W.E.B. DuBois

It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others. . . . One ever feels his twoness, - an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.

A little less complaint and whining, and a little more dogged work and manly striving, would do us more credit than a thousand civil rights bills.