488 FARMERS' INSTITUTES. 



EDUCATION FOB THE AGRICULTURAL CLASSES. 



BY ALVA SHERWOOD. 

 [Read at the Three Oaks Institute, February II, 1887.] 



Nearly three hundred years ago Lord Bacon, the great father of inductive- 

 philosophy, expressed his idea of the value of education in the sentence 

 "Knowledge is power," and since his time the greatest minds of all nations 

 have accepted his idea and acted upon it. We take it for granted, then, that 

 all intelligent people believe in education in general, and that it only remains 

 for us to consider the subject of education for the agricultural classes. Farm- 

 ers have been too generally imbued with the idea that while education is an 

 essential to success in what they termed the " learned professions," it is not 

 an essential to a successful farmer. They have taken the stand that theirs is 

 not a business for thought but for action. They have sometimes said that 

 " Providence has designed certain persons to lead and others to follow." This 

 spirit is not in keeping with the principles upon which our government was 

 founded, it is inconsistent with correct ideas of citizenship and can never lead 

 to a high intellectual standard among the masses. 



Every man is a free citizen and should exercise and develop his individu- 

 ality. We deny to any class the monopoly of thought. Let us do so as inde- 

 pendent, rational individuals, capable of exercising and enjoying the powers 

 which God has given us. As Bacon has said: "Read not to contradict and 

 confute, nor to believe and take for grq,nted, nor to find talk and discourse; 

 but to weigh and consider." 



We suggest that the reason why some tillers of the soil have argued that 

 education is not essential to success in farming, is based upon improper defini- 

 tions of the terms used. In order to discuss this question intelligently it is 

 necessary to define what we mean by education, and what our idea of success 

 is. 



In regard to education we desire to say, that any system which has a tend- 

 ency to unfit the individual for his proper place in life is objectionable. It 

 should never be the object of agricultural education (or any education) to 

 enable its possessor to live without work, nor should the idea of making a liv- 

 ing upon the labor of others be held out as an inducement for acquiring 

 knowledge. 



The legitimate results of culture are not to do away with hard work, but to 

 bring our labor into harmony with nature's laws, of adapting our efforts to 

 existing conditions and of making a wise application of energy, in order that 

 our toil may be effective. It is only by education that we can hope to attain 

 such a result. The operations of nature are regulated by fixed and inexorable 

 laws, the manifestations of which are subject to many varying and sometimes 

 conflicting forces, which may often seriously disturb results. The laws are 

 nevertheless, certain, and he who ignores them is destined to reap the reward 

 of disobedience. Nature places no premium upon ignorance by allowing pun- 

 ishment to pass because those who disobey her laws did not know of their 

 existence. 



Man has a nature which requires a variety of occupations for its proper 

 development, study, meditation, society and relaxation should be mixed 



