W. S. Scarborough

“ Angell of Michigan University has truly declared that a man who has any claims to scholarship or learning cannot hoard its blessings as a miser hoards gold, that he can hardly enjoy it without in some degree sharing its blessings with others, that its very nature is to be outgoing and effusive. Because of this truth the Negro scholar is an inspiration to his own people who need just such an object lesson as himself. The race gains self-respect as it sees one of its own on higher planes. ”

“ One question is being intensely pressed forward—how to learn a living? and the swing of the pendulum concerning the Negro’s education has swept a degree beyond any heretofore measured.
That manual training is needful no one will deny for a moment; that some of all races must inevitably be sons of toil is readily admitted; and that such education has its share in the development of every race there is no contention. We all know that Learning and Labor traveled hand in hand, with the emphasis upon the former, when the Anglo Saxon first wrestled with the wilderness of America. ”

“ Education, learning, scholarship will make the undying lustre of a people—will prove their greatest glory. Thinkers will give an immortality to a people that neither wealth, nor industry, nor strength of arm, nor even virtue can procure for it. ”

“ The foes are often of his own race. It will take all the philosophy he can summon to contend with the opposition that comes from ignorance, from coarseness, from the unthinking and the malicious. It will need all his self-control and forbearance to move along under grasping, bullying ignorance that seeks to ride rough shod over superior knowledge and breeding; it will demand all his logic to meet the arguments from without that the Negro has no time now for scholarship—that he must get money and get land first ”

“ It is to our shame, however, that we are forced to admit that just such shams are so often on “dress parade” before the world that by them the race is too frequently largely judged, and to its detriment. The day has come when the brain of the race must both direct its brawn and expose its brass. Ignorance and charlatanism will seek enlightenment or retreat only when intelligence and learning make a masterly array for leadership.
This mission of leadership has many phases. The educated Negro leads by making himself felt, unconsciously, in many ways. ”

“ The Negro like any other scholar is not the man who has simply been through college, but the one “through whom the college has been”—the one who has not only gathered from contact with college life varied stores of knowledge, but who has grown in strength of character and breadth of culture; one who has become imbued with the spirit of high ideals ”

“ We know too that when the desert wastes were changed to smiling plains the ways of the two drifted apart, and learning took the path for culture and high scholarship, untrammeled, while labor plodded on, gaining slowly comparative ease in its varied lines. It is only when limitation is placed upon a race that objection comes—when one race is selected for more than a fair share of experimentation in the exploitation of a theory. Then danger seems imminent. In this case the danger lies in the tendency to lose sight of Negro scholarship—of Negro higher learning. ”

“ If there was but the present moment to contemplate, the race might be excused for pausing, for acquiescing in the limitations set for its education, and for saying the game is not worth the candle. But to-day does not end all. There is a future and that Negro is lacking in proper manhood who does not determine to help on that future. The future is always bound up in the present and if this future is to make men and women out of the race in coming generations the question is answered. Negro scholarship is worth striving for, because the educated Negro is to lead for that future. ”

“ The educated Negro is an absolute fact. The day is past when his ability to learn is scoffed at. But on the other hand is born that fear that he may go too far—excel or equal the Anglo-Saxon,—and that fear is a prime motive in the minds of many who seek to hedge the onward path of the race. ”

“ So scientists, historians, linguists, sociologists, professional men in all lines are needed, not only that the life and history of the race may be properly presented to the world, but in order that another mission may be fulfilled—that of keeping before the world the fact that the Negro possesses intellect; that he is both able and capable, and that through this possession and training the race purposes to develop its civilization.
The Negro scholar must not be so wrapped up in his own achievements that he cannot see the possibilities in those about him. ”

“ Angell of Michigan University does not consider, when speaking of the Anglo-Saxon, that one college bred person in a thousand in his state “is unwise or inexpedient,” why should friend or foe of the Negro consider less than 3000 college bred men and women out of an entire population of nearly 10,000,000, “unwise or inexpedient?” It would be laughable if it were not so pitiful to think of the hue and cry about too much learning for the Negro. The trouble with the race is not too much learning but not enough. A little learning is surely a dangerous thing. ”

“ We have too many dudes whose ideal does not rise above the possession of a new suit, a cane, a silk hat, patent leather shoes, a cigarette and a good time—too many in every sense the “sport of the gods.” It is the mission of the educated Negro to help change this—to see that thoughtlessness gives place to seriousness. Ruskin spoke a basic truth when he said that youth is no time for thoughtlessness; and it is especially applicable to the youth of a race that has its future to make. ”

“ The Educated Negro and His Mission. Human thought is like a pendulum. It sways from belief to belief, from theory to theory, from plan to plan, and the length of its vibrations is governed by a multitude of contending forces operating from both within and without. Two of these influences, in the present age, are all potential. One is the ardent desire to find the best ways and means by which the human race may hasten on its varied development, and the other is the strenuous determination to discover what may be styled the “Northwest” passage to that coveted result. ”

“ So is every other race, but the Negro can least afford it just now. It may be true that some of these hold diplomas indicating completion of courses of higher studies, but they are not really the educated ones, and the fact of their existence does not prove the uselessness of the educated Negro or the failure of higher education for the race. It is to our credit that comparatively few, who have struggled through the long years that lead to culture and scholarship, can be found to give enemies of the race an opportunity for assault from that quarter. ”

