Thus one Secretary refers to a missionary, born a slave
in America and educated here, as "the most scholarly man in the whole
mission." Another society testifies, and our personal knowledge of
the man referred to confirms the testimony, to the remarkable success
of one of its colored missionaries as "a business manager, a preacher
and a teacher, showing himself fully equal to any emergency, and
remarkable in his influence with the heads of the tribes, and his
success in winning souls." The testimony in regard to two others of
its missionaries is almost equally emphatic.
The Secretary of the Protestant Episcopal Church of America writes:
"All ordained men on our missionary staff in Africa, from the Bishop
down, are colored men. I think we have concluded that, all things
considered, except for the work of higher education, colored
missionaries are more available in that field than white." He refers
with gratification to the career of Bishop Ferguson, the only colored
man who has a seat in the American House of Bishops, who was born in
America, educated in the mission schools, and has risen through the
positions of teacher, deacon, priest and rector, until he was
consecrated the Bishop of Cape Palmas in 1885, and has worthily
filled all these positions. The Church Missionary Society of London
refers to the remarkable career of Bishop Crowther, who was born in
Africa, put on board a slave ship, rescued, and landed at Freetown,
educated in Sierra Leone and in England, and at length entered his
chosen field on the Niger, reduced the language of the people to
writing, and preached the gospel to them in their native tongue. In
1861, there were reported to be 1,500 converts as the result of his
labors. He received the degree of D.D., from Oxford, England, and was
consecrated in 1864 African Bishop of the Niger. This society also
mentions others, one as possessing "special educational and
linguistic powers;" another as a "pastor and evangelist with
remarkable power and spiritual influence;" another as "a practical
organizer and administrator;" another as "very successful in
educational work," and it adds: "Many others have also shown
considerable power as educationists, pastors and evangelists."
From all these facts, the inferences are plain:
1. That Negroes have succeeded in this work, and that those in
America can be prepared for it. They can endure the climate, find
ready access to the hearts of the people, and be eminently successful
in preaching the Gospel. They should have the best training for the
purpose, and great care should be exercised in selecting and sending
forth only those of good education, mature character, sound judgment
and unquestioned piety.
2. America owes it as a debt to them and to Africa that they be
furnished with the means for this training. The guilt of man-stealing
and of slavery can have no better atonement than by sending back to
Africa the sons of those stolen from those benighted shores, who
shall bring with them the light and blessing of civilization and
Christianity. England, too, having had a share in introducing slavery
into America, should take its share in making this atonement.
3. The colored people of America should be aroused to this
providential call to this high mission in behalf of their fatherland.
We do not question nor minify their great duty and destiny in
America. Their warm affections, their easily kindled zeal, their gift
of song and eloquence, will yet add an enriching pathos to our piety,
and a wider range to our patriotism. But this call to Africa, while
not interfering with duty here, will broaden their vision and deepen
their piety. There will be a grand uplift to them in grasping and
endeavoring to realize this great work. It will raise them above
petty ambitions, it will give a practical turn to their religious
enthusiasm, and bring them into closer sympathy with Jesus Christ.
They have been in fellowship with Him in suffering, they may now be
co-workers with Him in redemption.
But Africa, so degraded! Why should her sons go back to her? The Scot
loves the hills and the glens whence his family came; the German
never forgets the Fatherland; but what is there to awaken the love of
the Negro for Africa? Gen. Garfield was born in a humble home, and
went thence as a canal driver, but when he became President of the
United States he did not despise that humble home, nor the mother
that bore him, lowly as both were, but at his inauguration he had his
mother placed in an honored seat on the platform, and his first act
after taking the oath of office was to step over, before that vast
assembly, and kiss that mother.
American descendant of Africa! The home of your fathers is humble and
degraded, and you are elevated and refined. Show that you are really
great and Christlike by giving the redeeming kiss to Africa!
* * * * *
THE HOPEFULNESS OF INDIAN MISSIONS, AS SEEN IN THE LIGHT OF HISTORY.
BY REV. A.F. BEARD, D.D.
The contemplation of the past sometimes weakens the energies for
action in the present. But when the present is a consequence of the
past, we can scarcely do our work rightly if we neglect the lessons
of experience.
The history of missions among our Indian tribes has lessons in it
which may be wisely heeded.
When the first settlers of this country left their ships, which had
been freighted with the destinies of a continent, and faced the
perils of a wilderness, they met at the outset a strange people. No
one knew who they were, nor how many; they themselves did not know.
They had no history. They had become vain in their imaginations, and
their foolish heart was darkened. Ignorant as to the past, their
theory of the future was vague and shadowy. Their spirits would exist
after death. The heroic and brave and worthy would go to the happy
hunting-grounds, where would be pleasant climate and fair weather,
and where abundance would be exhaustless and satisfactions complete.
