Here we must close our inquiries, sum up the results, see what
experience teaches, draw the contrasts between these several classes of
Missions, and determine the best mode of employing human
instrumentalities for the extension of the Gospel in Africa.
These Missions, as we have shown, had to be planted upon a broad field
of barbarism; where the civil condition, the objects of worship, the
social customs, the intellectual state of the people, were the
antagonists of what prevail under a Christian civilization. The
missionary’s task embraced much of toil, privation, danger, patience,
perseverance. Wars were to be turned into peace, superstitions
overthrown, polygamy abolished, ignorance dispelled, before civilization
and Christianity could be established. This was the work to be
accomplished. The results have been given in detail, and now they must
only be recapitulated and contrasted.
The Missions to the natives, beyond the protection of the colonies, have
made the least progress. They are established upon the proper basis, but
have fewer agencies employed than the other missions, and a
corresponding inefficiency is the result. Common schools, Sabbath
schools, and preaching, are means used for promoting the Gospel in all
the African missions. Those to the natives, are limited chiefly to these
three plans of operation, while the other missions possess many
subordinate means that greatly facilitate their progress. Preaching to
adults, though not altogether unsuccessful, has won but few converts,
and done but little for the overthrow of superstition. Education lays
the axe at the root of ignorance, but from the fewness of the teachers
and schools, the small attendance of pupils, and the reaction of
heathenism upon them, it has made very little impression on the
surrounding barbarism. Less, still, has been done by these missions, in
preventing native wars; while polygamy remains almost wholly unaffected
by them. The greatest difficulty, however, is, that the missionaries,
with very few exceptions, are white men, whose constitutions, generally,
yield to the effects of the climate, and the missions are constantly
liable to be weakened and broken up. This is true of the Gaboon and
Mendi Missions, particularly, and can be remedied, only, by substituting
colored missionaries, since they, alone, have constitutions adapted to
the climate. The mission to the Zulus differs from these two, in having
a climate better adapted to the Anglo-Saxon; but it has to contend with
the additional obstacle of a hostile white immigration, which threatens
its existence. As the customs and morals of Christianity become better
understood, at these missions, the enmity of the natives continues to
increase; and the missionary, after years of toil, feels, more and more,
the indispensable necessity of multiplying the agencies for removing the
barriers to the Gospel by which he is surrounded.
The Missions in South Africa, by their early success, and the progress
they have always made in times of peace, afford ample evidence of the
practicability of Christianizing Africa, wherever civil government
protects the missionary, and prevents the prevalence of native wars. But
while we may here derive a powerful argument in favor of increased
effort for the extension of Christianity, where the conditions of
society are thus favorable; the additional lesson is impressed upon the
mind, with tremendous force, that the white and black races—that
Englishmen and Africans—can not dwell together as equals; but that the
intelligence and active energies of the one, when brought into conflict
with the ignorance and indolent habits of the other, must make the Negro
an easy prey to the Anglo-Saxon. The sad results of this conflict of
races, in the wars of the last few years, casts a deep gloom over the
future prospects of South Africa, and renders it doubtful whether the
missions can be sustained among the natives as independent tribes. It
would appear, that, under British policy, the loss of liberty is the
price at which the African must purchase Christianity.
The immigration of Englishmen into South Africa, then, instead of
diminishing the obstacles to the success of the Gospel, is adding a new
one of an aggravated character. Nor can the difficulty be obviated. When
Christian missions harmonize with the policy of England, she grants them
protection; but when they stand in the way of the execution of her
schemes, they are brushed aside as objects of indifference, and treated
with no higher regard than pagan institutions. While her soldiers were
slaughtering the Christian Hottentots, in the church of the Moravians,
her revenues were upholding the heathen temples of India. As she designs
to build up an extensive white colony, in South Africa, the main
obstacles to these missions will be rendered as immovable as the British
throne. In this respect, they are more discouraging than those to the
natives, the barriers to which must be broken down by time and
perseverance.
