Alexander Crummell

“ But, as an individual, I have earnestly desired a non-sanguinary evangelization of West Africa. All empire, the world over, in rude countries has been cemented by blood. In Western Africa the tribes universally, save in Liberia, are strong, independent, warlike. Even British prowess, both at Sierra Leone and on the Gold Coast, succumbs at times to their indomitable spirit. And thus you see that, for the establishment of a strong black civilization in Central Africa, a strong and a bloody hand must be used. Color is nothing anywhere. Civilized condition differences men all over the globe. ”

“ In fine, I address myself to all that class of sentiments in the human heart which creates a thirst for wealth, position, honor, and power. I desire the auxiliary aid of this class of persons, and this class of motives, for it is such influences and agencies which are calculated to advance the material growth of Africa. She needs skill, enterprise, energy, worldly talent, to raise her; and these applied here to her needs and circumstances, will prove the hand-maid of religion, and will serve the great purposes of civilization and enlightenment through all her borders. ”

“ I have had the fear that some of my fellow-citizens accustomed themselves to look upon Liberia as a "close corporation." The attempt to pass a "naturalization law," in the face of the fact that it takes teaks to add a thousand living men to our population, chiefly caused that fear. But we in common with you are becoming awake to the conviction that, as a race, we have a great work to do. The zeal of England and of America for Africa is opening our eyes. Our own thoughtful men begin to feel the binding tie which joins them in every interest and feeling with the negro race all over the globe. ”

“ I would not insult the intellect and conscience of any colored man who thinks it his duty to labor for his race on American soil, by telling him that it is his duty to come to Africa. If he is educated up to the ideas of responsibility and obligation, he knows his duty better than I do. ”

“ Let us therefore call our skilful and energetic brethren to come to us and share the suffering and the glory of saving Africa. Let us stand on the beach and on the hill-side, and beckon to them in all lands to come and participate in lofty duty, in painful but saving labor, and to aid in the restoration and enlightenment of a vast continent! ”

“ The slave-trade is interdicted throughout Christendom; the chief powers of earth have put a lien upon the system of slavery interest and research in Africa have reached a state of intensity; mystery has been banished from some of her most secret quarters; sunlight, after ages of darkness, has burst in upon the charmed regions of her wealth and value; and yet the negro, on his native soil, is but "a hewer of wood and drawer of water" ”

“ And when you consider the fact of kinship, on our part, with Africa, the less liability to fever, the incentive to gain, the magnificent objects before us, and the magnificent field on which to develop them, and the probable early power of intelligent black men to penetrate, scathless, any neighborhood where they might reside, you can see the likelihood of an early repossession of Africa, in trade, commerce, and moral power, by her now scattered children in distant lands. ”

“ The power of the negro, if he has such power, to tell upon human interests, and to help shape human destinies, should, at an early day, make full demonstration of itself. We owe it to ourselves, to our race, and to our generous defenders and benefactors, both in Europe and America, to show that we are capable "of receiving the seed of present history into a kindly yet a vigorous soil, and [that we can] reproduce it, the same, and yet new, for a future period" [22] in all the homes of this traduced yet vital and progressive race. ”

“ I assure you that there is a school of this character in Liberia; men who feel obligated to philanthropy, who are burdened with a sense of duty, who have the keenest, most sensitive feeling of race, who love Africa, who are anxious for the welfare of the whole negro family, who labor with all their might for the advancement of industry and civilization, who would fain glorify God. When I look upon this class of men, and mark their ways, I feel that the country will yet attain standing and reach some distinction. ”

“ Great social evils universally prevail. Confidence and security are destroyed. Licentiousness abounds everywhere. Moloch rules and reigns throughout the whole continent, and by the ordeal of Sassywood, Fetiches, human sacrifices, and devil-worship, is devouring men, women, and little children. They have not the Gospel. They are living without God. The Cross has never met their gaze, and its consolations have never entered their hearts, nor its everlasting truths cheered their deaths.
And all this only epitomizes the miseries of Africa, for it would take a volume to detail and enumerate them. ”

“ But the enlightened sons of Africa, in distant lands, are called to a far higher work than even this; a work which as much transcends mere civilization as the abiding interests of eternity outvie the transient concerns of time. To wrest a continent from ruin; to bless and animate millions of torpid and benighted souls ”

“ And Liberia's wants in this respect are stronger than either of the above. You should learn willingly to give, even of your best, to save, and regenerate, and build up the race in distant quarters. [21] You should study to rise above the niggard spirit which grudgingly and pettishly yields its grasp upon a fellow laborer. You should claim in regard to this continent that "this is our Africa," in all her gifts, and in her budding grace and glory. ”

“ Has not God married pain, and suffering, and death to the fresh beginnings of all new nationalities? Would it not be marvellous, not to say miraculous, if it were true, that the history of this colony—for it is nothing more than a colony as yet—that it had been exempted from these trials? And what right have we to expect that God in these days will work miracles, especially for black men? ”

“ If they were, I should despair of any future for Liberia, and depart.
We have another, a larger class than these; a class which comprises awakened old men and generous and ardent youth; the minds whose great object in life is not mere gain or comfort, but who feel that they have a great work to accomplish for their children, for their race, and for God; wio feel that they have been called to this mission, and who wish to spend themselves in the expansion and compacting of this youthful republic, to save bleeding, benighted Africa, and to help redeem the continent. ”

