Twentieth Century Negro Literature Part 36

What could be the moral condition of a race to whom family rights were forbidden and whose business, next to labor, was to propagate solely for the master's gain? The words mother, father, were used only in the language of the "big house."

Womanhood, the foundation stone of moral eminence, pa.s.sed through a crucial ordeal, and it is to be greatly wondered at that the Negro woman emerged with even the crudest type of moral capacity.

Every line on every page of the history of those dark days teem and reek with the abandon of licentiousness, nor could this be otherwise.

It was the natural sequence of a debasing system. It is no disparagement upon the n.o.ble few whose garments were kept unspotted, nor upon those who would have reached towards higher ideals, if they had been masters of themselves, to say that the ante-bellum Negro did not possess a great degree of morality. There can be no other conclusion drawn from such demoralizing conditions.

The moral status of the Negro is to-day an all-absorbing theme, and is discussed pro and con by friend and enemy in other races, and by the optimist and pessimist of his own. Comparisons concerning his morals and moral growth are made as all other comparisons are made concerning him, not between his present and former condition, nor between his condition and that of any other people at the same stage of development, under the same conditions and environments. On the contrary, inconsistency is ever present in the attempts to show the world existing facts. Whenever an attack was made upon the system of slavery, the defenders of the system immediately pointed to the poor slaveholder and the dearth of Negro criminals as points in favor of a time when the Negro enjoyed the blessings of a "mild and humane system."

When the progress of the black race in America is placed in the balance, the lowest and most degraded and careless of the ma.s.ses who have not come out of a state of inertia are brought into comparison with the n.o.blest types that have ascended the scale of life. What wonder then that there is so much adverse criticism; what is needed is a search for facts and an unprejudiced putting of all that appertains to the Negro, and a just acknowledgment of the results attained.

That the American Negro has made an advance along all lines that make for the higher development of a people cannot be denied. He has improved morally in a corresponding way. The limit of this paper will not permit a statistical comparison, but a few points may be noticed in pa.s.sing. His moral instinct is quickened and his moral nature a.s.serts itself in higher forms of life under the new conditions. He has started at the fountainhead and the purity of his home and hearthstone is a magnificent memorial to the purity of the black woman.

Were it possible to give in numbers the correct estimate of these beautiful homes and their characters, even the most bitter of his enemies and the pessimists of his own race would look with doubt upon the pernicious libels disseminated in the periodical literature of the day. The dark picture of the Negro's shortcomings is thrown on the canvas and so familiar has it become that not a few seldom think that there is another picture which the Negro himself knows to be truer to life and more prophetic of his real nature, taken from real life, and one that ought to give inspiration and hope to all seekers after facts.

The Negro ministry has made rapid and marked progress in moral achievements for itself and also for the race in their wide influence upon the same. There is a constant and ever-increasing demand coming from the people for a higher and n.o.bler service in the pulpit, and the demand is being met in a comparative measure. Moreover there are professional men whose lives prove the possessors' estimate of virtue and are being spent in bringing others up to these lofty ideals.

The n.o.ble army of teachers, most of whom are women, are not to be overlooked or underestimated. Next to the faithful mother, these n.o.ble women have lived and worked for the race. They have proved themselves ever against untoward conditions. Their work and worth should not be reflected against because of the few whose lives are not up to the standards of true womanhood. It is undeniably true that the virtues of Solomon's virtuous women may be duplicated in mult.i.tudes of our women teachers.

A word concerning the criminal record of the Negro might be worth considering. It is here that the moral weakness of the race is said to be most manifest. We are told that figures do not lie, and an appeal from the records is not to be considered for a moment. Yet, he who wants facts and is in search of the truth must appeal and must make personal investigation.

As yet statistics, the press and history, have not given a truthful, unbiased record of the Negro of to-day as he really is. One side has been faithfully followed, and elaborately and painfully portrayed, but of the other side only here and there an item, a reference and a charitable surmise rewards the seeker after knowledge. A careful study of the environments of the so-called criminal cla.s.s, also the courts of justice before which the criminals are arraigned, would develop some interesting, not to say startling, facts; for example, "it has been shown by Prof. Branson, of the Georgia State Normal School, that while the illiterate Negro population of the state furnish three convicts per thousand, the Negroes who have profited by the public schools furnish only one convict per thousand." Many of the criminals start from the court-room and are the victims of injustice.

