David Livingstone delivered two lectures in Cambridge in early December, 1857. The second one was in the Town Hall a day after the lecture to an audience in Cambridge University.
Below is the full version as published in Dr Livingstone’s Cambridge Lectures, (ed.) William Monk (Cambridge: Deighton, Bell for the Editor, 1858).
The following Lecture was delivered in the Town-Hall, on the day after the delivery of the other. Although the notice was so short, crowds of persons came to hear, who could not gain admittance, Swann Hurrell, Esq., the Mayor, took the chair, and some members of the Town Council were present. The anxiety of all classes to see and hear Dr Livingstone is pleasing, since it shews the state of public opinion on several vital topics, especially the civilisation and evangelisation of Africa. After being introduced to the assembly, the Doctor, without any prefatory remarks, took his wand, and began to point towards some maps of Africa just above his head, in his usual manner speaking as follows : —
IN turning to the map of South Africa, I want to draw your attention to three imaginary zones, on the southern part, all different in population and climate. You will see that this part of Africa forms a kind of cone. This cone can be divided into three longitudinal bands or zones, just spoken of: the eastern band comprises what is generally known as Kafirland, which has been rather a difficult nut to crack for the English nation. However, the Kafir war has at length ended, both parties owning themselves tired ; only we had to pay two millions of money, and lost a great many valuable lives as well. That part of the country is mountainous and well watered. The central zone, or Bechuana country, is comparatively dry, being seldom visited by rain ; and its inhabitants, the Bechuanas, Bushmen, and Bakalahari, &c., are not nearly so warlike as the Caffres. Passing towards the West, we come to a level plain called the Kalahari desert, not consisting of barren sands, like the generally received notions of deserts, but covered with grass, bushes and trees, and containing a population of Bushmen and other people called the Bakalahari. I lived sixteen years on the borders of the Kalahari desert ; and having gone to the country in 1841, I was naturally anxious to ascertain the effect the teaching of the missionaries had produced.
I must own that I was disappointed in what I saw, having formed rather sanguine expectations. I forwarded the result of my inquiries to the London Missionary Society, by whom I was sent out, and after a little time went to the country beyond, where I found the people in just the same state as the missionaries found those I had left ; and when I compared those I had just come amongst with the people with whom I had recently lived, the benefit of the missionary teaching then appeared great indeed. True, the African when Christianised is not so elevated as we who have had the advantages of civilisation and Christianity for ages; but still, when rescued from the degradation and superstitions of heathenism, he evinces improvement in an eminent degree. We should compare new converts who are still surrounded with all their old associations of heathenism, rather with the churches first planted by the Apostles, than with ourselves. Public opinion, law, custom, and general manners, with us who have enjoyed the inestimable blessings of the Gospel so long, are so essentially different from those which governed the converts of the first Christian age, and which still influence those new disciples of the better way among whom our modern Missionaries labour. If these latter soldiers of the cross have sometimes to mourn over the inconsistencies of their converts, it must be remembered that such was also the case with the Apostles, as their writings prove; especially those of St Paul, the great Apostle of the Gentiles.
I was not at all anxious to enter on the labours of other men ; for I consider that the young missionary should devote himself as much as possible to his own field of duty, and not interfere with any other man's labour, but go to the real heathen, who may not as yet have heard Christ's name, or received his Gospel. Through the instrumentality of Mr Moffat, the Bechuanas have the Bible in their own language. To shew the value put on the sacred volume, in the first editions there were two sorts, one rather cheaper than the other and the binding less costly. The natives, who are rather inclined to be niggardly, purchased the cheap edition, thinking the binding stronger; but finding it was not so, they soon bought all the more costly Bibles with avidity.
