,,service ,,by ,,the ,,educated ,,negro ,,address ,,of ,,roscoe ,,conkling ,,bruce ,,of ,,tuskegee ,,institute ,,at ,,the ,,commencement ,,exercises ,,of ,,the ,m ,,street ,,high ,,school ,,metropolitan ,a4 ,m4 ,e4 ,,church ,,washington1 ,d4 ,c41 ,,june #af1 #aijc ,copyright #aijc ,c4 ,w4 ,b4 ,bruce ,tuskegee ,institute ,steam ,print4 ,,service ,,by ,,the ,,educated ,,negro4 ,when ,george ,william ,curtis had received from ,harvard her greatest degree1 he arose at the ,alumni ,dinner and said1 8,in the old ,italian story the nobleman turns out of the hot street crowded with eager faces into the coolness and silence of his palace4 ,as he looks at the pictures of the long line of ancestors he hears a voice1--or is it his own heart beating8--which says to him noblesse oblige4 ,the youngest scion of the oldest house is pledged by all the virtues and honor of his ancestry to a life not unworthy his lineage4444 ,when ,i came here ,i was not a nobleman1 but to-day ,i have been ennobled4 ,the youngest doctor of the oldest school1 ,i too1 say with the ,italian1 noblesse oblige4 ,i am pledged by all the honorable traditions of the noble family into which ,i am this day adopted40444 ,you1 my friends1 are ennobled by the diploma of a school1 rich in traditions of high endeavor and actual service4 ,shall those traditions fail to enter your hearts1 and to quicken your energies1 and to chasten your ambitions8 ,this question you are not now competent to answer1 and you will not be competent until you have lived your lives4 ,your equipment for the business of life is not contemptible4 ,as workers you have some acquaintance with the natural resources of our country1 and the ways in which they have been utilized in the production and distribution of commodities through the perfecting of industrial organization and the applying of science to work4 ,more1 importantly1 you possess in varying degrees a group of valuable industrial qualities1--that ambition without which work is drudgery and enlargement of life unsought and unattainable2 that habit of earnest endeavor which1 established by continuous attention to ,greek or ,latin1 mathematics or history1 may be utilized in the school room1 or on the farm1 or in the court room2 that habit of self-control which enables men to sacrifice vagrant impulse to sober duty2 that resourcefulness which discovers better methods of getting work done2 that directing intelligence by which one man can effectively organize for a given purpose1 many materials and many workers4 ,in addition to the knowledge and the qualities ,i have mentioned1 most of you have a settled disposition toward some form of self-support appropriate to an exceptional training2 while you know that some men must black other men's boots1 you also know that a boot-black with a high school diploma at home means waste--waste of time1 waste of money1 waste of education4 ,moreover1 you appreciate the duties and value the privileges of citizenship in a democracy1 and most of you have on the whole a serious intent to do what you reasonably can to promote the general welfare4 ,such is your equipment as citizens4 ,finally1 as human beings1 you are able to participate in the intellectual1 sthetic1 and moral interests of cultivated people4 ,how may you with such equipment be really useful under the conditions of ,american life8 ,that is our problem4 ,and right here let me say that nobody wishes you to make a profession of uplifting your race4 ,in the first place1 that's a pretty big job2 and in the second place1 your race is uplifted whenever one of you manages well a truck farm1 a grocery store1 a school room1 or a bank4 ,charity begins at home2 your chief business should be to uplift each himself4 ,my present purpose1 however1 is to consider mainly how such individual success may contribute to the welfare of the many4 ,let us consider1 first of all1 how you may be of direct service by work in which the chief factor is personal influence and by work in which the chief factor is directing intelligence4 ,teaching is an art inseparable from the personality of the teacher1--an art in which a mature person seeks by personal influence to help immature persons build their characters soundly4 ,teaching ability1 to adapt the words of ,cardinal ,newman1 8is not a mere extrinsic or accidental advantage which is ours to-day and another's to-morrow1 which may be got up from a book and easily forgotten again1 which we can command or communicate at our pleasure1 which we can borrow for the occasion1 carry about in our hands and take into the market2 it is an acquired illumination1 it is a habit1 a personal possession and an inward endowment40 ,the best way to become a good teacher is1 therefore1 to become a good man or a good woman1 and to grow in power to interest and influence young people4 ,such personality and power cannot be manufactured to order1 but are slowly developed by much reading and thinking and doing and no little contact with wholesome people4 ,in ,charles ,francis ,adams' pungent address1 at ,cambridge in #ahhc1 he said1 8,in these days of repeating rifles1 