The unworthy would wander without in a state of misfortune and
restless discontent. For their religious ceremonies, a priesthood
existed, and those who composed this were devoted to it from their
childhood. The howling dervishes of Turkey and the pagan priests of
the South Sea Islands, may be compared with the pow-wows of the North
American Indians.
It is impossible to estimate the number of this aboriginal
population. Doubtless the popular impression is an exaggerated one.
It would be safe to say that, all told, there were never at any one
period, more than half a million of these people, occupying the
present territory of the United States from ocean to ocean. They were
widely scattered, so that there were great stretches of forest and
prairie lying between the different tribes.
There were many groups, distinct in their languages, which yet bore a
general resemblance to each other in construction, so that the
several tribes could at least easily learn to understand each other.
I think that the weight of authority is, that they belong to one
family of nations, and are derived from one stock, while they display
considerable diversities in language and customs.
The motive of the early settlers of New England, which took
precedence over all others--as they declared--was "_a desire to
advance the gospel in these remote parts of the world, even if they
should be but stepping-stones to those who were to follow them_."
Finding these barbarous tribes here, the Pilgrim Fathers bartered
with them for peaceable possession, which they did not always secure.
As civilization encroached upon barbarism, the colonists kept their
homes often only by the defences of war. But peace was in the hearts
and purposes of the early settlers.
As early as 1643, the Rev. John Eliot, who had been educated at the
University of Cambridge, England, and who had come to Boston,
Massachusetts, in 1630, wrote that he had "been through varieties of
intercourse with the Indians, and had many solemn discourses with all
sorts of nations of them." It was his theory that they were the
descendants of the lost tribes of Israel. He acquired their language.
It was an arduous undertaking, but he said "Prayer and pains through
faith in Christ Jesus will do anything."
In 1660, he had visited all the Indians in the Massachusetts and
Plymouth Colonies, and preached the gospel to them, and the first
Indian church was then formed.
In 1661, he had translated the New Testament into the Indian tongue,
and in 1663, the Old Testament. This Indian Bible was published at
Cambridge, and was the only Bible printed in America until a much
later period. Besides this, Eliot instituted schools, and induced
large numbers to give up their savage customs and habits, and to form
themselves into civilized communities.
The zeal of Eliot quickened that of others, and in 1674, there was a
missionary circuit of 14 villages and 1,100 praying Indians.
At this same date, through the sacrificial labors of Mr. Thomas
Mayhew and his son, there were 1,500 praying Indians in the Island of
Martha's Vineyard and vicinity. The next year came war--King Philip's
War. It meant extermination of the whites, or conquest of the red
men. Civilization was too strong to be resisted by barbarism, and
then began the long catalogue of organized Indian miseries. The
General Court ordered the removal of the conquered Indians, and they
were pushed away before the aggressive steps of a stronger race. In
1743, the Rev. David Brainerd was propagating missions among the
Indians with success in various places. Idolatrous sacrifices were
altogether abolished; many heathen customs lost their sanction, and
sincere converts were made whose pious lives and peaceful deaths
attested to the influence of the spirit of God in their hearts.
At this period of history the Moravian Church began missions in
Pennsylvania among the Delawares. Christian Rauch soon won the
confidence of the savages and excited their astonishment. And
observing him asleep in his hut, an Indian said: "This man cannot be
a bad man, he fears no evil, he does not fear us who are so fierce,
but he sleeps in peace and puts his life in our hands." There was a
remarkable acknowledgment of this mission in converted souls. The
Moravian Missions in various sections of the country, from the early
date of 1740 until now, have been characterized by courage, activity,
humility and devotion. In the midst of these scenes of devastation
and murder, the Moravian missionaries have wandered in deserts, in
mountains, in dens and caves of the earth, never relinquishing their
purposes, and they have obtained a good report through faith.
The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, which began
its existence in 1812, adopted measures in 1815 for carrying the
gospel to the Indians. One hundred thousand of these people, as
untamed as when the Pilgrims met them at Plymouth, as ignorant in
most respects, and as truly heathen as were their fathers centuries
before them, were then supposed to be living east of the Mississippi
River. The first mission was among the Creeks and Cherokees. Three
missionaries and their wives began the work. In character it was a
compound of mission boarding school and agricultural college. In
eighteen months, the Indian boys could read the Bible, and nearly a
score of them could write; five converted heathen were members of the
church.
