m 



of invention and imjDrovement, that they can arrive at perfection ■without ex- 

 periment, at perfect utility without loss or expense, they forget the universal 

 lesson taught alike by bitter experience and the inflexible laws of nature. 

 I submit whether the steam engine, or magnetic telegraph were perfected at a 

 blow, under any specific dispensation that saved the inventors from loss and 

 ridicule. So far from it, ruin and disaster, worldly persecution and disgrace, 

 the prison and the stake have been the fate of the greatest benefactors of the 

 race. In the giant progress and conquests of man over nature, I think the 

 professors of agriculture, the great science of sciences, can afford to assume 

 their share of the labor, sacrifices and expense. I grant sometimes they may 

 incur ridicule and disaster. They may be stigmatized as theorists, visiona- 

 ries, book farmers. In pursuit of experimental inquiries, a few squash seeds 

 may now and then be lost ; an animal may be injured ; a tree destroyed ; 

 even a whole crop may be diminished or destroyed, but I humbly submit, 

 whether in consequence of such occasional results, any man or set of men 

 shall remain self-doomed dunces the remainder of their days. If I remember 

 rightly, when the stroke of lightning knocked Franklix over, lie did not 

 cease to experiment on electricity ; and when the first steam boiler blew up, 

 Watt did not cease to build steam engines. 



There are times in the progress of every art and science, when one man is 

 right, and all the world besides, is wrong. The world test him and his pro- 

 jects by experience of the past. The inspired genius ^limself is guided by a 

 beacon light far in advance of his generation. If conservatism is right any 

 where, it is wrong in agricultural inquiry. The first man who took the first 

 wild plants and roots and began to mature them into rice and wheat and pota- 

 toes, was a visionary. The first man who took the wild crab apple and the 

 bitter almond, to mature them into delicious fruit, was doubtless a laughing 

 stock. The first man who put salt upon his provisions in order to save his 

 family from starvation, was regarded as throwing away positive labor for 

 possible good. The first fence was doubtless viewed with indignation, as an 

 encroachment on the common rights of mankind. The man who had the au- 

 dacity to shut up the first pig under the silly idea that he would fatten faster 

 and cheaper, was as big a fool as a member of a modern agricultural society. 

 Many of my hearers can remember the unmeasured ridicule heaped upon the 

 first cast iron ploiighs. The laborers of Belgium iise to this day a clumsy 

 kind of sickle to harvest wheat. At the first introduction, they would proba- 

 bly sneer at and reject our strong, light, efiicient cradle scythes. At the ex- 

 hibition of ploughs and the ploughing match of the World's Fair, v.-e have a 

 fine practical illustration of the instantaneous adoption of a great practical 

 improvement, and the vast benefits of exhibitions and competition. John 

 Bull declared our ploughs too light, too weak, incapable of performing the 

 requisite quantity of work. John Bull had a prejudice against Jonathan's 

 ploughs. The last result John ever imagined, was that he should ever cease 

 to sail the fastest ship on the ocean, or guide the fleetest and neatest furrow on 

 the land. The modest man only sought supremacy on both land and sea. At 

 the close of the ploiighing match a sturdy ploughman thrcAV out the Ameri- 



