Between the sterner flights of logic, I have sought to set some little alightings of what may be poetry. They are tributes to Beauty, unworthy to stand alone; yet perversely, in my mind, now at the end, I know not whether I mean the Thought for the Fancy—or the Fancy for the Thought, or why the book trails off to playing, rather than standing strong on unanswering fact. But this is alway—is it not?—the Riddle of Life.

Many of my words appear here transformed from other publications and I thank the Atlantic, the Independent, the Crisis, and the Journal of Race Development for letting me use them again.

W.E. BURGHARDT DU BOIS.
New York, 1919.

Contents

[POSTSCRIPT]
[Credo]
[I][THE SHADOW OF YEAR]
[A Litany at Atlanta]
[II][THE SOULS OF WHITE FOLK]
[The Riddle of the Sphinx]
[III][THE HANDS OF ETHIOPIA]
[The Princess of the Hither Isles]
[IV][OF WORK AND WEALTH]
[The Second Coming]
[V]["THE SERVANT IN THE HOUSE"]
[Jesus Christ in Texas]
[VI][OF THE RULING OF MEN]
[The Call]
[VII][THE DAMNATION OF WOMEN]
[Children of the Moon]
[VIII][THE IMMORTAL CHILD]
[Almighty Death]
[IX][OF BEAUTY AND DEATH]
[The Prayers of God]
[X][THE COMET]
[A Hymn to the Peoples]

Credo

I believe in God, who made of one blood all nations that on earth do dwell. I believe that all men, black and brown and white, are brothers, varying through time and opportunity, in form and gift and feature, but differing in no essential particular, and alike in soul and the possibility of infinite development.