my alma mater sent me and my classmates out into the strife equipped with shields and swords and javelins4 ,we were to grapple with living questions through the medium of the dead languages40 ,while thus sharply criticizing the content of the curriculum1 ,mr4 ,adams would have been the first to maintain that to breathe the atmosphere of a university is an assured way of getting broadened culture1 and that this atmosphere is made largely by the teachers4 ,frederick ,douglass had no university degree1 but he was certainly a man of culture2 his teachers were among the choicest spirits of an aroused generation--,sumner and ,garrison and ,wendell ,phillips--and they gave him breadth and balance and clear-sightedness4 ,charles ,francis ,adams was set upon the highway of modern culture despite the curriculum2 ,douglass received that grace which is of the spirit of literature without the curriculum4 ,both men were deeply indebted to noble teachers4 ,the thing that makes one man really different from another is not so much knowledge as character2 and the thing that makes one school different from another is not so much curriculum and apparatus1 as teaching body4 ,algebra and trigonometry1 ,greek and ,latin1 history and political economy1 the student will forget2 but he will not forget a teacher gentle but earnest1 of disinterested scholarship and life-long devotion4 ,the specific teaching may be quite erased from the memory1 but in the heart will be left a deepening respect for the teacher4 ,many of you are to become class-room teachers4 ,remember that teaching ability is an inward endowment2 remember that a morally stunted man or a ribbon-loving woman cannot be an effective teacher4 ,the most searching critic of character ,i ever knew was a barefoot boy whose laughing eyes danced over the pages of the fourth reader2 an intuitive philosopher he6 ,school boy opinion has1 ,i doubt not1 many vagaries but on the whole its essential decisions as to teachers are amazingly correct4 ,whether you teach geography by the ,oswego ,method1 is not greatly to the point2 whether you have won the confidence of your class--that is the main issue2 and that conquest is not made by the sword of discipline but by the spirit of vigorous goodness4 ,moreover the genuine teacher knows that his duty is not bounded by the four walls of the class-room4 ,he is dealing with boys and girls to be sure1 but he is dealing with more--with social conditions4 ,the life and work of the community he must study quite as much as he must study the child4 ,indeed1 child and man are largely products of social conditions4 ,the educated teacher1 by friendly visits to homes and by cheerful work in churches and societies1 will seek to elevate community opinion and the standard of life and work4 ,a crowded unclean home in an undrained street1 is almost as much an object of concern to the educated teacher as is a hopeless little dunce who can't spell 8rabbit60 ,let us ground child-study in community study4 ,this knowledge of the life and work of the community will react upon the program of study4 ,the educated teacher1 ,i have said1 aims at raising somewhat the level of life in the community4 ,the program of study is an instrument for that end4 ,a school unresponsive to the needs of actual life is a school preparing for ,utopia4 ,the universities and the public schools of the ,western ,states illustrate what ,i mean3 for example1 the ,university of ,california has recently introduced a course in irrigation4 ,and here in the ,east1 ,cornell teaches poultry raising4 ,for an unscrubbed population the school should emphasize cleanliness2 for a propertyless population1 foresight and thrift4 ,let me speak even more definitely4 ,in this city of ,washington1 as in other urban communities1 the death rate of the ,negro population is exceedingly high4 ,this excessive death rate is due to a variety of causes2 relatively low economic position is a powerful cause4 ,thus1 one of the largest industrial insurance companies in the ,united ,states finds1 ,i learn1 that the death rate of ,negroes is practically the same as that of whites1 in approximately the same industrial occupations2 and there is much more evidence to the same effect4 ,in addition to the teaching of hygiene1 the school may aim to remedy the conditions expressed in the high death rate1 in two ways1--first1 through imparting productive capacity by the training of hands2 and second1 through developing wants by the touching of hearts and arousing of minds4 ,already you have a manual training high school and through the grades certain work in carpentry and sewing and cooking4 ,the increasing efficiency of all such work should be welcomed and actively aided by every educated teacher4 ,after a while1 let us hope1 the schools here will offer from one end to the other1 such teaching of the industrial arts as will prepare students worthily to maintain themselves under severe economic stress4 ,do you realize that1 despite the enlargement of educational opportunities in ,washington and the growth of the ,negro population1 there are probably here