ECONOMICAL ARRANGEMENTS AT AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE. 241 



by those above him. I do not know that it is necessary for me 

 to discuss the question whether such a condition of society is 

 preferable to one in which the laborer is first to be served from 

 the produce of his own toil ; in which every man, by honest 

 industry, may become the sovereign owner of the acres which 

 he tills, and while he labors he may proudly feel that he is 

 laboring for himself, and not for another. I shall leave all this 

 to the dispassionate judgment of my reader, content even that it 

 should be ascribed to the misfortune of birth, or the perverse 

 prejudices of education, that I immeasurably prefer a condition 

 of society, where the rights of all men are, as far as possible, 

 held equal ; where no monopoly of wealth, or education, or rank, 

 or power, limits or impedes the progress even of the humblest 

 members of the community ; and where, in a free and equal 

 competition, without injury to his neighbor, every man, for him 

 self and those dependent upon him, becomes the creator of his 

 own fortunes. 



No human institution is perfect. Every effort will doubtless 

 be made to adapt the institution at Cirencester to its proper and 

 valuable ends. It is obvious that some practical difficulties will 

 present themselves, which it will require great skill to overcome. 

 The distinctions of rank, which prevail in England, and form a 

 part of its constitution, are as rigorously observed at places of 

 education as in any other departments of society, and are marked 

 there by differences of dress and of privilege. Will these dis 

 tinctions prevail here ? If they prevail here, will they not prove 

 inconvenient in respect to the labors of the farm ? or is the 

 institution in no respect intended for the education of persons of 

 rank? I am curious to know how this is to be arranged. 

 Many noblemen in England, of the highest rank, are among the 

 most intelligent practical agriculturists in the kingdom. Will 

 they not desire all the advantages of the institution for their sons ? 

 and will they consent to forego all the distinctions and priv 

 ileges of their rank for the sake of the education ? After all, 

 the difficulty may be purely imaginary ; for I confess, in my 

 simplicity, educated as I had been in the plain democratic or 

 republican habits of New England, nothing surprised me more 

 than the perfect readiness, with which, in every case, the claims 

 of rank are acknowledged, and in most cases even the pride and 

 pleasure with which this deference is paid, and their rights 

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