332 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



with equal propriety be called a central part of the earth. It 

 must be the central point of trade and commercial enterprise, 

 not only for the millions within its borders, but for the greater 

 number of millions which shall occupy the territory on the 

 North, North East, and North West. No man who purchases 

 a farm need be discouraged by the fear that his land will become 

 less valuable by any cause other than his own neglect, or that 

 agriculture will ever cease to be an honorable and remunerat- 

 ing employment! Such a thing cannot be in a community 

 whose population is doubled in about thirty-five years, and 

 whose commerce has been quadrupled in a shorter period. 



There is much to hope for agriculture from the application 

 of science. The skill of the mechanic has already done much 

 in the invention and construction of labor-saving machines and 

 improved implements. In this respect there has been the most 

 decided change within the last thirty years. Mowing machines, 

 reaping machines, threshing machines, horse-rakes and corn 

 shellers, are all the work of the present generation. And the 

 farmer that should still persist in using the plough tliat was in 

 universal use at the beginning of the present century, would 

 be regarded as a fit subject for yonder asylum. 



Great mistakes are often made in the application of scientific 

 principles, and it must always be so. It is too difficult a matter 

 to be fully understood*. A chemical process is going on contin- 

 ually about us — in the water we drink, in the air we breathe, in 

 every particle of earth coming in contact with the atmosphere 

 — in all vegetation — in the trees which shade us, in the houses 

 we live in. Every thing is changing its present and forming 

 new comljinations. There is nothing idle in the physical world. 

 Motion is the universal law. It may be invisible, but is none 

 the less certain. In one thing there is growth, in another, decay, 

 and the same law may govern both. 



The farmer should have some knowledge of these chemical 

 processes — such a knowledge as will enable him to apply them 

 in his business. The mariner need not know why the magnetic 

 needle points to the pole, or why the north star remains at 

 nearly the same point ; but the fact he must know and act 

 upon, if he would navigate the seas in safety. So the farmer 

 need not know why these chemical laws exist ; but they will 

 exist, and have full force whether he knows them or not. It is 