to-day fewer ,negro artisans than there were in #ahgj8 ,here is a profound need1 and for the schools a rare opportunity4 ,moreover1 the school life of most children is short1 not over five or six years4 ,if the school possessed adequate facilities for giving industrial capacity1 more parents would be willing and able to let their children remain in school seven and eight and nine years4 ,the schools and the cultivated portion of this community cannot afford to give those who ask for bread a stone4 ,we must send the whole boy to school and not merely his head6 ,not for a moment do ,i decry that important function of the schools1 which ,i have called the development of wants4 ,human wants are social forces4 ,corn and cotton are grown to supply certain bodily wants2 the fine arts are cultivated in response to certain sthetic wants2 philosophy and pure science are elaborated at the quiet insistence of certain intellectual wants2 religion is preached to assuage certain spiritual wants4 ,every voluntary act is the hand-maid of some want4 ,now1 it is the fundamental business of the schools to enlarge the range of the students' interests and wants1 to stir up a divine discontent4 ,the saddest thing about the ,negro peasant in his windowless cabin in ,georgia1 the saddest thing about the ,negroes in the filthy shanties of ,mobile1 ,new ,york1 and ,washington1 is not so much poverty1 as slovenly unconcern4 ,what all such people need--be they white or black1 red or yellow--is the development of wants--wants for better things4 ,a man of moderately developed wants will exert himself to get a steady job under healthful conditions1 to get a comfortable house to live in--three or four sunny1 pleasantly furnished rooms and1 if possible a garden for vegetables and flowers--yes1 he will exert himself to win a wife to make that house a home4 ,such wants 7and they are1 you will note1 not impossibly spiritual7 every school ought to tend to develop4 ,in short1 the development of the wants of sober men and the giving of the skill to buy the means of satisfying those wants--these two things are vital to the work of the school4 ,let me be clearly understood2 the school should of course develop the more spiritual wants1 wants for the things that give literature and art and religion their values4 ,these spiritual things are the headwaters of the fullest and deepest and highest enjoyments of life4 ,but these matters have long been emphasized in the traditions of school-men2 moreover1 when the flesh is weak1 the spirit is not very strong4 ,my wish just now is to emphasize the things that lie at the basis of race maintenance and progress4 ,the considerations brought forward exhibit the opportunities of the teacher and the high significance of the teacher's work4 ,teaching and preaching are very much alike4 ,phillips ,brooks said very truly that preaching is the bringing of truth through personality4 ,some of you will prepare yourselves to preach2 all of you will have to do with preachers4 ,there is no lack of preachers but there is much lack of good preachers4 ,the preacher has the entree to the firesides of the people4 ,the educated preacher1 like the educated teacher1 realizes the profound effect that the housing of the working classes exerts upon the morals and the efficiency and the happiness of the working classes1 the profound effect that surroundings exert upon life and character4 ,the preacher will use some of the influence that issues from his superrational functions to make the homes of the people hygienically as well as morally clean1 to make those homes more attractive than the resorts of vice4 ,religion and the ,church have1 from a certain point of view1 two main functions1--first to make peace between human society and assumed spiritual beings2 and1 second1 to antagonize anti-social acts and tendencies4 ,the first function1 religion performs for a horde of man-eating savages as well as for the congregation of ,st4 ,paul's2 the second function religion performs1 characteristically in a civilized society1 by allying itself with morality4 ,the surprisingly low death rate of ,jews wherever found is unquestionably due in large part to this alliance of religion and morality4 ,in our ,english ,bible we find3-- 8,and ,god spake all these words1 saying1 8,honour thy father and thy mother4444 8,thou shalt not kill4 8,thou shalt not commit adultery4 8,thou shalt not steal4 8,thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour4 8,though shalt not covet thy neighbour's house1 thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife1 444 nor anything that is thy neighbour's4 8,and all the people saw the thunderings1 and the lightnings1 and the noise of the trumpet1 and the mountain smoking40444 ,now1 the practical usefulness of the preacher lies largely in the fact that he supplies the sanctions for right doing1--the thunderings and the lightnings and the noise of the trumpet1 the mountain smoking1 and in all but above all ,jehovah4 ,to show the man in the street or in the cotton field that for him lying and stealing are bad because1 if everybody