Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1886-05-28
The Use of Machinery.
BY PROF. LEE DAVIS LODGE, A. M.

Inventions are mile-stones on the road of
progress, marking the successive advances
rof the race on one line Of its development.
They are realized thoughts. With the
golden keys of science man has unlocked
door after door in the great storehouse of
nature. Each new discovery has increased
his productive power, that is, has made him
better able TO supply his wants. The i'm
provements in agricultural implements from
the wooden pillow and the fail TO the steel
pillow and the threshing machine have rem
dered it possible TO cultivate far larger tracts
of land with far richer reward. Smiling
Plenty from her ample horn now pours
bounty over all the land. Thanks to the
machinery used in manufacturing, the poor
est man may now obtain for few cents ar.
ticles Of inestimable utility to him. Cheap
ened production continually places larger
and larger number of things within his
grasp, so that the luxuries of one genera
ton become the necessities, almost, of the
Eext. Commerce with its railroads and
steamships and canals transports from place
to place immense supplies of breadstuffs and
fruits which in other ages of the world must
have persisted where they were produced.
We eat bananas in mid winter, and the in
habitant of the tropics can make "ice-cold
| lemonade"
1t seems queer that the progress of inven-
ton, which has thus in all departments of
production so enormously increased the
supply Of commodities and which has pro-
vided the means for their distribution, should
be charged as the bane of the working peo-
pie. 1t is the true policy of every man to
add as much as he can TO the total produc-
ton, for the more commodities there are
produced, the more commodities there are
10 be divided. If the opponents of ma
chinery are right, then is scarcity better
] than plenty and pallid starvation rather TO
Rbe desired than rosy-cheeked comfort II
they are right, civilization has been retro
erosion, and we should smash up our ma
chinery, and return TO the purple romance
of primitive times, when our savage ances-
tors stirred the soil with sticks or horns
made fire with wooden drills, or cut down
trees with stone axes-nay, even these sim
pie tools, being really machines, should be
interdicted. What brisk demand there
must have been for labor thenl Every hon
est man had chance TO earn his bread by
the sweat Of his brow. 1t is true there was
then terrible struggle for existence-for a
bare, scanty subsstence-carried on with
nature, with fellOwmen and with the wild
animals in forest and field, but there were
out of work
The effect of cheapened production is al
ways the same from what ever cause it re.
suits, whether from Improvements in ma
chinery or the employment OF cheaper labor.
IL is quite easy to see what that effect must
be. If new machine be invented which
can produce as many articles, with half as
many men as before, the results are, ~ that
about one.half of the workmen in that in
dustry are deprived Of work, (2) that there
is an increased demand for products, and
therefore for labor, in other industries, and
~ that the difference between the former
and the present price Of the cheapened art-
Gle is saved to the whole community now
and for the future. The consequence last
mentioned is the most important, and it fol-
lows every instance of cheapened produc-
ton. The second effect is compensation
for the first. Undoubtedly real distress falls
upon the men who lose their places, espe-
cially il, as sometimes occurs, they be un-
able to learn new trades or new methods in
their own trade But the ills resulting from
the use of machinery are incidental, tenn
porary and particular, while the benefits are
essential, permanent and genial