I succeeded in teaching a number of the idiots from the asylums both to read and to write so well that I was able to present them at a public school for an examination together with normal children. And they passed the examination successfully.
These results seemed almost miraculous to those who saw them. To me, however, the boys from the asylums had been able to compete with the normal children only because they had been taught in a different way. They had been helped in their psychic development, and the normal children had, instead, been suffocated, held back. I found myself thinking that if, some day, the special education which had developed these idiot children in such a marvellous fashion, could be applied to the development of normal children, the "miracle" of which my friends talked would no longer be possible. The abyss between the inferior mentality of the idiot and that of the normal brain can never be bridged if the normal child has reached his full development.
While everyone was admiring the progress of my idiots, I was searching for the reasons which could keep the happy healthy children of the common schools on so low a plane that they could be equalled in tests of intelligence by my unfortunate pupils!
One day, a directress in the Institute for Deficients, asked me to read one of the prophecies of Ezekiel which had made a profound impression upon her, as it seemed to prophesy the education of deficients.
"The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones.
"And caused me to pass by them round about: and, behold, there were very many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry.
"And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou knowest.
"Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry hones, hear the word of the Lord.
"Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live:
"And I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the Lord.