were a liar and a thief1 society would fall to pieces1--that would be very well1 but it would hardly make the man honest in word and deed4 ,if1 however1 you marshal feelings of awe and reverence in defence of honesty1 if you get ,god on your side1 your success is more assured and you may develop a 8sensibility to principle which feels a stain like a wound40 ,the preacher fortifies the common moralities with these religious sanctions and that is no easy business4 ,the preacher must himself be righteous1 resourceful1 sympathetic1 with the gift of nearness to men4 ,such qualities education is peculiarly fit to bestow or to develop1 and hence an educated ministry is sorely needed by our people from ,boston to ,new ,orleans4 ,an educated ministry would realize that social settlements1 gymnasiums1 kindergartens1 day nurseries1 friendly visiting1 homes for defectives and orphans and the aged may fitly and usefully be organized and maintained by the church4 ,by such means the church may tend to establish a kingdom of heaven on earth4 ,among cultivated ,negroes there is apparent an unfortunate tendency to look at preachers askance4 ,this is due largely to reaction against bad preachers1 and to failure to understand and appreciate the temporal opportunities of the ,church4 ,i argue for the usefulness of good preachers and of the 8institutional0 church4 ,though no member of this graduating class should become a preacher or a preacher's wife1 every member may wisely ally himself with the church and use his personal influence to enlarge and strengthen church work1 to make it definite and human and nobly practical4 ,so much for the work in which personal influence is the determining factor4 ,medicine and business are types of the work in which what ,i have rudely called directing intelligence determines4 ,in the profession of medicine1 ,i admit1 personal influence and directing intelligence subtly interlace4 ,the ,negro doctor's social position makes him specially accessible to ,negroes in cases of need4 ,as a friend of the family or of the family's friends1 the doctor is not dreaded as a feelingless stranger with a terrible knife4 ,moreover1 the ,negro doctor does not feel himself a man of alien blood come to tend an inferior4 ,social position and understanding sympathy1 then1 render the ,negro doctor readily accessible and very useful4 ,moreover1 the ,negro's physical condition offers the doctor large opportunities for noble service4 ,in a book upon 8,ethnic ,factors in the ,population of ,boston10 ,doctor ,bushee says1 8,in ,boston the mortality of the ,negro is much larger than that of any other ethnic factor02 again1 8,a high death rate1 instead of a low birthrate is causing the ,negroes to disappear02 and the statistics are not much more encouraging in many other urban communities ,north and ,south4 ,that relatively low economic position is a powerful factor in producing this alarming death rate1 ,i have already suggested2 another capital factor is pitiable ignorance of the rudiments of personal hygiene and of sanitation4 ,negro doctors may without much trouble diffuse throughout a community these rudiments of knowledge and in so doing will prove themselves public servants4 ,north and ,south the conspicuous financial success and substantial social service of hundreds of ,negro doctors eloquently establish the correctness of this view2 and of practising physicians1 the ,negro people to-day have unmistakably too few4 ,what of the ,negro business man8 ,in ,washington public employment and the professions have captured most of the energetic and alert ,negroes1 to the injury of business development4 ,springfield1 ,massachusetts2 ,richmond1 ,virginia2 ,dayton1 ,ohio1--not one of these important cities has a total population as large as the ,negro population of the ,district of ,columbia4 ,as buyers of goods1 eighty-seven thousand people are important2 but as sellers of goods1 the eighty-seven thousand ,negroes in ,washington are by no means important4 ,for example1 of the total profits on the dry goods bought in a year by the ,negro population of ,washington1--profits amounting to thousands and thousands of dollars1 for the ratio of expenditure to income is exceptionally large1--what per cent4 goes to ,negro merchants8 ,shall ,i say five per cent41 one per cent41 or one thousandth of one per cent48 ,mathematical precision is1 of course1 not possible but you and ,i know that practically none of these profits go to ,negro merchants4 ,and you and ,i could name a dozen white merchants who have been enriched by those profits4 ,and in consideration of this fact how many ,negro clerks have the white merchants placed in their stores8 how many ,negro floor walkers8 how many ,negro buyers8 ,and1 my friends1 how many thousands of years must elapse before the ,washington ,negro will add to his culture enough co-operative endeavor and competitive power to change all this8 ,i myself have never yet been convinced that the ,anglo-,saxon and the ,jew really need the black man's charity4 ,though ,i cannot point out1 then1 to the members of this graduating