It is worthy of emphasis, that the antiquity of the Negro race is beyond dispute.  This is a fact established by the most immutable historical data, and recorded on the monumental brass and marble of the Oriental nations of the most remote period of time.  The importance and worth of the Negro have given him a place in all the histories of Egypt, Greece, and Rome.  His position, it is true, in all history up to the present day, has been accidental, incidental, and collateral; but it is sufficient to show how he has been regarded in the past by other nations.  His brightest days were when history was an infant; and, since he early turned from God, he has found the cold face of hate and the hurtful hand of the Caucasian against him.  The Negro type is the result of degradation.  It is nothing more than the lowest strata of the African race.  Pouring over the venerable mountain terraces, an abundant stream from an abundant and unknown source, into the malarial districts, the genuine African has gradually degenerated into the typical Negro.  His blood infected with the poison of his low habitation, his body shrivelled by disease, his intellect veiled in pagan superstitions, the noblest yearnings of his soul strangled at birth by the savage passions of a nature abandoned to sensuality,—­the poor Negro of Africa deserves more our pity than our contempt.

It is true that the weaker tribes, or many of the Negroid type, were the chief source of supply for the slave-market in this country for many years; but slavery in the United States—­a severe ordeal through which to pass to citizenship and civilization—­had the effect of calling into life many a slumbering and dying attribute in the Negro nature.  The cruel institution drove him from an extreme idolatry to an extreme religious exercise of his faith in worship.  And now that he is an American citizen,—­the condition and circumstances which rendered his piety appropriate abolished,—­he is likely to move over to an extreme rationalism.

The Negro empires to which we have called attention are an argument against the theory that he is without government, and his career as a soldier[118] would not disgrace the uniform of an American soldier.  Brave, swift in execution, terrible in the onslaught, tireless in energy, obedient to superiors, and clannish to a fault,—­the abilities of these black soldiers are worthy of a good cause.

On the edge of the Dark Continent, Sierra Leone and Liberia have sprung up as light-houses on a dark and stormy ocean of lost humanity.  Hundreds of thousands of degraded Negroes have been snatched from the vile swamps, and Christianity has been received and appreciated by them.  These two Negro settlements have solved two problems; viz., the Negro’s ability to administer a government, and the capacity of the native for the reception of education and Christian civilization.  San Domingo and Jamaica have their lessons too, but it is not our purpose to write the history of the Colored people of the world.  The task may be undertaken some time in the future, however.