King Leopold's Soliloquy

King Leopold's Soliloquy is a pamphlet by Mark Twain. It is written about the rule of King Leopold in the then Belgian colony of Congo.

In the text, King Leopold madly raves about many things, including the good things he says he has done for the people of the Congo Free State, including the millions spent on religion and art. He says that he had come to Congo with piety "oozing" at "every pore", how he had only wanted to convert the poor peoples to Christianity, how he wanted to stop the slave trade, and other such things.

Later in the story, Leopold says that he did not take any of the government money, that he did not use the revenue as his personal "swag", and that such claims by the "meddlesome American missionaries", "frank British consuls", and "blabbing Belgian-born traitors" are wholly false. He claims that for a King to be criticized as he has is blasphemy, for surely, he reasons, under the rule of God, any King who was not doing God's will would not be helped.

He claims that they only say what is unfavorable to him, such as the unfair taxes he levied against the people of the Congo, which caused starvation and murder of whole villages, but not the fact that he had sent missionaries to the villages, to convert them to Christianity. In the end, he claims that nothing can satisfy the Englishmen.

See also

• BoondocksNet.com eBook of King Leopold's Soliloquy