TRAXSACTIONS. 89 



from our own. The same law prevails in animated nature, 

 and it may be laid down as a rule subject to few, and 

 those for the most part doubtful, exceptions, that no tree 

 or shrub, or herb, or flower, or grass, or fish, or fowl, or 

 four-footed beast, or creeping thing, is common to both 

 continents, with the exception of such as man, in his wide 

 migrations, has transported with him. This points to a 

 radical difference in soil or climate, or both, which doubt- 

 less requires a difference in the processes, if not the ob- 

 jects of rural industry. Providence here, as in all our 

 other conditions, makes large demands on the powers of 

 reason and observation implanted in every human breast ; 

 and the exercise of these in every relation is peculiarly 

 incumbent upon the American citizen, not merely by reason 

 of his peculiar privileges and the duties thence resulting, 

 but on account of the physical necessities of his position. 

 The general result, then, of the careful study of Euro- 

 pean life in all its relations to material things, is that the 

 character of our soil and climate, earth and sky alike, re- 

 quire us to devise for ourselves such adaptations of all in- 

 dustrial pursuits as will bring them best in unison with 

 our peculiar circumstances, and thus to accommodate our . 

 rural life to the conditions in which nature has placed us. 

 In the religious, political, civil, and industrial institutions 

 of Europe, God has given us, his last organized great na- 

 tion, much for attentive study, nothing for blind imita- 

 tion. All must be more or less modified to harmonize with 

 American nature, and in our general social life, as in each 

 man's private history, we must be emphatically the archi- 

 tects of our own fortunes. 