How strangely the cruelty of Great Britain, towards the Kaffirs,
contrasts with her humanity towards the recaptured Africans of Sierra
Leone! In the former case, she robbed the blacks of their possessions,
to give lands to her white subjects; in the latter, Cuba and Brazil were
deprived of their cargoes of slaves, to build up a colony for herself.
But how much stranger, still, does England’s conduct contrast with the
policy of American Colonization! Liberia, instead of robbing the Native
African of his rights, was founded, expressly, to rescue him from
oppression and superstition, and to bestow upon him liberty and the
Gospel of Christ.
The Missions in the English Colonies of Recaptured Africans, have been
more successful, and are more promising, than either of the two just
noticed. The cause of this difference should be considered. The
foundations of Sierra Leone were laid, when Africa was literally “the
land of the shadow of death.” Its corner stone inclosed the last link of
the shackles of slavery in England. Its founder looked forward to the
redemption of the land of Ham, as a result of the scheme he had
projected. A large majority of the emigrants who founded the Colony, had
been trained where Religion was free, and where Liberty was struggling
into birth. They had caught something of the spirit of freedom, and
wished to realize its blessings. These hopes were blasted; and, in
anger, they abandoned the churches they had built, rather than accept
religion at the hands of those who had denied them freedom. They failed
to discriminate between the unchristian policy of the English
government, and the Christian charity of the English Church. The
slave-trade was carried on under the flag that brought them the
missionary; and they turned coldly away from the man of God, to let him
re-embark for his English home, or sink to the grave beneath a tropical
sun. Thus did the Gospel fail in its establishment among the emigrants
of Sierra Leone. Neither could it succeed among the surrounding natives,
while the hunters of slaves kept the tribes in perpetual hostilities.
Thus twenty years rolled away, before the traffic in human flesh was
suppressed; and then, only, could Christianity gain a foothold.
But the gift of equal rights was not included in the gift of the Gospel;
and half the stimulants to mental improvement remained unsupplied. The
agencies established, however, were not powerless for good. Security was
gained for the missionary, and the population could dwell in peace. The
Episcopal missionaries were driven into the Colony, to prosecute their
labors under its protection. The prejudices engendered by the early
collisions with the civil authorities, wore away with the lapse of time.
The American fugitives, who had refused the Gospel from the
Episcopalians, now accepted it from the Wesleyans. The denial of civil
rights to themselves, could not justify their refusal of eternal life
for their offspring. The children were gathered once more into the
schools, and education commenced. Sierra Leone was made the “city of
refuge,” for all who should be rescued from the horrors of the
slave-ships; and thus it became a central sun from which the light of
the Gospel could radiate to the farthest limits of Africa.
Sierra Leone, as a mission field, is free from some of the most serious
difficulties which retard the progress of the Gospel among the Natives
and in South Africa. Its chief advantages consist in its freedom from
war; in the absence of white Colonists; and in the accumulating progress
of civilization. Its inhabitants possess such a unity of races, such a
social equality, as to prevent hostile collisions on account of color.
Its officers and principal merchants, only, are white; and, hence, fewer
occasions arise here than in South Africa, where the black man is made
to feel his inferiority to the white. The intellectual improvement of
its people has been much more rapid than that of the population in the
South African Missions; and, as a consequence, the teachers of the
schools and seminaries, in Sierra Leone and its connections, are,
mostly, colored men; while few, indeed, of the natives in the Colonies
of the Cape, have been able to attain such positions.[54]
In these facts are we to find the causes of the superiority of the
Sierra Leone missions, over those to the Natives and to the South of
Africa.
Sierra Leone, however, when contrasted with Liberia, is found to lack
some of the essential elements of progress possessed by the Republic.
