Association with the masters, missionary effort and motives of expediency gave these rites an early veneer of Christianity, and after the lapse of many generations the Negro church became Christian.
From "The Souls of Black Folk," this passage explains how early African religious practices adopted a Christian veneer and evolved into the Negro church.
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The ten master songs I have mentioned tell in word and music of trouble and exile, of strife and hiding; they grope toward some unseen power and sigh for rest in the End.
The words that are left to us are not without interest, and, cleared of evident dross, they conceal much of real poetry and meaning beneath conventional theology and unmeaning rhapsody.
Then in after years when I came to Nashville I saw the great temple builded of these songs towering over the pale city.
But the true Negro folk-song still lives in the hearts of those who have heard them truly sung and in the hearts of the Negro people.