Chapter II: Part 2

This race has not greatly mingled with other races. It is, we are inclined to believe, rather a characteristic of it not to seek an amalgamation with another people, its tendency is to remain apart. We are well aware, indeed, that this is exactly contrary to the views of many who have built their opinions on popular assertions and prejudice rather than on observed facts. The assumption is that the negro desires to mingle his blood with that of the white races. The reverse is the fact. There is, though it may seem to some unaccountable, a certain pride of race, which leads the negro to exult in the purity of his blood, and to regard a foreign element in it as not only not desirable, but even objectionable. This feeling does not belong simply to the negro on his own continent; it perpetuates, perhaps magnifies itself when surrounded by another people. Among them in this country a pure-blooded negro will, with biting sarcasm, taunt the mulatto with the fact that the blood of another race is in his veins.

This feeling, which must have been noticed by any one whose observation has been extensive or intelligent enough to collect the facts, leads the race to remain by itself; and when left to its natural course, such is the result. The statistics of this country show that the free black does not and cannot mingle with the white race. No elevation or freedom can produce such an intermixture. Here and there, but so seldom as to present but perhaps a single case only in widely separated communities, there is an inter-marriage. This seeming want of inclination, coupled with a natural and insuperable repugnance on the part of the white, must ever keep the two races apart when they stand on an equal footing of freedom.

The often repeated argument against emancipation, founded on the notion that it would be necessarily followed by amalgamation, is the product of the grossest ignorance and thoughtlessness, while at the same time it betrays a shameful want of confidence in the white race itself. It surely argues no great power or stability in a people when they are not able to keep themselves from being mixed up with a confessedly inferior race. But facts point in a wholly different direction: so far from freedom promoting this intermixture, the only condition in which these two races are found mingling is where the negro is in a state of servitude. Here the process goes on freely and under the working of natural causes. The influences which on either side under other circumstances make it impossible, here become inoperative, and are overborne by other and more powerful ones. The close intimacies, beginning with infancy and extending over the whole life, destroying what under other circumstances might seem to be a natural separation; a servile desire to please on the part of the slave, lust and cupidity on the part of the master, all combine to make the blood of the two races flow in the same veins. Slavery is the source of amalgamation. The mulatto and the quadroon tell you unerringly of a present or a former servitude.

With this pliant ductility and this permanence of race, there is another striking characteristic;--the negro's attachment to place. It is probably a natural trait, but from easily perceived causes it is perhaps intensified in the case of the American negro. He loves his home and seldom goes willingly away from it, whether slave or free. The number of fugitives from bondage would be prodigiously multiplied were this feeling more easily overcome. Many a poor bondman has turned back to slavery when the hard alternative has been forced upon him to remain in it or go forever away from the familiar and dear scenes of his childhood's home. It is necessity scarcely less powerful than death that compels him to leave them behind.

The efforts which philanthropy has made to promote their colonization have met with an insuperable obstacle here, and will be compelled to contend, more or less unsuccessfully with it, till there shall be strength and education enough given the black to rise above it.

Among the many objections which have been urged against emancipation, this has been a very common one, and has had great force in the popular mind;--it will flood the Northern States with free blacks. The objection is vulgar and thoughtless. If the simple economic law of supply and demand, as powerful over men as materials, were not sufficient to keep this people where they are needed, and to prevent them from going where they are not, the love of home would be strong enough to bar such result. The slave needs all the mighty stimulus of a prospective deliverance from slavery to induce him to leave the place of his birth, and that even is often enough; why, then, when he has that boon in his hand, and walks the old haunts a freeman, with work requited and enough, why should he now go away to strangers and strange land? No, the States which have meanly and and disgracefully passed their laws excluding the freed black from a home within their borders, might have spared themselves the dishonor. The dreaded calamity would never have occurred. The enactments were the assumption of a gratuitous infamy.

