376 MISSOURI STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



We arc entitled to the useful and the beautiful ; they are scattered 

 along our rugged and toil-worn pathway through life to counteract the 

 gloom of a sin-cursed earth and enliven and cheer our haltless march 

 through time. Whatever is useful, whatever is beautiful, is worthy of 

 our care and labor, whatever advances in science, in morals, in virtue 

 should be encouraged. 



Horticulture educates — all things educate, but in different channels. 

 Some educate upward, some downward ; some are elevating, some de- 

 g'rading. Says an authoress of an excellent work on Botany : " The 

 study of nature, in any of her forms, is highly interesting and useful. 

 But the heavenly bodies are far distant from us ; and were they 

 within our reach, are too mighty for us to grasp. Our feeble minds 

 seem overwhelmed in the contemplation of their immensity. Animals, 

 though affording the most striking marks of designing wisdom, cannot 

 be dissected and examined without painful emotions. But the vegeta- 

 ble world offers a boundless field of inquiry, which may be explored with 

 the most pure and delightful emotions. Here the Almighty seems to 

 manifest Himself to us, with less of that dazzling sublimity whicli it is 

 almost painful to behold, in His m.orc magnificent creations ; and it 

 would seem, that accommodating the vegetable world to our capacities 

 of observations. He had'especially designed it for our investigation and 

 amusement, as well as our sustenance and comfort. 



The study of botany naturally leads to greater love and reverence 

 for the Deity. We would not affirm that it does, in reality, always pro- 

 duce this effect, for, unhappily, there are some minds, which, though 

 quick to perceive the beauties of nature, seem blindly to over-look Him 

 who spreads them forth. They can admire the gifts, while they forget 

 the giver. But those who feel in their hearts, a love to God, and who 

 see in the natural world, the workings of this power, can look abroad, 

 and adopting the language of a christian poet, exclaim, " My Father 

 made them all." 



Agricultural societies should be educators of good, and were in- 

 tended as such, but like nearly all things else, if not properly guarded, 

 may be taken possession of by the evil one, and run in the interests of 

 vice. It is no longer an uncertainty that our county agricultural socie- 

 ties arc degenerating into grounds where more evil, than good seeds, are 

 sown. It is no longer a doubt that our Fairs, of the present day, are ed- 

 ucating downward. While there is an assumed control, by regulated boards 

 of directory, chosen officers and established rules and systems of order, yet 

 there is an undercurrent control of the speed ring, by secret plans and 

 combinations of trained and experienced tricksters that the honest 