“ There is plenty of active leadership for this Afro-American scholar as a part of his mission. There are books to be written; experiments to be made; conditions to be analyzed; ways and means invented to reach ends; and we need Negro specialists in all these fields. Great economic results will never come to us, nor will a truly great standing be ours as long as we are content to leave our affairs to the sole direction, however wise or kindly intended, of another race. ”

“ Added to this the Negro scholar above all must be one who makes himself a reforming force for the world’s betterment. Here is the Negro’s opportunity—to combine in himself those characteristics Mr. Austin mentioned not long ago—the purely scholarly qualities of the German, the statesmanlike qualities of the English and then to be a propagandist.
The Negro who is an educated man must be a practical man, and zealous in getting to work to show that thinking and doing go together. If the world needs such men from the white race, so much the more are educated Negroes needed. ”

“ The artisan, the laborer have their niches, but they must work with and not against the educated classes. That the strong working brain must be the guide of the strong working hand, I have ever contended. The masses must move, but it must be the classes that move them if progress upward is to be the order. We must build up an honest, thrifty yeomanry, but we must multiply rapidly our educated men to lead and work and influence in these various fields.
The fact that the Negro scholar is needed for this work shows the demand. ”

“ Industry alone does not [Pg 9] make for morality. As one has said, “A strict labor diet does not strengthen morals, it only suppresses passions.” In the home and for home building is needed that ethical, philosophical, and esthetical training that belongs to the higher education. This training is the great instrument for the present upbuilding of the race which is to do so much in laying foundations for the fine heredity every race covets. I repeat that the seeds of culture are to be sown by the educated Negro and in the home they are never wholly without fruit. ”

“ VanDyke has said that true manhood and womanhood cannot exist without an ideal side; that these are the finer feelings which have no market value but which must be kept alive. Why should we endeavor to keep them alive? Simply because the world at large recognizes that this means development in the highest sense, and we claim that this is an especial need of the Negro race. Then we ask, How are these finer feelings kept alive? and the answer comes that this stimulation must proceed from culture and scholarship. ”

“ There are other fields of activity that need the presence and kindly penetrative interest of the educated ones of the race. The slums call for this influence. The growing problems in our northern cities especially call for work at the hands of the intelligent, scholarly men and women. Vice must be checked in the race, and a transformation be effected in the manner of life in the dark portions of the cities. Here we have a problem of our own—to separate poverty from viciousness and encourage the people to better morals and industrious, clean lives. ”

“ Nothing but true scholarship can lead these young people to take proper measure of self and estimate the things about them at their true value as they stand at that precarious place, the beginning of a career. ”

“ With all these spheres calling especially for education and culture there is still another of the most importance, for it holds so much for the future of the race. This is the improvement of domestic life. We want no upper classes where evils are glossed over because there are money and position to be respected. We must work for the ideal family life. Home is the social center for a race, the real center of race improvement, and we want better homes. ”

“ Educated men are the ones to take a place in affairs, national and municipal, aiding to solve great problems, cure great evils and guide the destinies of a people. What else can it mean when we see such a scholar as President Seth Low step from the administration of college affairs to the administration of the affairs of a great city in a righteous endeavor to help cleanse a corrupt government? ”

“ We repeat that the suggestions bearing upon the education of the Negro race have caused too decided a swing of the pendulum in many quarters and higher education is in danger of being swallowed up, if not to a great extent abandoned, in the extreme importance attached to that other education we denominate as Industrial. ”

“ It is an absurdity to claim there can be too many of the race with learning enough and discipline enough to make themselves useful leaders.
There is room for all kinds of work. There is need of the practical, the industrial, and it is honorable to work with the hands. ”

“ No one knows better than the thoughtful members of the race the difficulties to be faced here where a people is segregated in certain portions—where the good and the bad must perforce live elbow to elbow, in constant contact and often consequent contamination. It needs settlement work of the most earnest kind, and only those who have standing and education will be able to do the desired good. ”

“ When there is more of genuine scholarship among members of the race there will be a different attitude assumed towards it. But as long as the Negro prefers to construe owlish looks as wisdom, to bow down to clam like silence as profound philosophy, to stand agape over blatant mouthings as eloquence, and to measure mental calibre by bodily avoirdupois, he not only gives evidence of weakness in a lack of sound discrimination, but he subjects the entire race to consequent criticism and contempt. ”

“ This same influence is to be exercised over those young men and women fresh from college who have two things to learn—that the knowledge they possess is neither altogether new, nor is it patented by them, and further, that one great danger lies ever before those of any race who have won great distinction in college halls—that of total extinction out in the world. ”

“ Ward has pertinently observed, “To the man who wants to lift a mass of people out of lower into higher conditions they are people, individual people, not races,” and he adds further with just emphasis, “When it comes to nurture and education they are to be considered as individuals, each to be lifted up and their children surrounded by a superior environment.” ”

“ The consequence is that, in this determined reach for all that humanity craves for itself and for its civilization, the oscillations of thought and endeavor are oftimes marked by notable extremes. Especially has this been true in lines of education. Again and again has it been sought to wheel the educational car upon new tracks where exaggerated views, revolutionary ideas, radical methods have caused the eyes of the world to be focused upon the attempt, and no movement within the arc that the world’s opinions have traversed has been unnoticed. ”