The Martyrdom of Man by Winwood Reade (mini ebook reader .TXT) 📕
- Author: Winwood Reade
- Performer: -
Book online «The Martyrdom of Man by Winwood Reade (mini ebook reader .TXT) 📕». Author Winwood Reade
The Martyrdom of Man
By
Winwood Reade
Transcribed by Jan Lloyd (villa_la_miranda@mercuryin.es) and Donal O’Danachair
(kodak_seaside@hotmail.com)
Contents:
Note
Author’s Preface
* Chapter 1 — War
Egypt
Western Asia
The Persians
The Greeks
The Macedonians
Alexandria
The Phoenicians
Carthage and Rome
Roman Africa
The Arabs
* Chapter 2 — Religion
The Natural History of Religion
The Israelites
The Jews
The Prophets
The Character of Jesus
The Christians
Arabia
Mecca
The Character of Mohammed
Description of Africa
The Mohammedans in Central Africa
* Chapter 3 — Liberty
Ancient Europe
The German Invasion
The Castle
The Town
The Church
Venice
Arab Spain
The Portuguese Discoveries
The Slave-Trade
Abolition in Europe
Abolition in America
Materials of Human History
* Chapter 4 — Intellect
Animal Period of the Earth
Origin and early History of Man
Summary of Universal History
The Future of the Human Race
The Religion of Reason and Love
NOTE
Reade’s full name was William Winwood Reade: on the Martrydom, and
on his last book, The Outcast, it stands as Winwood Reade, his literary
choice. A nephew of Charles Reade, he was born at Murrayfield, near
Crieff, on 26 December, 1838, and died at Wimbledon, on 24th April,
1875. (These are the dates of Mr. Legge, who seems, however, not to
have finally correlated them.) He published in 1859 Charlotte and Myra;
in 1860 Liberty Hall Oxon (his college was Magdalen, then known as
Hertford); in 1860 The Veil of Isis, an attack on Catholicism. His first
visit to Africa was in 1862. In 1865 he published See-Saw; in 1868 he
again went to Africa, and in 1873 appeared his African Sketch Book,
which is in part an abridgment of his Savage Africa (1863). The
Martyrdom of Man was published in 1872. In 1873 he made his third trip
to Africa, as Times correspondent in the Ashanti War, which he saw
through, being the only civilian present at the taking of Coomassie; and in
1874 appeared his Story of the Ashanti Campaign, embodying, with
criticism, his Times letters. In his last illness he wrote The Outcast
(1875) setting forth in fiction form the fate of persecution attaching to the
aggressive profession of “unbelief.” Orthodox writers have stressed the
fact that, while he again professes his disbelief in immortality, he does
not profess to ”know.” The Outcast reached a third edition in the year of
its issue, but does not appear to have been since reprinted until its
publication by Watts & Co., in the Thinker’s Library series in 1933.
AUTHOR’S PREFACE
In 1862-3 I made a tour in Western Africa, and afterwards desired to
revisit that strange country with the view of opening up new ground and
of studying religion and morality among the natives. I was, however,
unable to bear a second time the great expenses of African travel, and had
almost given up the hope of becoming an explorer when I was introduced
by Mr. Bates, the well known Amazon traveller and Secretary of the
Royal Geographical Society, to one of its Associates, Mr. Andrew
Swanzy, who had long desired to do something in the cause of African
discovery. He placed unlimited means at my disposal, and left me free to
choose my own route. I travelled in Africa for two years (1868-70) and
made a journey which is mentioned in the test. The narrative of my
travels will be published in due course; I allude to them now in order to
show that I have had some personal experience of savages. I wish also to
take the first opportunity of thanking Mr. Swanzy for his assistance,
which was given not only in the most generous but also in the most
graceful manner.
With respect to the present work, I began it intending to prove that
“Negroland” or Inner Africa is not cut off from the main-stream of
events, as writers of philosophical history have always maintained, but
connected by means of Islam with the lands of the East; and also that it
has, by means of the slave-trade, powerfully influenced the moral history
of Europe and the political history of the United States. But I was
gradually led from writing the history of Africa into writing the history of
the world. I could not describe the Negroland of ancient times without
describing Egypt and Carthage. From Egypt I was drawn to Asia and to
Greece; from Carthage I was drawn to Rome. That is the first chapter.
Next, having to relate the progress of the Mohammedans in Central
Africa, it was necessary for me to explain the nature and origin of Islam,
but that religion cannot be understood without a previous study of
Christianity and of Judaism, and those religions cannot be understood
without a study of religion among savages. That is the second chapter.
Thirdly, I sketched the history of the slave-trade, which took me back to
the discoveries of the Portuguese, the glories of Venetian commerce, the
revival of the arts, the Dark Ages, and the invasion of the Germans. Thus
finding that my outline of universal history was almost complete, I
determined in the last chapter to give a brief summary of the whole,
filling up the parts omitted, and adding to it the materials of another work
suggested several years ago by The Origin of Species.
One of my reasons for revisiting Africa was to collect materials for this
work, which I had intended to call The Origin of Mind. However, Mr.