The effect of emancipation will be the reverse of this fear. Instead of the freed slaves flocking northward, the free blacks of the North will gradually go South; in place of Northern States being overrun with the one, they will, in process of time, be stripped of the other. With slavery out of the way, the black will naturally bend his steps to the region where climate, congenial employments, habits, associations, all welcome him; he will go away from a people who do not understand him, and whose prejudices keep him down, to be near a people who have grown up with him, who know him, and are better able to do him good. This consolidation of the race in one part of the land will have an important bearing on its future. Emancipation only will fully accomplish it.

Passing these characteristics, common to the race both in Africa and in this country, let us consider others, which have been superadded by the residence of the negro in America. These are marked and important. The residence of the Jewish people for some two hundred years in Egypt, had a controlling influence over the whole national character and destiny. The Hebrew would never have been the man he was, nor would he have had the after history had he not known the bondage in the land of the Pharaohs. So, we think, the negro will, in all the coming time, be a man essentially different because of these two hundred years of slavery in America. * Nor will it be a temporary or limited effect; it will probably mould all the history of the race on its native continent. Africa will in future times look back upon slavery in America much in the same way that the Jew did upon his Egyptian bondage, and will be able to trace the wonder-working power of Divine Providence in the results which have flowed from it.

*There are some curious analogies between the bondage in Egypt and slavery in America. It seems as if slavery were about to come to an end in this country after almost identically the same period of existence. As far as the best calculations can fix the time, the bondage in Egypt lasted something more than two hundred years, and it is about that time since the first cargo of African slaves were landed by the Dutch at Jamestown, in 1620. The Hebrews went out suddenly and unexpectedly, under the pressure of tremendous judgments Will it be so in America?

Strangely enough, one of the marked effects of the residence of the black in this country has been to give a new and foreign element to the mental and physical structure of the negro. It has created an admixture of blood with a superior race. The natural effect of slavery has been to infuse the best blood of the master in the veins of the slave. This fact has not, perhaps, received the attention which it deserves as having an influence upon the future of the negro race. We do not speak of it in the way of sarcasm or reproach, but as something which, while it cannot be concealed or denied, ought not to be overlooked. It cannot be when the coming history of this people is under consideration.

The intermingling of race has been extensive; so much so, that in many places the pure-blooded negro is in the minority of the whole colored population. Here is not the place to make any extended observations on the intellectual and physiological effects of the union of different races in the same people, to elevate and give them tone and character. The facts are very familiar. We can see that in the case before us these effects will be of the same general character.

In the new social order which will come into being on the abolition of slavery, this intermixture of race will be less and less frequent, but what has already taken place will tend greatly to hasten the elevation and advancement of the black. The energy, the fire, and activity, the ingenuity and perseverance of the Anglo-Saxon, joined to the plastic docility of the African, is a strange combination, yet one which may be seen every day, and which when made free and permitted to exert its unrestrained power, will be of unmeasured value. The mulatto makes a very bad slave, Anglo-Saxon blood being never intended to run in the veins of a voluntary bondman, but will be a noble freedman.

It need not be a perpetuated intermingling of race. It will not be when slavery has gone, and it is well. Physically the mulattoes are a feeble people, and destined usually to an early death; nor are they prolific. By the force of merely natural causes, in process of time, they will almost wholly disappear. The immobility of the race will assert itself. But in the meanwhile they will have done their work in assisting the rise of their brethren. It is a force imparted for a special occasion. strangely given, but not in vain. It is a spoil taken from the enemy, one of the marvellous instances in which human passions and crime go to help human progress; it is the blood of the master given to make by-and-by a speedier elevation and a more perfect manhood for the slave.

Together with this transfusion of lineage in a part of the colored population, the actual contact of the whole with the white race is another fact which must be attentively regarded. This otherwise isolated people, isolated not only by continental separation, but by color from the rest of the human family, have been brought into the closest possible relationship with one of t he foremost people of the world. They have been introduced into families, making part of the household; have, to a certain extent, been brought under the influences of the civilization and enlightenment of this white race. Upon such a susceptible people, receiving impressions so easily, and being moulded so completely by them, this association cannot but have an unmeasured influence, hastening their elevation whenever the time of freedom comes.

