2Q2 OXFORD SOCIETY. 



merchant, and professional man. He rises early, and remem- 

 bers the couplet of Poor Richard, 



" Plow deep while sluggards sleep, 



And you will have corn to sell and to keep." 



Have I not drawn a faithful picture ? If so, would it not be 

 well, young- men, to have a little regard to the kind admoni- 

 tions of a father before making the important decision? 

 Almost every man, as he advances in years, turns back to his 

 youth as the happy period of life, and if his early days were 

 spent on the farm, he will sigh for the time when he may leave 

 the counting-room, or shop, and go back to spend the remainder 

 of his days on some land which he can call his own. 



AVhile visiting the store of a wholesale merchant in the 

 metropolis of our State, a year or two since, I was invited by 

 the owner to take a ride and see his little farm out of town. 

 He was constantly calling my attention to his highly cultivated 

 field of three or four acres. Not a word is uttered about that 

 store with its well-filled shelves of goods. That bit of land 

 was all his theme. Now his case was only the spontaneous 

 out-breaking of man's very nature. 



A man loith capital can be an independent farmer, and as 

 sure as there is a fulfillment of the promise, that there shall be 

 seed time and harvest, the young farmer icithout can become an 

 independent man. 



