The following pages are an effort to stem the tide of prejudice against
the Colored race. The white man despises the colored man, and has come
to think him fit only for the menial drudgery to which the majority of
the race has been so long doomed. "This prejudice was never reasoned
up, and will never be reasoned down." _It must be lived down._ In a
land where wealth is the basis of reputation, the colored man must
prove his sagacity and enterprise by successful trade or speculation.
To show his capacity for mental culture he must BE, not merely _claim
the right to be_, a scholar. Professional eminence is peculiarly the
result of practice and long experience. The colored people, therefore,
owe it to each other and to their race to extend liberal encouragement
to colored lawyers, physicians and teachers, as well as to mechanics
and artisans of all kinds. Let no individual despair. Not to name the
living, let me hold up the example of one whose career deserves to
be often spoken of, as complete proof that a colored man can rise to
social respect and the highest employment and usefulness, in spite
not only of the prejudice that crushes his race, but of the heaviest
personal burdens. Dr. DAVID RUGGLES, poor, blind and an invalid,
founded a well-known Water Cure Establishment in the town where I
write, erected expensive buildings, won honorable distinction as a most
successful and skilful practitioner, secured the warm regard and esteem
of this community, and left a name embalmed in the hearts of many who
feel that they owe life to his eminent skill and careful practice.
Black though he was, his aid was sought sometimes by those numbered
among the Pro-Slavery class. To be sure, his is but a single instance,
and I know it required pre-eminent ability to make a way up to light
through the overwhelming mass of prejudice and contempt. But it is
these rare cases of strong will and eminent endowment,--always sure to
make the world feel whether it will or no,--that will finally wring
from a contemptuous community the reluctant confession of the colored
man's equality.
I ask, therefore, the reader's patronage of the following sheets, on
several grounds; first, as an encouragement to the author, Mr. NELL,
to pursue a subject which well deserves illustration on other points
besides those on which he has labored; secondly, to scatter broadly as
possible, the facts here collected, as instance of the colored man's
success--a record of the genius he has shown, and the services he has
rendered society in the higher departments of exertion; thirdly, to
encourage such men as RUGGLES to perseverance, by showing a generous
appreciation of their labors and a cordial sympathy in their trials.
Some things set down here go to prove colored men patriotic--though
denied a country; and all show a wish, on their part, to prove
themselves men, in a land whose laws refuse to recognize their manhood.
If the reader shall, sometimes, blush to find that in the days of our
country's weakness, we remembered their power to help or harm us, and
availed ourselves gladly of their generous services, while we have
since, used our strength only to crush them the more completely, let
him resolve henceforth to do them justice himself and claim it for them
of others. If any shall be convinced by these facts, that they need
only a free path to show the same capacity and reap the same rewards
as other races, let such labor to open every door to their efforts,
and hasten the day when to be black shall not, almost necessarily,
doom a man to poverty and the most menial drudgery. There is touching
eloquence, as well as Spartan brevity, in the appeal of a well-known
colored man, Rev. PETER WILLIAMS, of New York:
"We are _natives_ of this country; we ask only to be treated as well as
_foreigners_. Not a few of our fathers suffered and bled to purchase
its independence; we ask only to be treated as well as those who fought
against it. We have toiled to cultivate it, and to raise it to its
present prosperous condition; we ask only to share equal privileges
with those who come from distant lands to enjoy the fruits of our
labor."