FOURTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART V. 235.> 



of the states. Then we are particularly happy, too, in the pioneer 

 period of our State. The early settlers of this commonwealth gave it 

 an impulse and the direction from which it can never escape, and it 

 moves as by tradition and by instinct into paths of righteousness and 

 safety and of conservatism. But these men and women who now occupy 

 this kingdom in everything that tends to make life lovely and sublime 

 (I do not discourage the men and women of other states; they are the 

 best in the worldi save our own)— these men and women who now In- 

 habit this empire in everything that tends to make life complete and 

 happy and content, have neither parallel nor companions upon the face 

 of the earth in education, in the diffusion of intelligence and in respect 

 for law and order, in the beauty and sanctity of their homes, and above- 

 all in the comparison of these things in the ease and dignity with whicli 

 they pass from rank to rank in life; as I said a moment ago. they are 

 without parallel or companions in all the world. 



I have used the word ranks, and that has gotten to be an unpopular 

 word in these later days, but I used it advisedly for the people of Iowa 

 understand that there are ranks in life. There are ranks in society, 

 there are ranks in literature, there are ranks in art, ranks in every- 

 thing; but they understand that it is the genius of our institutions that 

 these ranks are always and ever open to every man and every woman 

 who has the courage or spirit to enter them. (Applause.) 



I compliment this association most heartily upon the direction which 

 it helps to give to the thought^ of the age. I am delighted in these 

 days of turbulence, in these days when civilization has become complex 

 and it is difficult to unravel the intricate thoughts that bind u$ together, 

 I compliment and congratulate you that you are doing something, doing 

 much to dignify, dignify the cause, if I may so term it, of human labor. 

 These people of ours, not in Iowa but throughout the United States, tlje 

 first people in all history who have assigned honest, faithful labor to its 

 true place in the economics of the earth, and you are teaching — you are 

 teaching the world that agriculture, that labor is not only honorable 

 (it has always been honorable), but that it is dignified as well as hon- 

 orable because you are bringing thought, investigation, research, intel- 

 ligence to the work at your hands. It is one of the happiest comments 

 of this state, or of any other, that the people begin to understand that 

 agriculture in all its phases is a scientific pursuit, and that the man. 

 who accomplishes victories in this field must have a mind as well 

 trained and a hand as steady and true as the man who accomplishes 

 victories in any of the learned professions, — and that is the reason that 

 you are doing much, not only for your own following, but for the world,, 

 in making it understand that there is such a thing as nobility and dig 

 nity and high-mindedness and high citizenship in these ranks. 



And that leads me to a suggestion, because I am not going to talk 

 about butter. I do not know hew many different kinds of cows there 

 are; I do not know there is such a thing as a dual purpose cow and a 

 special purpose cow, but then I do not know half as much as you do, and 

 it would be folly for me to stand here and attempt to teach you the 

 alphabet in a learning in which you all hold post graduate diplomas. 



