266 WISCONSIN AGEICULTURE. 



sickle, and reap the ripened harvest So it is in the animal 

 kingdom — no being starts at once into life in the full maturity 

 and vigor of all its powers. AVhether man or animal, there are 

 the same gradual processes, the same progressive development, 

 as in the vegetable world. Even the earth, which we inhabit, 

 owes its original formation, and its present condition and aspects, 

 to processes and changes which required millions of years, if not 

 of ages, for their completion. 



The same law of gradual and progressive development, or 

 growth, governs also with respect of the intellectual and moral 

 condition of the human family. Slowly,''and at times by almost 

 imperceptible degrees, this condition has been improved by the 

 increasing means, and the constantly adapting agencies of men- 

 tal and spiritual enlightenment and culture. The race has not 

 suddenly sprung up, but has grown^ through successive periods, 

 of development, to its present stature. It has passed the age of 

 its infancy, and in some measure has put away its childish things. 

 Discovery has succeeded discovery. New light has been con- 

 stantly pouring from the full ocean of infinite wisdom into the 

 souls of men. New, and more glorious dispensations of grace 

 and mercy have succeeded each other ; ancient mysteries have 

 been cleared away — the old and worn out rubbish of church and 

 state swept from the path of progress, and sublimer and more 

 enrapturing truths revealed to the human heart and understand- 

 ing. 



We see, too, how that human governments are the result of 

 development — the offspring of growth. The American Eevo- 

 lution, and consequent American Freedom and Republicanism, 

 came as the natural and inevitable growth of the world and of 

 man. There had been first the blade, then the ear, after that, 

 the full corn in the ear. And when the fruit was brought forth, 

 the husbandman put in the sickle, because the harvest was come. 

 So, then, the American Constitution and Union, and our free 

 Democratic Government, were not born of a night, and matured 

 in a day, but were the results of a long series of progressive de- 

 velopment, controlled by infinite wisdom and goodness — results 

 necessitated by the very position to which the American people 



