quote · Legacy record
One reads the truer deeper facts of Reconstruction with a great despair. It is at once so simple and human, and yet so futile. There is no villain, no idiot, no saint. There are just men; men who crave ease and power, men who know want and hunger, men who have crawled. They all dream and strive with ecstasy of fear and strain of effort, balked of hope and hate. Yet the rich world is wide enough for all, wants all, needs all. So slight a gesture, a word, might set the strife in order, not with full content, but with growing dawn of fulfillment. Instead roars the crash of hell...
One reads the truer deeper facts of Reconstruction with a great despair. It is at once so simple and human, and yet so futile. There is no villain, no idiot, no saint. There are just men; men who crave ease and power, men who know want and hunger, men who have crawled. They all dream and strive with ecstasy of fear and strain of effort, balked of hope and hate. Yet the rich world is wide enough for all, wants all, needs all. So slight a gesture, a word, might set the strife in order, not with full content, but with growing dawn of fulfillment. Instead roars the crash of hell...
Approximate author period: c. 1915 AD · modern
Meaning not yet available
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- Author or tradition
- W.E.B. Du Bois
Attribution: attributed - Country attributed
- Not established
A country attribution does not establish the earliest origin. - Historical period
- Approximate author period: c. 1915 AD · modern
Approximate author-period evidence for W. E. B. Du Bois: life dates 1868 to 1963. Wikidata Q158060, inspected 2026-10-08. Not a quotation composition date or independent verification of attribution. Source: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q158060 (accessed 2026-10-08).
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Supplied reference C; CSV row 303465; supplied attribution, independently unverified
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