St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1881-03-25

armoTeTs, some dyeTs, brewers, cloth
iers, architects, carpenters and masons.
The feudal mobiles strOvs to destroy the
cities of labor. and in a measure were
successful. The clothiers of Flanders
passed over to England i'll Edward Ills
time, and laid the foundation OF its
manufacturing system. Labor lied
from feudalsm, the prosecutors, the In
QUESTION, the pride of birth, and left
Italy and Spain to sink into decay to-
gether. 1t found a home in Holland,
and made it for a century the model OF
! European progress.
In the later ages republicanlsm and
! labor have risen together, and 1T is be-
cause so many men work that so many
are free. France, with its innumerasle
| tillers of the soil, has become capable
| of self-government, and from the
mighty workshops of England have
come its wealth, intelligence and ad-
vancing freedom. The strong frames
and hardy intellects of the English
working classes have made them at last
| its real rulers, the source of its great
ness and its hope. Knowledge is the
parent of labor. As men rise from a
savage life they learn to plant and reap,
TO spin and weave, to build cities, found
nations, invent and improve. The
highest form of civilization will be that
in which the great majority of the COM
munity are engaged in healthful labor,
when mind and body are cultivated to-
gether, and refinement and Intelligence
lead to the general equality of virtue.
This was the theory that Washington
inculcated and practised, that Franklin
strove to enforce, that the wlsest re-
publicans of every age have made the
foundation of freedom.
/, Every young man aud woman among
us-we repeat the lesson of the Arabic
moralists and of history should learn
and practice some manual art. Health
requires it, the mind rests upon it, and
even freedom is secure only in labor.
Youth is the season of activity, when
the powers of mind and body expand,
B and require some field of effort. With
the wealthier classes among us 1t Is Of
5 ten wasted in the pursuits of pleasure,
in the nominal study of some profession
that is never to be practiced, and in the
harmless games, or the dangerous ones,
] that occupy the leisure of the idle. We
have already imported all the foreign
: devices for killing time, and often soul
. and body. The races that corrupt Eng
. land, and make the Derby-day shame
to civilization, the gambling dens, the
|. coaching clubs, polo, the tennis, the
fox-hunt and various European amuse-
ments, serve to satisfy the natural long
, ing of youth fol labor, and corrupt it.
YEARLY the mind of the young passes
a from one vain expedient to another un-
r til it sinks into sensuality and dies.
How many of the new generation perish
E of Incidence and never reach maturity
T How many weary, worthless lives pass
. on around us
f 1t is the great error of our young men
+ who have their fortunes to make that
: they shrink from manual labor, and
= crowd into the professions, that offer
prizes only to the few. They starve
amidst the throng for which no employ
Z ment offers, OF if they succeed in max
ing money, often do so at the cost of an
: overburdened conscience. Life brings
t them no peace because they have part
n ed with their integrity or their humani-
q tv. Health. too is lost. 1t would be
d well for every lawyer if he could pass
, three or four hours each day i'll manual
i labor, and every clergyman if he could
D emulate the industry of st. Paul. TC
II the literary man, the editor and author
the thinker, the use of physical exercise
l. is equally important. Carlyle, Maccau-
i lev and DR.. johnson found theirs il
). endless walks about London and Vic
n tor Hugo is seldom at rest in Paris. Ii
T is one of the questions of the future how
n to blend literary employment will
It manual labor, and satisfy the physical
e impulse that in every man and woman
requires regular work to preserve al
unclouded mind. Burns, in his Edin-
burg triumphs, sighed for his country
landscape Horace and Virgil remem-
bered with regret the happy hours O.
their laboriOus youth.
Our common schools might be made
to suggest useful employments. In the
country they might teach when to SOW
i and reap, the difference of soils, the
elements of scientific agriculture. AnC
thousands of cur youth may yet fine
employment in the culture of the earth
, 1t is an endless source of pleasure anC
: profit. Food for the population that il
" rapidly sprInging up around us vii
soon be difficult to find, unless some
better means of cultivation be devised
the old soil renewed and waste lands
reclaimed. The vigor and intelligence
!, of our youth should be directed to this
u question. An endless series of active
u employments, open for the young, il
manufactures, merchandise, the arts, il
building railroads, and planting tele
i graphs. knowledge has prepared 1
thousand new occupations knowledge
Z will provide the best material fol
i filling them. What society chiefly
wants is honest, intelligent labor. The
I age of dull work is nearly over. The
u common school system will create a la
boring class in the future full of intelli
gence, and they may also be made t.
direct their intelligence to useful labor
In most European countries the public
schools have already begun to teacl
= trades.
But in this new direction of the pow
ers of the nation our country SHOULD
lead the way to the land of labor. Ou
factories, workshops, railways an(
{ farms should draw in the best intellec
{ of the people. They open the way t.
, fortune, health and practical wisdom
Our most successful citizens have usu
ally been those who made their way il
trade. 1t will apparently be the duty
of our common schools to blend litera
. tufe WITH ldOOT, 10 tedcu luuustIy ant
cultivate discretion. The waste labO
of the past ages, had it been skiltully
: directed, might have brought ease anC
comfort to the toiling world.-EUgen,
j Laurence in Harper's Weekly.
2 CONCERNING THE HANGING OF Pic
=, TUREs.-The majority OF people haDs
t pictures too high on the wall. What.
e ever the height of a room, the picture:
}. in it should be hung on a level with the
b eve of IN nhnlf whnn standing NJ