Darwin’s Descent of Man has left little for me to say respecting the birth
and infancy of the faculties and affections. I therefore merely follow in
his footsteps, not from blind veneration for a great master, but because I
find that his conclusions are confirmed by the phenomena of savage life.
On certain minor points I venture to dissent from Mr. Darwin’s views, as
I shall show in my personal narrative, and there is probably much in this
work of which Mr. Darwin will disapprove. He must therefore not be
made responsible for all the opinions of his disciple.
I had intended to give my authorities in full with notes and elucidations,
but am prevented from doing so by want of space, this volume being
already larger than it should be. I wish therefore to impress upon the
reader that there is scarcely anything in this work which I can claim as
my own. I have taken not only facts and ideas, but phrases and even
paragraphs, from other writers. I cannot pay all my debts in full, but I
must at least do myself the pleasure of mentioning those authors who
have been my chief guides. On Egypt they are Wilkinson, Herodotus
(Rawlinson’s edition), Bunsen; Ethiopia or Abyssinia, Bruce, Baker,
Lepsius; Carthage, Heeren (African Nations), Niebuhr, Mommsen;
East Africa, Vincent (Periplus), Guillain, Hakluyt Society’s
Publications; Moslem Africa (Central), Park, Caillie, Denham and
Clapperton, Lander, Barth, Ibn Batuta, Leo Africanus; Guinea and
South Africa, Azurara, Barros, Major, Hakluyt, Purchas, Livingstone;
Assyria, Sir H. Rawlinson, Layard; India, Max Muller, Weber; Persia,
Heeren (Asiatic Nations); Central Asia, Burnes, Wolff, Vambery;
Arabia, Niebuhr, Caussin de Perceval, Sprenger, Deutsch, Muir,
Burckhardt, Burton, Palgrave; Palestine, Dean Stanley, Renan,
Dollinger, Spinoza, Robinson, Neander; Greece, Grote, O. Muller,
Curtius, Heeren, Lewes, Taine, About, Becker (Charicles); Rome,
Gibbon, Macaulay, Becker (Gallus); Dark Ages, Hallam, Guizot,
Robertson, Prescott, Irving; Philosophy of History, Herder, Buckle
Comte, Lecky, Mill, Draper; Science, Darwin, Lyell, Herbert,
Spencer, Huxley, Tyndall, Chambers (Vestiges of Creation), Wallace,
Tylor, and Lubbock. All of the works of the above named authors
deserve to be carefully read by the students of universal history, and in
them he will find references to the original authorities, and to all writers
of importance on the various subjects treated of in this work.
As for my religious sentiments, they are expressed in opposition to the
advice and wishes of several literary friends, and of the publisher, who
have urged me to alter certain passages which they do not like, and which
they believe will provoke against me the anger of the public. Now, as a
literary workman I am thankful to be guided by the knowledge of experts,
and I bow to the decisions of the great public, for whom alone I write,
whom alone I care to please, and in whose broad unbiased judgment I
place implicit trust. But in the matter of religion I listen to no
remonstrance; I acknowledge no decision save that of the divine monitor
within me. My conscience is my adviser, my audience, and my judge. It
bade me write as I have written, without evasion, without disguise; it bids
me to go on as I have begun, whatever the result may be. If therefore my
religious opinions should be condemned, without a single exception, by
every reader of the book, it will not make me regret having expressed
them, and it will not prevent me from expressing then again. It is my
earnest and sincere conviction that those opinions are not only true, but
also that they tend to elevate and purify the mind. One thing at all events
I know—that it has done me good to write this book, and therefore I do
not think that it can injure those by whom it will be read.
WAR
The land of Egypt is six hundred miles long, and is bounded by two
ranges of naked limestone hills which sometimes approach and
sometimes retire from each other, leaving between them an average
breadth of seven miles. On the north they widen and disappear, giving
place to a marshy meadow plain which extends to the Mediterranean
coast. On the south they are no longer of limestone, but of granite; they
narrow to a point; they close in till they almost touch; and through the
mountain gate thus formed the river Nile leaps with a roar into the valley,
and runs north towards the sea.
In the winter and spring it rolls a languid stream through a dry and dusty
plain. But in the summer an extraordinary thing happens. The river
grows troubled and swift; it turns red as blood, and then green; it rises, it
swells, till at length, overflowing its banks, it covers the adjoining lands
to the base of the hills on either side. The whole valley becomes a lake
from which the villages rise like islands, for they are built on artificial
mounds.
This catastrophe was welcomed by the Egyptians with religious gratitude
and noisy mirth. When their fields had entirely disappeared they thanked
the gods and kept their harvest-home. The tax gatherers measured the
water as if it were grain, and announced what the crops and the budget of
the next year would be. Gay barges with painted sails conveyed the
merry husbandmen from village to village and from fair to fair. It was
then that they had their boat tournaments, their wrestling matches, their
bouts at single-stick and other athletic sports. It was then that the
thimble-riggers and jack-puddings, blind harpers
Comments (0)