A cordial acquiescence in the extension of French territory westward, might reasonably obtain in return a diminution of the jealousy with which our neighbours view the increase of English influence on the east side of the African continent. A cynic may remark that the policy here suggested would resemble an agreement between freebooters for the division of spoil; but, in truth, we believe it to be a mistake to suppose that there would be any spoil to distribute. It is more than doubtful whether any future extension of the African possessions either of France or England would more than pay the necessary expenses of occupation and administration. The gain to both countries would be of a different order—the outlet provided for the healthful play of energies cramped within the limits of an old society, and the sense, invigorating to the whole nation, of accomplishing a useful part in the world’s development.
Objections to every attempt on the part of a modern civilised State to undertake the government of inferior races have been urged on various grounds by writers of the highest reputation.
The barriers established by differences in mental condition, in traditions, and inherited ideas, between peoples in a different stage of development, are easily shown to create formidable difficulties in the way of mutual understanding and appreciation, which must precede all useful efforts to carry the less advanced races along the path of progress. The history of British India where, at least during the present century, the experiment has been tried on the largest scale, and with the most genuine regard for the welfare of the governed populations, supplies many an example of the errors inevitable in so difficult an enterprise. Measures devised with the best intentions have sometimes failed altogether in achieving the expected effect, or, when this has been attained, have created discontent, because not corresponding with the ideas of the native population.
How much better it would be, say objectors of this class, to let these backward races work out for themselves the problems of material and mental development, in conformity with the conditions which nature and history have imposed, than to attempt, in the face of your own admitted ignorance, to play the part of Providence towards them.
If the discussion were to turn upon the destiny of a country wherein the elementary conditions of social order had been secured, wherein progress of some kind, at however slow a pace, was not an impossibility, it might be possible to admit the force of these arguments. But it is forgotten that in point of fact most barbarous countries have failed to reach this indispensable preliminary stage. However diverse the conditions and the ideas of the human race, the primal requisites for social order are everywhere the same. Security for person and property, the protection of the weak against the strong, tribunals before which justice can be obtained without fear or favour—where these do not exist, the Power, whatever it may be, that confers them on a people is a beneficent one, and for the sake of these any errors that it may commit in its government will be condoned by posterity.
These remarks apply with especial force to such a country as Marocco, where, under the yoke of invaders, the greater part of the population has been for centuries constantly declining in material and mental condition.
When all has been said, it must be felt that theoretical considerations are little likely to prevail against that which history declares to be the uniform condition of human progress. As a general rule the most vigorous nations are those in which the increase of population is most rapid, and extension into new territories is their inevitable destiny. Statesmen and rulers may to some extent guide and control, but they are powerless to prevent the operation of natural laws. The choice, in regard to the inferior races, seems to be whether they shall fall under the rule of the stronger, and be gradually modified by the influence of new ideas and institutions, or whether they shall disappear altogether and give place to the new comer. Where, as has too often happened, the latter process is effected by injustice and violence, the evil to the world arises not so much from the loss of a race unfitted to bear the strain of competition, as from the moral deterioration that ensues to the invaders.
Amongst the opponents of the extension of European rule over the adjacent continents must be reckoned those who base their objections mainly on economic grounds. If the question of the French occupation of Marocco should arise in a practical shape, it is little likely that French statesmen will be withheld by considerations which, even in England, have not obtained wide acceptance; and it would be out of place to discuss them here. It is, indeed, impossible to deny that there is a share of truth in the views of those who hold that colonies and foreign possessions do not, as a general rule, directly add to the prosperity of a country. If the aim of any nation were merely to attain a high level of material well-being, and it could either restrain its citizens from intercourse with less civilised people, or be content to forego the duty of protecting them, it might be possible to avoid entering on the path which inevitably leads to extension of territory. Fortunately for the human race, such ideas never have prevailed among those nations which have played any important part in history. If the instinct of adventure, that has brought the more advanced races into contact with the barbarian and the savage, has always been alloyed by association with the baser passions of some, it has also been ennobled by the higher aims of others. To lay, in new regions, the foundations of civil society; to establish, more or less imperfectly, the reign of order and justice, and to secure the protection of the weak against the strong—these have been the tasks hitherto achieved by the ruling races of the world; and as knowledge has increased, as the difficulties of social progress have become better understood, and a stricter code of justice in dealing with the inferior races is gradually becoming established, it is allowable to hope that the inevitable changes may be accomplished with less of human suffering and with better success.
Rome might have been a happier State if its citizens had confined their ambition to make it a commercial emporium for the neighbouring tribes of middle Italy, and, content with self-defence, had refrained from all distant enterprise; Carthage need not have tempted her fate, if she had been satisfied with her own corner of Africa; but then the world would have had no history, and the series of changes from which modern civilisation has been developed would have been for ages, it may be for ever, delayed.
Of the entire African continent it may be truly asserted that, with the exception of the small portions held by England and France, its condition, for at least thirty centuries, has been either stationary or positively retrograde. The main cause that has maintained unbroken the long night of barbarism throughout so vast a region must be sought in the physical obstacles that prevented the ruling races of the world from extending their power southwards from the shores of the Mediterranean. For a time it appeared that the Saracen conquerors of North Africa were destined to spread the light of a relatively high civilisation over a great part of the continent. But that race is effete; it is gradually losing ground; and it remains for the nations that claim to lead the van in the onward march of the human race to undertake the work that awaits them.