The weekly Anglo-African., 1860-03-17

Gu With slavery Ut pTtJuuiCc. " l'h 'ho
spirit of liberty that pervades the breasts
of many, of the opposite color, at the pres
ent day, no listlessness with regard to any
important interest, bearing on the welfare
of his race, should be INDUCED in for mo-
ment, by colored men To prove, would
time admit, that have not marked out du-
ties and labors too difficult to be performed,
hundreds of cases might be referred to in
different parts of the United States and
! Canada, who were raised under bondage
up to manhood and womanhood, without
an hours schooling, actually prohibited
from learning their A B G, who have not
only struggled from under the yoke,
but are now to be found among our most
successful business men, most intelligent
and eloquent speakers, best writers, &c,
having acquired all their book learning af-
ter passing their q st year, mainly through
their own exertions. Also, in this connec-
ton, in support of my position, would
take the liberty to introduce the name of
undetermined black man, who is justly
entitled to the love and admiration of every
man and woman, identified with his race,
on this continent. His upright character
and manly perseverance after knowledge,
succeeded as he did, reflects imperishable
credit on the race. He emphatically made
his name historical. i allude to Benjamin
Bannecker. He was born poor and,
though free himself, his parents were slaves.
With slavery he was in every sense sur
rounded, of course with but poor opportu-
mites for selfimprovement. Nevertheless,
he valued information, and was bound to
struggle to obtain it. The secret of his
success may be found in one brief para
graph alone, in his ever memorable letter
to the Hon. Thomas Jefferson, respecting
an almanac he had just flushed, and was
about forwarding with the letter to that
dignitary-it reads as follows "This cal
culation is the production of my arduous
study, in my advanced stage of life; for
having long had unbounded desires to be-
come acquainted with the secrets of nature,
/ have had to crafty my curiosity herein
through my own assiduous application to
astronomical study, in which | need not re-
count to you the many difficulties and dis
advantages have had to encounter"
What lessonl In calling your atten-
ton to him, l wish particularly to impress
you with the fact that the same "arduous
study and unbounded desire to become ac-
quainted with the secrets of nature" &C.,
if struggled for by any Of you, the same
happy results may be experienced in your
case as in his. Certainly no colored man
in free State ought to remain without
knowledge of reading and writing; for, to
my mind, the necessity thereof forces itself
upon him as upon no other class in the
country Some colored men say, eff we
are ignorant, the white man has so merci-
lessly wronged us, that he is responsible
for all our shortcomings" 1t must readily
be admitted that there is great force in this
view; nevertheless, our Indifference on this
plea is not justifable; we shuuld rather
double our diligence, that we might have
more power and force to make the white
man see his Indebtedness, his enormous
injustice towards us. We may wait as
long in the future as we have in the past
for the race who have oppressed us to re-
move the yoke, to elevate us to footing
with themselves, but SO long as we remain
in ignorance, or in a state of Indifference,
we shall be hoping for more from that
quarter than we shall get; we may fancy
that some wonderful streak of good luck
may suddenly overtake us, and in all these
things be woefully disappointed. Some Of
the opposite race have alwayssympathized
with us-at the present day we know that
noble and selfsacrifcing hearts daily feel
with those in bonds as bound with them;
that they are willing to spend their money
in the cause, or peril their lives even for
the freedom of the blackman; abundant tes-
timony on this point could be gained from
every State in the Union, from prisons and
court-houses, from presses and pulpits,
from underground railroads and fugitive
slave trials, from day schools and night
schools, showing that there are warm and
earnest hearts engaged in our behalf, to
whom we should feel grateful, by whom
we should feel cheered; still l repeat, our
great business should be to look to selfim-
provement- "selEreliance IS the sure road
10 independence" Without this main spring
it is an easy matter to make shipwreck of
hope, and to turn away the habit, of in
temperance and dissipation.
To fairly start in this upward course of
Ill uCCuo "
sit down and think very seriously, as did
a certain man described in "Foster's Els
says" This man had lost his property by
"imprudence," and was reduced to almost
destitute want, so much SO that he wander
ed about for some time almost in state of
despair, meditating self-destruction, till he
at last sat down upon hill which over
looked the fertile fields that he once called
his own. "He remained" says the nara
tive, fixed in thought number of hours,
at the end of which he sprang to the ground
with a vehement, exulting emotion. He
had formed his resolution, which was, that
all these estates should be his again. he
had formed his plan, too, which he instant
ly began to execute. The result of his in
tense thought brought him to the conclu-
sion that "there was no other way for him
but hard labor" to take the very first job
that might offer, however low the wages
might be, and to save a part of it in spite