The guilty child declamation piece. David Walker, 1785 2022-11-17
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The "Guilty Child" is a powerful and poignant declamation piece that touches on the complex and often difficult relationship between a parent and a child. At its core, the piece grapples with the theme of guilt and responsibility, as the child in the story takes on the burden of guilt for their parent's mistakes and shortcomings.
The piece begins with the child's assertion that they are guilty, and that they have "shouldered the weight of [their] parent's sins." This immediately establishes the central conflict of the piece, as the child feels responsible for their parent's actions and believes that they must bear the consequences for them. This idea is further emphasized as the child describes how they have "carried the cross of [their] parent's shame" and "born the burden of [their] parent's guilt."
As the piece progresses, it becomes clear that the child's guilt is not only a result of their parent's mistakes, but also a result of their own feelings of inadequacy and failure. The child feels that they have not lived up to their parent's expectations, and that they have let them down. This is exemplified in the line "I am guilty because I am not enough," which highlights the child's internal struggle with self-worth and their belief that they have failed to be the kind of child that their parent wanted them to be.
Despite their feelings of guilt and responsibility, the child also recognizes that they are not solely to blame for their parent's actions. They acknowledge that their parent has made mistakes and that they have their own demons to contend with. However, the child's sense of responsibility is so strong that they are unable to let go of their guilt, even in the face of their parent's own flaws and weaknesses.
The "Guilty Child" declamation piece is a powerful and emotionally charged piece that speaks to the complex and often difficult dynamic between a parent and a child. It touches on themes of guilt, responsibility, and self-worth, and highlights the way in which children can internalize their parent's mistakes and take on the burden of guilt and shame as their own. Ultimately, the piece serves as a poignant reminder of the powerful and lasting impact that a parent can have on their child's life, and the importance of understanding and forgiveness in any parent-child relationship.
David Walker, 1785
My colour will yet, root some of you out of the very face of the earth!!!!!! I would wish, candidly, however, before the Lord, to be understood, that I would not give a pinch of snuff to be married to any white person I ever saw in all the days of my life. These positions I shall endeavour, by the help of the Lord, to demonstrate in the course of this Appeal, to the satisfaction of the most incredulous mind--and may God Almighty, who is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, open your hearts to understand and believe the truth. If you do you are much mistaken--See how the American people treat us--have we souls in our bodies? It is surprising to think that the Americans, having the Bible in their hands, do not believe it. I declare, it is really so amusing to hear the Southerners and Westerners of this country talk about barbarity, that it is positively, enough to make a man smile. But they who stay to till the ground must be slaves. I have searched the Bible as well as they, if I am not as well learned as they are, and have never seen a verse which testifies whether we are the seed of Cain or of Abel. Some perhaps may deny, by saying, that they never thought or said that we were not men.
A declaration made July 4, 1776. Now, I ask you, had you not rather be killed than to be a slave to a tyrant, who takes the life of your mother, wife, and dear little children? Why do they not take possession of those places? Then if he gives peace and tranquillity to tyrants, and permits them to keep our fathers, our mothers, ourselves and our children in eternal ignorance and wretchedness, to support them and their families, would he be to us a God of justice? But I declare that the atrocity is really to Heaven daring and infernal, that I must say that God has commenced a course of exposition among the Americans, and the glorious and heavenly work will continue to progress until they learn to do justice. But God deceived him as he will Christian Americans, unless they are very cautious how they move. Where would be the principle or piety that would govern the people? Notice, I said in the concluding clause of Article 3--I call God, I call Angels, I call men to witness, that the destruction of the Americans is at hand, and will be speedily consummated unless they repent. They yield in a moment to the whites, let them be right or wrong--the reason they are able to keep their feet on our throats. Whether you believe it or not, I tell you that God will dash tyrants, in combination with devils, into atoms, and will bring you out from your wretchedness and miseries under these Christian People!!!!!! Can it be that which was preached by our Lord Jesus Christ from Heaven? But to return to Mr.
