114 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



desired results. We judge of their conduct in the light of events and 

 with certainty affirm its wisdom and beneficence. 



I have said that the logic of events leads to accurate conclusions. 

 The statement implies an ability to comprehend events. While we may 

 be able to determine as to the tendency of events, we are sometimes 

 wholly unable to determine the extent of their influence. This is usually 

 true concerning those influences which operate on man's higher nature. 

 Who shall determine the influence of a righteous act? Even a generous 

 impulse or a noble resolution is beyond human comprehension in the 

 power of its influence. AVe affirm what we do know when we assert 

 that the methods of Farmers' Club work are such as to be the parent of 

 generous impulses and noble resolutions, of which in turn is born lofty 

 conduct. 



For many years in many places the Farmers' Club was unostenta- 

 tiously, but powerfully, acting upon the social, moral and intellectual 

 status of the community where it existed. Go into one of those com- 

 munities and carefully note its moral tone; determine as accurately 

 as you may the intellectual calibre of its citizens; learn of their social 

 instincts and tendencies; then compare these conditions with those 

 existing in some other community similarly situated, except that it has 

 lacked the influence of the Farmers' Club. 



These comparisons are frequently made and always force the conclu- 

 sion that the Farmers' Club is a powerful influence for the uplifting of 

 a community, socially, morally and intellectually. But until man shall 

 be able to compass infinity, or until we are ready to admit that man's 

 moral and intellectual condition here shall have no bearing upon his 

 condition in the Great Beyond, let no man attempt to measure that 

 influence in its height and length and breadth. 



But you ask, does not the Farmers' Club assist in bettering the farm- 

 ers' financial condition? Yes, as a result — an almost inevitable result — 

 of advanced social, moral and intellectual status. 



As an ultimate purpose the amassing of wealth is unworthy of man's 

 best effort. It is not my purpose to enter upon a discussion of either 

 the practical or ethical influence of wealth accumulating, but 1 do wish 

 to affirm, and with emphasis, that financial progress is not, and never 

 has been, the chief aim of Farmers' Club effort. In most clubs it has 

 been properly subordinated to its right position, namely a resultant good 

 to be realized as an incident in the accomplishment of something 

 infinitely better. That individual, and it applies to organizations as 

 well, whose main purpose and desire is the amassing of wealth, will, if 

 he succeeds, find himself dwarfed in all that constitutes noblest man- 

 hood, while the chances are that he will be defeated in his main purpose, 

 for ''there is that scattereth and yet increaseth; and there is that with- 

 holdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to poverty." 



Do not misunderstand me. As means to an end, wealth is desirable. 

 Poverty is always a misfortune, a hindrance, a limitation. Wealth 

 places within our reach the materials which aid so powerfully in the 

 development of our higher natures. It gives us our homes with their 

 ennobling influences. It fills our parlors with music with its refining 

 and purifying power. It adorns our walls with the works of the mas- 

 ters, and our appreciation and love of the beautiful is developed and 

 intensified. It fills the shelves of our library with the works of the 

 best authors. It enables us to compass the earth and the wonders and 



