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“Of these agents there are two kinds. There are the external agents of the enemy. I have already talked in detail about them. And then there are our internal enemies, those we carry in our souls. Tonight I will talk of these internal agents, injected into us by the enemy, operating from within, and therefore much more dangerous than the external kind.”
“’How, you ask me, how did these agents get into us, into our behavior, into our very souls? In answer I say to you: Remember what slavery did, what slavery meant. Slavery took you, took her, took him, took everyone of you, plucked you root and branch and fruit and flower, and lost you in the western world. Slavery westernized you. It is up to you, if you want to break from slavery, to return to your roots.”
“Westernization: what does it mean? It means you have been immersed for centuries in filth. Returning to your roots means you need to wash your selves, your bodies, your behavior, clean of all those centuries of dirt.”
“Brothers, sisters, the recognition of the internal enemy is no easy task. The enemy disguises himself in ideas, in the shape of principles. Ideas and principles are hard to recognize as enemies. But what is a guide for if not to point you to the true path away from the false? What is divine guidance but your help in lifting every clever disguise from the enemy’s face? Tonight I will name for you the many disguises, the dangerous masks of the internal enemy: the western traits implanted in you to destroy you.”
“’Listen to truth, lost sister,’ Cinque said. ‘The work I’m doing here is for my people. That sister was sent to me twisted. I started to straighten her out. I was set to make her a queen, in a land of kings and queens.’”
“’Cinque, none of this makes sense. There’s no such thing as a land of kings and queens. For one king you have millions of subjects and slaves. Africans moved beyond that nonsense about kings and queens ages ago.’”
“’You denying history?’”
“’No, Cinque. I’m telling you the need to be royal is a sickness of the slave soul.’”
Ayi Kwei Armah
“Osiris Rising: A novel of Africa past, present and future”
Pages 142 & 153 respectively
Don’t know how I feel about this part
““’Cinque, none of this makes sense. There’s no such thing as a land of kings and queens. For one king you have millions of subjects and slaves. Africans moved beyond that nonsense about kings and queens ages ago.’”“’You denying history?’”
“’No, Cinque. I’m telling you the need to be royal is a sickness of the slave soul.’”