Mr Moffat's labours, for the first ten years of his ministration, were not attended with any apparent success ; and a large body of the tribe left the district in which he preached ; and went a hundred miles away, in order to get out of the reach of his preaching, thinking to live in their own way without any stings of conscience ; but in the latter respect they were mistaken, for the seed of the Gospel had taken root in their hearts, and they were obliged to send to the missionaries for assistance, and their chiefs used to go backwards and forwards for teaching: there was a constant relay going to the missionaries and coming back to teach those whom they left at home. When first visited by the missionary, one hundred were considered proper subjects for baptism, and the Church there now numbers upwards of three hundred in that one village. Many native missionary stations are dispersed around. It is an indisputable fact that when a man feels the value of the Gospel himself, in his own heart, he is ever anxious to impart its blessing to others. Travelling still in the south, I determined to visit a tribe called the Bakwains, resolving to go to the country beyond Kuruman, and when I commenced preaching the Gospel to them, I seemed as one who came with a lie or with some political object in view; hence they received me with suspicion, saying, " It is too good to be true," adding, "this man has some other design, which we shall soon see;" for they thought it strange that a man should leave his own tribe to preach to others: this caution was rather a good trait in their character, for it prevented them making sudden professions like the South Sea Islanders.
Their chief [Sechele] is a remarkable man, not an average specimen of his people. He resolved at once to learn to read ; and on the very first day of my visit acquired the alphabet. Sechele one day said to me, after I had been preaching to the tribe, "Do you imagine you will get these people to believe by just talking to them ? I can do nothing without thrashing them. If you want them to believe, I, and my under-chiefs, will get our whips of Rhinoceros hide, and soon make them all believe." That was before he understood the Gospel; he soon after began to feel its influence, but, as he expressed himself, could not disentangle himself from his country's custom of having more wives than one. This was a source of disquietude to him. Feeling the Gospel at heart, he talked no longer of thrashing his people, but suggested frequent prayer-meetings. Accordingly, when he consulted me on the subject pressing so much on his mind, and especially about baptism, for which he applied about two years after he professed Christianity, I simply asked him if he thought he was doing right? What he thought he ought to do? I never preached against polygamy, but left the matter to take its course. Sechele went away, and sent home four of his wives, giving each a new dress, &c., saying he had no fault to find with them, but the sole reason for parting with them was conviction in the truth of the Gospel, and therefore the separation was a relief to his mind ; hence I was saved from many anxious thoughts on this matter. These women and their friends henceforth became the determined enemies both of myself and Sechele. Now, among the Africans, if a chief is fond of hunting, dancing, or drinking, his people are ever anxious to follow in the same pursuits; but with Christianity this was not the case. Sechele was both astonished and disappointed at finding the people stand aloof from his meetings, and his under-chiefs oppose both him and me, I and my cause were now unpopular. Unfortunately at this time there was a four years' drought ; and the people believed implicitly that their chief had the power of making rain, and since none had come for so long a time, they suspected me of having thrown a charm over him, and would not allow him to make the rain. He was the rain-maker of the tribe ; and this fact was easily connected with my instruments and movements, to them so unfathomable. If Sechele was thus the accredited rain-maker of the tribe, I was now the self-appointed necromancer, and he had become my unconscious victim.
Many of these people waited on me, begging me to allow them to make only a few showers, really thinking that I was purposely preventing the rain from descending. One old man used to come to me, and say, "The corn is yellow for want of rain; the cattle want grass; the children require milk; the people lack water, therefore only let our chief make the showers to come, and then he may sing and pray as long as he likes." Looking at my peculiar circumstances, this drought was remarkable. I watched the clouds as anxiously as they ; and many a cloudy morning, promising refreshing showers, turned into a cloudless day as parching as ever. They declared that the people would starve, or all leave the district, and I should have no one to preach to. It was quite heart-rending to hear them, seeing their distress ; and especially keeping in mind their mental, moral, and spiritual degradation.
