The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1875-01-29
Science and Bread.

| One of our excellent contemporaries has
an article on the insect plaques of the pres
ont -grasshoppers, Colorado beetles,
phylloxera, and so on, and bitterly COM
plains that scientific men do not tell us the
remedy for all these things. 1t thinks men
of science should drop questions of purely
theoretical interest, and turn to those which
are practical. There is n possibility, it says,
ofdoing without theories, but no possibility
of doing without bread. 1t farther remarks
that the ravages of the grasshopper alone
proves how inadequate is science to deal
with the present svbject or the alienation of
the wants or mseries ofmankind
Only that these sentiments appear in a
very respectable paper, we should hardly
suppose them held by any person of intelli-
gcncc 1t would be rather hard after some
( scientist had shown Us that there was 4 pow
er in steam, to insist that he should make
locomotive, aud even should he assent to this,
compel him to mount the engine and pull
the cars over the track. For years past the
French have suffered terribly in their vine-
| yards, and to some extent we also. Riley
| in this country, and Planchon in Europe, at
| length pointed out the existence of a root
| parasite, and spent an immense amount ofla-
Dor in tracing them through all their transfor-
nations Are they to be dubbed humbug sbe-
cause they tell us no more? The idea that
these men are to give bread, as well as furn-
sh the toos-for knowledge is a strong inn
| plement in the development of human pro-
grcs.-is prcposterous.
There is but one way to get bread and that
is the way laid down in the beginning by the
sweat of ones brow. Science may show how
to cool the perspiring skin, and how to ease
the aching back but that it is to work while
we sleep or sit under the shade perusing
"Hours of Idleness," never entered into Ma
lures law.
We are not among those who believe that
mere science has done as much for agricul-
ture as some of its yotarics claim for it. If
we had to choose between what is sometimes
called scientific agriculture and that system
of EARNING which is the result of daily and
dearbought experience through perhaps a
thousand years, we know which side we
| SlOuiu De on. lueIt Is uOInluS 10 us 81
dear as practical common-sense. At the same
time we do sot ignore our obligation to
science for many valuable hints and truths
have done much to advance agricultural
progress. Our only wonder is that science
has done as much as it has, not that it should
have done more, as our critical cotem orary
thinks. The men of scence-those who are
continually working to gather new facts fol
Us, and who try to lay bare the laws of ma
ture to our common understanding, are very
few Most of them for the love Of science
devote the labor of their lives for a very
meagre compensation. In business they
might have been wealthy. In science they
rarely make anything, Their labors are
mostly free gifts to us. Let them go on and
find out the truths of nature. Let us not ca.
vii that they do not care to turn their own
truths into money. 1t is for us to do that
Let them give us tools if they like, but the
cultivation of the soil is our work to do
Germantocn telegraph.