But are occupations for the fullest use of a higher education by colored people limited? They certainly are. A white pastor may minister to a colored church, a white teacher may instruct colored children, a white physician may prescribe for a colored patient, a white attorney may counsel for a colored client, a white mechanic may employ colored laborers, a white merchant may serve colored customers, but in none of these spheres does the rule work both ways except in a few rare instances. So the services of educated colored people in the professions and in business are confined to their own race, and in that they are crowded by their white competitors. Furthermore they are not welcomed to these higher walks of life even among their own people by their neighbors of the more powerful race; but the general and almost universal public sentiment is in favor of keeping them down. More than this, many of their own race prefer the services of white lawyers, physicians, ministers, teachers, mechanics and merchants. Under all these adverse circumstances and others that might be named, it requires great courage and perseverance in a colored youth to complete a full course of study. But should they be encouraged or dissuaded? If the philosophy of civilization teaches anything it teaches that Nature intended that every man should make the most of himself, and every race should attain the highest possible development; and if Christianity teaches anything it teaches the same lesson. Unless some one knows for certain that the Negro is the descendant of Ham, and that the descendants of Ham have not yet served their time in hewing wood and drawing water, why not test the virtue of this rather queer theory by trying, on a small scale, the experiment of giving Negroes the opportunity of acquiring all the education their mental capacity is capable of receiving, and looking on to see what they will do with it, and what effect it will have upon the race, and not expect that every individual will be a success or achieve high place among men? As the masses become enlightened the demand for well educated men and women must increase. The “cornfield preacher” who depends upon the “Sperrit” will step down and out, and the seminary graduate, with “Bible religion” will take his place. Thoroughly trained and equipped colored lawyers and physicians will conquer the prejudice that now exists among their own people against them, and will conquer it the more easily if they are better prepared for work than their white competitors. All this need not come about in one generation. We can transmit the work, with our faith and our hopes, as a legacy to our children.