Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1877-10-17
Teach Them n Trade.

The saying that What the fathers accu-
muate the sons will spend" is not whit
less true now than IL was when, to aid in
more normal and Just distribution of wealth.
our forefathers did away with the laws of
entail and primogeniture. Men accumulate
great fortunes, and bring their children up
in luxury and without any habits of thrift or
industry which were the cause of their own
prosperity. The. children spend the money
the parents have earned and the third gen.
Grafton comes on the stage poverty-stricken,
and frequently devoid of the moral stamina
and intellectual capabilities which made their
grandparents prosperous Again, in these
days of speculation and financial vicissi-
tudes, the millionaire of to-day is likely to
be bankrupt tomorrow. But how seldom is
this contingency taken into consideration in
the education of the children of the wealthy.
or of even the merely well-to-do." We ap-
pear to consider idleness one of the privileges
of the rich-a thing to be coveted. Industry
is regarded as a popular thing for those
whom necessity compels to bread-winning,
yet scarcely respectable, never intrinsically
honorable or morally incumbent on all. The
boy or girl who has to earn n living is gen
orally pitied as if it were less honorable to
be self-sustaining than to depend on some
one else for support often they are despised
There is no civilized country where labor is
so little honored as in the United States
we worship mammon and pity or despise
honest labor To get living to accumu-
late wealth without returning to the world
proper equivalent for it, is the strife OF
life with the great masses of our people.
Yet in land like this, where property is
sure to be dissipated or to change hands at
least every second generations there is the
greatest necessity for every person to be
capable of self-support. All persons should
learn some handcraft, trade, art or profess
sion with such thoroughness that they may
safely compete with Others in the like calling
The foundation of such training should be laid
in childhood. Our public schools should give
technical instruction. At home particular re-
gard should be had to the child's adaptabili-
ties. Almost every child is mercifuly and
wisely endowed by Providence with an apti-
tude for some particular handicraft or produc-
tive industry. little observation of the
pecuiarities of children will show this, and if
parents would study the bent of their chill
dren's talents and allow opportunity for cul-
cure IN their direction, much of the misery
that is engendered by incapacity and idle
less would be avoided Thousands of bright,
capable boys are put every year as runners
into brokers' offices, lawyers offices, news
paper offices, who should be on farms or at
the artisans bench learning trades. Girls
are idle or occupied with frivoites scarcely
ess dishonorable than ideness, hanging
.round the paternal fireside waiting for a
settlement, who should be employing every
hour in the serious preparation for life's
duties. 1t is strange that notwithstanding
the experience of the majority proves that
marriage in no wise insures them against
vicissitudes of fortune against poverty or
the necessity of remunerative industry
women will continue to regard matrimony
AS a snug harbor in which they shall sit at
ease and be sheltered from the buifeting of
lifes storms. Whether woman marry or
not, they are all better morally, intellectu-
ally and physically for being able to do some
sort of work so intelligently and thoroughly
that in the day of need they can dare the
struggle for life with fair chance of hon
orable success. Whether our boys and girls
are ever obliged to depend on themselves
for subsistence or not, it tends to their self
respect and the true dignity belonging to
manhood and womanhood to know that
they have within themselves resources which
lift them above the fear of fortunes tricks.
There is no permanent " luck " like that OF
industry aud skill no " fortune like that
with which a practical education endows
one 1t is time that every son and daughter
Of American soil should receive as an article
Of faith the truth that one of the meanest
things possible for moderately endowed or
healthy person of either sex to do is to get
their bread by the sweat OF other faces than
their own.-Chrisiidn Inteligencer