Along whatever way one’s path may happen to lie, and whatever may be the task which he undertakes to perform, his life would be utterly unnatural if it were devoid of difficulties. A life without handicaps would be no more natural than a summer without showers or a year without a winter. It is not even desirable that one should live without encountering more or less resistance to his efforts to realize his best and highest hopes. Furthermore, these difficulties are often unforeseen. They cannot be calculated, but they must be allowed for. At the beginning of the carrying out of any enterprise, the proper thing to do is to reckon one’s resources and to count the cost. At the beginning of any journey, the barriers in the way must be a calculation in the plan. At the outset of any endeavor, one must realize that not every part of his task will be altogether easy. If it were, the finished product would hardly be worth while, and certainly the toiler himself would not have benefited largely from his labor. Difficulties, expected and unexpected, are as certain to come as is the succession of the days and nights. Life is frequently likened to a race. It is true that it is a progress toward a goal, and that in it there are many who are contending against each other for what they look upon as a victory. Life is not a race, however, in which every element of the situation is ideal for every runner. It is only in dreams where such perfect conditions may be found. In the hard facts of life it is otherwise. In the real race each contestant has at least some odds against him. Life, then, is a race in which each runner is hampered with a handicap. Each situation presents some difficulty, and occasionally the most brilliant of successes is made in spite of this hindrance. The ideal race would not be one without handicaps. It is rather one in which a man plays his part well in spite of handicaps. The ideal victory is not that which is won because the contestant had everything in his favor. It is rather the one which is gained in spite of the odds which the contestant had against him. Homer and Milton were blind, yet each won for himself a secure place among the world’s small group of immortal poets. It would have been easy for either to have made his affliction an excuse for failure. Instead, each made his handicap an added reason for success. Each learned to glimpse a glory which is hidden to most who are blessed with faultless vision.