The republic. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1849-1853, 1853-06-20
"A Few Words to Mechanics

~ ooOOuie gOou CHeInlSt anG GOOu boot
maker is equally difficult This may not be
credited by every one; but we have no doubt
OR the subject. Whoever wishes to test the
matter need only take sprightly and intelli-
gent youth and keep him at work under in
| structlOns in chemical laboratory during ten
hours day for four years, with the requisite
tones around him, and if he does not turn out
! among chemists as reputable as another of like
abilities and opportunities among bUotmakers,
then all of those who study chemistry after the
usual fashion must be persons of extraordinary
gifts, There is indeed no doubt on the mind
OF any practical and experienced person THAI it
requires four years Of faithful application to be-
| come a good bUotmaker, saddler printer, car
penter, or mason, while two sessions at col
lege, with three hours reading day, is Deem
ed sufficient to make physician, learned in
all the collateral branches-and the nominal
occupancy of a chair and table in lawyers
office for the same period of time is adequate to
constitute one lawyer
1t is in consequence of the severe and ex-
tended preparation in the former class of pur-
suits that our mechanics are such perfect mas
ters of their trades; and it is because super
fcial survey only is required of the field of
study in the ''learned professions" that so few
of their professors are learned men, the fact
being notorious that the preliminary education
of the greater number of the lawyers and doc
tors of the United States is not far beyond that
acquired by respectable mechanics at least in all
| the regions of country that Heaven has blessed
with public schools. A great advantage of the
mechanic is, that he aims at excellence in
single pursuit, and takes ample time to attain
to 1t; while the great disadvantage of the pro-
! fessonal man is, not that any thing in partcu-
lar before him is difficult, but that the varied
knowledge his profession calls for, and the
hasty preparation he is required to make, de-
mand, in order to attain to any eminence, the
most dilgent application during period of
| fifteen or twenty years after he has been pro-
nOunced proficient by school whose profits,
success, and fame depend more upon the num-
Der Of its graduates than upon their thorough
| ness in the branches that should have been
taught them.
! But when the mechanic passes from under
the care of his instructor the whole period of
his pupilage is over, and the duties before him
are so familiar that his regular daily task is
one of ease, calling for the exercise of com
| paIatively little reflection, at least until he
assumes the position of contractor and en-
| ployer. His mind is therefore at liberty as is
| that of no other man Of business, and his op-
| pOrtunities Of becoming deeply and thoroughly
/ learned In any department of science to which
he may apply himself are such as are possessed
/ by few Others He is one of the few men in
the world who can afford to ride a hobby, and
whether that hobby De the politics of the day,
the drama, history the Greek or Latin Ian
guage, mathematics, mineraogy, chemistry
music, or any thing else worthy the concen-
tfated powers of the mind, he has no obstacle
in his path A portion of his hours OF reaxa-
tion can always be devoted to it, and, without
conflicting with present duties, almost all his
reflections during his hours of labor may have
reference to it.
The facts in illustration of this truth are
abundant, not only in the distinction to which
mechanics So often attain in the eyes of the
world, but also by the errors and the evils into
which their misguided efforts often lead them.
! There is not, indeed, known ism, or i'm
practicable theory, presenting its vivid start
! ling, and fascinating novelties, which is not
embraced with giants might by such men,
whose strong minds would have casped sclen-
thc truth with equal tenacty, had 1t been so
presented to them as to appear within their
reach. But it is at the threshold that the diff