398 



TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.— SUPPLEMENT. 



civilization and independence, but none has toiled 

 under the crushing weight of a servitude so pro- 

 tracted and inflicted from so many sources. Mil- 

 lenniums mark the period of the bondage and 

 humiliation of Africa's children. The four quar- 

 ters of the globe have heard their groans and 

 been sprinkled and stained with their blood. All 

 that passed by have felt at liberty to contemn 

 and plunder. The oppressors of this race have 

 been men w T ith religion, and men without religion 

 — Christians, Mohammedans, and pagans. Na- 

 tions with the Bible, and nations with the Koran, 

 and nations without Bible or Koran — all have 

 joined in afflicting this continent. And now the 

 last of her oppressors, tearing from her bosom 

 annually half a million of her children, are nations 

 with the Koran. All travelers tell us that when 

 the Arab traders in East Africa are suppressed 

 the work will be done. This will no doubt be 

 accomplished before very long. The Viceroy of 

 Egypt is pledged to England to suppress the traf- 

 fic, and in a given time to abolish slavery alto- 

 gether. 



It was a long time before the Christian world 

 discovered, or rather admitted, the wrong in the 



slave-trade ; and we are persuaded that just as 

 the truth in Christianity produced, though tardily, 

 a Wilberforce and a Clarkson, so the truth in Is- 

 lam will raise up, is now raising up, Moslem phi- 

 lanthropists and reformers who will give to the 

 negro the hand of a brother, and perhaps, out- 

 stripping their Christian brethren in liberality, 

 accord him an equal share in political and social 

 privileges — a liberality in dealing with weaker 

 races which some Europeans confess themselves 

 unable to exercise. 



Dr. Livingstone seems to have thought that 

 there might be some possibility of a Moslem Wil- 

 berforce, if we may judge from his immortal 

 prayer, written, according to Mr. Waller, just one 

 year before his death, and recorded on the tablet 

 near his grave in Westminster Abbey, and which, 

 in conclusion, is here most fervently reiterated : 



"All I can add in my loneliness is, may Heav- 

 en's rich blessing come down on every one — 

 American, English, or Turk — who will help to 

 heal the open sore of the world." ' — Amen ! 



Liberia, West Africa, March 30, 1878. 



Fraser's Magazine. 



HELLAS AND CIVILIZATION. 



By Professor GRANT ALLEN. 



AMONG all the weighty problems which a sci- 

 entific philosophy of history must some day 

 set itself to solve, not one possesses a deeper in- 

 terest than that of the Hellenic culture in its ori- 

 gin and development. I do not mean merely the 

 simple antiquarian question, to what external 

 source — Egypt, Assyria, Phoenicia — Hellas was 

 mainly indebted for her first lessons in the arts 

 of life, though that in itself forms no uninviting 

 subject ; but I speak rather here of those more 

 intimate and native causes which made Hellas, 

 in and by her own inherent features, the first 

 cradle of free, individual, subjective civilization. 

 The problem thus proposed for our solution in- 

 closes in its terms the whole secret of all subse- 

 quent progress ; and the geographical peculiari- 

 ties of the physical Hellas become accordingly 

 a matter of lasting interest to the entire human 

 race. 



For the course which Hellenic influence im- 

 pressed upon history is something absolutely 

 unique in its nature. The culture of Hellas dif- 



fered from the preceding cultures of Egypt and 

 Assyria, or from the independent cultures of In- 

 dia, China, Peru, and Mexico, not in degree but 

 in kind. Conversely, the later cultures which 

 derive their origin from Hellas, those of Rome 

 and of modern Europe or America, differ from 

 hers not in kind but in degree. Before or with- 

 out Hellas civilization was objective, limited, un- 

 fruitful, and but little progressive. After and 

 under the influence of Hellas civilization became 

 subjective, free, fruitful, and rapidly progressive. 

 The causes at work beneath this great change in 

 the evolution of humanity surely call for careful 

 consideration. 



Yet I fear that already the reader will have 

 misinterpreted my words, and will have jumped 

 at the conclusion that this paper endeavors to 

 establish certain transcendental propositions ex- 

 actly opposite to those sober and matter-of-fact 

 principles which it really proposes to lay down. 

 Instead of regarding the rise of Hellenic culture 

 1 " Last Journals," vol. ii., p. 182. 



