The Souls of Black Folk - Essays and Sketches #223235

But the facing Of so vast a prejudice could not but bring the inevitable self-questioning, self-dispar agement, and lowering of ideals which ever accompany repression and breed in an atmosphere of contempt and hate. Whisperings and portents came borne upon the four winds: Lo! We are diseased and dying, cried the dark hosts; we cannot write, our voting is vain; what need of education, since we must always cook and serve? And the Nation echoed and enforced this self-criticism, saying: Be~ eentent to be servants, and 'nothing more; what need-of higher culture-for~ half men? Away with the black man's ballot, by force or fraud, and behold the suicide Of a race Neverthe less, out of the evil came something of good, the more careful adjustment of education to real life, the clearer perception of the Negroes' social responsibili ties, and the sobering realization of the meaning of progress.