Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 1, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 January 1892 — Contented Blind Men. [ARTICLE]

Contented Blind Men.

"I see Alphonse Daudot is very feeble and almost blind,” said Mr. J. W. Willard. “And yet,” he went on, "he is dictating to his wife wbat will probably bo his lust novel. It is curious to note the different spirit in which different great men moot affliction. I remember a German savant whoso one object in life was learning, and when his sight was gone he oonnnittod suicide. That gone, the world to him was us the darkness of tho tomb. Milton felt his blindness keenly, ns in his pathetic sonnet he lets the world know, but ho did some of his greatest work while suffering under the calamity. Heine, in his six years of suffering uud anguish, spent in what ho himself cynically terms his ‘graveof mattresses,’ wrote some of his most touching poems. The blind ohupluiu of Congress —Dr. Milburn —is one of tho happiest of mortals; so was tho late Mr. Fawcett, Postmaster-General of Englund, and I know a doctor near Chicago who, though blind, is one of lho cleverest of his profession. He not only attends to Ids large circle of patients, but is u writer on medical subjects as well, and operates tho typewriter with the skill of a professional. In company he plays tho most trying games of cards and is tho brightest man at the tublc. After ull, it seems to be a case of a man having tho inind to rise superior to tho troubles of life, and recognizing that oven undor attliotion there are things worth living for.”—[Bt. Louis Globe-Democrat.