Read Ebook: The American Missionary — Volume 35 No. 6 June 1881 by Various

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The flood-tide of enthusiasm on the part of the Freedmen, as a matter of course, began to ebb when the difficulties of obtaining an education fairly dawned upon them. Some of their friends at the North, seeing this, began to lose faith in their educability, and as a consequence began also to withhold their support from the work. But the American Missionary Association said, "This is just as we expected," and instead of yielding, buckled down to its work all the more earnestly, and argued for its continuance all the more forcefully. The reaction would again react. The tide of interest would return with healthier beat, and the second call would be more effective than the first. It was a firm faith in such an outcome that prompted the annual reports which, for several years, held out this bow of promise, while that ugly debt was hanging like a threatening cloud over all the work; and the faith has been justified by the results. The reaction of the reaction has come. The tide is setting back again with normal flow. The cause is advocated from the leading pulpits; our foremost statesmen endorse it; the most influential newspapers editorially commend it; the debt has been wiped out; our schools are crowded to their utmost capacity, and there is to-day sounding in the ears of the public a louder call for the immediate enlargement of work for the education of the Freedmen than has ever yet been heard. It is not the old, with heads filled with all sorts of fantastic notions, who now clamor for what they never can acquire. The young and ambitious are pressing forward, and they are doing it with eyes wide open to the difficulties that must be encountered, while at the same time, to give them confidence and hope, they have before them the living examples of scholarly achievement on the part of some of the youth of their race. These young men and young women, who are now turned away from the doors of our schools because "there is no room," appeal to us not merely because they want to obtain an education for themselves, but because they represent the neglected condition of a race. It is a remarkable fact, and most pathetic in its meaning, that they plead in many instances to be taken into school in order that they may qualify themselves to be the means of the elevation of their people.

A critical time is this. These millions cannot be left much longer in their ignorance without danger to the public peace. Vice does not tend to produce virtue. Ignorance does not tend to produce knowledge. Let the feeling settle down on the colored youth that all avenues for intellectual culture are closed against them, and ambition for improvement will soon disappear, and when the brood of evils to which ignorance is the prolific parent has been once fairly let loose upon the land, it may be too late to remedy the mischief. "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure," says the wisdom of the ages. The demand of the hour is, "Let the wisdom of the ages be put to practical use." Recorded in books, tossed from lip to lip, it profits little; it must be put into action. No question presses upon the Christian and patriotic thought of our land with greater urgency, or bears within it farther reaching consequences, than this same question of the education of our negro population. The hour of opportunity is now. We ask the friends of the Freedmen to heed this second call that comes to them, to prosecute the work of Christian education among the negroes, with a greater zeal and greater enthusiasm than ever before. If we are faithful, a rich harvest will be ours to reap.

THE NEGRO FOR HIS PLACE.

PROF. C. C. PAINTER.

An intelligent Christian woman, fairly representative, we believe, of the best friends of the negro, herself engaged in the work of negro education as an amateur, in the literal meaning of the word, during her annual sojourn in the South, said to us recently that she did not believe in the attempt of Fisk, Howard, Atlanta and like schools to give this people a higher education. They should be taught the three R's, and how to work, and so fitted for their place in life. She esteemed it an unfortunate mistake and blunder that they should be disqualified for it by a classical education.

An associate editor of one of our largest dailies, a widely influential man, commended, not simply by its excellence, but by way of contrast, the work done at Hampton, not because in the pursuit of its own aims it left the work of higher education to other schools, but because it taught its negro pupils to work, and did not make fools of them by teaching them Latin and Greek, and this, not because he is opposed to higher education for any one, but because such an education unfitted the negro for his place. These friends are not alone in the opinion that the place of the negro is definitely known, and that is one which demands and allows a very limited range of intellectual power, and requires the exercise of his muscles chiefly.

