Darkwater - Voices from Within the Veil by W. E. B. (William Edward Burghardt) Du Bois
page 23 of 248 (09%)
page 23 of 248 (09%)
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And yet, whose is the deeper guilt? Who made these devils? Who nursed them in crime and fed them on injustice? Who ravished and debauched their mothers and their grandmothers? Who bought and sold their crime and waxed fat and rich on public iniquity? _Thou knowest, good God!_ Is this Thy Justice, O Father, that guile be easier than innocence and the innocent be crucified for the guilt of the untouched guilty? _Justice, O Judge of men!_ Wherefore do we pray? Is not the God of the Fathers dead? Have not seers seen in Heaven's halls Thine hearsed and lifeless form stark amidst the black and rolling smoke of sin, where all along bow bitter forms of endless dead? _Awake, Thou that sleepest!_ Thou art not dead, but flown afar, up hills of endless light, through blazing corridors of suns, where worlds do swing of good and gentle men, of women strong and free--far from the cozenage, black hypocrisy, and chaste prostitution of this shameful speck of dust! _Turn again, O Lord; leave us not to perish in our sin!_ From lust of body and lust of blood,-- _Great God, deliver us!_ |
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