THE MOSLEM AND THE NEGRO.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1293, 23 November 1911, Page 5

THE MOSLEM AND THE NEGRO.

LECTURE BY DR. KARL KUMM. Dr. Karl Kumm, explorer and missionary, lectured again in the Town Hall last evening to a largo audience. His subject was "Tho Turk in Tripoli and the Future of tho Negro Race." Professor Pickeu, who presided, said it gavo him special pleasure to welcome Dr. Kumm as a representative of a body (tho Sudan United Mission) in which Christians of different churches had como together to Christianise the heathen. "I am not here to defend atrocities," raid Dr. Kumm, in tho course of his lecture, "but any kind of rule in .Tripoli will bo preferable to tho abominations that were being carried on thero a little while ago. Wo cannot describe in tho newspapers tho atrocities to which Bomo of those Italians must have been exposed at the hands of the Moslems. We havo been playing about with tho Moslems a good doal. W0 hoar of tho. sixty or eeventv millions of Moslems in tho British Empire, and I admit that they ought to havo justice, but it is wrong to pamper them. Tho Moslem religion is anti-Christian and anti-European, and wo may as well rccogniso its true character. It is against advancement. Give people Christianity and you give them tho foundation for the highest civilisation, but Moslemism elevates people up to a certain level and there they stop. It is ail uphill cul-do-sac." Tho lecturer went on to say that the civilising efforts of the British power in Central Africa had, to a certain extent, facilitated tho spread of Mohammedanism among the negroes. It must always be remembered that the negro was a child and it was a mistako to suppose that a negro once converted was 011 tho same level as the European Christian. If this had been recognised, many of tho difficulties connected with tho negro races in Africa and America would have been solved. The proper method was not to imnoso our civilisation upon them, but to give them Christianity and let t.hem evolve a civilisation of their own. That was what should havo been done in South Africa, and tho natives should not have been given the franchise. Side by side with tho white man, but on their own separate lands, they should have been Christianised, and left to develop in their own way. There wero 150 millions of negroes in Central m c ?- Tl lcy werfl a P^ o "' o of "'0 future. Wo should never take Africa from them, but thev might seek to take other countries, liko South America, at some future time. They were now in the balance. Would they go over to Mohammedanism, or would they conic to Chris.lanity? Now that they wero prevented from beating back the Moslems by warliko _ methods, Mohammedanism was advancing amongst them, and the only remedy was to pour Christian missionaries into their midst. The Moslems wero penning their missionaries and traders bv thousands. It was a great crisis, anil Christians should unite to copo with it. Ho pleaded for help in this work.