We respectfully submit that the only possible apology for slavery as it existed in this country was based upon the assumption that the white man had the right to determine just the place in the scale of being that the black man should occupy. He stood forth as the authorized interpreter of nature, and maintained that both nature and Noah had settled it that the sons of Ham were fitted alone to be the servants of their brethren.

When we have assented to the proposition that nature has allotted to a race a certain position, we have assented, logically, to the further and co-ordinate proposition that it should be fitted for the place and kept in it; thus the whole code of slave laws stands approved and justified.

There has been much discussion, and there will probably be a great deal more, as to the proper place and exact sphere of woman; and with more show of reason, for she constitutes not a race, but a class; and nature has indicated in the fact of sex some of the possibilities of her nature and duties of her sphere; has decided some things as possible, and some as impossible to her. She cannot be the father of a family; but what she may be intellectually, morally, spiritually, as a mother, as a woman, can be known only when she has opened before her unlimited opportunity for her untrammeled powers. She may not transcend nature's limitations, but she ought to insist that man's ignorance and prejudice shall not prove a more insuperable bar to what she may do.

That nature has placed any disqualifications upon the negro, and has thus indicated or determined what is or what is not possible for him to accomplish, we cannot know until we have so far removed the obstacles we have put in his way, and stricken off the chains with which we have bound him, and thrown open an opportunity which we have barred against him, that he shall have a chance to show what the purpose was with reference to him; and we may thus learn, also, as we are beginning to do, what our injustice and wrong has been.

Our treatment of the negro, whether as slave or Freedman, has been and will be shaped by our theories in regard to him, but it is time we honestly sought to know what the facts are, and draw our theories from them rather than attempt to limit him by our prejudices, as if they were indisputable facts of nature.

The master said the negro's place is that of a chattel slave, and he wisely enacted that he should neither be educated out of it, nor be allowed to escape from it. The fortunes of war broke the chain and palsied the whip-arm of the master, and now his friends, many of them, who rejoice that he has escaped from his old place, would attempt to fit him for a new one, but determine for him what it shall be, and express grave apprehensions of evil if we say he should have the best possible opportunity to find for himself what it is. The war destroyed the old chain by which he was held in his appointed place, but has not eradicated the disposition of the Anglo-Saxon to decide for him what his new one must be, and in the minds of many it is that of a laborer of the lowest grade; and lest he might escape from it by rising above it, they would see to it that his education shall be of such character as to fit him for it alone.

While the wise teacher sees to it that he shall not neglect thorough training in the most elementary branches in order to become a smatterer in Greek and Latin, it should be done on the general principle applicable to all races and every individual, that any other course would be consummate folly. The theory to which our practice should conform is this: Give to every child of God the best opportunity possible for him as such, and let him in the untrammeled exercise of his powers find out what his Creator designed him to be and assigned him to do.

The time is coming when it will appear incredible that a man's place in the intellectual and social world shall be assigned to him because of the color of his skin, any more than because of the color of his eyes, or of his clothes. Educate not the negro, but the child, not for his place, but that he may find his place, and do his work among his fellows.

ANNIVERSARY ANNOUNCEMENTS.

FISK UNIVERSITY, NASHVILLE, TENN.--Baccalaureate Sermon, Sunday A.M., May 22d. Anniversary of Missionary Society, Sunday evening. Examinations, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Commencement Exercises, and the ceremony of laying the corner-stone of Livingstone Missionary Hall, Thursday.

TALLADEGA COLLEGE, TALLADEGA, ALA.--Baccalaureate Sermon, by the President, Sunday, June 12th. Examinations, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Commencement Exercises, Thursday.

ATLANTA UNIVERSITY, ATLANTA, GA.--Baccalaureate Sermon, Sunday, June 12th, Examinations, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, to be attended by the Examining Committee appointed by the Governor of Georgia. Commencement Exercises Thursday. Address by Rev. Atticus G. Haygood, D.D., President of Emory College.

