NEGRO AS A WRITER.

BY REV. J. Q. JOHNSON, D. D.

[Illustration: J. Q. Johnson, D. D.]

REV. J. Q. JOHNSON, D. D.

Rev. J. Q. Johnson, D. D., was graduated from the Collegiate
Department, of Fisk University in 1890; from the Hartford
Theological Seminary in 1893. He taught mathematics at
Tuskegee for one year; the John P. Slater fund published his
report of the fifth Tuskegee Negro Conference in its series
of "Occasional Papers." He has been President of Allen
University, Columbia, S. C. His pastoral work has embraced
some of the strongest and most influential churches in the
A. M. E. connection. Associated with him was his brilliant
and cultured wife--Mrs. Halle Tanner Johnson--the first
woman who ever passed the State Medical Board of Examiners
of Alabama. Her recent death was a loss to the race.

Dr. Johnson is among the foremost men of his church. He is
among the best read men of the race. He is an able preacher
and a strong, forceful writer. One of his characteristic
points is his ability to say much in little. He goes right
to the point without wasting time with needless _words_. He
received Doctor's degree from Morris Brown College, Atlanta,
Ga. He studied two years as a post-graduate student at
Princeton University.

It would be extravagant to set up any claims of greatness in behalf of
Negro writers. The Negro has yet his contribution to make to the
literature of mankind. We fully believe that he has a message to
deliver. The making of a writer is a matter of centuries. England was
a long time producing a Shakespeare or a Milton, Italy a Dante, Russia
a Tolstoi, France a Hugo or a Dumas, Germany a Goethe and a Schiller.
America, active in invention and commerce, has not yet produced a name
worthy to stand by the side of those just mentioned. All really great
writers have not only a national or racial, but also a universal
quality in their productions. So far the greater part of our literary
effort has been of historical compilations. We have accumulated a
large mass of material for the future historians. Williams' "History
of the Negro Race" is an example of this kind. In this way we have
recorded the deeds of distinguished Negroes in every avenue of life.
Such works have kept alive the hope and kindled the aspirations of the
race. A most interesting work of this kind is that of Pro