In a state of slavery, while these influences are exerted and their power is given, yet it must be more or less a latent power. Slavery gives no opportunity for its exhibition. It is like throwing electric sparks into the Leyden jar; it might seem that as they flash and disappear, that all the power is lost, but when the proper conditions are fulfilled the unseen force, slowly gathered, puts itself forth with prodigious energy. When the impulse and opportunity is given by freedom to the American negro for advancement, the probabilities are that an example of rapid elevation will be given by them such as the world has never seen. The elements which have been working in and around them are such as have never been combined in any people before. The facts are, when thoughtfully considered, not only peculiar but wonderful. Here is an imitative and plastic people dwelling in the most intimate associations with an enlightened, energetic race, surrounded by the light of civilization, learning, art, science; it is simply impossible that they shall not partake in some degree of these great benefits. They may be seemingly excluded from them all, but a subtile power is the while going forth and is silently laying itself up in store, by-and-by to appear in their sudden development.

But beyond and above all, the negro race in America is a Christian race. Here are four millions of Christians. We mean, of course, Christian in contradistinction from any other form of religious belief. Before this one fact we may stand in silent wonder and admiration at the processes of God's great providence. If any where on earth the night of heathenism is dark, and the darkness is palpable, it is in the negro's native home. Yet here are millions of the same race maintaining their peculiar characteristics with great distinctness, yet in all essential points a Christian people, infinitely above their brethren in their original seat. The contrast in this regard between the race here and there is simply immeasurable. They have been taken out of the blackness of idolatry, and nurtured for two centuries in the light of an advance Christianity, so that heathenism has passed almost out of their traditions.

All this great result has been occasioned by slavery, sprung from cupidity and the origin of unnumbered crimes! Perhaps human history presents nowhere a more striking example of God's power to make the wickedness of man bring honor to his name.

Here, then, are a Christian people, with very much of superstition, with very much of ignorance, with, you may say, a low type of piety, but yet, after all, a Christian people. They are more, a Protestant people. Romanism has never obtained any extensive hold on them here. * May we not say that in this, that these four millions of blacks are a Protestant Christian people, there is an element of unbounded promise?

*It is very striking in this connection that Romanism has never made any progress or met with any permanent success in Africa. In the North where Mohammedanism prevails, (see Barth,) it is repudiated on account of its supposed proclivity to polytheism, and in other parts of the continent different causes have prevented its taking root. Indeed, West Africa presents the most striking instance on record of the utter failure of the Romish religion to benefit a heathen people. For more than two centuries the Portuguese had a kingdom in Congo, and for a time it was powerful and extensive in its influence. With it the Papacy sought an establishment. "It was a work," says Wilson, ( Bibliotheca Sacra, Jan . 1852), "at which successive missionaries labored with untiring assiduity for two centuries. Among these were some of the most learned and able men that Rome ever sent forth to the Pagan world. It was a cause that ever lay near the heart of the kings of Portugal, when that nation was at its climax of power and wealth. Yet before the close of the eighteenth century, indeed, for any thing we know to the contrary, before the middle of it, not only all their former civilization, but almost every trace of Christianity had disappeared from the land, and the whole country had fallen back into the deepest ignorance and heathenism, and into greater weakness and poverty than had ever been experienced even before its discovery." With a continent wonderfully kept from Romanism there, and a people preserved from it here, may we not see a divine adaptation for the future, a finger-pointing to some signal good for the church and the world?

If we throw together these characteristics and facts in regard to the negro race which we have now pointed out, we have this:--Here is a nation with good mental endowments, peculiarly distinct and seemingly destined to remain so, yet docile and ready to receive the impression of all influences surrounding them, brought not only in closest contact with one of the first races of the world, but actually receiving a transfusion of its best blood, made at least in part partakers of a very high civilization, and already Christianized in a form where there is the least play of superstition or error. Is it difficult to predict the future of such a people? Is it certainly absurd to say that there is a history before it, if not of the highest style, yet one good and even excellent; if not the noblest, as aggressive in its good upon the world, yet one sufficiently glorious for itself?

