The Souls of Black Folk - Dr. Earl Wright II

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The Souls of Black Folkfor he had but half a heart in either cause. By the poverty and ignoranceof his people, the Negro minister or doctor was tempted towardquackery and demagogy; and by the criticism of the otherworld, toward ideals that made him ashamed of his lowly tasks. Thewould-be black savant was confronted by the paradox that the knowledgehis people needed was a twice-told tale to his white neighbors,while the knowledge which would teach the white world was Greekto his own flesh and blood. The innate love of harmony and beautythat set the ruder souls of his people a-dancing and a-singing raisedbut confusion and doubt in the soul of the black artist; for thebeauty revealed to him was the soul-beauty of a race which his largeraudience despised, and he could not articulate the message of anotherpeople. This waste of double aims, this seeking to satisfy twounreconciled ideals, has wrought sad havoc with the courage andfaith and deeds of ten thousand thousand people,—has sent themoften wooing false gods and invoking false means of salvation, andat times has even seemed about to make them ashamed of themselves.Away back in the days of bondage they thought to see in onedivine event the end of all doubt and disappointment; few menever worshipped Freedom with half such unquestioning faith as didthe American Negro for two centuries. To him, so far as he thoughtand dreamed, slavery was indeed the sum of all villainies, the causeof all sorrow, the root of all prejudice; Emancipation was the key toa promised land of sweeter beauty than ever stretched before theeyes of wearied Israelites. In song and exhortation swelled one refrain—Liberty;in his tears and curses the God he implored hadFreedom in his right hand. At last it came,—suddenly, fearfully,like a dream. With one wild carnival of blood and passion came themessage in his own plaintive cadences:—10“Shout, O children! Shout, you’re free!For God has bought your liberty!”Years have passed away since then,—ten, twenty, forty; forty yearsof national life, forty years of renewal and development, and yet the
W. E. B. Du Boisswarthy spectre sits in its accustomed seat at the Nation’s feast. Invain do we cry to this our vastest social problem:—“Take any shape but that, and my firm nervesShall never tremble!”The Nation has not yet found peace from its sins; the freedmanhas not yet found in freedom his promised land. Whatever of goodmay have come in these years of change, the shadow of a deep disappointmentrests upon the Negro people,—a disappointment allthe more bitter because the unattained ideal was unbounded saveby the simple ignorance of a lowly people.The first decade was merely a prolongation of the vain search forfreedom, the boon that seemed ever barely to elude their grasp,—like a tantalizing will-o’-the-wisp, maddening and misleading theheadless host. The holocaust of war, the terrors of the Ku-Klux Klan,the lies of carpet-baggers, the disorganization of industry, and thecontradictory advice of friends and foes, left the bewildered serfwith no new watchword beyond the old cry for freedom. As thetime flew, however, he began to grasp a new idea. The ideal of libertydemanded for its attainment powerful means, and these theFifteenth Amendment gave him. The ballot, which before he hadlooked upon as a visible sign of freedom, he now regarded as thechief means of gaining and perfecting the liberty with which warhad partially endowed him. And why not? Had not votes made warand emancipated millions? Had not votes enfranchised the freedmen?Was anything impossible to a power that had done all this? Amillion black men started with renewed zeal to vote themselves intothe kingdom. So the decade flew away, the revolution of 1876 came,and left the half-free serf weary, wondering, but still inspired. Slowlybut steadily, in the following years, a new vision began gradually toreplace the dream of political power,—a powerful movement, therise of another ideal to guide the unguided, another pillar of fire bynight after a clouded day. It was the ideal of “book-learning”; thecuriosity, born of compulsory ignorance, to know and test the powerof the cabalistic letters of the white man, the longing to know. Hereat last seemed to have been discovered the mountain path to Canaan;11
Page 1 and 2: The Souls ofBlack FolkbyW. E. B. Du
Page 3 and 4: W. E. B. Du BoisContentsThe Foretho
Page 5 and 6: W. E. B. Du BoisThe Souls of BlackF
Page 7 and 8: W. E. B. Du BoisIOf Our Spiritual S
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Page 15 and 16: W. E. B. Du Boisand in the name of
Page 17 and 18: W. E. B. Du Boisway and that, could
Page 19 and 20: W. E. B. Du Boisfreedmen was often
Page 21 and 22: W. E. B. Du Boisof regulations, whi
Page 23 and 24: W. E. B. Du BoisOn May 12, 1865, Ho
Page 25 and 26: W. E. B. Du Boisthe bill argued tha
Page 27 and 28: W. E. B. Du Boiswith half-articulat
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The Souls of Black Folkalmost fear
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The Souls of Black FolkIn the Black
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The Souls of Black FolkCambridge, t
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The Souls of Black Folkish to ask w
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The Souls of Black Folkto walk with
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The Souls of Black Folkof the war u
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The Souls of Black FolkThat a syste
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The Souls of Black Folk“The exper
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The Souls of Black Folkcult to prov
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The Souls of Black Folkhuman intima
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The Souls of Black Folkbuild a soli
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The Souls of Black Folk82VIIOf the
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The Souls of Black Folkdiscomfort l
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The Souls of Black Folkcountry, and
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The Souls of Black FolkThere is a s
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The Souls of Black Folkmen once cal
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The Souls of Black Folkfamilies, we
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The Souls of Black FolkNo wonder th
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The Souls of Black Folkhouse now, b
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The Souls of Black Folkpreacher’s
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The Souls of Black Folkinto the sha
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The Souls of Black FolkThe size and
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The Souls of Black Folkhouse invest
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The Souls of Black Folka home, no o
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The Souls of Black Folkwhole the me
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The Souls of Black FolkNigger hardl
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The Souls of Black Folkthe adult po
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The Souls of Black Folkhalf of the
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The Souls of Black Folkholders. If
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The Souls of Black Folk118IXOf the
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The Souls of Black Folkhouse gather
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The Souls of Black Folkmen were not
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The Souls of Black Folkprocedure. W
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The Souls of Black Folkand educated
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The Souls of Black Folkthat the pol
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The Souls of Black Folkgovernment m
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The Souls of Black Folkthen has nat
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The Souls of Black Folkcaste-levell
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The Souls of Black Folk136XOf the F
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The Souls of Black Folkuntil, under
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The Souls of Black Folklaws; subdiv
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The Souls of Black Folkalways been
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The Souls of Black Folkof his numbe
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The Souls of Black Folkof the anti-
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The Souls of Black FolkBetween the
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The Souls of Black Folkit curiously
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The Souls of Black FolkI shirk not.
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The Souls of Black Folkthere so man
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The Souls of Black Folkbows before
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The Souls of Black Folklem of the w
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The Souls of Black Folklocked the d
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The Souls of Black FolkUniversity h
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The Souls of Black Folk164XIIIOf th
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The Souls of Black Folkwhen John co
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The Souls of Black FolkThus he grew
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The Souls of Black Folkhad no touch
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The Souls of Black Folkranged his t
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The Souls of Black Folkchurch, and
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The Souls of Black Folkdren irregul
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The Souls of Black Folkmerry eyes.
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The Souls of Black Folkdeur God him
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The Souls of Black Folkthe Hudson a
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The Souls of Black FolkMyo,” whic
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The Souls of Black Folk“Jetz Geh
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The Souls of Black Folktion flouris
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