Sports Complex, University of Lagos on the 17th of March, 2009.
“I love my country better than my family; but I love humanity better than my country.”—Sir Francis Bacon.
Nations and organizations of the world, representatives of sects and groups, companies and embassies, cultural troupes and also schools, critics and journalists, humane and supportive colleagues and students from all centres of academic learning in Lagos, fellow lawyers in comprehensive training, students of this and other Universities, all categories of human mortals here present, ladies and gentlemen.
As if helplessly incarcerated in the web of irresistible spiritual manipulations and conjectures, I provided the inspirations behind an annual but profoundly universal celebration for this planet in 2007. The pain of pioneering its first edition on the 17th of March that year the thousands of my students, I and scores of brave others did commitedly bear. This was at Hybrid Academy, Surulere, and Lagos, Nigeria.
The same feat was repeated on the 17th of the March that followed. Then, teeming thousands gathered at Ijeshatedo Community Hall to recite the noble song we had composed for the joy of billions on earth in 2007. I am therefore excited that this same song, which is found relevant in 2009, shall forever remain fitting and befitting to the aching affairs and mood of man’s collective humanity.
As you say Happy Humanity Day to everyone you know and see today, I recommend for history’s ultimate commendation, your differently deep inputs and sacrifices that replay this poetic melody and better sounding song to the global hearing of your beloved planet. Thank you all for believing in, and whole-heartedly supporting the finest cause of humanity through Humanity Day!
That is a noble way to think: Every human life is an essential drop in the severally named but one ocean of God. The sociologists of heaven would accept no classification of man than as man; and that the logic of this reasoning might be noted and respected by all earthlings, God makes children out of parents. Man is not Yoruba, man is man. Man is not Ashanti, man is man. Man is not Hausa, man is man. Man is not Zulu, man is man. Man is not Ibo, man is man. Man is not Black, or White, man is man. Man is not woman or man, man is man. Man is not literate or illiterate, man is man. Man is not Asian or American, European or African, man is man. Man is neither Rosicrucian nor Buddhist, not Christian, not Muslim, man is supremely man; and the most vicious venom invented by violent vandals in the development and joy of man is discriminatory bias—bias agelessly borne of ignorance and which selfishness and hate-filled love horrendously prefer.
Theodore Parker say: “The world is my country, all of mankind are my brethren, and to do good is my religion.” Humanity Day represents the birthday of man that men and women who celebrate key individuals and other festivals shall annually make a much-meaning and far-reaching ceremony in affirmation of their worthiness if they are wise.
Man was first the problem of the world before the world turned into problem for man. Every soul is a fragment of beautiful empire in blissful Humania, a place where man’s difficult but attainable perfection gloriously affects the golden hope of the collective man, and that of the whole Universe.
Those who attempt to survive with the facility of evil are as evil as the ruiners of good. For, to consume the immoral dish of evil in prevention of stomach desperation is to manage to escape from a danger which accosts the lives of those whom nature assigns to congratulate one’s victory from the claws of terror.
The liberty of man and his mind is, starting from this day and generation, not only the dream of worthy peoples ideal spiritual consciousness had historical awaken in different parts of the world; it is also the dream of every creature in the biological mask of man. The enlightening wonders of the Greeks’ superior logics of existence, the organized African powers and ways of doing things, the tenacious initiatives of Great Britain’s years of survival in history, the courageous frontiers of the French and the American revolutions, etc., all have become, for man’s general humanity, the inspirations to be expanded and sincerely acted for the greater good of man. Therefore with our non-discriminatory world-view, let us see that the region is ruinous, which excludes our plant’s good in its development plans, and with similar spirit, let us affectionately frown at any monarch or priest, professor or poet, whose power and thoughts decimate our golden hope as a whole.
Let all politicians know that man’s next political level is the sovereignty of sovereignties inscribed The Earth Republic; and that as they lie on oath and steal nations’ resources and gold, they labour to be slaves in an empire of boundless freedom.
Ideal strength is measured in the context of its noble use. And none in the world is the strongest, no matter how strong in the raw content of any strength.
Call it an empty dream if you choose, but the real future of man that serves as the rail on which eternity shall be wheeled to us is one language in the midst of millions, one identity in the couch of varieties, one currency in the bank of several, one policy from the volumes by congress; and as the wheel of time rolls on the surface of our space, all living and non-living tings shall speak with one accord that “Humanity is the noblest essence of man.”
Empty shall be our zeal,
Squandered shall our passion be,
If humanity is not its reach!
Celebrations make sense only when they constitute some change-importing progress for man. So in Every Seventeenth of March, the book we must write for the good of man, and which must be dedicated to Humanity Day and to you, the world shall read in wholesale, the retail-by-retail details and ways of solving the group problems of man.
But whether or not I am around to run around, to diffuse the inspiration and plan with you in coming years, see it as a failure deserving the worst of shame, to have any 17th of March gone without the spirit of man as man, plus all the meaningful liturgies that fill earth’s joint divinity in harmony with God.
This is a holy agreement, whether formal or not, that our best shall be given to assist the cause of God as creature-captains in the ship of His work. Humanity Day is the link to our general hope as a race. Do not betray, or seem betraying its beauty I plead. This invaluably valuable beauty refuses to be yours unless you serve its all in the service you render to the world.
Every beautiful person, object or idea is manifested and made for purposes that transcend instant consumption. To sit beside in the hope of consuming beauty is to desecrate and be unworthy of the temple of beauty. For, to preserve and be worthy of beauty is to limit the extent of one’s consumption of, and do without preying on beauty made as reverence light for the joy of planet earth. Beauty is beauty only when strongly felt and passionately adored in one’s feelings; feelings that furnish every mortal’s mental outlook with shame-devoid honour, by the standard of posterity’s dispassionate judgment.
The world deserves more knowledge and love than are currently wrought by us. So with its good as our unbounded drive, let us all labour and wait, live and die, that in the future of this race, it shall not matter which truthful path individuals and nations take to get to the treasure that jointly aids.
Beware that evil is real and take kind precautions against being its game. Respect the beliefs and thoughts of others if you think you ought to keep your own. Follow only those motivations and dream that place no barriers on the path of others. Consent to no bid at diminishing your dignity without a heart to hurt. Be hopeful and be whole. To be immortal even as mortals, these are the guides.
As the conclusion of the gratitude note I wrote in appreciation of those who contributed to, and attended the official birth of my Earthbuilders in 2006 reads, “We hope that humanity will endure longer than our knowledge of her endurance has inspired us to think, since the power regulating her affairs is more sustaining than the evils good mortals fear will end her. But in the hope and knowledge of that endurance, we must create a noble volume of benevolent actions for us living as tasks, and for posterity as generations’ assignment.”
Stay strong and live well. May we all witness several of it before we die. Happy Humanity Day to you, and to your loved and hated ones. Happy Humanity Day to the family of man.
Thank you all for listening,
God bless humanity.
NB: Mankind Olawale Oyewumi is a teacher of Language and Literature.He is the father of SAMAFORMISM and the founder of Humanity Day.A writer of substance from Africa,he has two great books to his intellectual credit,SONGS OF THE LAW and IMMORTAL INSTRUCTIONS.He planned and edited A GIFT TO NIGERIA AT FIFTY.He is working on HOPE OF THE BRAVE (a novel) at the moment.