Whatever may be the ultimate destiny of this people, we think that we are justified when we say, looking over the facts in the case, that when they have removed from them the incubus of slavery, and start forth on a career of freedom, that their rise will be extremely rapid. Indeed, taking all the elements of progress which they possess into consideration, it is simply impossible that it should be otherwise.

While we give expression to these thoughts, let us not be understood as affirming that the benefits of which we speak are the legitimate results of slavery. Nothing could be farther from our intention. To substitute a cause for an occasion is a very common error: indeed some minds seem incapable of fully apprehending the world-wide difference. The legitimate effect of slavery is to thrust the victim as far down in the scale of being as is possible. The nearer the brute, the better the slave , is the true law of slavery. Slavery is the cause of ignorance, degradation, and crime. It, by a dreadful necessity, strips the slave of every attribute of manhood; neither soul nor body is his own; the one is kept in darkness as the other is sold in the shambles. What can a system that locks up all human knowledge, stalks through the soul trampling down all that constitutes the man, not accidentally, but by the necessity of its existence, what can such a system do for its victim?

There may be benefits such as we are now speaking of, coming to the slave in his slavery, but slavery does not give them. The laws which create slavery would shut out every thing, but they cannot. In spite of them all, the good will come. So it has been with the colored race in this country. This good can only be made to appear in a state of freedom.

Just here there is forced upon us another thoughht of tremendous significance. This gradual unseen, but mighty gathering of power in the slave in this land cannot be forever without one day coming into form. You cannot be evermore throwing electricity into the jar; by-and-by its overcharged contents will burst out in sudden explosion. While you may let the conductor take them safely and usefully away! No one cares to follow in imagination where the thought leads him. Emancipation must be given sooner or later, or all goes down in a hideous ruin; and no experience can calculate nicely when the last moment of safety is reached. It may come, and the crashing thunderbolt tell that it has gone.

Of the way in which this freedom is to be brought about, it is not the intention of this article to speak. To this writer, there seem perhaps no problem which approaches it in difficulty. Emancipation--it is easy to talk and declaim about, it is easy to prove right and to show desirable, but how to bring about, that is the labor. He is a rash man, who speaks very confidently on this matter. That it should be brought about, that the well-being of the two races, the interest of two continents, and humanity itself, the very existence of this American people demand it, no thinking man ought to doubt. It becomes this nation to address itself to this work, and see that it is done and done well.

While, however, we stand aghast at the difficulties of the work, it is comforting to know that the solution is not committed to us, but that the providence of God is pushing it forward. Events crowding upon each other with a rapidity which bewilders us, seem steadily and swiftly bringing the freedom of the negro to its accomplishments. No man is competent to say what the issue will be, or to what new form the events will shape themselves. A little while ago the most common consent of men looked toward a gradual emancipation, to-day it seems more and more as if the fetters were to be stricken off at a blow. How, or when, who shall say?

In whatever way it is done, one thing we may expect--it will not be by the premeditated devices of men. The great works of God are not done in that way. Smaller and comparatively unimportant ones may be, but those which affect grand interests, and shape the history of the world, the Great Jehovah takes into His own hand and brings them to pass so marvellously that all men shall recognize His power and "Know His name," (Isa. 52, 6.) "Therefore they shall know in that day that I am He that doth speak; behold it is I!" In the meanwhile it becomes all men reverently and obediently to be watching the movements of His Providence, to keep abreast of them, and boldly to take each new step as it is indicated, and as soon as it is. The end may come sooner, as it probably be vastly easier in its coming than we have dared to hope.

