The Personal Life of David Livingstone: Chiefly from his Unpublished Journals and Correspondence in the Possession of His FamilyBlaikie, William Garden
Religion
The Personal Life of David Livingstone: Chiefly from his Unpublished Journals and Correspondence in the Possession of His Family
Blaikie, William Garden
Livingstone, David, 1813-1873
"In the country to which I went," he continued, "I endeavored
to follow the footsteps of my Lord and Master." Our Saviour
was a physician; but it is not to be expected that his
followers should perform miracles. The nearest approach which
they could expect to make was to become acquainted with
medical science, and endeavor to heal the diseases of man....
One patient expressed his opinion of my religion to the
following effect: "We like you very much; you are the only
white man we have got acquainted with. We like you because
you aid us whilst we are sick, but we don't like your
everlasting preaching and praying. We can't get accustomed to
that!"
To the United Presbyterians of Glasgow he spoke of mission work in
Africa. At one time he had been somewhat disappointed with the Bechuana
Christians, and thought the results of the mission had been exaggerated,
but when he went into the interior and saw heathenism in all its
unmitigated ferocity, he changed his opinion, and had a higher opinion
than ever of what the mission had done. Such gatherings as the present
were very encouraging; but in Africa mission work was hard work without
excitement; and they had just to resolve to do their duty without
expecting to receive gratitude from those whom they labored to serve.
When gratitude came, they were thankful to have it; but when it did not
come they must go on doing their duty, as unto the Lord.
His reply to the cotton-spinners is interesting as showing how fresh his
sympathy still was with the sons of toil, and what respect he had for
their position. He congratulated himself on the Spartan training he had
got at the Blantyre mill, which had really been the foundation of all
the work he had done. Poverty and hard work were often looked down
on,--he did not know why,--for wickedness was the only thing that ought
to be a reproach to any man. Those that looked down on cotton-spinners
with contempt were men who, had they been cotton-spinners at the
beginning, would have been cotton-spinners to the end. The life of toil
was what belonged to the great majority of the race, and to be poor was
no reproach. The Saviour occupied the humble position that they had been
born in, and he looked back on his own past life as having been spent in
the same position in which the Saviour lived.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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