Such untoward conditions serve rather to stamp out every vestige of n.o.bility rather than inspire to a reaching out after higher ideals.

The young or post-bellum Negro is steadily improving morally. In the face of strong opposition, in his moral development, just as he does in mental, financial and civil growth, against all the opposing forces that would hinder his growth and relegate him to the lowest stratum of mankind, he is forcing his way up the stream. His spiritual and moral nature is beating under the animal nature which for so long a time held him as a slave. He now does right for right's sake, and loves the pure and good. He honors the women of his race and is raising her to n.o.bler plains in his thoughts and life.

The Negro woman is a.s.serting herself also and is building for herself a character that rests upon a foundation of personal purity. This she is doing not only for herself, but for others. The building up of pure homes is her chief concern and in them she reigns with womanly queenliness.

Social reform receives her attention, and in these walks she may be found teaching the young the single standard of purity for both s.e.xes.

Her way is the roughest, her path most closely beset with snares, but her works show for themselves.

If there had been no advancement along moral lines, the Negro's material and intellectual attainments would count for very little in the world of affairs, for he would degenerate to a mere mechanical factor in human society and become a tool in every case in the hands of a stronger race. But he has added to his material and intellectual strength a greater and higher force, viz., that of moral worth, which at once raises him to higher planes in the social and civil world, and brings him into contact with his enemies and oppressors.

The Negro has met and overcome the great barriers to his progress one by one. Despite the snares that are all about his path, and their hidden evils that seek to hold him in thralldom, yet he bursts his chains and marches forward with renewed purpose and greater zeal.

Yes, the young Negro is embodying n.o.bler ideas in his nature and reaching forward after higher ideals because of his superior advantages. He is to face a future pregnant with struggles of a higher order and of a more diverse character, than the struggles of an earlier day. He enters into compet.i.tion, not with one race only, but with all the races of mankind. As the knowledge of the fierceness of the battle comes to him, he raises himself from his lethargy and in the strength of his manhood he goes forward.

He who doubts not the Negro's growth and development along intellectual and financial lines cannot gainsay his steady and st.u.r.dy growth in moral and social power.

TOPIC XVI.

THE NEGRO AS A WRITER.

BY REV. J. Q. JOHNSON, D. D.

[Ill.u.s.tration: J. Q. Johnson, D. D.]

REV. J. Q. JOHNSON, D. D.

Rev. J. Q. Johnson, D. D., was graduated from the Collegiate Department, of Fisk University in 1890; from the Hartford Theological Seminary in 1893. He taught mathematics at Tuskegee for one year; the John P. Slater fund published his report of the fifth Tuskegee Negro Conference in its series of "Occasional Papers." He has been President of Allen University, Columbia, S. C. His pastoral work has embraced some of the strongest and most influential churches in the A. M. E. connection. a.s.sociated with him was his brilliant and cultured wife--Mrs. Halle Tanner Johnson--the first woman who ever pa.s.sed the State Medical Board of Examiners of Alabama. Her recent death was a loss to the race.

Dr. Johnson is among the foremost men of his church. He is among the best read men of the race. He is an able preacher and a strong, forceful writer. One of his characteristic points is his ability to say much in little. He goes right to the point without wasting time with needless _words_. He received Doctor's degree from Morris Brown College, Atlanta, Ga. He studied two years as a post-graduate student at Princeton University.

It would be extravagant to set up any claims of greatness in behalf of Negro writers. The Negro has yet his contribution to make to the literature of mankind. We fully believe that he has a message to deliver. The making of a writer is a matter of centuries. England was a long time producing a Shakespeare or a Milton, Italy a Dante, Russia a Tolstoi, France a Hugo or a Dumas, Germany a Goethe and a Schiller.

America, active in invention and commerce, has not yet produced a name worthy to stand by the side of those just mentioned. All really great writers have not only a national or racial, but also a universal quality in their productions. So far the greater part of our literary effort has been of historical compilations. We have acc.u.mulated a large ma.s.s of material for the future historians. Williams' "History of the Negro Race" is an example of this kind. In this way we have recorded the deeds of distinguished Negroes in every avenue of life.

Such works have kept alive the hope and kindled the aspirations of the race. A most interesting work of this kind is that of Prof. E. H.

