He still remained in the South, for Minnie’s grave had made the South to him a sacred place, a place in which to labor and to wait until peace like bright dew should descend where carnage had spread ruin around, and freedom and justice, like glorified angels, should reign triumphant where violence and slavery had held their fearful carnival of shame and crime for ages.  Earnestly he set himself to bring around the hour when

  Peace, white-robed and pure, should move
    O’er rifts of ruin deep and wide,
  When her hands should span with lasting love
    The chasms rent by hate and pride.

And he was blessed in his labors of love and faith.

Conclusion

And now, in conclusion, may I not ask the indulgence of my readers for a few moments, simply to say that Louis and Minnie are only ideal beings, touched here and there with a coloring from real life?

But while I confess (not wishing to mis-represent the most lawless of the Ku-Klux) that Minnie has only lived and died in my imagination, may I not modestly ask that the lesson of Minnie shall have its place among the educational ideas for the advancement of our race?

The greatest want of our people, if I understand our wants aright, is not simply wealth, nor genius, nor mere intelligence, but live men, and earnest, lovely women, whose lives shall represent not a “stagnant mass, but a living force.”

We have wealth among us, but how much of it is ever spent in building up the future of the race? in encouraging talent, and developing genius?  We have intelligence, but how much do we add to the reservoir of the world’s thought?  We have genius among us, but how much can it rely upon the colored race for support?

Take even the Christian Recorder; where are the graduates from colleges and high school whose pens and brains lend beauty, strength, grace and culture to its pages?

If, when their school days are over, the last composition shall have been given at the examination, will not the disused faculties revenge themselves by rusting?  If I could say it without being officious and intrusive, I would say to some who are about to graduate this year, do not feel that your education is finished, when the diploma of your institution is in your hands.  Look upon the knowledge you have gained only as a stepping stone to a future, which you are determined shall grandly contrast with the past.

While some of the authors of the present day have been weaving their stories about white men marrying beautiful quadroon girls, who, in so doing were lost to us socially, I conceived of one of that same class to whom I gave a higher, holier destiny; a life of lofty self-sacrifice and beautiful self-consecration, finished at the post of duty, and rounded off with the fiery crown of martyrdom, a circlet which ever changes into a diadem of glory.