class openings in established business houses1 ,i can point out that their success in business will provide opportunities for some later class1 and will help to make the spending of ,negroes enrich ,negroes4 ,let me suggest two other ways in which the ,negro business men may be of great service to the many4 ,in the first place1 the rents charged ,negroes in cities1 for example1 ,washington1 are considerably higher for the same accommodations than the rents charged white people4 ,by offering good houses at reasonable rents to the ,negro working class1 the ,negro business man will find a paying investment and a means of much service4 ,in the second place1 hotels1 restaurants1 and theatres even in the capital of the nation are open to black men and women only on degrading terms1 or not open at all4 ,the closing of such accommodations is really the opening for black business men of the doors of opportunity4 ,in discussing ways of direct service ,i have then mentioned teaching and preaching as types of the work in which the decisive factor is personal influence4 ,medicine and business ,i have mentioned as types of the work in which the decisive factor is directing intelligence4 ,and now ,i wish to discuss two ways in which educated ,negroes may be of indirect service1--first1 by offering their fellows copies for imitation1 and1 second1 by establishing the dignity of the race4 ,in #ahha1 hardly a white man or a black man in the country dreamed that in twenty-two years a ,negro would have achieved the building of a beautiful city in a ,southern wilderness1 would have organized efficiently the business of that industrial community of some #agjj people1 would have won the abiding confidence of white men and black men ,north and ,south1 would have brought the white ,north and the white ,south into intelligent co-operation in the uplifting of black men1 would have worked out a solution for the central problem in ,american education1 would have been acknowledged master of arts by the oldest university in the land1 would have written one of the impressive books of the century1 would have been asked by the ,british ,government for help in the reconstruction of ,south ,africa1 would have been called by the sanest of ,british critics of affairs the most notable figure in the ,american ,republic6 ,and yet1 this miracle you and ,i see to-day with our own eyes4 ,the example of this man is being imitated in a hundred educational and industrial communities in the ,southern ,states4 ,and all men feel more respect for the ,negro race because out of its loins has come ,booker ,t4 ,washington4 ,a constructive statesman like ,washington1 educators like ,lewis ,moore and ,lucy ,moten and your own ,anna ,cooper1 theologians like ,bowen and ,grimke1 scholars like ,blyden and ,scarborough and ,du,bois and ,kelly ,miller1 inventors like ,woods and ,mc,coy1 a novelist like ,chesnutt1 a poet like ,dunbar1 a musician like ,coleridge-,taylor1 a painter like ,tanner--yes1 and1 of those who are gone1 ,banneker who searched the heavens2 ,toussaint1 soldier and statesman2 ,aldridge1 the tragedian with his first medal in arts and sciences from the ,king of ,prussia2 ,pushkin1 the poet of the ,russias2 ,dumas1 father and son2 the saintly ,crummel2 and ,douglass the argument for freedom1--,i say1 the indirect service of such people is incalculable4 ,now1 for you and me no such careers are probable and yet every educated ,negro who is worth his salt1 is in similar fashion a copy for imitation and serves to secure respect for his race4 ,the ,negro contractor and builder2 the ,negro who owns a well managed truck farm2 the ,negro school teacher1 who has saved money enough to buy municipal bonds or shares in a railway1--that person becomes in a money getting time a definite and concrete argument to white men and to black men that black men can be more than hewers of wood and drawers of water1 than cooks and coachmen4 ,fundamentally1 you and ,i by our thoughtfulness1 our practical interest in the happiness of others1 our elevation above petty prejudice1 our simplicity1 our decisive prudence1 our enduring energy1 our devotion1 may indirectly count for good in a thousand ways in the life and work of our communities4 ,and1 now1 my friends1 you enter the circle of educated men and women4 ,your personal influence will be felt in school room and in pulpit4 ,your directing intelligence will count in law1 and medicine1 and business2 as able and devoted men and women1 you by your examples will steady the nerves of a staggering people and make the word ,negro more than a reproach4 ,delicate indecision1 hesitant virtue1 carping discontent1 bric-a-brac culture--these ill become stalwart men and robust women4 ,by all the honorable traditions of the noble family into which you are now adopted1 you are pledged not to pick your way daintily in the soft places of the earth2 you are pledged to make your lives real1 useful1 constructive4 ,remember--noblesse oblige6 ,,transcriber',s ,,notes3 ,spaced out text is surrounded by underscores3 gesperrt4 ,obvious typographical errors have been corrected4