I endeavoured to persuade them that no mortal could control the rain, and their argument was, "We know very well that God makes the rain; we pray to him by means of medicines. You use medicines to give to a sick man, and sometimes he dies: you don't give up your medicine, because one man dies; and when any one is cured by it, you take the credit. So, the only thing we can do is to offer our medicines, which, by continued application, may be successful." The only way to eradicate such absurdities from the minds of these poor people is to give them the Gospel. They entertain a horror of Christianity, because they imagine that every one who becomes a Christian does not want rain, regarding me as the leader of the anti-rain faction. Those who became converted, therefore, cannot be regarded as hypocrites; for hypocrites do not generally take the line that ensures an empty stomach. I have no doubt the Gospel is entering into their hearts ; for when I have been passing their houses, I have frequently heard them engaged in prayer, in a loud tone of voice. It is considered very disgraceful for men to cry in Africa; a stoical indifference to all sorrow or suffering is their educated practice. Yet have I seen stern men in public assemblies, crying out, like the jailor at Philippi, and weeping in the most piteous manner about the concerns of their souls. I doubt not, though I may not live to see it, but that God will bring my ministry in that region to a good result.
The difficulty of the chief Sechele, as I said before, was with regard to his five wives. The father of this man had been murdered, and four of the principal men had assisted in restoring the son to the chieftainship of the tribe : to shew his gratitude for which service, he had married a daughter of each of his benefactors; now, he could not very well put them away without appearing ungrateful. I found great difficulty in this matter: the wives were my aptest scholars, and I wished to save them as well as the Chief. In consequence of being sent away, these women and their friends became bitter enemies of Christianity. Furthermore, the African has a passion for an alliance with great men; on being introduced, he is sure to tell you that he is the remote cousin, relation or descendant, of some noted man; or some friend or hanger-on will tell you for him. Such alliances too have a political importance for the chief himself; since they attach powerful men to his interests and service. Hence my difficulties were increased by these facts. But the most difficult opponents I had to contend against were the Dutch Boers.
Two hundred years ago, a number of Dutch and French people, the descendants of pious families, fled from the persecutions in Holland and France, and settled at and around the Cape. But their descendants fled from the British dominion in Cape Colony, on account of the emancipation by the government of their Hottentot slaves. They said, they did not like a government that made no difference between a black man and a white one : they therefore made forays and slavery incursions, and established themselves where they could pursue their slave-holding propensities with impunity. No fugitive slave-law being in operation, hundreds of Africans fled from the Boers to Sechele, and the Dutch consequently desired to get rid of that chief. They attacked the Bakwains while I was staying among them; and had frequent battles with the people, killing many of them in these unequal conflicts. As an illustration as to how far exaggeration can be carried, on one occasion, I lent the chief a cooking-pot, which the Boers afterwards magnified into a cannon! and 5 guns into 500 ; writing to the English authorities, to inform them that I was protecting the Bakwains with cannon; and even some Boers were killed with guns. The reputation of this cannon kept the Boers away for seven years; but when their independence was declared by the Colonial government, they again made war upon the Bakwains, and being mounted and possessing guns, had the advantage, but it so happened that the Bakwains killed some of the Boers in one foray, and the latter gave me all the credit for it: asserting as a reason, "These people knew nothing of shooting till this Englishman came among them, and he has taught it them," The Boers, however, ultimately were victorious, and carried off 200 children of the Bakwains into slavery, killing 60 adults.
Sechele, knowing that such a proceeding was contrary to their engagements, and all law, set off to go to the Queen of England, to tell her of their conduct, I met him on his way to the Cape, and endeavoured to persuade him from going any further; on explaining the difficulties of the way, and endeavouring to dissuade him from the attempt, he put the pointed question: — " Will the Queen not listen to me, supposing I should reach her?” I replied, "I believe she would listen, but the difficulty is to get to her." He had many conversations with me on the subject, but he was determined, however, in his course, and proceeded to Cape Town.
