Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1874-10-17
MAN vARIOUSLY CONSIDERED.
what Henry Ward Beecher Had to Say
az Vermont Fair.

/ shall not discuss the various indus
tries I see represented or this fair
ground, said Henry Ward Beecher, in
his address at the st. Johnsbury, VT,
Fair, but that which lies behind them,
the enterprise that produces them. A
bull can push harder and below louder
than can. Eagles can see further and
birds can fly faster, fishes and flies, and
and all created things excel in the par
ticular sphere for which they we're
created but they are not capable of
education except within certain bounds.
Man has an almost indefinite capacity
of education and development. I hear
great deal of talk about the highest
and lowest ranks in society. The low
est are often on the top wave of society.
The lowest man is that one who is most
like stone. He never grows. He is
the man that thanks God that he was
born rich, and has no need to earn his
living. He never develops, never edu-
Gates himself. Men are not born equal.
All men are not born free. Slaves are
born to bondage. Some men are born
bears and wolves and foxes; some are
born curmudgeons. When our fore
fathers said that all men were born free,
they meant all men ought to be born
free. may assert that 1 am as good
as any other man. 1t depends how
good that other man is. Laughter and
applause
The world owes you living. Does
it? The best thing the world owes
some men is halter. Loud laughter
and cheers. Those badly brought up,
unspanked men that live only to create
patience in better men, and the virtue
of endurance in their mothers-those
useless, shiftless men that are found IN
all neighborhoods and families have
but one virtue, the virtue of the pa
thence and endurance they create in
others. Laughter. The useless class
is the lower class. Lower than the
horse or the OK is the useless man.
Lower than the babe. God forbid the
comparison. Better than any harp or
piano, better than any schoolmaster is
the babe in the cradle. To suffer is
the divinest lesson ever given by the
divine teacher. I'll put the cradle
against the pulpit any time. Zap
plause. Are the old useless? Who
cared for you? The old father and
mother are like the leaves in the forest
like the gorgeous naples, more glo-
rious in their ripened beauty than in
their summer livery. A babe IN one
corner and grandfather in the other
are the greatest blessings and orna-
ments that any firesides can boast, and
no home picture is perfect without one
or both of them. A criminal with
sharp brains and cunning fingers has O
better chance in New England than a
shiftless man. Applause. A mother
is the only human being who bears
with the shiftless one. But ye that are
strong must initiate her example. If
you bear With such, they are means of
grace to you. The guiltiest of all men
are those who sit upon their nests of
ease and criminally enjoy themselves.
The wrongdoers are the unproductive
men. The productive man is the one
who works with hands and brains-the
man who invents, who constructs, who
improves.
You yourselves can bear testimony of
how one mans fruitful brain has i'm.
proved and benefited this whole neigh
borhood. Nor do I leave out of the
list of productive men those who are
called schemers and spectators. Such
men create industries they stimulate
thought. Whoever pursues an indus
try that needs no thinking must take
pot luck with the animals. The man
who does the lowest work requiring the
least man power is the lowest. A mans
work will bring just the value of his
brains Inventive brain work mixed
with Imagination, doing fancy work,
gets fancy prices. Prices follow brains.
My father was blacksmith, and
have tender side for blacksmiths to
this day. My grandfather was har-
ness maker, and that gives me tender
feeling for harness makers, too. But
don't want blacksmiths and harness
makers to made dull axes and bad har-
ness and stay poor blacksmiths and
harness makers for all their lives. No,
[ want all blacksmiths and harness
makers to come up. If you want to go
up in the social scale go up by higher
work. The secret of the prosperity of
New England is that it was taught in
New England that men were better than
crops.
1 am told that New England is
changing hands, that she is falling
into the hands of foreigners. Two hun
| fbn Ior
ed to New England. A judicious weed
ing out of the old stock will do good.
l think judicious system of murder
might do good. Laughter and ap-
plause. Some talk good deal about
mean lrishmen getting into the coun-
try. Well, I'm of the opinion that in
ten years good education at the ballot
box and in our law courts mean Irish
man, il he doesn't die of whisky, will
be getting to be good New England
stock. Laughter and applause. Bring
in hither as many of your foreigners as
you please. Well digest them into
New Englanders. An elephant brows-
ing in forest does not become forest,
but the forest becomes elephant. It's
fgment of fear that New England is
} going to run out. When was a boy,
remember there was a man who said
t to my father, "Don't you think, Mr..
Beecher, that foreign emigration will
ruin this country ?" "Well," was the
| answer, "I've seen this country ruined
: three times, and it's my opinion she
J stands running remarkably well. y
: Laughter and applause.
4 There's no telling what the future OF
/ this country is to be. California's fu-
, ture, with her giant trees, her treas
: ures Of mines and groves-no man can