The Plymouth weekly Democrat. (Plymouth, Ind.) 1860-1869, 1869-03-04
Why L Want the Boys TO Learn Farm
ing.

EVERY pursuit or calling that ministers
to the sustenarce, comfort or enlightCn-
ment of mankind is honorable and lauda-
bic. That is a narrow and essentially
false conception which regards the farmer
as more benefactOr than a beneficiary,
and stigmatizes as drones and cormorants
all who do not directly contribute to the
production and increase of material
wealth. The upright, able lawyer, the
studious, skillful physician, the pious low
ing clergyman, are wOrkingmen, as truly
and quite as nobly as though they were
wood choppers or bricklayers He who,
by whatever means, helps to diminish the
fearful aggregate OF Ignorance, sin and
suffering in the world, and dilfuse instead
k, owledge, virtue and happiness, is
worthy Of all honor, and far from me be
the Y ish to discourage and degrade him.
And yet hold it the duty of every father
to look well TO the physical and industrial
training of his sons and daughters-tO see
that each of them is early Injured 10 some
form of manual labor, and thoroughly
trained to efficiency in some pursuit which
ministers directly to the material or phys
ical needs of mankind. My reasons for
this conviction are summed UP as follows
The demand for intellectual labor or its
products. and even for mercantile capa-
city, is exceedingly capricious. In
season of commercial prosperity, great
city affords employment to thousands
clerks, book keepers, teachers of music,
languages, etc, etc, who VIII nearly all be
left high and dry by the ebb OF the tide
War, pestilence, a bad harvest, business
reyulsiOn, throws them suddenly out of
employment, and no merit or excellence
on their part can avert the catastrophe.
[ would have every one SO armed and
equipped for the battle of life that, if sud-
denly endorsed, he can fight on efficiently
and undismayedly on foot.
The professions are fcarfully over
crowded. A Western village is half
peopled by doctors, lawyers, and clergy
men, who have rushed in ahead Of the ex-
pected flood Of immigration. Like miners
in the Sierra Nevada or Rocky Noun
tains, they have severally staked out their
claims, and are waiting for others to come
in and help develop and work them to
mutual profit But "while the grass
grows, the steed starves." Whatever may
be their fortune ten or twenty years hence
and events are constantly interposing
to blast their sanguine hopes doctor,
| lawyer, minister, are often winning but
mcagre, precariOus support for the pres
l.
ashamed" is the plant which many would
utter if they could afford to be frank and
| outspoken. Thousands suffer and stagger
on, oppressed by want and ever increasing
debt, who would gladly take refuge in pro-
ductive industry, ifthey had been trained to
familiarity with pitchforks and plow-
handles. They would outgrow their pres
| emit embarrassments if il were not for the
new doctors, lawyers and clergymen an-
nually ground out to compete with them
for practice or parishes, and whose train
ing is as helplessly Onc-sided as their own.
| would qualify the professional men who
| shall henceforth be trained for broader
and more assured usefulness than that Of
their elder brethren.
| New York city swarms with hungry,
needy, shivering, covering, cringing lel-
low mortals, all in eager, imploring, hope
! less quest of :" something to do" To the
reproach of what passes for education,
must say that a majority of these have had
| considerable money spent in schooling
| them for lives Of usefulness. They are
| qualified CT presume) to keep books or
copy manuscripts, or teach languages, or
act as goVernesses, or follow some other
of the frightfully over stocked vacations
But when l say to one of them, "The
work you seek is positively not to be had,
| since ten want to do it where one wants it
done; you must strike off into the broad,
free country. and ask farmer after farmer
to give you work till you find it." the gen
eral response, II know nothing of farm
ing" strikes on my ear like knell Even
at seasons when the farmers were intense
ly hurried by their summer harvest, and
ready to pay largely for any help that was
not hindrance, have known our city to
be thrmged with weary, sad petitioners
for something TO do" flour current ed
ucaion were not plumber or fraud,
this could not be.-Llaace Greedy, in