Henry Morton Stanley quotes

Henry Morton Stanley was a Welsh-American journalist and explorer, renowned for his expeditions in central Africa. Famous for finding the missionary David Livingstone, his travels mapped unknown regions and established European colonial presence. He became one of the most influential figures in the history of African exploration. Here are 19 of his quotes:

Dr. Livingstone, I presume?

Henry Morton Stanley

But my estimates, for instance, based upon book information, were simply ridiculous, fanciful images of African attractions were soon dissipated, anticipated pleasures vanished, and all crude ideas began to resolve themselves into shape.

Henry Morton Stanley

I had intended to have gone into Africa incognito. But the fact that a white man, even an American, was about to enter Africa was soon known all over Zanzibar.

Henry Morton Stanley

An insuperable obstacle to rapid transit in Africa is the want of carriers, and as speed was the main object of the Expedition under my command, my duty was to lessen this difficulty as much as possible.

Henry Morton Stanley

The Europeans and Americans residing in the town of Zanzibar are either Government officials, independent merchants, or agents for a few great mercantile houses in Europe and America.

Henry Morton Stanley

As seen in my loneliness, there was this difference between the Bible and the newspapers. The one reminded one that, apart from God, my life was but a bubble of air, and it bade me remember my Creator; the other fostered arrogance and loneliness.

Henry Morton Stanley

Though many illusions are of a character we should gladly cherish, yet the sooner we lose some of them, the sooner we gain the power of seeing clearly into things. The one who possesses least has the best chance of becoming wise. The man who travels, and reflects, loses illusions faster than he who stays at home.

Henry Morton Stanley

And this in turn makes it plain that the Right Man problem is a problem of highly dominant people. Dominance is a subject of enormous importance to biologists and zoologists because the percentage of dominant animals - or human beings - seems to be amazingly constant. Bernard Shaw once asked the explorer H. M. Stanley how many other men could take over leadership of the expedition if Stanley himself fell ill; Stanley replied promptly: "One in twenty." "Is that exact or approximate?" asked Shaw. "Exact." And biological studies have confirmed this as a fact. For some odd reason, precisely five per cent - one in twenty - of any animal group are dominant - have leadership qualities. During the Korean War, the Chinese made the interesting discovery that if they separated out the dominant five per cent of American prisoners of war, and kept them in separate compound, the remaining ninety-five per cent made no attempt to escape.

Henry Morton Stanley

Religion acts as a moral gardener, to weed out, or suppress, evil tendencies, which, like weeds: grow.

Henry Morton Stanley

Only by proving that we are superior to the savages, not only through our power to kill them but through our entire way of life, can we control them as they are now, in their present stage; it is necessary for their own well-being, even more than ours.

Henry Morton Stanley

I crossed Africa from East to West and from West to East, and I never saw any excesses committed. I do not think that from this point of view there is a single sovereign living who has done so much for humanity as Leopold II.

Henry Morton Stanley

The sky lovingly smiles on the earth and her children.

Henry Morton Stanley

Spoken on 10 November 1871 in Ujiji near Lake Tanganyika in present-day Tanzania.

Henry Morton Stanley

We have attacked and destroyed 28 large towns, and 3 or 4 score villages.

Henry Morton Stanley

To-day, with its forests pierced and open, its routes, its stations, it is in advance of all other African States. Take the French Congo, the German East Africa, Portuguese West Africa, and compare them. The Congo State prospers in a greater degree than any other part of the black continent.

Henry Morton Stanley

I had on the Congo under my orders three hundred men, English, Germans, Dutch, Portuguese, Belgians. I found no difference between them. All did their best according to their means. All were in the course of duty the object of some charge. I examined the charges minutely and always found them to be without foundation. That did not prevent these stories reaching Banana, and from there, Europe.

Henry Morton Stanley

Stanley shoots negroes as if they where monkeys.

Henry Morton Stanley