“ Here arises the call of duty and obligation to colored men. Other people may, if they choose, forget the homes of their sires; for almost every European nation is now reaping the fruits of a thousand years' civilization. Every one of them can spare thousands and even millions of their sons to build up civilization in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, or Victoria. But Africa is the victim of her heterogeneous idolatries. Africa is wasting away beneath the accretions of civil and moral miseries. Darkness covers the land, and gross darkness the people. ”

“ Moreover, these men are to have strong moral proclivities, equal to the deep penetration and the unyielding tenacity of their minds. No greater curse could be entailed upon Africa than the sudden appearance upon her shores of a mighty host of heartless black buccaneers, (for such indeed they would prove themselves,) men sharpened up by letters and training, filled with, feverish greed, with hearts utterly alien from moral good and human well-being, and only regarding Africa as a convenient gold-field from which to extract emolument and treasure to carry off to foreign quarters. ”

“ But I say it deliberately, that the difficulties in the way of our brethren doing a goodly work for Africa, are more subjective than objective. One of these hindrances is a want of missionary zeal. This is a marked characteristic of American black Christians. I say American, for from all I hear, it does not characterize our West Indian brethren; and the infant church of Sierra Leone is already, in sixty years from its birth, a mother of missions. This is our radical defect. Our religion is not diffusive, but rather introversive. It does not flow out, but rather inward. ”

“ It shows only that phase of piety which may be termed the "piety of self-satisfaction." But if we are true disciples, we should not only seek a comforting piety, but we should also exhibit an effective and expansive one. We should let our godliness exhale like the odor of flowers. We should live for the good of our kind, and strive for the salvation of the world.
Another of these hindrances is what the phrenologists term "inhabitiveness,"—the stolid inhabitativeness of our race. As a people, we cling with an almost deadly fixity to locality. ”

“ But, notwithstanding these pleas, there are other great facts which grapple hold of these men and bind them to this darkened, wretched, negro race by indissoluble bonds. There is the fact of kinship, which a lofty manhood and a proud generosity keep them now, and ever will keep them, from disclaiming. There are the strong currents of kindred blood which neither time nor circumstance can ever entirely wash out. ”

“ It has gathered into its fold tens of thousands of the sons of Africa on American soil.
"The poor forsaken ones:"
men, however, of earnest mind, who would not sit in the negro pew; men, who but for this society must have been left to indifferentism or infidelity, have had their wounded hearts soothed by the visitations of this society, and their anxious, passionate gaze turned from the trials of caste and slavery, to "the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world." ”

“ Sad as this is, it is not to be wondered at. "Oppression" not only "makes a wise man mad,"it robs him also of his self-respect. And this is our loss; but having emerged from slavery, it is our duty to cast off its grave-clothes and resist its deadly influences. ”

“ To the farthest interior, leagues and combinations would be formed with the men of commerce; and thus civilization, enlightenment, and Christianity would be carried to every state, town, and village of interior Africa. The galling remembrance of the slave-trade on the coast, and of slavery in America, would quicken the blood and the brain of both parties, and every wretch of a slave-trader who might visit the coast would have to atone for his temerity by submitting to the rigid code framed for piracy. ”

“ As to learning, we have no greater need than this same religion; and there can be no excess of means, no superabundance of agencies, no delicacy or profundity of culture, unadapted to actual present needs of all this wide region of Liberia. We have our native population, and we have our emigrant youth and children, thousands upon thousands, all around us. And when I look at the quickness, the capacity, and the thirst of the natives for enlightenment, I can see no difference in the needs of the one from the other ”

“ Any one can see that I have intended nothing discourteous; and it should be remembered that commercial enterprise in Africa has no necessary connection with emigration, or colonization. How great soever the diversities of opinion upon these points, on this platform, Douglass and Delany can stand beside the foremost citizens and merchants of Liberia. Hence those men whose feelings are the most averse to any thins; like colonization, cannot object to the promotion of trade and the acquisition of wealth. ”

“ It is the duty of black men to feel and labor for the salvation of the mighty millions of their kin all through this continent. I know that there is a class of her children who repudiate any close and peculiar connection with Africa. They and their fathers have been absent from this soil for centuries. In the course of time their blood has been mingled somewhat with that of other peoples and races. ”

“ It must follow, as a necessity, that the trade and commerce of Africa shall fall into the hands of black men. At an early day whole fleets of vessels, manned and officered by black men from the United States and Liberia, would outrival all the other agencies which are now being used for grasping West African commerce. Large and important houses would spring into existence among you all through the States. Wealth would flow into your coffers, and affluence would soon exhibit itself amid all your associations. ”

“ These civilized States are sending out their adventurous travellers to question, on the spot, the mysterious spell which seems to shut out Africa from the world and its civilization. These enterprising spirits are entering every possible avenue to the heart of Africa, anxious to assure the inner tribes of the continent that the enlightened populations of Europe would fain salute them as brethren, and share with them the culture and enlightenment which, during the ages, have raised them from rudeness and degradation ”