TOUGALOO UNIVERSITY, TOUGALOO, MISS.--Baccalaureate Sermon by Rev. M. E. Strieby, D.D., Sunday, May 29th. Examinations and closing exercises Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.

STRAIGHT UNIVERSITY, NEW ORLEANS, LA.--Baccalaureate Sermon, Sunday, May 29th. Examinations and closing exercises, May 30th and 31st and June 1st.

TILLOTSON COLLEGIATE AND NORMAL INSTITUTE, AUSTIN, TEXAS.--Examinations and closing exercises, June 8th, 9th and 10th.

BEACH INSTITUTE, SAVANNAH, GA.--Examinations and closing exercises, May 26th and 27th.

SWAYNE SCHOOL, MONTGOMERY, ALA.--Examinations and closing exercises, May 30th and 31st.

EMERSON INSTITUTE, MOBILE, ALA.--Examinations and closing exercises, May 25th, 26th and 27th.

LE MOYNE INSTITUTE, MEMPHIS, TENN.--Annual Sermon, Sunday evening, May 29th. Junior Exhibition, Monday, 30th. Graduating exercises, Wednesday, June 1st.

LEWIS HIGH SCHOOL, MACON, GA.--Examinations and closing exercises, May 31st and June 1st.

AVERY INSTITUTE, CHARLESTON, S.C.--Examinations and closing exercises, June 29th and 30th.

The next meeting of the National Teachers' Association will be held in Atlanta, Ga., July 19th. This opportunity for interchange of views between Northern and Southern teachers ought to result in great good. Northern teachers need not fear to visit Atlanta at that season of the year, as its altitude, about eleven hundred feet above the sea, gives it a mild and healthful climate. Our teachers often spend their summer there.

BENEFACTIONS.

Cyrus McCormick, of Chicago, has added ,000 to his former gifts to the Presbyterian Theological Seminary of that place.

Robert L. Stewart has enlarged his gift to the San Francisco Presbyterian Theological Seminary from ,000 to ,000.

Mr. Moses Hopkins, brother of the late Mark Hopkins, has just given to a California academy an endowment of ,000, the largest sum yet bestowed in this way by any one person in that State.

Harvard College has received a gift of 5,000 for the erection of a physical laboratory, provided a fund of ,000 be raised to defray the running expenses. As in the case of the Law School, the name of the benefactor is not to be made public.

Mr. Thomas A. Scott has endowed the chair of Mathematics in the University of Pennsylvania, now occupied by Prof. Kendall, with ,000. He has also given ,000 to Jefferson College, ,000 to the Orthopedic Hospital, and ,000 to the children's department of the Episcopal Hospital.

ITEMS FROM THE FIELD.

MCINTOSH, GA.--Miss Parmelee, from Memphis, after visiting some of her old pupils at Andersonville, writes: "It is easy to forget any hardship connected with those pioneer days in visiting these Christian homes of former pupils, and the homes that have been blessed through them. One woman was telling me of this and that neighborhood where schools and church meetings had been held, and, with a gratitude that was genuine, exclaimed: 'There's many a light been started in this dark place, and it all dates back to Andersonville.' I could but feel, and afterwards say: 'No, it all dates back through John Wycliffe to Calvary.' I have been deeply impressed during these past few days with a sense of the power of grace. I never had great expectations of any of these friends. Their honest, kindly, God-fearing lives are all that I expected, and more than I feared. Remembering their former low estate, I am filled with a sense of relief and gratitude at finding them so trusty and good. Friday morn: just there came a call to go and see a sick woman; returning from the two-mile ride, I found forty women waiting for me. I talked to them for half an hour and then answered questions for nearly an hour. Several come in every day to listen to the school talks."

