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I have mentioned these things because I wish to emphasize that there isn't anybody here who could not probably beg, borrow, or steal a library, or even a bedroom or a barn, in which to start an organization such as ours. There is probably no community in the country large enough to justify an association for the blind where $400 could not be found to start one.

A great drawback to the ease with which our work might be accomplished is the blind graduate who has been inefficiently trained at school. We have such, who have all kinds of honor marks in Greek, Latin, music, theory, etc., but who cannot speak an English sentence without a grammatical error or even keep personally clean. We have others who profess to be tuners, but who are too fond of us to tune the Association's pianos lest they hurt them. There are other graduates, notably from Overbrook, Perkins, and Batavia, who have been so well taught that we only wish that they could become our teachers and cooperators. The school does not do its duty unless the greatest number of graduates are efficient advocates and examples of the capacity of the blind, unless they have strong bodies which make it possible for them to make the most of their brains and hands. Though our blind may lose their sight after the school age, every efficient blind person who has learned how to be blind under a sympathetic and capable corps of teachers, who has been adequately prepared physically and mentally to take his place in the world, is a beacon light of encouragement to the other blind in their darkness, ignorance, or helplessness.

The after care of the blind when he has left school is a serious problem, but one which at last we are all beginning to recognize. The duty of the community to provide for the aged and infirm blind has been one which it has dealt with to some extent, and the results, like the curate's egg, have been good in spots.

We have long recognized the right of every individual to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The time has come now when modern justice should make this possible for our indigent blind. Life in the almshouse cannot truly be called life for an intelligent, ambitious man or woman who loses sight in the fullness of strength, and who wishes to turn that strength again into a useful channel. Liberty is not possible for the poor blind unless we teach them to work, and do not force them to accept charity, to beg, or to steal. The pursuit of happiness is not possible without opportunity. Therefore, our Republic does not fulfill the modern conception of liberty for all; our humanity is incomplete as long as we do not prevent all possible blindness, give every unavoidably blind child, every blind man, and every blind woman a chance -- a chance to do their best, despite their handicap, to develop that capacity which God has given them.