Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 5, February 2, 1884.: A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and FiresideVarious
Science
Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 5, February 2, 1884.: A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside
Various
Agriculture -- United States -- Periodicals; Farm life -- Periodicals; United States -- Rural conditions -- Periodicals
In some one of the first sentences of this paper I alluded to the
influence of good and profitable farming in improving the condition and
standing of the farmer, as a man among men. This, after all, is the
crowning objective point, or should be, of all those who make the most
of the opportunities the great mass neglect. If with all his getting a
man does not get some real wisdom, some development in stalwart
morality, and a higher cultivation of the mind, it needs no Solomon or
Bible to tell the on-lookers that he is a comparative failure; and it
ought to be apparent to himself. The legitimate profits of a higher
grade of farming ought to be expended to elevate the farmer, his wife,
his children, and all the attendants whom he directs. Part of them
should appear in the form of better and more comfortable houses and
barns, finer stock, better horses, better roads and school-houses, a
larger list of newspapers and periodicals, better libraries and better
housekeeping, and more cheery houses in which intelligence and music are
not strangers. It is as important that a man should spend his earnings
aright, as that he should use his energies and talents to earn. It is
not a manly element in a man whose chief forte is that he can hold all
he can get. A clam can do that, and not suffer much, either, in a
comparison of brains with the groveling getter of mere wealth. The high
behest to earn much, by and through grand opportunities to labor and
direct labor, blossoms into blessing in its best sense only when the
earnings are spent to increase the intelligence, add to the comforts,
and aid men to discharge their private and public duties more nobly than
it is possible for a man to do with an income that simply gives him
bread.
Because the earnings of the farm are not more frequently spent in thus
installing a section of paradise on the farm, is the real cause of the
stampede therefrom of many of the smart ones who deem the struggle for
elevation there a hopeless one, and, catching an inspiration from the
shriek of civilization that announces each swiftly flying train, they
turn their backs on what have been to them farm dungeons, and mingle
with the surging throng in quest of a better condition. That they are
often mistaken and baffled in taking such a route, does not deter a new
crowd from going. They fly from what they dread, as much as they are
inspired by what they hope to win. These things ought not so to be; and
a wise improvement of the many neglected opportunities on the farm would
go far to rectify the ills they fly from, but from which yet few escape.
Say what we will about all its defects, its uninviting toil, and low
wages, agriculture disenthralled of its ignorance is the basis rock of
our hope; and he is a slanderer of the noblest occupation who raises the
veil to expose its defects and servility for any other purpose than to
help make greener its verdure, and brighten its bloom.
* * * * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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