CHILDERSBURG, ALA.--"We are going on in the work of the Lord. We have a good lively Sabbath-school every Sabbath, and all seem to enjoy the lesson. All are Christians but six, and I hope to gain those for the Lord. We are going on in peace as pastor and people. We did not pay all we owed on our church farm last year, but we will pay all of it this year, and then we will give or every year to carry other work on. My members want to give as much as any one else to the work. I hope they will. I have put my horse on the church farm to work. Bro. Y. gives his entire attention to the farm, and he rents more land to make out a full two-horse crop. He has planted all his corn, and the most of his cotton land is bedded up, and I think he is doing well. One of my best members last year went to Long View, Ala., and since he has been there he has got up a meeting-house and wants me to come and preach once a month."

CYPRESS SLASH, LIBERTY CO., GA.--The Cypress Slash church was dedicated the 10th of April. An audience of 150 was comfortably seated in the new church. A brief sketch of the history and formation of the church was given, going back to the time when the first public meeting was held in the public road. The church is now in a growing condition, and the church building is completed except the ceiling.

LITTLE ROCK, ARK.--On the Sabbath, April 24th, by a Council, Rev. B. F. Foster was ordained as pastor of the new church of this city, which has now come on to a membership of 69, and which has purchased a lot for 0, one half of which has already been paid. Supt. Roy, Rev. J. W. Roberts, of Paris, Texas, and Rev. L. A. Roberts, of Memphis, led in the services of the sermon, charge, right hand, and address. It was a great day for the new enterprise. Two other sermons were preached by the young men. On the evening of the 25th, Mr. Foster was married by his two young brethren to Miss Helena Duff, a graduate of Talladega College.

At the annual meeting of the New Orleans Sunday-school Association, held April 4th in the Y. M. C. A. Hall, the lesson of the next Sunday, upon the good Samaritan, was the subject of the three addresses made. George W. Cable, the author, a member of Dr. Palmer's church, spoke from manuscript upon the point: "Who is my neighbor?" After giving the question the old antislavery interpretation he found the wounded man as an amalgam of Chinese, Indian and Negro, and a Roman Catholic; and his suggestion was that we should not put that man up in the gallery of the church, nor make him wait for the communion till after we had been served. The hits made a few persons wince, as was apparent in the assembly; but they were honestly delivered and will do good. They are a finger indication of the working of the Southern Christian mind. I noticed that Prof. McPherron, of the Straight University, had been selected to act as precentor to lead the singing of the occasion, being a prominent and greatly respected member of the Philharmonic Society of the city. Dr. Alexander, who is an officer of the city S. S. Association, was called upon to offer prayer. Nor is it an evidence that these men have fallen from grace that by their patient waiting they are thus winning honorable recognition among the best people of the city.

L. E. R.

GENERAL NOTES.

The Freedmen.

Africa.

--The French Government is placing a second telegraphic line between Algeria and Tunis. It was to have been finished by the last of March.

--Work on the railroad from S?tif to Algeria has been commenced. The greatest activity prevails, and the whole line may be finished in 14 months.

--The Belgian Society has charged Mr. Stanley with engaging anew at Zanzibar, for several years, native workmen, who will be employed upon the Congo.

--The sultan of Zanzibar has offered to the celebrated traveler Thomson the mission of exploring the basin of the Rovuma from a geological point of view.

--Mgr. Taurin Cahagua, apostolic vicar of the Gallas, has gone to Berber to install there three missionaries. From thence he will go with the others to Havar.

--M. Irgens Bergh, a Danish archaeologist, has arrived at Cairo to devote himself to his favorite studies. M. Insenger, a Hollander, also an archaeologist, accompanies him. The field of his scientific exploration will be essentially Nubia and Upper Egypt.

--After a journey in Europe M. de Hesse Wartegg, who has already turned his studies in Fayoum and in Nubia to the Coptic race, has returned to Alexandria to continue them. He is accompanied by Dr. Hociner, a noted botanist. These gentlemen are awaiting the arrival of two other students attached to the expedition, after which they will set out in a caravan for Upper Egypt.

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