He may also, see them telling news and lies, making mischief one upon another. I have several times called the white Americans our natural enemies--I shall here define my meaning of the phrase. May God have mercy on your freedom and happiness!! While the Spaniards are running about upon the field of battle cutting each other's throats, has not the Lord an afflicted and suffering people in the midst of them, whose cries and groans in consequence of oppression are continually pouring into the ears of the God of justice? Will it be the case with the whites of the United States of America? And when my curious observer comes to take notice of those who are said to be free, which assertion I deny and who are making some frivolous pretentions to common sense, he will see that branch of ignorance among the slaves assuming a more cunning and deceitful course of procedure. I have known tyrants or usurpers of human liberty in different parts of this country to take their fellow creatures, the coloured people, and beat them until they would scarcely leave life in them; what for? But how far the American preachers are from preaching against slavery and oppression, which have carried their country to the brink of a precipice; to save them from plunging down the side of which, will hardly be affected, will appear in the sequel of this paragraph, which I shall narrate just as as it transpired. But they got dreadfully deceived. Here is a fact, which I this very minute take from the mouth of a young coloured man, who has been to school in this state Massachusetts nearly nine years, and who knows grammar this day, nearly as well as he did the day he first entered the school-house, under a white master. Any man who is curious to see the full force of ignorance developed among the coloured people of the United States of America, has only to go into the southern and western states of this confederacy, where, if he is not a tyrant, but has the feelings of a human being, who can feel for a fellow creature, he may see enough to make his very heart bleed! The whites have always been an unjust, jealous, unmerciful, avaricious and blood-thirsty set of beings, always seeking after power and authority.
To which he also replied in the negative, telling me his son did not learn those things. Here I pause for a moment, to give the world time to consider what was my surprise, to hear such preaching from a minister of my Master, whose very gospel is that of peace and not of blood and whips, as this pretended preacher tried to make us believe. These ignorant, vicious, and wretched men, contribute almost as much injury to our body as tyrants themselves, by doing so much for the promotion of ignorance amongst us; for they, making such pretensions to knowledge, such of our youth as are seeking after knowledge, and can get access to them, take them as criterions to go by, who will lead them into a channel, where, unless the Lord blesses them with the privilege of seeing their folly, they will be irretrievably lost forever, while in time!!! Any hyphens occurring in line breaks have been removed, and the trailing part of a word has been joined to the preceding line. This is a fair illustration of the state of society in this country--it shows what a bearing avarice has upon a people, when they are nearly given up by the Lord to a hard heart and a reprobate mind, in consequence of afflicting their fellow creatures. Torrey's Portraiture of Domestic Slavery in the United States, page 85, 86.
But Christian Americans, not only hinder their fellow creatures, the Africans, but thousands of them will absolutely beat a coloured person nearly to death, if they catch him on his knees, supplicating the throne of grace. Have not the Americans instituted laws to hinder us from obtaining our freedom? They think that we do not feel for our brethren, whom they are murdering by the inches, but they are dreadfully deceived. Not, indeed, to show me a coloured President, a Governor, a Legislator, a Senator, a Mayor, or an Attorney at the Bar. At this moment, every negro was found to be perfectly at liberty; and one of them seizing a club, gave Petit a violent blow on the head, and laid him dead at his feet; and Allen, who came to his assistance, met a similar fate, from the contents of a pistol fired by another of the gang. There have been and are at this day in Boston, New-York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore, coloured men, who are in league with tyrants, and who receive a great portion of their daily bread, of the moneys which they acquire from the blood and tears of their more miserable brethren, whom they scandalously delivered into the hands of our natural enemies!!!!!! Encountered typographical errors have been preserved, and appear in red type. Is he not able to repay the Americans for their cruelties, with which they have afflicted Africa's sons and daughters, without our interference, unless we are ordered? It is not, indeed, what I care about inter-marriages with the whites, which induced me to pass this subject in review; for the Lord knows, that there is a day coming when they will be glad enough to get into the company of the blacks, notwithstanding, we are, in this generation, levelled by them, almost on a level with the brute creation: and some of us they treat even worse than they do the brutes that perish.
