FALSE DOCTRINES. 239 



Under these circumstances, is it rio-ht or reasonable to 

 pay any attention to the doctrines of superficial wise- 

 acres, who, with their wretched chemical analyses find an 

 inexhaustible supply of nutritive substances in any given 

 soil, even in one which can no longer produce clover, 

 turnips, or potatoes, and yet may be rendered capable of 

 producing these plants by manuring with ashes or hme m 

 the right places ? 



In face of the daily experience which shows that the 

 corn-fields, if they are to remain fruitful, must be 

 manured after a short series of years, it is a crime against 

 human society, a sin against the pubhc welfare, to dis- 

 seminate the doctrine that the fodder-plants, which fur- 

 nish manure to the corn fields, will constantly find upon 

 the field the conditions of their own o-rowth, that the 

 law of nature applies to one kind of plant only, and has 

 no bearing upon the other. The teaching of these men 

 has no other result 'than to keep agriculture in the low 

 position which it now occupies. In England it is a 

 mere mechanical handicraft, and in that country manure 

 is regarded as merely the oil which smoothes the wheels 

 and keeps the machine in motion. 



In Germany agriculture is a jaded horse, treated with 

 blows instead of fodder ; nowhere is its real beauty and 

 the intellectual aspect of its piu'suit recognised. JS'ot 

 merely for its utiUty, but on account of this very intellectual 

 natm^e of its pursuit, it stands above aU occupations ; and 

 its practice procures, to the man who understands the 

 voice of nature, not only all the advantages for which he 

 strives, but also those pleasures which science alone can 

 afford. 



In human society, ignorance is undoubtedly the fun- 

 damental, and therefore the very greatest evil. The igno- 

 rant man, however rich he may be, is not protected iroin 