Crogman, "The White Side of a Black Subject." In this book we have the serious and earnest efforts of the race recorded. Here we learn of educators like Booker T. Was.h.i.+ngton and J. W. E. Bowen, lawyers like T. McCants Stewart and S. A. McElwee, women physicians like Halle T.

Johnson and Georgia Was.h.i.+ngton. Books of this kind are in almost every Negro home in the land.

The Negro as a writer of prose is nowhere seen to a better advantage than in Dr. Blyden's "Christianity, Islam and the Negro Race." Here we find the Negro in command of the best English style. Whatever may be said of his opinions, his mastery of a forcible, spirited, nervous expression reminds one of Macauly and Addison. Probably the best book from the standpoint of scientific, historical investigation is the work of Dr. DuBois on "The Suppression of the African Slave Trade."

Bishop B. T. Tanner, in his "Dispensations in the Church," has made a real contribution to our race literature. In this he establishes the Hamitic origin of the ancient Egyptians and shows that Ham is not one whit behind j.a.pheth and Shem in achievement. Dr. R. L. Perry's work, "The Cus.h.i.+te," is a very excellent work along the same line. In this department there is yet much work for the Negro scholar.

In Paul Lawrence Dunbar, the race has struck its highest note in song.

A high and worthy tribute has been paid this writer by William Dean Howells. His lyrics have not only a genuine race flavor, but at the same time they appeal to the universal heart. Dunbar's work is of the first cla.s.s. He has made a real contribution to the literature of the country. His name must now appear in any Manual of American Literature. The success of this writer is a matter of note. His poems and stories are in most of the popular magazines and his books on all news stands. It is clear from this that, whenever a Negro writes anything worth reading, his productions will be in constant demand.

Mention must here be made of the commendable work of Chas. W.

Chestnutt, another popular writer of the race. The lamented Dr. A. A.

Whitman and Mrs. Frances W. Harper are two poets well-known to the public. Some think that Whitman is a greater poet than Dunbar.

In a short sketch like this, it is impossible to do justice to the literary achievements of the race. A whole volume might be written on the great work done by the Negro press. Here we have many strong writers--men of such mould as Fortune, Stewart, Mitch.e.l.l and H. T.

Johnson. Then, too, there are noted names as magazine writers--Scarborough, Kelly Miller, D. W. Culp and B. T. Was.h.i.+ngton and H. T. Kealing.

The Negro has been a failure nowhere. In war, there stands Toussaint L'Overture and Maceo; in education, B. T. Was.h.i.+ngton; in oratory, Frederick Douglas; in art, H. O. Tanner; in letters, Phyllis Wheatley and Paul Lawrence Dunbar. These and others like them are our prophets of the future. Being thus judged by our best men, it doth not yet appear what we shall be. The Greeks are great in a large measure because they wrote of themselves. So the Anglo Saxon, and any race for that matter. The Negro must do the same. His story will not be adequately told till it is done by himself. The Negro poet, novelist and historian have a vast wealth of material before them. Every southern city and plantation are vocal with the past history of our race. From the past and the present, from our achievements and our suffering, the Negro writer, whether poet, novelist or historian, will deliver our message to the world.

SECOND PAPER.

THE NEGRO AS A WRITER.

BY WALTER I. LEWIS.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Prof. W. I. Lewis]

WALTER I. LEWIS.

Walter I. Lewis was born near Chester, S. C. No record having been kept, it is not possible to determine the date of his birth. Walter is the third of seven children that were born to William Charles and Mollie Lewis who were slaves to a man by the name of W. T. Gilmore.

He successfully pa.s.sed from the common schools to the preparatory department of Biddle University.

Walter I. Lewis graduated with the second honor of his cla.s.s of five from Biddle University, in Charlotte, N. C., and at once began his life-work, public school teaching, at Spartanburg, S. C.

After teaching in that city for three years, two of which he succeeded in securing a sufficient donation from the Peabody Fund to have the school term increased from five to nine months, he accepted an appointment under the Freedmen's Board of the Presbyterian Church, to take charge of their parochial school in Columbia, Tenn.

Special inducements were offered him to take a position in the newly organized graded schools of that city, and he resigned the parochial school after serving one year, and accepted work with the graded school. This he found congenial and won special distinction in using the phonetic method of teaching primary pupils, that system being newly introduced there then.