I close with an illustration. Croesus was a rich man, a king. One day Croesus said to Solon, the philosopher, "Do you not think I am a happy man?" Solon answered, "Alas, I do not know, Croesus; that life is happy that ends well." A few years later when Croesus had lost his wealth, his kingdom, and his health, and had been deserted by those who in his days of glory ran to do his slightest bidding, Croesus in anguish and misery exclaimed, "Solon, Solon, thou saidst truly that life is well and happy that ends well." SOME ELEMENTS NECESSARY TO RACE DEVELOPMENT[42] BY ROBERT RUSSA MOTON _Commandant of Cadets, Hampton Institute, Virginia_ [Note 42: An address delivered at the Tuskegee Commencement, May, 1912.] _Students, Friends:_ Among the most highly developed races we observe certain dominant characteristics, certain very essential elements of character, by which they have so influenced mankind and helped the world that they were enabled to write their names in history so indelibly as to withstand and endure the test of time. Your education, your observation, your occupation, have brought you into close touch and into personal and vital relations with the fundamental problems of life. We may call it the truth problem, the labor problem, the Indian problem, or perhaps the Negro problem. I like to call it the "Human Race Problem." The dawn of history breaks upon a world at strife, a universal conflict of man at war with his brother. The very face of the earth has been dyed in blood and its surface whitened with human bones in an endeavor to establish a harmonious and helpful adjustment between man and man. There can be no interest more fundamental or of greater concern to the human family than the proper adjustment of man's relations to his brother. You and I belong to an undeveloped, backward race that is rarely for its own sake taken into account in the adjustment of man's relation to man, but is considered largely with reference to the impression which it makes upon the dominant Anglo-Saxon. The Negro's very existence is itself somewhat satellitious, and secondary only, to the great white orb around which he revolves. If by chance any light does appear in the black man's sphere of operations, it is usually assumed that it is reflected from his association with his white brother. The black is generally projected against the white and usually to the disadvantage and embarrassment of the former. It becomes very easy, therefore, to see in our minds and hearts what is so apparent in our faces, "Darkness there and nothing more."