ssage of Macbeth:

We fail!
But screw your courage to the sticking-point,
And we'll not fail.

Always there is a reward for those who fight against difficulties, who
persist in their struggle even when failure follows failure. Everyday
the glad story of the sequel to such persistent struggles is recorded.
The records of commercial life, of school life, of home life are full of
these.

VI

CONQUERING INFIRMITY

Of all obstacles that can stand in the way of courageous conquest, one
of the most fatal, in the opinion of many, is blindness. Yet it is not
necessary that the loss of the eyes should be the fatal handicap it is
almost universally considered. It is a mistake to feel that when a
worker has anything seriously and permanently wrong with his eyes he
cannot be expected longer to perform tasks that are normal for one who
has the full use of all his five senses. In fact, when we hear that a
man is going blind we are apt to dismiss with a sigh his chance for
continuing productive labor of any sort; we feel that there is little
left for him but sitting resignedly in a chimney corner and listening to
others read to him or patiently fingering the raised letters provided
for the use of the blind.

In protest against this error a novelist has taken for his hero a young
man who lost his sight. His friends pitied him, talked dolefully to him,
promised to look after him in the days of incapacity. Of course he sank
lower and lower in the doleful dumps. Then one came into his life who
never seemed to notice his blindness, who talked to him as if he could
see, who encouraged him to do things by taking it for granted that they
would be performed. Her treatment proved effective; before long the
blind man was learning self-reliance, and was well on the road to
achievement.

The story was true to life for, times without number, blind men and
women have shown their ability to work as effectively as if they could
see. More than two hundred years ago a teacher in London named Richard
Lucas lost his eyesight. Many of his friends thought that he would, of
course, give up all idea of being a useful man; in that day few thought
of the possibility of one so afflicted doing anything worth much. But
the young man thought differently. He listened to others as they read to
him, and completed his studies. He became the author of a dozen volumes,
and was among the leaders of his day. One of his