668 



Agriculture is also conducive to a good mental development. Upon 

 this point there is probably a difference of opinion. The inhabitants of 

 -cities are prone to fancy themselves better educated, and possessed of 

 more information, than the people of the country. This assumption of 

 theirs is quite current in city newspapers of the lower order, and forms 

 the body of many a stale cockney joke and pointless story. Indeed, as 

 the papers attribute every exhibition of shrewd knavery to a Yankee, 

 and of simple, unconscious wit to an Irishman, so all ignorance and 

 greenness belong to a countryman. It may be, that on an average, the 

 inhabitants of cities excel in the heartless and silly ruffle-work accom- 

 plishments of the day ; it may be that the crowding of so many occu- 

 pations together, brings them oftener mto contact with men of profound 

 study, and thereby they acquire a smattering of more knowledge from 

 otherg, and it may be, thought, fluency, and self-possession are exhibited 

 by them in a higher degi-ee ; while the countryman, . if studious and 

 thoughtful, confined to a narrower range, is more thorough and exact 

 and modest, and in strength of judgment and soundness of opinion, need 

 have no fear of a comparison. 



But without endeavoring to settle this question by facts, and not for- 

 getting that the facilities of acquiring information in the city have here- 

 tofore been much greater tlian in the country, but now are about the 

 same in both, let us examine particularly the relative influence of 

 fanning and other industrial pursuits on the human mind. 



There is no other occupation so suited to a healthful development of 

 the soul as the cultivation of the soil. Almost all other bodily indus- 

 try, if it presupposes any degree of mental culture, produces a partial 

 and distorted development. The range of thought necessary to consti- 

 tute a good mechanic, is not so wide as that necessary to constitute a 

 skillful farmer. In the yarious departments of manufactures, division 

 of labor is pressed to its utmost limits, and many human beings are 

 constantly employed in one trivial occupation, such as the sharpening 

 of a pin, the polishing of a button, the weaving of a carpet, the super- 

 intendence of a machine. 



He may become expert in this 2>rocess; he may profoundly under- 

 stand all the mental action involved in it, but after a familiaj-ity with 

 the beaten track is acquired, it cannot suggest a new thought, nor fur- 

 nish the slightest aliment to the mind. This may be an extreme case. 



