142 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



EDUCATION FOR THE ADULT FARMER. 



By Dk. WILLIAM FREAR, State Colleue, Pa. 



Mr. Chairman: I hoped I might be excused from delivering an ad- 

 dress this evening, but I shall try to make my remarks brief, because 

 we have a very long programme. 



When I speak of education of the adult farmer, I speak of edu- 

 cation in different ways. When I speak of the education of the 

 artist, the education of the poet, and the education of the clergy- 

 man for his calling, I am at once thought of as speaking of a school; 

 and so of training in law, or training in physics, or in aesthetics; 

 and so it may be thought at once. What does the man mean when 

 he speaks of the education of the adult farmer? Now, we under- 

 stand, of course, that in this enlightened land of ours, everyone must 

 have some education; and, if we meant schooling, such as given 

 to our youth, we will grant that the farmer must have it. And, in 

 the next place, why necessary to speak on such a subject to the 

 adults of this audience? 



When I speak of the education of the adult farmer, I have some 

 other thoughts in mind. We all strive for success in life, and to 

 each it may have a different signification; it means something dis- 

 tinctly dift'erent, as the individual differs one from the other. Many 

 men measure as the degree of their success their cash; but when 

 they come to look at the truth of their own success in life, wherever 

 they have found themselves successful, they have discovered that 

 success is not measurable in such small terms as this; but, as has 

 been already said, it is the result of that degree of usefulness which 

 brings the true contentment and happiness that can be obtained 

 on this mundane sphere. 



A man's success is not measured by what he has, but, as has been 

 stated by the last speaker, in what he is. Now, success in a business 

 does not depend simply on the amount of cash you get from that 

 business. The man that goes out with the idea that for this day's 

 work he will get one dollar and a half or two dollars, or, if he is 

 a tiigh priced man, twenty dollars for that day's work, and then 

 measures his success by the number of dollars he is getting for the 

 number of hours he has given, has a very poor idea of what success 

 is in life. 



