This truth is not hard to apply to the conditions of to-day. The income of every country depends on its natural resources, and on the skill and energy of its inhabitants; and the quickest way to increase the income is to concentrate on the production of those articles for which there is the greatest demand throughout the commercial world. The relentless application of this principle has been characteristic of the nineteenth century. But the augmentation of income has in one special way been purchased by a diminution of capital. The industrial movement has been based on an immense expenditure of coal and iron; and in America and Great Britain the coal and iron which can be cheaply obtained are within measurable distance of exhaustion. As these supplies diminish, the industrial leadership of America and Great Britain must disappear, unless they can employ their activities in other forms of industry. Those, therefore, who desire that the English-speaking countries should maintain for many ages that high position which they now occupy, should do all in their power to encourage a proper system of agriculture--the one industry in which the fullest use can be made of natural resources without diminishing the inheritance of future generations--the industry "about which," Mr. James J. Hill emphatically declares, "all others revolve, and by which future America shall stand or fall." The third economic reason will hardly be disputed. Agricultural prosperity is an important factor in financial stability. The fluctuations of commerce depend largely on the good and bad harvests of the world, but, as they do not coincide with them in time, their violence is, on the whole, likely to be less in a nation where agricultural and manufacturing interests balance each other, than in one depending mainly or entirely on either. The small savings of numerous farmers, amounting in the aggregate to very large sums, are a powerful means of steadying the money market; they are not liable to the vicissitudes nor attracted by the temptations which affect the larger investors. They remain a permanent national resource, which, as the experience of France proves, may be confidently drawn upon in time of need. I have often thought that, were it not for the thrift and industry of the French peasantry, financial crises would be as frequent in France as political upheavals.