Now, it so happened, that the Governor of Cape Colony had just sent home a flaming account of the peace and happiness that would prevail under his plan, and had he taken any notice of Sechele it would have been a virtual confession, that he had made a mull: consequently the chief and myself met with little encouragement. He had an interview with the Governor, to whom he delivered a letter from me, offering to point out the whole of the children, but all to no purpose: it is convenient sometimes for governors to be deaf, and shrug their shoulders, and to put political expediency before individual right. The British officers at the Cape, however — for English officers, wherever they are, are always fond of fair play — advised Sechele to go on, and subscribed £113 for him; but not knowing the value of money, he soon spent it all, giving a sovereign where sixpence would do, and so on ; so that he found himself, at length, a thousand miles from home, and as poor as when he started. Instead of feeling angry at the ill-success of his mission, he began to preach to the natives around, and many anti-slavery tribes enlisted under him : consequently he has now many more people than he had before, and finds it hard work to be both priest and king. He opened a prayer-meeting, and, in fact, became his own missionary among his own people. He built himself a house and a school, and was the means of converting his wife. The people clustered around him, and there is every reason to believe that he is a sincere Christian.
What we greatly need is more missionaries to sow the seed of spiritual truth. The fields are white to the harvest. Glorious is the prospect of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on all the ends of the earth. Labourers are wanted in the heathen vineyard of the Lord. As yet the missionary has only put in the thin end of the wedge towards the advancement of the kingdom of heaven in those dark places of the earth, which are still "full of the habitations of cruelty — Africa, especially. Where, as yet, are the mission stations of North or South central Africa? Yet there are numbers of tribes,
" In those romantic regions men grow wild.
There dwells the negro, Nature's outcast child."
As an encouragement to those who think of being missionaries, I need not say more than call to remembrance those Reformers who founded our Colleges here. The missionary’s work is one of the most honourable a man can desire. Think of those Reformers ; who would not like to be one of them ? The missionaries now are just in their position. Those who now go forth as missionaries, and endeavour to advance the knowledge of Christ and His Gospel, are pre-eminently their representatives. Like the morning star before the dawn, they entered into the thick darkness, and began the glorious work of making known the promises of Christ, for which posterity will bless their name. Indeed to be a missionary is a great privilege and honour. The work is so great and glorious, that it has this promise of Him who " is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever:” — " I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee," — encouraging both itself and its promoters.
Finding that I could not successfully carry on the work of a missionary among the Bakwains, I conceived the idea of becoming a traveller. The question came across my mind, Whither will you go, to the North or to the South ? I resolved to go to the North, to endeavour to open the country to the coast. Having got into the country beyond the Kalahari desert, bounded to the South by Lake Ngami, I came into quite a different country, where there are a great many rivers which flow from the sides into the centre. They form a very large river. The Zambezi is very much broader than the Thames at London Bridge. This large river flows out at the east end until it gets into the central basin by means of a fissure, which is 600 feet above the level of the sea. It was highly necessary for that fissure to be made. If it had not, a lake would have had to be formed for the purpose of getting away the very large amount of water which flows into the central basin. The rivers there are not like those in our country, since their sides are perpendicular. The region beyond the Kalahari desert is in the form of a basin, covered with a layer of calcareous tufa, intersected by the course of the Zambezi, which flows Southward until it reaches near Linyanti, and then branches off to the East. In the Kalahari desert there is not a single flowing stream, and the only water there is found in deep wells ; but at certain periods of the year water-melons are found in abundance, upon the fluid of which oxen and men have subsisted for days, obviating thereby the necessity for canning water. Animals are also plentiful ; and though they took care to keep out of bow-shot, I found that with my gun I could kill as many as were wanted. In my journey beyond the desert, I met with many antelopes of a kind before unknown to naturalists, besides elephants, buffaloes, zebras, &c.
The chief of the central basin I have described, is named Sekeletu. I proposed to teach him to read, but he said he was afraid it would change his heart, and make him content with only one wife, like Sechele. I told him if he were content, with one, what did it matter? But he said, " No, no ; I always want to have five. I intend to keep them," Seeing I was anxious that he should learn to read, he subjected his father-in-law to learn first, as some men like to see the effect of medicines on other people, before they imbibe them themselves ; and finding that it did him no harm, Sekeletu was taught long enough to gain the ability to read.
