Elizabeth daily monitor. [volume] (Elizabeth, N.J.) 1868-1880, 1869-04-19
Slisnbste Daily al g
PUBLISHED AT 155 BROAD STREET, BY
j. MADISON DRAKE.
TRADES AND PROFESSIONS.

Jews to teach children some useful
handicraft and in accordance with
this wise custom we find that the learn
ed Paul was sail. maker, the eloquent
Peter fisherman, and Christ himself
a carpenter. The fact that they la
bored with their own hands, is proof,
not of their poverty, but of their recog-
milton of the fact that productive labor
is the privilege as well as the duty of
man. But the Christian world appears
to have strangely reversed the teaching
of its religion. For generations to-
gether the badge of labor has been one
of disgrace, and the king, the priest,
the knight, and the merchant have
lorded it by turns over the farmer and
the craftsman, whose toll supported
their idleness. Yet the reason for this
is not wholly AMI unworthy one. 1t is
the homage paid by material force to
mind. There is really neither dignity
nor disgrace in manual labor. 1t de-
rives its quality from the amount OF
intellectual and moral force infused
into it. So long as the priest and the
merchant monopolized the brain power
of the world, they were fairly entitled
to its respect and submission.
At the present day, this principle is
obtaining recognition, and the ancient
preiudices against manual trades is CIV
ing way. But there are still too many
parents, even in Democratic America,
who shrink from the idea of teaching
their children anything but genteel
profession" Young men who ego
through" college are expected to be-
come either clergymen, physicians, or
lawyers Perhaps, after almost starv-
ing in the attempt to establish them
selves in one of the overcrowded pro-
fesssions, they set up as brokers or
merchants. 1t is certainly not our pur-
pose to deriae any of these occupations.
They are honorable and useful but
they are not the only avenues to honor
and usefulness. What we insist upon
is this That the choice of a life work
shall be untrammelled by any false
notions of relative responsibility,
since nowadays an educated and up
right man can make any honest bust
ness respectable" Parents, in di
recting the choice of their children,
should take cognizance of two facts
above all a. The natural bent of the
child's mind and a. The condition
of the various trades and professions,
and the prospects of advancement in
each. The difference between the Ia
Dor which produces, by manufacture,
and that which merely exchanges, II
there be any difference, is to the adj
vantage of the former.
Laboring men are as apt to scorn
education as educated men to scorn
manual labor, and this double folly de,
Grades both labor and learning. Ii
men of culture would learn trades, then
men of trades would seek culture, and
many antagonisms of society would be
dissolved.
This question sometimes presents
itself in a more TROUBLESOME shape. 1t
is no unusual thing for men OF learning
to find it hard to earn thier bread.
Their is many book keeper who works
longer every day, and earns less than
he would as q house painter. just now
the opportunity for men of brains and
ambition in the trades is fine one,
There is general complaint of the quail.
ty of labor. People say their furniture
does not last as long as it used to their
household repairs are unskilfully per-
formed the workman are careless.
Good workmen, faithful, conscientious,
and skillful, can command the market
in spite OF trade unions on one side and
capital on the other Brains and hon
estv, intellectual and moral force, will
speedily tell in any handicraft
We say, therefore, to parents, ifyour
children show mechanical genius, by all
means let them choose path in life
where it will have full scope. More than
this, whatever may be their chosen pr :
LESSONS, see that every one OF them,
boy or girl, learns a handicraft. They
will be all the stronger for the indepen-
dence which such resource will give
them. Women in particular ought to
learn something thoroughly. Plain
sewing they understand, and the ranks
of consumptive seamstresses are con-
stantly full to OVERLOOKING. Teaching
they catch by instinct but it must be
either primary elements or fancy ac-
complishmsnts that teach. Hence wo-
men teachers are overnumerous and
consequently unpaid. The other things
they attempt, such as clerkships, type
setting, ETC., they generally perform
less successful ly than men, because
they are not trained like men. A trade
oobbled mn in q hurry is not q trade