THE SECOND CALL.
REV. JAS. POWELL, CHICAGO.
When emancipation summoned the American slaves to freedom, nothing appealed with stronger effect to the sympathies of their friends than their wonderful eagerness for education. They thought that if they only could obtain a knowledge of letters they would also come into possession of the white man’s power and the white man’s privileges. An illusion this, in so far as it held out promise of speedy fulfilment, but a serious fact, nevertheless, in that it points to the only open door through which the Freedmen or their descendants must pass, if they ever do come into possession of that power and those privileges.
But illusion as it was, it acted as an inspiration. Under its power, old men and old women, young men and maidens, children and youth, flocked into everything that was called a school for Freedmen.
This unprecedented manifestation of a hunger and thirst for education was promptly met by a large supply of missionary teachers and educational facilities. The promise, however, was larger than the fulfilment. Old people could not learn, and young people must improve by the diligent application of persistent effort extending through years. Such is the teaching of all history and experience. This the negroes did not know, and many of their friends had apparently forgotten it. Reaction came, and with it disappointment and discouragement. “It’s no use, chile, I’se too old to learn,” said the old negroes; and young Sambo, with a characteristic genuinely human, began to develop a passion for sport rather than study. The fact is, the wonderful passion for study exhibited by the Freedmen was abnormal. It is not natural for scholars to be running ahead of their teachers and enthusiastically shouting back for them to come on. As a rule, the teacher must lead. Ability to inspire pupils with a love for study is one of the essentials for success in teaching. The work of education, like everything else good in this world, must be pushed.
A full recognition of these facts dictated the original policy of the A. M. A. in its educational work among the Freedmen, and has shaped its policy ever since. Institutions were planted and fostered with a view to permanency. Interest in sustaining them might rise or fall, but the work, in order to succeed, must be patiently carried forward.
The flood-tide of enthusiasm on the part of the Freedmen, as a matter of course, began to ebb when the difficulties of obtaining an education fairly dawned upon them. Some of their friends at the North, seeing this, began to lose faith in their educability, and as a consequence began also to withhold their support from the work. But the American Missionary Association said, “This is just as we expected,” and instead of yielding, buckled down to its work all the more earnestly, and argued for its continuance all the more forcefully. The reaction would again react. The tide of interest would return with healthier beat, and the second call would be more effective than the first. It was a firm faith in such an outcome that prompted the annual reports which, for several years, held out this bow of promise, while that ugly debt was hanging like a threatening cloud over all the work; and the faith has been justified by the results. The reaction of the reaction has come. The tide is setting back again with normal flow. The cause is advocated from the leading pulpits; our foremost statesmen endorse it; the most influential newspapers editorially commend it; the debt has been wiped out; our schools are crowded to their utmost capacity, and there is to-day sounding in the ears of the public a louder call for the immediate enlargement of work for the education of the Freedmen than has ever yet been heard. It is not the old, with heads filled with all sorts of fantastic notions, who now clamor for what they never can acquire. The young and ambitious are pressing forward, and they are doing it with eyes wide open to the difficulties that must be encountered, while at the same time, to give them confidence and hope, they have before them the living examples of scholarly achievement on the part of some of the youth of their race. These young men and young women, who are now turned away from the doors of our schools because “there is no room,” appeal to us not merely because they want to obtain an education for themselves, but because they represent the neglected condition of a race. It is a remarkable fact, and most pathetic in its meaning, that they plead in many instances to be taken into school in order that they may qualify themselves to be the means of the elevation of their people.
A critical time is this. These millions cannot be left much longer in their ignorance without danger to the public peace. Vice does not tend to produce virtue. Ignorance does not tend to produce knowledge. Let the feeling settle down on the colored youth that all avenues for intellectual culture are closed against them, and ambition for improvement will soon disappear, and when the brood of evils to which ignorance is the prolific parent has been once fairly let loose upon the land, it may be too late to remedy the mischief. “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” says the wisdom of the ages. The demand of the hour is, “Let the wisdom of the ages be put to practical use.” Recorded in books, tossed from lip to lip, it profits little; it must be put into action. No question presses upon the Christian and patriotic thought of our land with greater urgency, or bears within it farther reaching consequences, than this same question of the education of our negro population. The hour of opportunity is now. We ask the friends of the Freedmen to heed this second call that comes to them, to prosecute the work of Christian education among the negroes, with a greater zeal and greater enthusiasm than ever before. If we are faithful, a rich harvest will be ours to reap.