This is what the online help has to say about blend:

Transforming one object into another object by averaging the shapes, sizes, and colors of the two objects.

The Blend command on the Tools menu lets you create a series of transformations that blend one object and color into another. Each transformation is changed slightly to look more like the second object. For example, if you blend a five-point star and a seven-point star, the transformations produce an effect in which one star appears to fade into the other.

(There's more but I assume you all can look it up for yourselves.)

Copyright © 1997 by Micrografx, Inc.

Blend can be used to mimic many of the text effects that Print Artist has, but you have much more control over the effect.  There is an article on this at the Draw resources site.

You can also use blend to get a better gradient than then ones you can pick thru the Draw fill command.  If you want to try it, go to Draw and draw a solid rectangle with no outline, now draw another rectangle on top of it, the same height but narrower, and change it to a different color.  Select both, go to tools, blend, and enter a step value of about 50.  You should get a very smooth gradient. 

Another thing that is useful is creating a gradient with more than two colors.  Draw three rectangle on your page. Make them all about 3 inches high and a half inch wide, no outline.  Space them evenly across the page, color the first rectangle magenta, the middle one yellow, and the last one cyan.  Now, select the first two rectangle, go to tools, blend, and enter a step value of about 40.  Next select the middle and left rectangle, and go to tools, blend, step value of 40.  Select all, group, and you now have a rainbow gradient.