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In the whirl and buzz of a lighted world the blind man, bewildered and helpless, sits clown in despair, and resigns himself with bitter patience to a life of inactivity and dependence. It is true that some blind men -- men blind from childhood or stricken with blindness in the midst of active lives -- have succeeded in almost every known business and profession despite their misfortune. But they have been men of exceptional capacity and energy.

Homer, Ossian, and Milton wrote great poems with never a ray of light in their eyes. Henry Fawcett, professor of political economy at Cambridge University, a member of Parliament for nineteen years, and, during Glad- stone's ministry, postmaster-general of Great Britain (he introduced many practical improvements in the postal service, among them the parcels post); Leonhard Euler, the Swiss mathematician and astronomer, who conducted his vast calculations mentally, and who was a member of all the royal societies of learning in Europe; Francois Huber, the naturalist, who was for a century the leading authority on bees; Augustin Thierry, the French historian, who wrote his great work on the Merovingians with the aid of others' eyes; and our own historian, William Hickling Prescott, are blind men who successfully kept in the forefront of life. A distinguished Belgian statesman and writer, Alexander Rodenbach, Didymus of Alexandria, the preceptor of Saint Jerome, Diodotus, the Stoic, friend and teacher of Cicero, Ziska, the leader of the Bohemians in the Hussite War; who thrice defeated the Emperor's forces, did noble work after their eyes had ceased to know the light. Blind men have been musicians, road-builders, carpenters, wood-workers, journalists, editors, yacht-builders, and teachers of the blind and the seeing.

These indomitable blind men wrought out their own salvation, and became the liberators of their afflicted fellows by proving what man can do in the dark by the light of courage and intelligence. For it must be seen that if an exceptional blind man, unaided by a special education in a school for the blind, can lead a life of service and distinction, an ordinary blind man without genius can be trained to do an ordinary man's work; and this . tells us what yet remains to do for the blind.

American commonwealths and philanthropists have always been generous to the blind. The states have provided excellent schools, generally based on sound and beneficent principles, for their blind children and youths. In many of these institutions the standard is high, and the pupils attain marked proficiency in all the common school branches. But for all the munificence of individual charity and the liberality of public endowment, the blind man is still lost to the community as a producer. Education, books, science, music do not Make the blind happy unless they enable them to work. Philanthropy which only rears fine buildings equipped with the implements of learning, and does not render its beneficiaries stronger and more serviceable citizens, annuls by unwisdom the generosity that inspires it, and makes void its charity.

Blind graduates of these schools have said to me, in the bitterness of disappointed hopes and ambitions, "It would have been better to leave us in ignorance than to enlighten and cultivate our minds only to plunge us into a double darkness. What boots it that we have spent our youth in kindergartens, museums, libraries, and music-rooms if we pass from those pleasant halls to sit with idle hands and eat the dry crust of discontent?" The time has come when strong and efficient measures should be taken in America to give the blind an opportunity to become self-supporting, or at least to earn a part of their support. In an age when the ability to work is regarded almost as a test of respectability, it is a disgrace that any man should be forced to sit in idleness.

The blind as a rule are poor. The parents of most of the children in the institutions for the blind are working people, and the man struck blind by accident or disease is usually a bread-winner. It is not uncommon for a young man to lose his sight in such occupations as stone-cutting, diamond-polishing, glazing, and blasting rocks. Without assistance, men thus blinded are doomed to involuntary idleness for the rest of their lives.

Up to the present day no adequate provision has been made for this class of blind persons in America, although Dr. Samuel G. Howe, the friend of all the afflicted and the pioneer in the education of the blind in the United States, outlined a plan to meet the industrial requirements of the adult blind more than sixty years ago. No other American has understood the sightless so thoroughly as Doctor Howe. He knew their weakness and how they might be strengthened. All his efforts in their behalf and all that he wrote about them show his discerning love and wisdom. He was one of the first to realize that there is something better even than feeding the hungry and clothing the naked, that it is a greater kindness to help them feed and clothe themselves. I do not know how I can better indicate the way in which the blind should be helped than by giving a summary of Doctor Howe's conclusions.