The liberty secured to the citizens of Liberia, extends to all their
relations, personal, social, political. The people of Sierra Leone,
enjoy but two of these elements of progress. They have personal freedom
and a fair degree of social equality, but are deprived of the
third—political equality—which, above all, exerts the most potent
influence to stimulate the intellectual faculties of men. The young
convert in the seminary at Sierra Leone, doubtless, finds great
encouragement to mental improvement, in the prospect of becoming a
teacher, or in entering the ministry; but to the unconverted youth, in
the absence of the prospect of political promotion, there is,
absolutely, nothing to stimulate to efforts at high attainment in
science and literature. Thus the political system of Sierra Leone,
supplies but half the elements of progress to its people. Had it been
otherwise, had the aspirations of its early emigrants been cherished,
and its civil affairs committed mainly to their hands, the Colony might
now be in a far more advanced situation. This will be apparent on a
fuller contrast of its condition with that of Liberia.
Thirty years after the waves of the Atlantic had closed over the remains
of SAMUEL J. MILLS, it was proclaimed from the top of Montserado, that
the star of African Nationality, after ages of wandering, had found its
orbit in the galaxy of Nations. On that eventful day, a multitude of
grateful men, with their wives and little ones, were lifting up their
voices in thanksgiving and praise, to their Father in Heaven. Over their
heads waved a banner bearing the motto, “The love of liberty brought us
here.” The barbarism that excited the pity of MILLS and BURGESS had
disappeared; the superstitions over which they grieved had vanished; a
Christian Nation had been born; and the vault of heaven re-echoed to
their shouts of joy.
It was thus that the Republic of Liberia was ushered into existence.
Sixty years were gone, since the establishment of Sierra Leone. How wide
the contrast between its history and that of Liberia! Liberty, at Sierra
Leone, had been rudely driven to the “bush.” Its people were held in
pupilage, bound by laws not of their own enactment, and governed by
officers of a race who had ever claimed the lordship over them. Taught
Religion, but deprived of Liberty, the manhood of mind could not be
fully developed. Uninstructed in human rights, they now yielded a
slavish submission to a distant throne. Not so in Liberia. Here, Liberty
and Religion had been rocked together in the same cradle. It was
Religion that had given Liberty to the Liberian. He knew nothing of the
one unconnected with the other. The Religion that had broken his
fetters, was itself free. Religious and political freedom, therefore,
was a principle dear to his heart. He spurned the idea, that man must
submit to dictation in religion and government; and, from the first, had
looked forward to the day, when his country should become a Christian
Republic. That day has come, and gone: and there the Liberian stands, a
citizen—a Christian; with no law—no restraint—no rule of conduct—but
what emanates from himself or his God.
The Republic stands, pre-eminent, as an auxiliary to missions. Its
political system, embraces all the known elements of civil, social, and
intellectual advancement; while its citizens are controlled by the
preservative element of Christian morals. Its policy makes it but one
grand agency for overturning African barbarism. Its advantages over
every other scheme are so obvious, that it must be regarded as the model
system, to which all others should be conformed; and as the rule by
which, alone, missions to Africa must hereafter be conducted.
The conquests of Liberia, over African barbarism, have been legitimate
results of the principles involved in her social and civil organization.
She offered to the natives an asylum from the merciless slave-catchers:
they removed within her limits to enjoy her protection. She employed
them in household affairs, agriculture, and the mechanic arts: they were
thus incorporated into her social system, attended the Church, and sent
their children to school. They wore _gri-gris_ and practiced polygamy:
these customs debarred them from political privileges. They offered
human sacrifices to their deities, and compelled those suspected of
witchcraft to drink a poisonous tea: the laws punished the taking of
life, in such modes, with the penalty of death. The surrounding tribes,
for their own safety, sought alliances with her: by the terms of the
treaties, she has kept them at peace, and prevented the trafficking in
slaves.
Thus has Liberia, by offering the natives political equality, induced
them to abandon polygamy and superstition; thus has the fear of
punishment deterred them from the practice of their murderous cruelties;
thus has war been prevented and the slave-trade suppressed within her
bounds: and thus has American Colonization solved the great problem of
African Redemption.