We know--it's been proved a thousand times ower--that a man can rise above sic trouble.

But he canno do it if he's thinking of it a' the time.

The men that have overcome the handicaps of blindness and deformity are those who gie no thought at all to what ails them--who go aboot as if they were as well and as strong as ever they've been.
It's a hard thing not to be heeding such things.
But it's easier than what these laddies have had to do, and what they must go on doing a' the rest of their lives.

They'll not be able to forget their troubles very long; there'll be plenty to remind them.
But let's not gae aboot the streets wi' our een like a pair of looking glasses in which every puir laddie sees himsel' reflected.
It's like the case of the lad that's been sair wounded aboot the head; that's had his face sae mangled and torn that he'd be a repulsive sicht were it not for the way that he became sae.

If he'd been courting a lassie before he was hurt wadna the thought of how she'd be feeling aboot him be amang his wairst troubles while he lay in hospital?
I've talked wi' such, and I know.
Noo, it's a hard thing to see the face one loves changed and altered and made hideous.