eBook David Walker's Appeal - Journal of Pan African Studies

Now let us reason--I mean you of the United States, whom I believe God designs to save from
destruction, if you will hear. For I declare to you, whether you believe it or not, that there are
some on the continent of America, who will never be able to repent. God will surely destroy
them, to show you his disapprobation of the murders they and you have inflicted on us. I say, let
us reason; had you not better take our body, while you have it in your power, and while we are
yet ignorant and wretched, not knowing but a little, give us education, and teach us the pure
religion of our Lord and Master, which is calculated to make the lion lay down in peace with the
lamb, and which millions of you have beaten us nearly to death for trying to obtain since we
have been among you, and thus at once, gain our affection while we are ignorant? Remember
Americans, that we must and shall be free and enlightened as you are, will you wait until we
shall, under God, obtain our liberty by the crushing arm of power? Will it not be dreadful for
you? I speak Americans for your good. We must and shall be free I say, in spite of you. You may
do your best to keep us in wretchedness and misery, to enrich you and your children, but God
will deliver us from under you. And wo, wo, will be to you if we have to obtain our freedom by
fighting. Throw away your fears and prejudices then, and enlighten us and treat us like men, and
we will like you more than we do now hate you; you are not astonished at my saying we hate
you, for if we are men we cannot but hate you, while you are treating us like dogs.
And tell us now no more about colonization, for America is as much our country, as it is
yours.Treat us like men, and there is no danger but we will all live in peace and happiness
together. For we are not like you, hard hearted, unmerciful, and unforgiving; what a happy
country this will be, if the whites will listen. What nation under heaven, will be able to do
anything with us, unless God gives us up into its hand? But Americans,
I declare to you, while you keep us and our children in bondage, and treat us like brutes, to make
us support you and your families, we cannot be your friends. You do not look for it, do you?
Treat us then like men, and we will be your friends. And there is not a doubt in my mind, but that
the whole of the past will be sunk into oblivion, and we yet, under God, will become a united and
happy people. The whites may say it is impossible, but remember that nothing is impossible with
God.
The Americans may say or do as they please, but they have to raise us from the condition of
brutes to that of respectable men, and to make a national acknowledgement to us for the wrongs
they have inflicted on us. As unexpected, strange, and wild as these propositions may to some
appear, it is no less a fact, that unless they are complied with, the Americans of the United States,
though they may for a little while escape, God will yet weigh them in a balance, and if they are
not superior to other men, as they have represented themselves to be, he will give them
wretchedness to their very heart's content.
50
David Walker’s Appeal by David Walker
The Journal of Pan African Studies 2009 eBook