God will show the whites what we are, yet. Would we not long before this time, have been respectable men, instead of such wretched victims of oppression as we are? If they do not want to part with your labours, which have enriched them, let them keep you, and my word for it, that God Almighty, will break their strong band. But do not actions speak louder than words? I assure you that God will accomplish it--if nothing else will answer, he will hurl tyrants and devils into atoms and make way for his people. They excelled too, in science, insomuch as to be usually employed as tutors to their master's children; Epictetus, Terence and Phædrus, were slaves,--but they were of the race of whites. But let us review Mr. Now suppose God were to give them more sense, what would they do? Wright, and Natalia Smith First edition, 2001 ca.
When this is accomplished a burst of glory will shine upon you, which will indeed astonish you and the world. Clay's public labor for these States--I want you candidly to answer the Lord, who sees the secrets of our hearts. See the inconsistency of the assertions of those wretches--they beat us inhumanely, sometimes almost to death, for attempting to inform ourselves, by reading the Word of our Maker, and at the same time tell us, that we are beings void of intellect!!!! This barbarous cruelty was by all the heathen nations of antiquity, and is by the Pagans, Jews and Mahometans of the present day, left entirely to Christian Americans to inflict on the Africans and their descendants, that their cup which is nearly full may be completed. Do you know that Mr. But some may ask, did not the blacks of Africa, and the mulattoes of Asia, go on in the same way as did the whites of Europe. Will he suffer one part of his creatures to go on oppressing another like brutes always, with impunity? The Antideluvians and heathens never dreamed of such barbarities.
Do the whites say, I being a black man, ought to be humble, which I readily admit? The man whose aspirations are not above, and even below these, is indeed, ignorant and wretched enough. Does he regard the heathens abroad, more than the heathens among the Americans? See his writings for the world, and public labours for the United States of America. Did not God make us all as it seemed best to himself? I hope you will not let it pass unnoticed. I ask those people who treat us so well, Oh! We are all in the world together!! We must and shall be free I say, in spite of you. Have we any other Master but Jesus Christ alone? From their condition, and the unconquerable prejudices resulting from their colour, they never could amalgamate with the free whites of this country. Clay, what kind of Christianity? Know this, my dear sirs, that although you treat us and our children now, as you do your domestic beast--yet the final result of all future events are known but to God Almighty alone, who rules in the armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, and who dethrones one earthly king and sits up another, as it seemeth good in his holy sight.
How we could be so submissive to a gang of men, whom we cannot tell whether they are as good as ourselves or not, I never could conceive. But the slaves among the Romans. There is no intelligent black man who knows any thing, but esteems a real Englishman, let him see him in what part of the world he will--for they are the greatest benefactors we have upon earth. America was colonized by as wise, judicious and educated men as the world afforded. Extract from the Speech of Mr. Let them commence their attack upon us as they did on our brethren in Ohio, driving and beating us from our country, and my soul for theirs, they will have enough of it. I know that the blacks, take them half enlightened and ignorant, are more humane and merciful than the most enlightened and refined European that can be found in all the earth.
And Joseph went out over all the land of Egypt. But we will leave the whites or Europeans as heathens, and take a view of them as Christians, in which capacity we see them as cruel, if not more so than ever. If it were possible, would they not dethrone Jehovah and seat themselves upon his throne? Has He not the hearts of all men in His hand? This language, perhaps is too harsh for the American's delicate ears. Have not the Americans the Bible in their hands? When the ark rested after the flood upon Mount Arrarat, in Asia, they eight were all the people which could be found alive in all the earth--in fact if Scriptures be true, which I believe are there were no other living men in all the earth, notwithstanding some ignorant creatures hesitate not to tell us that we, the blacks are the seed of Cain the murderer of his brother Abel. Can the whites deny this charge? They certainly think that we are a gang of fools.