Next, in 1818, missions were begun among the Chickasaws and the
Choctaws. Here, also, the first work was that of the school. So eager
were the Choctaws for instruction, that eight children were brought
160 miles across the country before the missionaries were ready for
them, and in one year from that date the Choctaw Nation voted to
devote to the schools their entire annuity of _six thousand dollars_,
from the sale of their lands to the United States.
The missionaries were subject to unceasing hindrances from renegade
whites, who are always on the borders of civilization, and have
usually been the enemies of missionaries.
But among the Cherokees no year passed without conversions. Those who
appeared to the missionaries so wild and forbidding that they were
received with fear, came under the gospel power and were clothed and
in their right mind. In six years the Church had largely increased.
Indians traveled a score of miles to attend the services. As yet,
there was no Cherokee written language. This mission was eight years
old when the four gospels were translated into the Cherokee tongue,
and in three or four years more, one-half the nation could read.
There were now among the Cherokees and the Choctaws, eighteen
missionary stations.
In 1826, the Board began work among eight other tribes in different
parts of the country.
It next took charge of the Stockbridge tribe, whose ancestors had
enjoyed the ministry of the celebrated Dr. Jonathan Edwards. They
were originally in Massachusetts. They were pushed back hundreds of
miles to Central New York, then pushed further back hundreds of miles
to Indiana; then pushed still further back hundreds of miles to
Michigan, and finally pushed back once more and allowed to rest in
the remote West--in Minnesota. During all these cruel removals, they
had themselves kept alive a school, and had among them exemplary
Christians. Now, after one hundred years of such history, the
American Board put a mission among them. The church survived, and the
whole settlement took in the spirit of civilization and took on its
forms. A year later were added the missions to the Chickasaws, and
now, about the close of the year 1830, it seemed as if the fruitage
of this Indian missionary consecration were at hand. Half the
Cherokees in Georgia could read. Civilized life had taken firm hold
on them, and they were governing themselves with Christian laws.
Eight churches were in life and power among them. The Chickasaws had
their church in Arkansas, and the Cherokees there, another. The
churches of the Choctaws had received to their communions that year
two hundred and fifty members who were hopefully converted, and in
all the Indian Missions of the American Board there was a steady
increase of hopefulness, while the members in tribes were also
increasing.
"Everywhere the fruits of the missions among the Indians were
abundant. No more docile pagans were ever approached with the gospel
than some of these peoples."
Nevertheless, from this period of time, Indian missions cease to be
successful for a generation.
The mission to the Chickasaws was abandoned in 1834; to the Osages in
1836; to the Stockbridge tribe, in 1848; to the Choctaws, in 1859; to
the Tuscaroras, in 1860; and to the Cherokees, in 1860; until at last
but a single mission remained, that among the great Sioux tribes or
the Dakotas. Twelve missions and forty-five churches, which reached
about one hundred thousand Indians abandoned in twenty-six years!
The question now asks itself: "Why were not these hopeful missionary
efforts to these pagan tribes more permanent? What turned the tide of
success and left the missions stranded?" Here comes the story of
dishonor. The Indian was here when the white man came. The Christian
white men recognized the Indian's right of occupancy as a right. They
did _not_ hold that half a million savages had a right to dispute the
ultimate sovereignty of civilization, but they agreed that when
civilization should move forward and barbarism should retreat, the
Indian should have Christian justice and not un-Christian wrong. He
should not be oppressed. He should be treated equitably. His rights
should be acknowledged, and if the demands of the greater number and
the greater life asked for a surrender of his rights as original
occupant, then there should be fair consideration, compensation and
honesty. It may be the providence of God that barbarism shall be
crowded out by civilization, that the Indian's hunting-ground shall
yield to the railway and the marts of commerce. It may not be right
that a continent of eight millions of square miles, more than twice
the size of all Europe, fair and beautiful and rich in resources,
should be kept for game preserves for half a million savages. It is
right that the forest should fall to make room for New England
villages, with their churches and school-houses and industry. The
rude stage of existence must make way for a higher. But the higher
has no right to be wicked in its onward movement. It has no right to
rob or cheat. It has no right to make compacts and violate them. It
has no right to break its faith with the weak. It has no right to
outrage the principle of justice.
The history of Indian wrongs by the whites in the inevitable advances
of civilization, need not be recited here. Unscrupulous greed has
hovered about the Indian reservations as waiting buzzards hover near
the wounded creature upon whose flesh they would fatten. Lands
guaranteed to the Indians were encroached upon by white people. These
encroachments resisted led to wars. Savage nature, wrought up with a
sense of injustice and burning for revenge, swept down upon guilty
intruders and innocent settlers alike, with indiscriminate massacre.
Then the Government called out its soldiery, and Indian wars with
less than half a million savages have cost the United States
$500,000,000, enough to plant missions among all the heathen tribes
of the world.