Thoughts on African Colonization. Garrison William Lloyd

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СКАЧАТЬ of a colony, or colonies, of selfish, ignorant, or even intelligent and high-minded men, on its shores. In every settlement of this kind, – no matter how choice the original materials, – vice will soon preponderate over virtue, intemperance over sobriety, knavery over honesty, oppression over liberty, and impiety over godliness. The natives will see just enough of christianity to hate and shun it; finding that its fruits are generally bad – that it has no restraining influence upon the mass of its nominal professors, – they will not easily comprehend the utility of abandoning their own idolatrous worship; looking only to the pernicious examples of the intruders, they will spurn with contempt the precepts of the gospel. Their confidence will be abused – their lands craftily trafficked for nought – their ignorance cheated – their inferiority treated oppressively; and then what must naturally follow? Why – WAR —a war of retaliation. All the vices, and few of the virtues, of the instructers, will be faithfully copied; and thus barriers will be erected against the progress of the Christian religion, not absolutely insurmountable, it is true, but sufficiently tall and strong to retard its noble career – barriers not only of superstition and ignorance, but of hatred and revenge. These reflections might be extended to the size of a volume; but they are probably sufficient to convince every unprejudiced, discerning mind, that the establishment of foreign colonies in a barbarous land is the surest way to prevent its speedy evangelism and civilization.

      In reply to this reasoning, some of the advocates of African colonization may argue, that schools and houses of worship, multiplying with the growth of the settlement at Liberia, will check the evil propensities and passions of the emigrants, and qualify them to act as missionaries or instructers among the natives; and thus great good will be bestowed upon Africa. This is at least a summary, if not a sure mode of obviating these difficulties.

      In the first place, it is by no means certain – nay, it is not probable, especially if the number of emigrants annually exported to Liberia swell from hundreds to thousands, (and this increase of transportation is positively promised by the Parent Society, and absolutely necessary to cause a perceptible diminution in the annual enlargement of our colored population) – I say, it is neither certain nor probable that the multiplication of literary and religious privileges will keep pace with the unnatural and enormous growth of the colony. Nine years after the first settlement of Liberia, it appears by the following extract of a letter from a highly respectable colored emigrant, (the Rev. George M. Erskine,) there was but the 'remnant of a school' left! This letter is dated 'Caldwell, Liberia, April 3, 1830.'

      'Sir, the state of things, with regard to schools, is truly lamentable. The only school in the Colony at this time, is a remnant of one at the Cape. Among the present emigrants, there are seventeen out of forty-eight that can read the Holy Scriptures, leaving thirty-one that cannot. Now, Sir, suppose each company of emigrants to this place bring a like proportion of illiterate persons into the Colony, then what state, think you, it must be in? But again, Sir: I am greatly mistaken if this Colony is not, for several years yet to come, mostly to be peopled with slaves sent out by their present owners, without any education themselves, and without means and very little desire to have their children instructed; and add to the above, that this people is planted in the midst, and are daily conversant with, a people that are not only heathen, but a people extremely partial in favor of their grovelling superstition. My dear Sir, this being the case, whether is it probable that they will come over to us, or we go down to them? To me the latter is the most likely, as it is the very essence of human nature to seek the lowest depth of degradation. Permit me to say, Sir, there must be a great revolution in this Colony before it can have a salutary influence on the surrounding natives; that is, before it can have a moral influence over them.'8

      Subsequent accounts, I am happy to state, present a better aspect in relation to the education of this outcast and persecuted people: their wants, however, are only partially supplied.

      The annual increase of the free colored and slave population in the United States is variously estimated from sixty to seventy-five thousand. The American Colonization Society proposes the annual removal of this vast body, – and more, if it be possible, – provided the energies and patronage of the General Government be enlisted in this expulsive crusade. Now, suppose the entire transportation effected, let any candid man decide how extremely difficult, not to say impracticable, it would be to discipline and instruct such an overwhelming mass of ignorance, or any considerable portion of it – and how pernicious must be the consequences to the colony and the natives, if it should not receive immediate culture!

      Secondly. It is neither certain nor probable that, allowing all that is assumed by colonizationists, the influence of secular and religious instruction would be sufficient to restrain the selfish desires and knavish propensities of those whose main object is, not to evangelize the natives, but to secure, by a summary process, competence and power for themselves. Indeed, their juxtaposition with the natives would be eminently calculated to induce the fever of avarice, and to generate the lust of dominion. It is well known that so eager are the colonists to acquire a rapid accumulation of wealth, by trafficking their paltry beads and poisonous rum and tobacco for ivory, camwood and gold dust, it is with the utmost difficulty any considerable portion of them are persuaded to cultivate the soil and engage in agricultural pursuits. Thus we are presented with the disgraceful, if not singular spectacle of a rivalry in cunning and trickishness between a colony of soi-disant missionaries (really avaricious and unscrupulous foreigners) and the tribes who are to come under their pious pupilage. If equal dexterity in trade is not apparent, each party is equally pleased with its successful attempts at deception, and both renew the fraudulent commerce with fresh alacrity – the one to gain a new triumph, and the other to retrieve an old defeat. And this is the mode of colonizationists to evangelize Africa! and this their mode to suppress the slave trade! and this their mode to elevate the free people of color! and this their mode to emancipate the slaves! It combines the folly and absurdity of a farce with the solemnity and murderment of a tragedy.

      Far be it from me to leave the impression upon the mind of the reader, from these representations, that all the colonists are actuated by the same selfish motives, or that they have exhibited any new and extraordinary traits of character in their commerce with the Africans. Many of them, I believe, are men who fear God and desire the welfare of his creatures: all of them have behaved as honorably, perhaps, and trafficked as equitably, as any other body of men, white or yellow, would have done in the same situation and under the same circumstances. Dishonesty in trade is no prodigy, even in this country. To bring accusations of fraud, cupidity and cunning against human nature, is not libellous. I am persuaded that robbery, – well contrived, deliberately executed robbery, – is perpetrated in every community among ourselves, without any due estimate of its moral turpitude, by reputable merchants and traders upon their customers, to a larger extent than all the avowed and heinous thefts collectively, which are committed against society. It is lamentable to see how studiously conscience and fair dealing are excluded from the secular business of the world. If we see, every day, illustrations of this dishonest conduct, given by men of refinement, intelligence and good character, what should we expect from those whose fetters have hardly fallen from their limbs; who have been systematically degraded by slavery; who have not consequently that lively sense of moral obligation which accompanies intelligence; who are beyond the influence of public sentiment, and surrounded by a barbarous people?

      The establishment of a colony of speculators, then, to evangelize Africa, does not discover much wisdom or promise much success; but, on the contrary, exhibits a total blindness of vision and a most unfavorable aspect.

      Let it be remembered, however, that rum and tobacco (two poisons which are exactly adapted to destroy both soul and body) are the principal articles given to the natives – because pertinaciously demanded by them – in exchange for their own. Their appetite for spirituous liquor, first created by the slave traders and subsequently excited by the colonists, is insatiate. Even the justly lamented Ashmun, if I do not mistake, for I have not his letter now before me, was so imprudent in one of his epistles to the Board of Managers as to concede the fatal necessity of selling rum freely СКАЧАТЬ