Patrick D. Bowen Blog

Sunday, October 6, 2013

Marcus Garvey on "Knowledge of Yourself"

An incredibly influential concept in the AAIR:

“May I say something to you to give you a true knowledge of yourself and life, so that the same glory and success obtained by other men who understand themselves may be yours? Man in the full knowledge of himself is a superb and supreme creature of creation. When man becomes possessor of the knowledge of himself, he becomes master of his environment, the captain of his own ship, the director of his own destiny, the accomplisher of his own ends. Man should understand himself because man is full of knowledge and this knowledge is a gift of nature. When Mother Nature created man, she deprived him of nothing. He was given the faculty of understanding all things around him. And this faculty for understanding has not been taken away from him. None of his senses have been taken away from him. So there is no excuse for the black man in lacking the knowledge that man has used to beautify the world and produce all that he needs for his happiness and civilization. Look the world over, and whatever you see in it that is pleasing to man, contributing to man’s comfort, to his needs, and to his satisfaction—it is but the work of man, man blessed with the knowledge of himself and the understanding of all things around him. If you are able to live with the knowledge of yourself and with the greater knowledge of nature, you must know what is good and what is not, you must know what is finite, you must know that which is material, physical, and otherwise is at your disposal to create or otherwise use. … You must acquire an understanding of yourselves!”

Listen to it here (this excerpt starts at 4:07)