I entered this central basin, in order to find out a path to the sea : I might have gone to the West from Linyanti, but the country in that direction is infested with an insect called Tsetse, whose bite is fatal to most tame animals. To escape the insect plague, I resolved to go northwards and westwards to Loanda, the capital of Angola, a large city containing 12,000 inhabitants, a cathedral, and a Jesuit college. Having got down to the West coast, I found I had not accomplished my object of finding a path to the sea, the way being beset with difficulties and almost impassable. In fact, the only conveyance was ox-back, and dense forests had to be passed through by tortuous paths. I resolved, therefore, to go back, and try if the Zambezi did not furnish a good pathway to the eastern coast.
I did not find the people in that direction quite so well disposed towards me as the western tribes : the former were accustomed to the slave-trade, and asked payment for every thing : they prayed to the departed spirits of dead men, and believed that the deceased had power to influence the living. When I was at Cassange, the farthest inland station of the Portuguese, the governor, with whom I was stopping, had a sick child, and the nurse sent for a diviner to tell the cause of its illness. This man worked himself into frenzy, foamed at the mouth, and, pretending to be speaking under the influence of the fit, said the child was being killed by the soul of a trader, whose goods its father had stolen, and he said he should make an offering to appease the vengeance of the departed spirit. Now, it so happened that a native of Cassange had recently died, leaving an assignment, under which the governor had taken his goods ; and the natives, not understanding the circumstances, said he had robbed him. This was the diviner's cue. The governor quietly sent to a friend of his, and they each took a stick, and applied them with such force to the back of the diviner, that he fled in the most undignified manner. I have never read of clairvoyance or spirit-rapping being tested similarly, but probably the trial would be equally successful.
My journey to Loanda was productive of delight among the natives whom I had left, and on returning to Linyanti the chief sent several tusks to Loanda for sale ; the men also got goods, but by the time they got back to Linyanti, had been so afflicted with fever, that they were all expended. Only 27 accompanied me to Loanda, but when the people found I was going to find a path to the East, 114 volunteered to join me.
The people of that central part were anxious to have intercourse with white men, and their productions of cotton, indigo, &c. cannot fail to render commerce with them advantageous. Without the central basin, also, besides cotton, there are extensive coal-fields, with nine seams upon the surface, as well as an abundance of iron ore of the best quality. There is also produced a fibrous plant worth £50 or £60 a ton; and I have the authority of an English merchant to state, that a fabric finer and stronger than flax might be woven from it. The wild vine grows here in great luxuriance, and might be brought, by cultivation, to bear the most delicious grapes.
On each side of the southern portion of Africa is an elevated ridge, in the centre of which flows the Zambezi, forming an oblong inclosure. The climate on the sides of each elevation is different to that of the centre ; Mr Moffat having found a species of the Angola goat, which flourishes in the Northern part of Asia, on the high-land; wheat also grows there well. This climate is, therefore, not open to the usual objection that Europeans could not live there. Some of the elevations in this part are about 5000 feet above the level of the sea. The country hereabout is one of gradual elevation ; still there are different climates, ridges, and elevations, and the heat at times very great; the high-lands generally are cool and salubrious, and fit for European residence. The Zambezi was full when I passed it, but even at low water it was as deep as the Thames in London, and therefore, might be traversed by a tolerably sized steamer. At the junction of other rivers with the Zambezi there is a rapid, and the coal-field to which I have alluded is near it; but the river is otherwise free from obstruction, and I trust will be the means of conveying the productions of that country to this, and thus opening the way for commerce and civilisation to the benighted Africans upon its banks.
The people of the interior are very desirous to hold intercourse with white men. Having been cradled in wars' alarms, they ask, " When will you bring us sleep?" " We want sleep!" meaning peace. One reason of my being well received in the country was, because it had got noised abroad that I had come for that purpose. One report told to the Portuguese governor at Teté was, " That the Son of God was coming, with the moon under his arm," alluding to me and my sextant. Several deputations from towns and villages in the interior, in waiting on me, asked for “sleep.” Such was also the topic of the songs, and talk of the women.
