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• 1 media/Thumb 184.png 2025-07-30T18:00:22-04:00 Speech by His Eminence Cardinal Lavigerie 13 Final part of Lavigerie's speech at the Anti-Slavery Congress. plain 2025-08-01T22:51:07-04:00 (Continued)
  
  What did I do in these immense regions?
  
  I did what the Church does, this Church that Our Lord, following his example, made the great sower: Exiit qui seminal, seminare. I sowed there what Christians sow, as our Tertullian said, when they want to ensure eternal harvests: I have shed blood there, the blood of my sons, of those White Fathers whom you see surrounding this pulpit at this moment. Six of them, apart from those who were sacrificed in other regions of Africa, suffered martyrdom there at the hands of barbarians and died blessing their executioners.
  
  How could I forget them today, in this parish of Saint-Sulpice, to which the first among them belonged, like you, by birth, my dear Brothers, and from where, six years before his martyrdom, he had left to come and train among us for the harsh life of the Missionaries.
  
  But the blood of the apostles was not the only blood shed.
  
  All forms of devotion have come together in France for a conquest that Providence has destined for us: science, charity, and even the army have left traces of their bloody heroism in the desert over the past quarter century. And that—God be praised!—it would have been necessary to avenge him, because the honour of France and that of the army were at stake, and it is not permissible for a people, especially a Christian people, to make light of their honour. But sadly, we have hesitated up to today. So, when the newspapers announced that, through an agreement with the European powers, the Sahara and central Sudan had just been recognized as now belonging to our sphere of influence, I saw this act as providential revenge for so many sacrifices.
  
  But what has been done is only the dawn:
  
  Now all that is needed is the work of the day and of the heat. That is why I am appealing once again to the French National Committee of the Anti-Slavery Society. Its members are well aware that, as always, these objections have already been raised. But for those who have studied these issues, the elements of their material and moral solutions, the objections have already been overcome.
  
  May we read what one of our most honourable, skilled, and experienced generals, an engineer worthy of the name, has just written. All that remains is a question of duty and honour. With a leader who is up to the task, a leader who knows how to keep himself and others on track, we will see all obstacles disappear. The most experienced soldiers from our African campaigns have no doubt that two hundred French troops, equipped with our advanced weapons and assisted by indigenous goums for the logistical support of convoys, will triumph over any hostilities that may be presented by populations that are undoubtedly fierce, but lacking weapons that would enable them to offer serious resistance, and whose lack of water always prevents them from gathering in large numbers.
  
  I speak according to those who know and to whom, as a sign of my absolute trust, I offered to follow them, despite my age, to assure the support of my my ministry to such an expedition.
  
  But after the work of force, which is necessary but to which I can offer only my prayers and good wishes, must come the work of civilization and peace. I can only encourage the French Anti-Slavery Committee to engage in this work.
  
  It will not be enough to force the Touaregs into submission, as will be easily done; that is the work of our soldiers; it is a matter of winning their hearts. And, in this regard, there are many useful things to do. It is the education of tribes reduced to the most abject poverty by centuries of oppression, unholy struggles, and all the disorder that these struggles bring in their wake; of wandering tribes who have lost all traditions of work and, amid incessant hostilities, are reduced to having only one means of survival: pillaging, murder, and the sale of human beings, which is more frequent and more atrocious here, on our doorstep, than anywhere else, even in Africa. What is needed is to bring life back to their oases by searching for lost water sources, by reviving crops suited to their soil, by educating their children, by providing charitable care for their sick, and by offering refuge to fugitive slaves.
  
  This is the portion that I have set aside, as you know, for the Antislavery Campaign in the African Sahara. I am not speaking, even to our missionaries, about preaching the faith. I believe that this is not the right place to start, in the midst of Muslim populations. We must begin by winning hearts and minds and avoiding stirring up fanaticism.
  
  Near the bordjs where our soldiers will have raised our flag, I will establish, God willing, stations of charity, work, and mercy. My workers have begun. The house where I am finishing their training is located on the very edge of the desert. This is where I call on all those who are willing to join us, not to conquer the Sahara themselves by force of arms, as some have thought, but to make these lost populations love the name and influence of France, and to prove to them that, if any sentiment inspires our country in such a conquest, it is above all that of doing good.
  
  This, my dear Brothers, is the Work that lies before us. It is for this that the collection will be taken up following this speech. It will be done by these missionaries, my sons, the White Fathers who have accompanied me to the steps of this pulpit, and who will make up for my inability to reach
  such a vast audience. Give them your donation as a sign that you approve of what we are doing in the Sahara. Parishioners of Saint-Sulpice, do not forget that it is the harvest of the blood shed by a child of this parish that will sprout, thanks to your alms, and if you cannot follow in the generous footsteps of your martyr, at least show that you are worthy of understanding his heroism.
  
  I will conclude, my dear Brothers.
  
  This is the last speech I want to give to France.
  
  I have long seen too many signs that old age has come upon me. I feel that infirmities and fatigue now prevent me from carrying the rest of my exhausted strength outward.
  
  I see clear evidence of this in your presence in this church at this solemn moment, Monseigneur.
  
  I have obtained assent from the Holy Father that he release you from the bonds that bound you to the Apostolic Vicariate of Lake Nyanza, so that I may employ the zeal, virtues, and talents you have received from God in the direction, under my authority, during my lifetime, and as my successor after my death, of the missionary works entrusted to me. The Great Leo XII, to whom I was happy to devote the last of my strength, deigned to grant my request. You are arriving today, Monseigneur. I am certainly not Elijah, but I place upon your shoulders, as upon those of another Elisha, the mantle that I can no longer bear alone. It will now be up to you to replace me in France and within your congregation, to plead the cause of our missionaries and our works, to reach out to them in our churches, as I have done for so long, with these hands that have been chained for the love of Our Lord, and to make them hear this voice that has confessed Jesus Christ. As for me, I will return to my Africa never to leave it again, and give it whatever God will grant me the strength to give, happy if, having been unable to do better work in sanctifying the sheep of the Father who have surrounded me for more than a quarter of a century, I am at least allowed to fall while pursuing the lost sheep!
  
  Monseigneur, the living memory, the great figure who inspired this entire speech, is that of the Great Pope whom Your Excellency represents among us. It is from him alone that I derive my mission and the one to whom I have entrusted to this young and generous apostle. It is he who must bless us through your venerable hands, and I humbly ask this for this faithful people who bow down before you.
  
  
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