The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-11-30


will be taught how to make the land pro-
duce, to understand and hence to love the
beauties and benefits of country life.
Our boys and girls in the country will
be educated for farming, just as doctors,
dentists, lawyers and others are taught
the learned professions. and In such edu-
cation they will learn that the knowledge
of how to farm is the most complex, the
most intricate and the most useful of
them all. When the farmer ceases to be
a man who does things because his father
did and learns what is proper to do and
then does it because it is proper we shall
have reached another era in our country's
onward march. We shall have begun at
the fountain source to study and correct
our nations problems. But before that
time is reached something must be done
to lead the now mature farmer into other
than beaten paths.
Whence all your splendid cities, your
steepled churches and your towering
sky-scrapers, but from the countryside? :?
Your country districts are to your cities
as the spring is to the mighty river. But
what are we doing to conserve this en-
ergy that makes possible even the lives
of our city dwellers? What concern have
we shown about the welfare of the coun-
try people?
Greatest Natural Resource
recently We nave read q great zeal
about active endeavors to conserve our
natural resources, such as forests, mines
and water power. The greatest natural
resource America has Is her native born
American manhood and womanhood. yet
what have we done and what are we
doing to preserve this great energy to
the welfare of our race and country?
That blood from which the great men of
our country have sprung, that blood so
f1111 n stamina NJ Of
pose. That blood which coursed the veins
OF our forefathers who laid the foundation
of opportunity for nation in 1776 You
often hear the cry for more factories, but
seldom that for more farmers While fac
tories make money farmers make men.
The one utilizes a countrys pent up hu-
man energy and her material resources,
while the other develops her greatest re-
source, human energy. OF all our natural
resources human energy alone increases
| with proper use, but perishes through
| lack of exercise Our cities should so ar
| ticulate the various kinds of this energy
that we may make of man In the COM
posite the systematic worker he often
is in the Individual
To do this there must be a better and
more thorough recognition by both the
urban and the rural population of their
interdependenee. The former must act
as a systematic distributor of the vast
energy developed by the latter and the
latter must continue as the generator of
that upon which our country's greatness
has been built and to which the future
must look for lasting strength. This
understanding must be created by a study
each of the other, on a plane of equal
consideration and with a view to the gen.
eral as distinguished from individual
selfish benefits. AS our population in
creases and our problems loom large be-
fore us we must think more and more
of community benefits and less of indi-
vidual advancement. We must more and
more consider human rights as superior
to material interests. We must realize
that the advancement of the human race
has been and shall ever be made
through a building up of the weak and
protecting them against the strong. That
true democracy alone can lead us toward
progress. There can be no progress with
out the inspiration of an ideal. We are to
become more idealistic in our thoughts
and less materialistic before we can attain
unto the state wherein the greatest good
will be enjoyed by the greatest number.
Education in the Country
Our hope lies in the education of those
now in the country into higher and full
Ter knowledge of the real purpose of life
to build a mountain of character, not of
gold. We must teach that no wealth be-
yond that which a man can use in the de-
velopment of his potentialty as a work
ing unit, looking toward the progress of