Because the Negro and the white race, although they have the same inherent powers, possess widely different characteristics. There are some things which the white race can do better than the Negro, and there are some things which the Negro can do better than the white race. This is no disparagement to either. It is no fault of the Negro that he has not that daring and restless spirit, that desire for founding new empires, that craving for power over weaker races, which makes the white race a pioneer; neither is it the fault of the white race that it has not that buoyancy of spirit, that cheerful patience, that music in the soul, that faith in a Higher Power, which supports the Negro under hardships that would crush or make pessimists of almost any other race on earth. There have been given to each race certain talents, and for them each will be held accountable, and rewarded accordingly as they shall use them. Two boys in the same family may be gifted differently, one with an artistic, the other with a scientific, turn of mind; both cannot become artists, nor both scientists, yet they may each become equally great in their respective spheres. It is for the Negro to find out his own best and strongest powers, and make the most of them. He cannot by merely imitating the white man arrive at his fullest and truest racial development. He cannot and will not, as an absolutely distinct race, evolve, along the same lines, the _identical_ civilization of the white race, but who shall say that along his own lines he may not evolve one equally as glorious and grand? It is true, situated as he is among the most advanced people of the world in the very height of their power, with almost all of the ideals before him belonging to that people, the American Negro is greatly handicapped in distinct racial development; but the task is, perhaps, not an impossible one. Some of the most accessible means have not yet been fully employed; for instance, the race has never been made entirely familiar with the deeds and thoughts of the few men of mark it has already produced. In this deeper sense of education the knowing of one Crispus Attucks is worth more to the race than the knowing of one George Washington; and the knowing of one Dunbar is worth more than the knowing of all the Longfellows that America will ever produce. If the Negro is to remain in this country a separate and distinct race, and is, as such, to reach the highest development of his powers, he ought to be given an education different from that given to the whites; in that, in addition to whatever other instruction he may receive, those virtuous traits and characteristics which are peculiarly his should be developed to the highest degree possible. If, on the other hand, he is to become, in time, one of the elements in the future American race--and this seems the more plausible answer to the question--his education ought to be purely American and not in any special way Negro.