230 BOAED OF AGEICULTUEE. 



EVENmG SESSION". 



Tuesday, August 20, 7:30 p. m. 

 HOW MUCH AND WHERE SHALL WE EDUCATE OUR BOYS? 



BY H. F. M MAHAN, LIBERTY. 



In a good many things we are agreed as to how much and where 

 shall our boys be educated. Not one of us but would have every faculty 

 of mind developed to the limit, every organ of the body perfectly de- 

 veloped. We would have our boys grow to be strong men— strong physic- 

 ally, strong morally, strong mentally. I thinli we are agreed that that 

 education should begin very early in life. Long before they reach the 

 school age we begin their moral and physical training, mailing sure they 

 grow straight and strong, that, in so far as we can train them, their 

 senses malie quick and clear discriminations, and that honesty, industry, 

 truthfulness and reverence for the righ.t become habitual. 



We are agreed, too, that every opportunity the common school affords 

 shall be theirs. Even the most careless parents recognize the absolute 

 need of this part of a boy's education. A knowledge of arithmetic, reading, 

 spelling and writing are essential to success in any business, while lan- 

 guage studies, history and geography are very necessary if our boys are 

 to be capable, intelligent citizens. And just so many as have it in their 

 power will send their boys through high school, believing the mental effort 

 necessary to master higher mathematics, Latin, rhetoric and the natural 

 sciences will better fit them to solve the real problems of life when they 

 begin business on their own account. 



If our boys would be merchants, lawyers, physicians, teachers, en- 

 gineers, or wish to enter any of the so-called learned professions, we are 

 willing to make all sorts of sacrifices, if need be, to give them special 

 training in their chosen line of work. The genius may succeed without 

 this special training. We know well enough that few of our boys are 

 geniuses, and that if they are to have an even chance with the born genius, 

 they must have every advantage the special school affords. Fifty years 

 ago serving an apprenticeship was thought sufficient, thus gaining the ex- 

 perience of one, or at most a few, men. Today we would have our boys 

 familiar with the learning of as many great minds as can be crowded into 

 a college course. 



It is not hard to find illustrations among successful men to prove the 

 need of such training. Within the last few years a score of men I know, 

 many of them from my own county, have risen to distinction who were 