All this evidences a certain preparedness for receiving the Gospel, and it is for Christian England to answer the inquiry with the pure Gospel of the Prince of Peace. Already Providence is clearing the way for that Gospel; the hand of God has been at work in a striking manner. When I first went to that country, I found Providence paving the way before me : a chieftain had invaded the central basin, before I went there; had conquered the country, discovered Lake Ngami; and the language of the Bechuanas, into which Mr Moffat had translated the Scriptures, had become diffused in the district.
The natives formerly used to cut off the heads of strangers, and stick them on poles; but the chief [Sebituane] who conquered them had made the country safe, otherwise my cranium might have adorned one of their villages. I am convinced that the Portuguese have never gone into this district, because their maps gave a different course to the Zambezi; and I am strengthened in that opinion from the quantity of ivory tusks I saw adorning the graves of chieftains, and put to other uses, thereby proving that there was no market for them. Another reason is, that they sent all the way to Mozambique for lime, when there were large marble quarries within a comparatively short distance. I therefore believe that I am the first European who has entered that region. But now they have the Bible in their own language, it is the fashionable language, and the missionary has no difficulty in communicating with them; thus shewing that the hand of Providence has been at work.
When I was at Loanda, I was laid up with the fevers of the country, and being very weak, Captain Bedingfield, with whom I was upon intimate terms, strongly persuaded me to go home, offering a free passage ; however, I having brought the twenty-seven men from Sekeletu, had no desire to leave them ; and committing certain papers and maps to the care of that officer, bade him farewell. Soon after, I received intelligence that the ship had gone down off Madeira, and my papers with it. Several lives were lost, but my friend was saved; but probably had I gone with the ship, I should have been drowned ; and had I, on the other hand, first travelled eastward, I should have gone in the midst of the skirmishes that were then going on between the Portuguese and the Kafirs, and might have been cut off among them. Even when I travelled in that direction, I was in some danger; but when I said I was an Englishman, I was allowed to pass. I was told that if I went to the East, the people who were for the support of the Portuguese government would perhaps kill me; I said that I loved a black man as well as a white man. I often found that I rose in the estimation of the people among whom I passed, when it was told I was an Englishman, one of that country which is engaged in putting down slavery : they called me " the right sort of white man."
In the middle of the country they passed me off in a way that I scarcely liked. The people imagine that all white people, and the manufactures they import, come out of the sea, and suppose that the whites live under the water ; also, that if they leave slaves, fruits, &c. on the sea-shore, that then the white men come up and take them away. My men were asked. Whether I came out of the sea ? “ Yes,” said they, " don't you see how-straight the water has made his hair?” Not relishing the idea of being passed off as a merman, I endeavoured to dissipate the idea, but the story was too good to be easily got rid of. The Africans, whose hair is all wool, could not understand my head, and some of them declared that I wore a wig made of a lion's mane.
My object in labouring as I have in Africa, is to open up the country to commerce and Christianity. This is my object in returning thither. I contend that we ought not to be ashamed of our religion, and had we not kept this so much out of sight in India, we should not be now in such straits in that country. Let us appear just what we are. For my own part, I intend to go out as a missionary, and hope boldly, but with civility, to state the truth of Christianity and my belief that those who do not possess it are in error. My object in Africa is not only the elevation of man, but that the country might be so opened, that man might see the need of his soul's salvation.
I propose in my next expedition to visit the Zambezi, and to propitiate the different chiefs along its banks, endeavouring to induce them to cultivate cotton, and to abolish the slave-trade: already they trade in ivory and gold-dust, and are anxious to extend their commercial operations. There is thus a probability of their interests being linked with ours, and thus the elevation of the African would be the result.
I believe England is alive to her duty of civilising and Christianising the heathen. We cannot all go out as missionaries, it is true ; but we may all do something towards providing a substitute: moreover, all may especially do that which every missionary highly prizes, viz. COMMEND THE WORK IN THEIR PRAYERS. I HOPE THAT THOSE WHOM I NOW ADDRESS, WILL BOTH PRAY FOR, AND HELP THOSE WHO ARE THEIR SUBSTITUTES.
