CECIL RHODES. "He Being Dead yet Speaketh."

Free Lance, Volume II, Issue 93, 12 April 1902, Page 8

CECIL RHODES. " He Being Dead yet Speaketh."

THE will of Cecil Rhodes is to be regarded as one of the most surprising documents of modern times. The admirers of the deceased statesman believed that in his vast schemes for the expansion of the Empire there was a suspicion of selfishness. It was but natural in a man of transcendent financial genius that he should use the powers he possessed for his own aggrandisement. That he did so no one doubted until recently. Had Cecil Rhodes left the whole of his fortune to his relatives there is no one who would have cavilled knowing the incalculable benefits the Empire had derived from his initiative. * ♦ ♦ His will, however, rescues his memory from the stigma of selfishness. The real Cecil Rhodes is known now that he lies at rest on the " View of the World " — the lovely Matoppos — as he was never known in life. He regarded himself solely and simply as the steward with his master's talents held in trust. His master was the Empire, and he has rendered to it the interest of those talents many thou-sand-fold. The accusation that the great man had fanned the flame of war in South ' Africa from* sordid motives dies with him. His magnificent scheme, set forth in his last testament, for the drawing together of men from the uttermost parts of the Empire at the same shrine of learning, is one of the finest examples of his forethought. He recognised that the bitterness that existed against the British Empire was the bitterness of ignorance, and he would enlarge knowledge as tending to assuage that bitterness. ♦ ♦ * From Germany, from America, from each of the component parts of the great Empire for which his ideals were created, and for which he has tirelessly worked, by the magnificence of those splendid scholarships he makes it possible to assemble the brightest intellects at Oxford, the seat of learning from which he himself and many thousands of the Empire's most gifted sons have graduated. With true prophetic eye he saw the necessity for the highest skill and training in the everyday management of the Empire's affairs. • • • By the accident of position, lack of wealth, and other causes genius may be lying dormant. Cecil Rhodes's scheme endeavours to awaken it, and give it a chance with the wealthier. Shakespeare said " the evil that men do live? after them ; the good is oft interred with their bones." Cecil Rhodes has proved an exception to the general application. The good this Empire-builder did, and still does, will live for ever, and wfll be a factor, however small, making for the peace of the world. * • • Dutch and English, Afrikanders, Americans, representing every nationality, Germans, and subjects of the King from every colony in gaining those scholarships and enlarging their views by contact, will help towards a more universal brotherhood and a wider tolerance of national weaknesses and a better estimate of national strength. The will of Cecil Rhodes has no precedent. The work which it will enable to be carried on in establishing ties of amity between three great peoples has no precedent. May his last action be an example that shall be followed by others. Of him it may be said as Mark Antony said of Caesar :—: — Moreover, he hath left you all his walks, His private arbours and new-planted orchards, On this side Tiber ; he hath left them you, And to your heirs for ever, common pleasures, To walk abroad, and recreate yourselves.