p. 6 (198) | HOW TO BE APPRECIATED by G.

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Apr 1, 1903

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 29, No. 13.

HOW TO BE APPRECIATED.

By G.

It is wonderful how many things give way to the interest of the pocket-book. Even race prejudice, one of the most irresistible barbed-wire fences that crosscut human society, is not an exception. A prominent United States senator from the South is famous for his violent speeches on the negro question. Yet it is said that he employs on his plantation a negro who has had charge of everything in the owner's absence for the past thirty years. This negro enjoys the absolute confidence of his employer. In speaking of him recently, the senator is reported to have said:—

I do not know whether I belong to Joe, or Joe belongs

to me. Anyhow, we have been together for thirty years, and we have agreed to live together until one or both of us die, and when I go away, if I go first, I know he will shed as sincere a tear as anybody. I would die to protect him from injustice or wrong.

This is in harmony with Booker Washington's practical theory that if colored people will cultivate the industrial arts, and become expert workmen on the farm and in the workshop, their services will be in demand to fill responsible positions. Thus they will not only gain respect, but make themselves indispensable. The success of “Joe” as a manager, and the respect he commands from a most radical opponent of race equality, is an object lesson, showing that politics and enforced social recognition are not the only roads to respectability and success. As a rule, a shiftless, willfully-ignorant white man is not any more respected in society than the same grade of black man. “Water always seeks its level,” but men find theirs without seeking. Yet if one aspires to a higher level, he must work to that end in a legitimate manner. The man who is qualified to do something worth while, and does it energetically, will always find recognition—regardless of race, color, or previous condition.

And this is the principle upon which God deals with men. There is no respect of persons with Him. “Whatsoever good each one doeth, the same shall he receive again from the Lord, whether he be bond or free.” Eph. 6: 8. And “he that doeth wrong shall receive again for the wrong that he hath done.” Col. 3: 25. The Gospel of Jesus Christ knows no lines of race, color, or condition. This principle was shown to Peter by divine revelation, and he publicly proclaimed it at the house of Cornelius, in Cæsarea. “And Peter opened his mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons; but in every nation he that feareth Him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with Him.” Acts 10: 34, 35.