386 [Senate 



the aggregate of civilization, receive an adequate appreciation, the 

 noblest and most important of them all should not be overlooked. 



The distinctive feature of modern civilization is the application of 

 the physical sciences to the practical pursuits of life. The great ob- 

 ject to be kept in view in education, next to the development and 

 direction of the moral and religious faculties of our nature, is practi- 

 cal usefulness. 



Agriculture, confessedly the most general and most important of 

 all the industrial arts — the source of wealth as well of individuals as 

 of nations — -is also confessedly far less indebted to science than any 

 other pursuit or profession. While in every other department to 

 which the ambition and energies of man have been from time to time 

 directed, the successful discoveries of modern science and the inven- 

 tions of modern art have been efficiently brought to bear in securing 

 and modifying the results attained, in that of agriculture alone, has 

 there been no corresponding advancement. If, as political economists 

 tell us, population has a constant and invariable tendency to press 

 upon the means of subsistence — if, as the history of the past, and the 

 events of the present in a portion of the old world, conspire to assure 

 us, the progress of civilization has not been attended with a correspond- 

 ing increase of physical well being ; and if the rich and abundant re- 

 sources of the earth are competent, when fully developed, to the 

 liberal and generous support of all its living inhabitants, it becomes 

 the duty^ no less than the interest, the obligation, no less than the ex- 

 pediency, of every proprietor of a portion of the earth's surface, to 

 develop to its utmost practicable extent, its capacity and fertility. 

 To this end he should at an early period be placed in possession of 

 every established theory of science and every discovery in any of its 

 various departments which may immediately or remotely, tend to the 

 advancement and improvement of existing modes of culture. He 

 should be made fully aware of the nature and power of all the elements 

 which separately or in combination, exert a favorable or an unfavorable 

 influence upon the soil ; he should thoroughly understand its geolo- 

 gical formation, and the effect of this formation upon the compara- 

 tive fertility of different portions of its surface, as well as the appro- 

 priate remedy for any deficiency in its original capability ; and above 

 all, he should be well versed in the chemical properties of the various 

 substances which in such an infinite diversity of forms enter into the 

 cultivation and growth of the vegetable, no less than of the animal 

 world, from which he is daily and hourly to draw fresh supplies for 

 future use. 



Believing as I do, that this knowledge can be most efficiently and 

 systematically communicated in our public schools, 1 am of opinion 

 that it should constitute a definite portion of the instruction there 

 ^ven : that in connection with the studies of Natural Philosophy, 

 Natural History, Chemistry and Geology, an adequate idea should be 

 given of the essential principles of agricultural chemistry, the organ- 

 ism of plants and animals, and the various relations which the phy- 

 sical economy of the material universe sustain to the development and 

 culture of the soil. An elementary text-book embracing these inter- 

 esting subjects of investigation and study, and presenting in a simple, 



