it
should be immediately supplemented by a trade, to labor skillfully, is
its great want today.

The question has been asked: "Can any race safely exist in any country
composed only of unskilled laborers and professional men? Must not the
future leaders of our people come from the middle classes, from those
who work and think?" Education to be of practical advantage must not
only sharpen the intellect, but it must be of that sort that will enable
them to engage in pursuits and avocations above those of mere drudgery;
those that are more lucrative, and from which accumulate wealth. The
school room must be the stepping stone to a good trade. The statement
has been made (which may be problematical) that we have fewer,
comparatively, very many fewer, mechanics of all kinds now than we had
in the days of slavery. The master knew that the money value of the
slave was increased in the ratio of his efficiency as a skilled laborer.

To the credit of Kentucky, Alabama, Arkansas and other Southern States,
they have made generous provisions for industrial education by supplying
machinery and the most modern appliances to teach skilled labor to
those who prefer them to the white apron of the waiter or the grubbing
hoe of the plantation. Of the students that graduate from our high
schools and colleges there are those who have not the qualities of head
and heart essential for teaching and preaching, including a love and
devotion to those callings, and possibly would have been shining marks
had their studies fitted them to grapple with the mercantile or
industrial factors that promise a future more independent and lucrative.

The advancement of any race in morals and culture is retarded when poor
and dependent. It is indispensable to progress that it has the benefit
of earnings laid by. It is therefore to these industrial features that
we must look for the foundation of advancement for the race. It will not
be found at either extreme of our present avocations; neither the
attainment of the professions, nor devotion to menial labor will solve
the problem of the "better way." A greater number must be fitted to
obtain work more lucrative in character and more ennobling in effect.
Institutions of applied science and business pursuits seem to me the
great doorway to ultimate success. Economy and industries of this kind
will more rapidly produce the means to achieve that higher education for
the race so desirable. Morality, learning and w