Rutland weekly herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1859-1877, 1866-05-24
Inducements 10 Young Men.

ask recent graduates of Middlebury
College are settled pastors of churches
near Boston, Mass. Why don't our YER
mont churches offer inducements which
shall retain our promising young men
among us 2"
The inquirer who penned the above
paragraph must not conflne his observa-
ton TO the churches for solution Of
the problem-he must extend his vision
to other people than those composing
our churches, and look at other objects,
If he would see and comprehend the
main cause of the evil for which he COM
plainingly inquiries. With equal pro-
priety he might ask why colleges and
schools do not offer inducements suffici-
ent to keep our best educators at home
where they are as much needed as they
are in Massachusetts, and New York.
And when he is done with this inquiry,
let him ask why our best and most gift
ed young men who leave the State to en-
enter all the various professions and all
the different industrial pursuits abroad,
are not kept at home by sufficient in
ducements offered them? If he perse-
veres in his inquiries, and keeps his eyes
open, and his mind actively a'oake, he will
undoubtedly discover the truth that un-
derlies the whole matter.
Has the writer of the above quoted
paragraph ever visited Vermont viii
lage, pleasantly situated on the banks of
some stream, where he saw the grass
growing, not only on the surrounding
hill-sides and intervening meadows, but
inl the very streets OF the village-and
where he saw few well constructed
and beautiful dwellings surrounded by
many more houses, some of which were
deserted, and many of which were dilap-
idated, with tall, rank weeds growing in
the gardens, grass growing over the
very door-steps, and an aspect of thrift
lessness generally spread over and
around 1t? did he notice few old store
buildings closed and one or two others
opened, with an old man and boy sit
ting in the door with but little to do
but to look out and closely watch
neighbours cow switching her tail over
her back in order to keep the flies of, or
a neighbours cat slowly pacing across
the grass grown path that leads to the
store door, that patient old man or that
listless boy getting up, perhaps half a
dozen times day, to wait on the Gus
toners who call TO purchase pound Of
tobacco, half pound Of tea, or some
trife in the dry-goods or grocery line?
And when his eye had long enough rest
ed on this picture, did he glance at the
village Westinghouse, and perhaps a
dilapidated old church, with broken win
dows, with the paint nearly worn off on
two sides, and no paint at all on the 9th
err two sides? Did he enter the sanctu-
airy, and notice those torn and faded
strips of carpeting in the aisles, with
here and there worn out cushion in the
slips, the dilapidated old pulpit looking
more like some old rookery than shrine
where live men worship a living God?
Now, would the writer of the inquiry,
"why don't our Vermont churches offer
inducements which would retain our
promising young men among us" step |
into such village as we have described,
and ask, why the church in that village
does not offer inducements which shall |
retain among its people talented young
men Just returned from college? 1t is
true the people of such place need the |
gospel as much as any heather popula-
ton; but so long as human nature main
ly enters into the composition of men
and women, we must employ human
reasoning in the arguments and appeals
with which we approach and address
them.
But suppose the Editor of the Yer
mont Record, in whose columns we find
the inquiry quoted, accompany us to that
village, and join us in efforts to induce
the fifty well to do farmers and retired
men of means there and Whereabouts to
combine and jointly invest the few
thousand dollars which they can readily
command in putting up machinery on
the beautiful stream whose waters are
running to waste, so that from 500 to
1900 people can be employed in manu-
featuring wooden or cotton goods, spin
ming yarn, thread or silk, manufacturing
chairs, pals, or wooden-ware generality
How long would it be before we should
hear the cry for more house room BE
fore we should see all the old dilapida-
ted houses repaired outside and in, the
closed stores re-opened, and proprietors
and clerks, instead Of listening to the
singing OF birds and brushing off flies,
actively engaged in waiting on custom
ers, who amid the busy hum OF industry
all around them, have their pockets full
Of money-and that rusty old meeting
house, church or chapel, repaired and
beautihed, or torn down to give room
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