Taking the fact of emancipation as fixed, and to be realized, and that there will here be a race of freedom rapidly rising civilization and enlightenment, we are confronted with the question-- Is this country to be the ultimate home of this people ? We answer, No. We do not believe that this people were brought here that they might have a permanent residence. They were brought to this land for tutelage and trial. The Hebrew bondage is the example illustrating it. Whatever may be said in respect to the right of the negro to a perpetual home here, and we would be the last to dispute it; whatever may be urged against the prejudice which thrusts them out of association and into painful separation, and we would not for an instant justify it; yet still we are of the opinion that here the negro will not abide as a people. Social equality and the enjoyment of every right are well nigh hopeless for him. Were there nothing else in the way, the stigma of slavery is almost perpetual and ineradicable.

He is here, not for America, but for Africa. He is here for a training that could not have been gotten there. When it is complete, he will go back and make the continent what it could never do without him. When, under the influences which have shaped his character and built him up, he has become a self-reliant, advanced Christian man, and he is ready and able to do something for his race, he will go back to do it.

Then will be Africa's time. Exploration, advancing commerce, and with it Christianity, will have prepared the way, as we see it now being made ready, and the negro race of this land will go back gradually but with increasing rapidity, and by a natural and healthy emigration. Such emigration only could be permanently and extensively beneficial to a new land. The colonist must be more or less be impelled by the native force of his own character to seek the new home. Africa must look for her Christianity and her civilization especially to her own sons. Like all other lands which are to be elevated, the power raising her must come from without. It seems to be the course of Divine Providence that new and heathen countries are to be civilized and Christianized by Christian colonization; not commercial, but Christian colonies must go out to them. The colonists must not supplant and destroy the aboriginal inhabitants, nor must they come simply as teachers, but they must abide as those whose home is to be there, who as residents bring them the arts and practices of civilized and Christian life, and whose extended and continued example illustrates the power and benefits of the life they bring.

This has been for the most part of the course of events. No people rises alone and unaided from a state of barbarism. The early history of nations which have a history, usually begins with the coming of a colony, whether it be Phoenician, Cadmean, or Trojan. "Religion, law and letters are not indigenous, but exotic; in all the past career of man upon the globe one race hands the torch of science to another." Of no people must this be more true than of the African. If Africa is to be elevated, it must be by the infusion of life and power from without, and by means of colonies which bring with them the elements of life and power.

The colonist who brings this boon to Africa must be an African. Every year and every experiment renders this more clearly evident. The white missionary has done, and is doing, a noble, perhaps indispensable work, but the permanent results which are to be found over extensive regions must come from men whose race is similar to the people among whom they dwell, and with whom it can mingle freely and advantageously. Such a race has been preparing, and will be prepared by the overruling power of God in this country.

At present the work of preparation is not complete. A few have been made partially ready, some fit for the work have gone and, by their success on the west coast of Africa, have shown what the people are capable of doing. A beginning has been made, but in the coming time it must have a new starting-point. The Liberian colony, or any other which shall be formed, must rise from the position of a far distant place to which one is banished, to be the attractive spot which calls, and to which a manly energy and independence urges.

To send only the degraded and the low in intellect is not the method to elevate and ennoble a new land. The stream will not rise higher than the fountain, and a slave, though free, cannot at once be a truly self-reliant man, least of all can he be a good teacher of self-reliance and progress. He must first teach himself, well as he may, before he can do much for others. The colonist must, if he carry good with him, be first elevated himself. Nor, on the other hand, can the isolated and exceptional cases of advancement and cultivation be spared from their brethren here.

For the most part, as can easily be seen would naturally be the case, the colonists who have hitherto gone have been the most energetic and intelligent. But in the time to come such cannot all be spared: their example and aid are needed here to help the general rise. But if the time comes, and when it comes, that under the stimulus of freedom the colored race as a whole advances to the point which we think there is for it in the future, individuals will not be of account; emigration passing along the track of commerce, and commerce by its own great laws will set toward Africa, and in this way the problem of Africarn colonization, and of African history in America will be fulfilled. All this may be very distant, many years may go by, though, fewer than perhaps we may imagine, but the Great God who guides the hours and their burden can bring it all about, and through one of the deepest crimes of history, the Rebellion of to-day, hasten it in its coming. It will be like Him to make crime its own avenger, and both crime and vengeance illustrate his goodness and love.