Page:The future of Africa.djvu/174

168 In another respect, moreover, we are stirred to energy and activity. We belong to a race possessed of the qualities of hope and endurance, equal at least, to any class of men in the world. The mid passage alone was enough to exterminate any people; but we, in large remnants, have survived it, both in body and soul! We have lived through all the lacerations and soul-crushings of the deadly system of slavery, and the miserable influences of caste. Not merely the life of the body, but the moral being, the soul of this poor race, has stood the shock of mental pain, and anguish, and sorest desolation, and yet come forth at last triumphant! Signal examples are vouchsafed us for courage and for hope. Bear witness, departed shades, who attest the moral strength and endurance of this race! Thou immortal Toussaint! Statesman, General, Ruler! Thou generous Eustace! Christian and Philanthropist! and all the other unnumbered hearts who have struggled, alas! in vain for freedom! Or ye, who on many a plantation have calmly, quietly died, rather than submit to the yoke! Or, ye other children of faith, who, under the saddest of all earthly ills, have manifested the wondrous power of grace, by the wisdom of patience and the calm dignity of hope! 2. I remark, secondly, that we have a further inducement to pious patriotism, from the fact that God's gracious favor is evidently manifested to our race. For three centuries we have been passing through the ordeal of trial and suffering, in the