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"If every child born into the community," says Doctor Howe, "has a right to food for his body and knowledge for his mind, then has he a right to some useful employment, for without it food and knowledge become but curses; they had better have been withheld."

Upon this broad and humane principle he organized the Perkins Institution for the Blind in Boston. Its first object was to instruct and enlighten the young blind, its second to enable the blind to earn their own livelihood. Accordingly, in 1840, he established a work department where those who had finished their education could pursue for their own profit the trades they had learned in school.

His annual reports furnish an interesting account of the ups and downs of his experiment. When a new enterprise is undertaken, it often happens that obstacles and difficulties are disregarded which later compel us to pause and consider. In the first enthusiasm of his work in behalf of the blind, Doctor Howe confidently expected that the great majority of the blind would be able to support themselves by means of their brains they would be musicians, teachers, journalists, and ministers of the gospel. The less gifted blind could earn their living by manual labour, with a little assistance and direction from their alma mater.

These expectations were doomed to disappointment. Not all blind persons are highly gifted. They do not all possess musical talent or extraordinary intellectual capacity; nor do they all have the energy and perseverance necessary to overcome the heavy handicap that they encounter at the start. If all the blind were Miltons and Rodenbachs, they would need no such champion as Doctor Howe -- no Moses would be necessary if there were no wilderness.

But although disappointed and often discouraged, Doctor Howe did not lose heart. Experience taught him the real wants of the blind and the best way to meet them. The failure of his high expectations showed him the imperative necessity of training the blind for some useful if less ambitious occupation.

He urged that the institutions should supplement their instruction by aiding their graduates in their attempts to become self-supporting.

The institutions, that is, should be the capitalists of the blind, but should seek no pecuniary advantage for themselves. They should be willing to make a considerable outlay in the beginning, and indeed to the end, if necessary. Their object should be to aid the blind to counteract the disadvantages under which they work by bringing them as near as possible to an equality of opportunity with other workmen.

Such were Doctor Howe's views when he opened a workshop for blind adults under the auspices of the Perkins Institution. The aim of the workshop was to give the blind the advantages which seeing workmen have -- of working in a company, of saving rent and fuel and other incidental expenses, of having capital, and obtaining their stock at wholesale cost, and getting their produce cheaply marketed. The shop, said Doctor Howe, should train them in diligence and skill; then if the world did not offer a field for the exercise of their talents, the institution should try to open one for them.

At the end of five years we find Doctor Howe optimistic about his experiment, and full of plans to extend the work so as to include a salesroom in the city for the reception and sale of articles made by the blind at home. Indeed, he looked forward to the foundation of an establishment broad enough to meet the wants of all the blind of New England. Would such an establishment, providing for so many persons, support itself? he asked. The answer was uncertain; but he argued that even if very few of the blind succeeded in becoming fully self-supporting, it was still good economy to enable them to earn as much of their support as possible. The State should help them indirectly in this way rather than pay their board and lodging. But, after all, the first consideration of a wise commonwealth is not economy, but the good of all its citizens.

We must cross the Atlantic and visit the Old World in order to find a practical demonstration of what the blind can do. The first institution for the employment of the blind was founded at Edinburgh in 1793. Since then workshops, salesrooms, and associations or agencies to promote the business interests of the blind have been established in Europe.

In Europe the emphasis has been upon industrial training, while in America more attention has been given to book education. When a pupil in a school for the blind in England or France shows no special apititude for music or intellectual pursuits, he is put into the work department, where he learns a trade. Afterward the institution, or one of the agencies for the purpose in his country, seeks out a position for him, and stands by him until he has proved his efficiency. On the other hand, when a student shows marked ability in any direction, he receives opportunity to fit himself for a more responsible position.