The Martyrdom of Man by Winwood Reade (mini ebook reader .TXT) π
The Egyptians were islanders, cut off from the rest of the world by sand and sea. They were rooted in their valley; they lived entirely upon its fruits, and happily these fruits sometimes failed. Had they always been able to obtain enough to eat, they would have remained always in the semi-savage state.
It may appear strange that Egypt should have suffered from famine, for there was no country in the ancient world where food was so abundant and so cheap. Not only did the land produce enormous crops of corn; the ditches and hollows which were filled by the overflowing Nile supplied a harvest of wholesome and nourishing aquatic plants, and on the borders of the des
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present time, could not have been obtained without the
assistance of the negro: and that the agitation on his behalf,
which was commenced by Granville Sharp, has assisted much to
expand the sympathies, and to educate the heart of the Anglo-Saxon people, who are somewhat inclined to pride of colour and
prejudice of race. Respecting the prospects of the negro, it is
difficult for me to form an opinion; but what I have seen of
the Africans in their native and semi-civilised condition
inclines me to take a hopeful view. The negroes are imitative
in an extraordinary degree, and imitation is the first
principle of progress. They are vain and ostentatious, ardent
for praise, keenly sensitive of blame. Their natural wants,
indeed, are few; they inherit the sober appetites of their
fathers who lived on a few handfuls of rice a day; but it will,
I believe, be found that when they enjoy the same inducements
to work as other men, when they can hope to distinguish
themselves in the Parliament, the pulpit, or in social life,
they will become as we are, the slaves of an idea, and will
work day and night to obtain something which they desire, but
do not positively need. Whether the negroes are equal in
average capacity to the white man, whether they will ever
produce a man of genius, is an idle and unimportant question;
they can at least gain their livelihood as labourers and
artisans; they are therefore of service to their country; let
them have fair play, and they will find their right place
whatever it may be: As regards the social question, they will
no doubt, like the Jews, intermarry always with their own race,
and will thus remain apart. But it need not be feared that they
will become hostile to those with whom they reside. Experience
has shown that, whenever aliens are treated as citizens, they
become citizens, whatever may be their religion or their race,
It is a mistake to suppose that the civilised negro calls
himself an African, and pines to return to his ancestral land.
If he is born in the States, he calls himself an American he
speaks with an American accent; he loves and he hates with an
American heart.
It is a question frequently asked of African travellers, What
is the future of that great continent? In the first place, with
respect to the West Coast, there is little prospect of great
changes taking place for many years to come. The commerce in
palm oil is important, and will increase. Cotton will be
received in large quantities from the Sudan. The East Coast
of Africa, when its resources have been developed, will be a
copy of the West Coast. It is not probable that European
colonies will ever flourish in these golden but unwholesome
lands. The educated negroes will in time monopolise the trade,
for they can live at less expense than Europeans, and do not
suffer from the climate. They may perhaps at some future day
possess both coasts, and thence spread with Bible and musket
into the interior. This prospect, however, is uncertain, and in
any case exceedingly remote.
That part of Africa which lies above the parallel 1OΒ° North
belongs to the Eastern Question. What ever may be the ultimate
destiny of Egypt, Algeria, and Morocco, will be shared by the
regions of the central Niger, from Haussa to Timbuctoo.
That part of the continent which lies below the parallel 2OΒ°
South, already belongs in part, and will in time entirely belong to
settlers of the Anglo-Saxon race. It resembles Australia, not
only in its position with respect to the Equator, but also in
its natural productions. It is a land of wool and mines,
without great navigable rivers, interspersed with sandy
deserts, and enjoying a wholesome though sultry air. Whatever
may be the future of Australia will also be the future of
Southern Africa.
Between these two lines intervenes a region inhabited for the
most part by pagan savages, thinly scattered over swamp and
forest. This concealed continent, this unknown world, will at
some far-off day, if my surmises prove correct, be invaded by
three civilising streams; by the British negroes from the
coasts by the Mohammedan negroes in robe and turban from the
great empires of the Niger region; and by the farmers and
graziers and miners of South Africa.
When, therefore, we speculate on the future of Africa, we can
do no more than bring certain regions of that continent within
the scope of two general questions; the future of our colonies,
and the future of the East; and these lead us up to a greater
question still, the future of the European race.
Upon this subject I shall offer a few remarks; and it is
obvious that in order to form some conception of the future it
is necessary to understand the present and the past. I shall
therefore endeavour to ascertain what we have been and what we
are. The monograph of Africa is ended. I shall make my sketch
of history complete, adding new features, passing quickly over
the parts that have been already drawn. I shall search out the
origin of man, determine his actual condition, speculate upon
his future destiny, and discuss the nature of his relations
towards that unknown Power of whom he is the offspring and the
slave. I shall examine this planet and its contents with the
calm curiosity of one whose sentiments and passions, whose
predilections and antipathies, whose hopes and fears, are not
interested in the question. I shall investigate without
prejudice; I shall state the results without reserve.
