Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1880-05-12

have cash in hand, reached that point, nearly
every man of them, by the combined opera
ton of their intelligence, their industry and
economy. The same road is open to the
rest of them, and to the people Of the west
and the south. "Capital" ia that portion
of the products Of mans labor which he
can refrain from using as he goes along. II
he is industrious and does not misapply his
labor, he may make living" and perhaps
a little more. His ideas Of what constitute
a "living" will have something to do with
that. If whiskey is necessity" with
him, he will probably not accumulate "cap-
ital " very fast, even if he is pretty industri-
GUS. If to industry he adds native intelli'
gence or brightness" he will see opportu-
mites for the profitable application of his
industry, and avail himself Of them to in
crease the earnings of his labor. This
brightness is partly inherited, but its
spring is ambition. Ambition sets man
to thinking, and the use of the brain in
thinking brightens it. Thinking is "natu-
raj " education. The study of the recorded
thought of our predecessors is schooling"
The people of New England have made use
of both, and thus they have been able to
put in their work to profit. They have also
bequeathed sharp intelects to their children,
just as improved cattle transmit their quail
ties to their offspring. This is true OF only
a part of the New England people. We
can take you, reader, to not few neighbor-
hoods in the New England states where you
can find abundant specimens OF the genus
homo no way superior to the Crackers " Of
Carolina. Generally you will learn, on in
quiry, that here, in the "good old times"
there was distillery. But even though
there are yet many lazy, many unintelligent,
many wasteful men and women in New
England those of her population, now and
heretofore, who have worked studied and
saved, have made her the wonder and the
envy of other sections, naturally more pro.
pitious TO such success.
The last time we went through the south,
the cry for "northern capital met us on
every side. But with only half an eye one
could see that without industry, education
and economy more fully developed in that
beautiful section of our country, any prob
able or possible influx of capital would be
"like pouring soap-suds down rat-hole."
Let any southerner figure up the cash spent
in his state for whiskey and tobacco, the
time wasted by able-bodied men in loafng
and riding about, the bad management of
the industrious for lack of even common
school education, and he will find that these
losses could not be supplied if all the profits
of New Englands industry were given to
the southern people every year. We have,
as we have said, all these vices in New
England, and can show as good specimens
of their products as any other community.
But there is sentiment against them strong
enough to stem the tide and make Roadway
against it, and that alone gives us what
"capital" we have. New England has
"got rich " very slowly, and she owes all her
surplus wealth to the slight predominance
of virtue over vice among her people. 1t is
by the hard work of her best citizens that
this is maintained. Let our southern friends
who see the need of capital to develop
their country take this only road to success,
and teach it to their neighbors. Let them
suppress the distillery aud set up the com
mon school upon its ruins. Let them teach
the dignity as well as the profit of honest
work. Let them believe in it themselves,
and then they can teach it. Hang your gen.
tility on the fence, brother farmers of the
south, as the Quaker hung his Quaker
clothing while he whipped the rowdy.
Work, study and save-that is the royal
road to prosperity, and the only bait where
with to catch "capital." And as heaven
helps those who help themselves" as "noth-
ing succeeds like success" when the true
principles of prosperity have thoroughly
taken root all needed outside help will be
easily obtained. AS yet nearly all the north
ern capital that has gone south has failed to
be heard from, because the conditions OF
success for foreign as well as for domestic
capital there are bad. The west perhaps
drinks as much whiskey (hardly, thought
and chews as much tobacco as the south
but it has the school.house (ahead of New
England, even, in that), it has no false gen
tility mot an atom of daddyism " in the
whole country, and is no more afraid than
it is ashamed to work. 1t is rapidly be
coming independent of assistance from the
east. The south has as grand and success
full career before it as any part of tbs
world if it can, even though slowly, read tn,
lessons that stand daily before its ewes,