The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1867-09-26
r. j. Moses to the colored People of Georgia.

Under the foregoing heading, we notice III the
Columbus Enquirer of the 22d instant an address
OF COL r. ]. Moses, to the colorod people of this
State written 'at the solicitation, says the writer,
''of some colored persons with whom have coz
versed upon the duties of the hour and how they
should be performed by the colored peopl :" and
mending it to the attention OF the colored people
in this vicinity
The negro is suddenly made free-the whole
rule of life is reversed with him; his comforts now
depend on the labor of his hands; il he works
faithfully, his comforts will be many; if be works
little, his comforts will be few. Upon his labor
depends the care he will have in sickness-the
provision he will have i'll age. All these facts and
duties are suddenly thrust upon him, and he has
to meet them with the education OF Lifetime
driving him in exactly the opposite direction. Is
it wonderful that tho negro should not learn in
day what the white man has taken lifetime to
ucquire2 Is II strange that he should cling to his
habits of ease and not learn in a day to love and
seek labor as means wherewith to invest him.
self with the comforts of life? Is it remarkable
that he should be lazy under the same circum-
stances that would make white man lazy?
think not. l think the wonder is that they are
learning the lesson soon as they do; that they
are so rapidly acquiring Industrious habits despite
the baleful influences with which Radical emissa-
ries have surrounded them.
The first social duty Of the negro ID to seek la
Dor, work faithfully fulfill his contracts, and cu-
tivat the good will and kind feelings of his for
mer master, the landholder of the country, to
whom he must look for employment, for his peo-
pie are an agricultural people, and the great ma
jority of them must live by agricultural labor
He should do this to increase his comforts,
educate his children, and provide for sickness and
old age He must learn to live in his children,
and hope to see them derive the benefits to arise
from his labor and Yrugality. He is rapidly ae-
curing knowledge Of these things, and II not
turned aside by foolish aspirations after political
power, or mischevous notions OF acquiring by
robbery, under tho name of confscation, land and
property which he can never possess except by the
labor of his hands, he will have an opportunity IN
a few years of showing that the love OF ease Is
not peculiar to the negro, and that the love oil la.
Dor for the increased comforts which labor Will
command is common to both races, the grea diff
ference in the rea tive industry OF the races being
a difference of education, which the black man IS
rapidly overcoming, AID not, as ID generally sup
posed, difference OF color only.
In concluding this letter, let me advise you 10
shun the stranger who has no interest in the land,
and is thrusting himself between You and your
former ma ;tcr for his Own selfish purposes ana not
for YOUR good. Cultivate good feelings with those
you have known always, and who must hive and
die with YOU i'll our Southern land.
Remember your homes and our homes
are together ths graves of your children anG
our children rest beneath the same SOD: Our
Georgia is your Georgia; our prosperity ID
Your prosperity. You are part OF the State,
sid Georgia cannot be L rlch, happy State
for the white man, unless 1t ls also rlch ana
happy State for the negroes Our interests are
the same If our crops are good your wages are
good if our crops are bad your wages are low. Ii
corn is low for the white il is low for the black
If bread is scarce and high for tho white man, it
is scarce and high for the black man. If you are
industrious and frugal, and the white man is ln-
dusrious and frugal the State and all who live in
ii will be prosperous and happy; but five quarrel
among ourselves the land Will lay waste, idlcness
will beget bad passions, bad passions will beget
strife. strife will make us lift our hands against
each other, and Georgia will weep for the madness
of her children.