What are the materials of human history? What are the earliest
records which throw light upon the origin of man? All written
documents are things of yesterday, whether penned on prepared
skins, papyrus rolls, or the soft inner bark of trees; whether
stamped on terra-cotta tablets, carved on granite obelisks, or
engraved on the smooth surface of upright rocks. Writing, even
in its simplest picture form, is an art which can be invented
only when a people have become mature.
The oldest books are therefore comparatively modern, and the
traditions which they contain are either false or but little
older than the books themselves. All travellers who have
collected traditions among a wild people know how little that
kind of evidence is worth. The savage exaggerates whenever he
repeats, and in a few generations the legend is transformed.
The evidence of language is of more value. It enables us to
trace back remotely divided nations to their common birthplace, and reveals the amount of culture, the domestic
institutions, and the religious ideas which they possessed
before they parted from one another. Yet languages soon die, or
rather become metamorphosed in structure as well as in
vocabulary; the oldest existing language can throw no light on
the condition of primeval man.
The archives of the earth also offer us their testimony: the
graves give up their dead, and teach us that man existed many
thousand years ago, in company with monstrous animals that have
long since passed away; and that those men were savages, using
weapons and implements of stone, yet possessing even then a
taste for ornament and art, wearing shell bracelets, and
drawing rude figures upon horns and stones. The manners and
ideas of such early tribes can best be inferred by a study of
existing savages. The missionary who resides among such races
as the Bushmen of Africa or the Botocudos of Brazil may be said
to live in pre-historic times.
But as regards the origin of man, we have only one document to
which we can refer; and that is the body of man himself. There,
in unmistakable characters, are inscribed the annals of his
early life. These hieroglyphics are not to be fully deciphered
without a special preparation for the task: the alphabet of
anatomy must first be mastered, and the student must be expert
in the language of all living and fossil forms. One fact,
however, can be submitted to the uninitiated eye, and it will
be sufficient for the purpose. Look at a skeleton and you will
see a little bone curled downwards between the legs, as if
trying to hide itself away. That bone is a relic of pre-human
days, and announces plainly whence our bodies come. We are all
of us naked under our clothes, and we are of all us tailed
under our skins. But when we descend to the man-like apes, we
find that, with them as with us, the tail is effete and in
disuse; and so we follow it downwards and downwards until we
discover it in all its glory in the body of the fish; being
there present, not as a relic or rudimentary organ, as in man
and the apes; not a mere appendage, as in the fox; not a
secondary instrument, a spare hand, as in certain monkeys, or a
fly-flapper, as in the giraffe; but as a primary organ of the
very first importance, endowing the fish with its locomotive
powers. Again, we examine the body of the fish, and we find in
it also rudimentary organs as useless and incongruous as the
tail in man; and thus we descend step by step, until we arrive
at the very bottom of the scale.
The method of development is still being actively discussed,
but the fact is placed beyond a doubt. Since The Origin of
Species appeared, philosophical naturalists no longer deny
that the ancestors of man must he sought for in the lower
kingdom. And, apart from the evidence which we carry with us in
our own persons, which we read in the tail-bone of the
skeleton, in the hair which was once the clothing of our
bodies, in the nails which were once our weapons of defence,
and in a hundred other facts which the scalpel and the
microscope disclose; apart from the evidence of our own voices,
our incoherent groans and cries, analogy alone would lead us
to, believe that mankind had been developed from the lowest
forms of life. For what is the history of the individual man?
He begins life as an ambiguous speck of matter which can in no
way be distinguished from the original form of the lowest
animal or plant. He next becomes a cell; his life is precisely
that of the animalcule. Cells cluster round this primordial
cell, and the man is so far advanced that he might be mistaken
for an undeveloped oyster; he grows still more, and it is clear
that he might even be a fish; he then passes into a stage which
is common to all quadrupeds, and next assumes a form which can
only belong to quadrupeds of the higher type. At last the hour
of birth approaches; coiled within, the dark womb he sits, the
image of an ape; a caricature and, a prophecy of the man that
is to be. He is born, and for some time he walks only on all-fours; he utters only inarticulate sounds; and even in his
boyhood his fondness for climbing trees would seem to be a
relic of the old arboreal life. Since, therefore, every man has
been himself in such a state that the most experienced observer
could not with the aid of the best microscopes have declared
whether he was going to be man or plant, man or animalcule, man
or mollusc, man or lobster, man or fish, man or reptile, man or
bird, man or quadruped, man or monkey; why should it appear
strange that the whole race has also had its animalcule and its
reptile days? But whether it appears strange or not, the public
must endeavour to accustom its mind to the fact which is now
firmly, established, and will never be overthrown.
Not only are the
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