The Pulaski citizen. [volume] (Pulaski, Tenn.) 1866-current, 1882-07-13
Farm and Home.
Education For Farmers.
By T. A. Bland

BY I. A. Bland.
To the average mind the word
education is limited in its defni-
ton to what one learns at school
but that is altogether too narrow. !
Education means growth, culture,
development, as well as the acquisi-
ton of knowledge, and knowledge
again is not monopolized by the
schools; indeed, one who knows only
what he learns at school is much
more justly entitled to the epithet of
ignoramus than he who, having no
opportunity to attend school, has
been a diligent student of nature
and of men. There were wise men
before letters were invented, or
schools established. Schools, good
schools, are excellent auxiliaries to
education, but they are nothing
more. 1t is admitted by all that no
amount of book-learning will suffice
to fit young man for the duties of
physician, lawyer, or a clergy
man, and the idea that it would fit
him for the profession of agricul-
ture is absurd. Yet each profession
has its literature, which can be
reached only through the portal of
the school or the aid of private in
structors, and the literature of each
profession is of prime Importance
to those who would pursue success
fully profession.
The literature Of q profession,
farming, for example, conserves the
wisdom of the past and records the
experiments of the present. But
the wisdom of the past preserved in
books is like wheat before it is
winnowed, mixed with the chaff OF
ignorance and the cheat of preju-
dice. So, also, is much of the
scientific knowledge of the present.
They are both misleading and in
furious to him who accepts them
without question. But they are
great helps to him whose mind has
been trained to criticise all things
and who accepts only that which
stands this crucial test.
Colleges confer degrees, yet these
are often misleading; the young
man with A. NJ. or NJ. d. after his
name is not necessarily a master Of
arts or Of medicine. He is only pre-
pared to enter upon a career OF
practical experiment, which, if ne
possesses the talent, the industry
and the perseverance necessary to
the completion of his education
may ultimately make him worthy OF
the title conferred upon him pre-
maturely by the school.
No amount of theoretical training
will fit man for the successful pur-
suit of agriculture; yet, without
theoretical training, man rarely
rises to the dignity of an intelligent
farmer.
Farming is a profession in the
same sense that the practice Of law
or of medicine is profession; hence
the youth who is destined to become
a farmer should be educated with
reference to that profession. The
public schools of this country fur
nish the facilities for all literary
training absolutely needed, and, in
the larger cities, the scientific
branches are taught as well us they
are in our colleges, and these are
important. While it were a waste
of time to study the dead languages,
the prospective farmer should be
come familiar with the elements Of
natural history, botany, chemistry,
geology and natural philosophy
These branches of science have a
direct relationship to his future
business, and the young farmer who
enters the profession versed in them
will find that he is not only pre-
pared for a larger measure of sue
cess, but that his mind is fitted for
communion with nature, whose
secrets, hid from others are con
stantly revealed to him, affording
an ineXhaustible source of pleasure
as well as profit. To him every eX-
banding leaf or opening flower has
a beautiful significance, and every
phenomenon involved in the growth
of plants has for him meaning I'M
known to the ignorant plodder. All
nature is to him one grand illus
trated encyclopedia filed with
lessons of wisdom, from the pen and
pencil of the original author and
artist of the universe.
To the educated farmer the rocks
present their own history, written
in unmistakable characters by the
finger of God. The soil whispers
to him of its fertilitp or complains
of its poverty in language perfectly
ineligible, and the treasures of
Flora, Ramona and Ceres, are shown,
in rich abundance at the feet of him
who wields the magic wand of in
tellipent labor''