520 [Assembly 



tentiveljj will be enabled , to a great extent to cast a horoscope 

 dver€uture events. Rural life has ever furnished, and will ever 

 continue to furnish those qualities of mind which are essential to 

 true greatness. As in the physical world from yonder mountain's 

 side is hewn the rough block of granite or of marble, that is trans- 

 ported to the distant city, there to be polished by the hand of art/' 

 and to become a part of some stately edifice, so in the world of 

 mind, the young man reared among the hills and valleys of rural 

 scenes and accustomed to the hardships of a toilsome life, leave§ 

 those hills and valleys to become after years of study and im- 

 provement, a pillar in the edifice of the' nation's councils. It is 

 a fact worthy of note that few of the great statesmen of our na- 

 tion were born in large cities or of parenta occupying high posi- 

 tions in society. Reared amid hardships and toil, in early youth 

 they acquired the habits of thinking and acting fur themselves^ 

 and those habits once formed they carry through life. Nor is it 

 alone to the great statesmen of our nation that these remarks will 

 apply. Look around us, who are the great lawyers, the great 

 divines, the great doctors, the great merchants of our cities at 

 the present day. They are men, many of them men, who, but a 

 few short years since, were unkown. In this country (thanks to 

 our republican institutions, ) talent accompanied by a proper de- 

 gree of laudable ambition, is ever sure of success ; we have here no 

 hereditary distinctions to struggle against, no class of society vs'hose 

 favor we must buy. The progress of the man of talent here is 

 ever onward, he may be a simple clerk in a banking house, he 

 may occupy but the place of a copyist in an attorney's ofiice,he 

 may follow the plow through the long summer's day, he may be 

 crushed for a time beneath the withering influence of poverty 

 ■-and misfortune, but these things are not his destiny. Not many 

 years will pass away ere he who was a clerk, is at the head of 

 that banking house. Not many years will pass away ere he who 

 was copyist rises superior to his calling, and the halls of justice 

 echo with his eloquence as a lawyer. Not many years will pass 

 away when he who followed the plow through that long summer 

 day will plow out for himself and his fellow laborers such thicgs 

 as will enrich their minds and render easier their toil of the body. 

 Not many years v/ill pass away ere he who was crushed beneath 

 chill penury and misfortune will rise above the lurid cloud, and 



